A/N: Hello! Apologies, but this chapter is very short. The rest of the story is in its final stages and it just felt right to end this chapter where it ends. Reviews appreciated!
John works for three days straight until Marcos tells him to stop. He sits him down in a slightly more private corner of the gym and asks him to tell him what the hell is going on.
"I didn't- I didn't tell her."
"Tell her what, John?"
"I- I said that it wasn't the right time but it's never really the right time, is it? Dammit, Marcos, I love her and I didn't tell her while I had the chance."
"Listen to me, man, you are going to get that chance. We are going to exhaust every option until we've rescued her, okay? We're going to get our girl back."
John realises that it's not just him that's desperate to find Clarice. He remembers the way he found her and Marcos one afternoon a couple of weeks ago, just sitting on the ground, backs pressed against the wall and legs touching slightly, not saying anything. Just being there for each other.
He believes what his best friend says.
Two weeks later, after they have realised that there's no other way, John and Marcos get in a car and drive to the Hellfire Club's HQ.
Marcos knocks on the door. Lorna opens it. Her eyes go wide with shock. "Marcos, John, what are you- what are you doing here?"
"This isn't a social visit, Lorna," Marcos says, his voice rough. He looks at the ground and back to her face, passing her rounded stomach. "Clarice has been taken. We need your help to get her back."
"Absolutely. Come in and we'll talk."
The Frost sisters are hacked off that Lorna's decided to help Marcos and John without consulting them, but they agree. Lorna's too powerful an ally to piss off. A plan is made and the next day they are on their way to the latest top-secret Sentinel Services facility.
John rides with Lorna. The silence is deafening before she decides to fill it.
"So, you really care about Clarice, huh?"
"She's part of my team. And you don't. Abandon. Your team." His words are razor-sharp.
"It's more than that, isn't it?"
"Stop. Just stop." John looks at her. "You don't get to ditch us and then ask about my love life."
"I genuinely do care-"
"No, you don't. You care about what you can get from me, which won't be anything but what I owe you for saving Clarice."
"You've got it all wrong, John. I'm trying to help. I'm trying to use the Hellfire Club to our advantage."
"Yeah, by killing people to end this war."
"No, by using their resources and information to stop the killing before it happens. Thanks to Aurora, I know what the Frosts intend to do and I know that to stop them I have to pretend to work alongside them."
"What do you mean, thanks to Aurora?"
"I mean, my daughter's already got her mutant powers and she's telepathic. She can read minds, which means for the moment that I can too. She can protect me from their telepathy, too."
"I'm assuming they don't know."
"No, and I want to keep it that way." She sighs. "I'm sorry I abandoned all of you. I'm trying to fix it."
"I hope so."
It happens so quickly when they get there. All guards and staff in the building are hypnotised into a mental fog by the Frosts. Lorna slams every door open, using Aurora to determine that every mutant there is beyond saving except one.
John is alone in the hallway as he runs to cell 409, yanking the door off its hinges.
She lies on a cold concrete floor in nothing but a jumpsuit. Her hair, matted and bedraggled, covers her face as she pretends to be asleep. John knows she's afraid but only semi-conscious. He can feel her broken ribs and collarbone, the electric burn of the shock collar around her neck. She is chained to the wall by a shackle on her foot.
"Clarice?" he says quietly.
She looks up. "John?" she murmurs in the tiniest voice. And all of a sudden he can't stop himself from falling to his knees in front of her. She touches a trembling hand to his cheek. "You're real?"
"Yeah, I'm real," he says, smiling weakly. "I'm going to get you out of here, okay?"
He breaks the shackle off her ankle and lifts her into his arms. She's only been here two and a half weeks, how is she so much lighter? The world is a blur as he runs to the truck and she falls unconscious.