A/N: Apologies to the British if my character Guy is found insulting or offensive in any way. For some reason when I conjured him up my bizarre subconscious just had to give him the accent. I blame it on all the Red Dwarf episodes I watched. Cheers!


Disclaimer: I do not own Sabertooth or any of the X-Men characters in any universe that I'm aware of.

I'm not making one red cent from this story. I'm just havin' some fun.


The next few weeks Victor stayed close to home, even as spring arrived full force and banished the last of the winter snows. Perhaps he sensed Tessa's anxieties, despite her attempts to keep them from him. She began to hope that he might decide to stay.

When the road was clear, Tessa brought the truck out of the garage. She changed the oil, balanced the tires, and made sure the battery held a charge. "I need to get a few things from town," she told Victor, "Some better fitting clothes for you, for starters."

Victor smirked. "Somehow I doubt that podunk town's got a big 'n' tall store."

"No," Tessa agreed, a smile of suppressed mirth tugging the corners of her mouth, "But they do have an internet cafe."

"You're shitting me."

"I'm serious. I can order you some outfits online and have them delivered to my P.O. Box." She hesitated. "Um, you wanna come to town with me?"

Victor smelled her anxiety. He shook his head. "Nah. I'm not in any hurry to reacquaint myself with the local assholes."

"Okay," Tessa said in obvious relief, "See you in a few hours, then." There was only about three inches' difference in their height; Victor hardly had to bend his head down to kiss her. He smiled at the sandals on her feet; her compromise to footwear.

Tessa climbed into the truck. The engine started with a muted roar, and the vehicle tore down the dirt track, headed for the paved road to town. Victor waited long after the sound of the engine faded to nothing before he left the clearing; he didn't want Tessa to sense where he was going. He knew it would only upset her.

Victor couldn't say why he felt compelled to return to the place where she found him. It was only a few months ago when those rednecks ambushed him, yet it felt like another life. Or like a dream. Maybe he just needed to prove to himself that the life he lived before coming to these woods really happened. Or maybe the part of him that thrilled in brutality needed to hold a grudge.

The forest had yet to catch up to the clearing's abundant growth. Thin patches of grass dotted the ground. Those trees that weren't evergreens sported new buds. Insects buzzed. Squirrels chased each other up and down the tree trunks, chattering angrily. Everything smelled alive.

Clunk. The soft toe of his boot knocked against something solid. Victor winced at the fleeting pain and looked down. A frown creased his heavy brow. He crouched, moved the damp leaves from last year's fall aside to reveal a metal spike driven into the ground, a length of thin metal cable tied to it. The other end of the cable was frayed and spotted with rust. Ice formed in Victor's heart, so cold that it burned. He searched the ground and found the other three spikes. They were the only visible indication that anything happened here. Victor got down on all fours, brought his nose to the ground and inhaled. There, so faint he almost missed it, the mingled stench of gasoline and charred flesh. Enough to bring it all flooding back; his car rolling into the ditch, the ceaseless volleys of gunfire, the shouts and taunts of his attackers, the agony of the flames. Victor's lips peeled back from his fangs as the rage he'd all but forgotten now swelled within him. His extended claws stabbed the tainted soil. "Motherfuckers," he hissed. He jumped to his feet and ran for the edge of the woods. He burst out onto the paved road, the unhindered sunlight dazzling his eyes. He spun around until he saw the ditch where his car went down. The dirt still showed signs of disturbance, but the vehicle was gone. Probably been towed and impounded.

The sound of a diesel engine reached his ears. Victor turned, saw a large flatbed approaching. He stepped out into the middle of the road. The vehicle lurched to a halt. The driver, a middle-aged, blue-collar type with a Nascar cap and a toothpick jutting from the corner of his mouth, stuck his head out of the window and called out, "You lost or somethin', fella?"

Victor sauntered over to the driver's window. "Car trouble."

The driver, whose coveralls were embroidered with the name Laertes (with a hand-written sticker beneath it that said "Call Me Larry!" smileyface), scanned the area in obvious puzzlement to the lack of any car in sight. "Er, guess you'll be needin' a ride then."

"Looks like." Victor's tone was just shy of menacing.

Poor Larry smileyface/Laertes squirmed, glanced at the empty seat beside him. He really didn't want to share his cab with this guy. "You can hitch a ride in th' back," he said, jerking his thumb behind him.

Victor flashed his fangs in a predatory grin, enjoying the man's discomfort. He went around to the back of the flatbed, found it loaded with bottles of pressurized gas in various sizes. Unfazed by the potentially volatile cargo, Victor clambered aboard, wedged himself in between the cold cylinders. Seconds later the truck lurched into motion. Throughout the long drive Victor nurtured thoughts of violence, hunting down the bastards who'd attacked him and taking his time with them. He'd had many decades to perfect his talents; he could make a victim's agony stretch out for days, if he wanted. Leave them so broken they couldn't even whimper from the pain, let alone beg for death. And then he would simply leave them; let them linger until death finally came, long after their minds were gone. His only distraction from his vengeful plans was on the outskirts of town when a familiar pickup passed in the opposite direction. He saw the back of Tessa's head, her short hair and long neck. She didn't stop or even slow down. For a brief instant Victor thought about jumping off and running back to the woods, but then the first houses came into view and the rage boiled in him, obliterating his second thoughts.

He thought he'd killed the monster within him, but it only slept while the snow covered the ground. Now it was spring, and the monster awakened, hungry for brutality. After so many lifetimes in its thrall, how could Victor ever think to cast it aside?

Not even for Tessa? a dim voice whispered in his head. Victor gritted his razor teeth. No. Not even for her.


Tessa tried to ignore the flutter of anxiety as she drove up to the cabin. She hopped out of the truck. "Victor?" Maybe he's inside, she thought to herself. She entered the house, glanced around the empty den. "Victor? You wanna help me unload the truck?"

No answer. Well, maybe he was out scaring the wildlife. She went back outside, calling his name as she wandered towards the edge of the clearing. She could easily locate him through the forest's song, but her mind turned away from that option; part of her already knew. She entered the woods, calling out. "Victor! This isn't funny!"

Her throat constricted. Her eyes blurred. She blinked, tried to ignore the sting in her eyes and the quaver in her voice. "V-Victor!"

A bird sang high above her, its joyful melody a mocking contrast to her growing fear. Tessa heard a sob and realized it was hers. She squeezed her burning eyes shut and screamed, "Victor!" Her panicked legs began to run. She didn't notice the loss of her sandals; wasn't aware of the jagged stones and hard roots that cut into her soles. Her feet bled and healed, over and over. She screamed until she was hoarse and her healing factor struggled to repair the damage to her strained vocal cords. She finally came to the place where she found him all but dead. Tessa staggered to a halt in the center of the square formed by the four metal spikes.

"Please," she sobbed, unsure to whom she begged, "Please …" She opened herself to the forest's music … and found Victor's song absent.

Tessa dropped to her knees, lowered her head until her short hair brushed the ground. The woods fell silent to her weeping.


"Vic? Shit, man, where the hell've you been?" The familiar muddled British-American accent squawked from the receiver. Victor was using a payphone outside a convenience store where Larry/Laertes was all too happy to leave him. He'd dialed the special code from memory, knowing payment for the call would not be necessary. The man he spoke to went by the name of Guy (which he insisted was pronounced Gee, as in geek) and had been Victor's main contact for various hits for the past three years. He was more than competent, which almost made up for his tendency to talk your goddamned ear off.

"I been getting calls out the arse, people wond'rin' why you aren't taking on any jobs. I dunno what th' fuck to tell 'em. I been sayin' you're on hiatus." Hi-yay-tuss, each syllable drawn out to boast his vocabulary talents. The limey prick.

"I've been nowhere," Victor truthfully replied, "Needed some time off the grid."

"Off the fuckin' planet's more like it, man. You have any idea the rain of shit I've had to deal with? People are pissed off, man! Totally raving. They call me lookin' for the best and you're totally unreachable. Some wanker even started a rumor that you're dead! And all you got to say's you've been off the bleedin' grid?" Guy's accent always got thicker when he was mad. Victor thought it was hilarious.

"Relax, Guy. I need you to wire me some cash." He gave his location.

"What's wrong with your credit cards, man?"

"Lost 'em in the fire."

"Fire! What the fu—"

"Christ, will you just calm down. Drink your tea or somethin'."

"I won't calm down till you tell me where the fuck you've been. And before you say it's none of my fuckin' business, let me inform you that one of our biggest clients threatened to go to the competition if you didn't turn up sharpish. You got any bloody idea how that'd make me look?" the voice from the receiver rose shrilly. Victor winced. He pressed the heel of his hand to his forehead, his equivalent to pinching the bridge of his nose (never a smart move with claws).

"You gonna wire the money or not?" he asked wearily.

"Yeah," Guy snapped, "Yeah, you'll get your soddin' money, then you'd better hop the next plane outta wherever the fuck you are and get back to work right pronto. Got it?"

"Fine. Right after I take care of some personal business first."

A choking sound emerged from the phone, the sound of someone too stunned to speak coherently. Victor never met Guy face to face, but he imagined some doughy kid parked in front of a computer with acne scars on his cheeks and a plethora of junk food wrappers strewn about his workstation. Right now he could see him sputtering into his headset, eyes popping and pasty face turning red. Victor smirked.

"Di-Did you not hear what I just told you, y' stupid moggy!" The first time he called Victor that the mutant had to look it up. "We're facin' imminent ruinage here!"

"I'll call you when I'm done here. Cheers!" Victor hung up, cutting Guy off mid-rant.


Humans were creatures of habit. All Victor had to do was wait across the street from the bar where he first encountered his attackers. In spite of his memorable appearance, the mutant was well versed in concealment. Crouched within the shadow of an alleyway, he remained unnoticed as night settled in. The early spring air grew chill with the loss of the sun. Streetlights blinked on; the one closest to the bar flickered and buzzed like a surly wasp. Under its unsteady glow, a familiar figure staggered through the bar's entrance onto the sidewalk. Victor's lip curled at the stink of rotgut and old sweat that drifted across the street, and beneath that an odor as distinct as a person's fingerprints.

The man with the rose tattoo on his neck stumbled towards a row of parked vehicles, digging in his hip pocket for his keys. He paused before a rusty Toyota that once upon a time might have been white and now was mostly mottled gray primer and orange rust, still searching for the elusive keys. They finally emerged with a jingle. He squinted at the keyhole on the driver's side door and began the laborious process of fitting Tab A into Slot B. The area around the keyhole bore many scratches from previous attempts.

"Sure you're good to drive there, slick?"

The tattooed man turned to yell at whatever nosy bastard decided to interrupt his complex maneuverings when a massive fist slammed into his face, knocking him against the side of his car and dropping him to the pavement in an untidy heap. Victor bent down to retrieve the keys from the unconscious man and unlocked the car. He then picked up the limp body, stuffed him into the passenger seat, and placed himself behind the wheel. As usual, he had to adjust the seat all the way back to accommodate his tall frame. The engine wheezed to life with minimal fuss. The car backed out of its parking spot, then rattled off down the road.

"Wakey wakey."

Something cold and acrid doused the man's head, rousing him from his stupor. Some of it dribbled into his mouth. He gagged, spat. His watery eyes blinked up at a tall silhouette before him, backlit by the twin rays of his Toyota's headlights. The figure held something in its hand that the tattooed man, despite his fogged mind, recognized as a gas can. He tried to move only to discover his hands bound behind him, and something else, sharp points that dug into his body. The man with the rose tattoo looked around him in growing alarm. He was in a field outside of town, his hands tied behind him to a metal fencepost. Barbed wire was coiled around his torso; an effective deterrent to struggling.

"Wh-what th' fuck?"

A pop and hiss, and red light blazed. One of the emergency roadside flares from the trunk of his car. It illuminated the face of the menacing figure. The tattooed man blanched.

"Remember me, asshole?" Victor grinned.

"Oh shit. Oh Jesus. We- You're s'posed to be dead!"

"You shot me fifty goddamned times and I was still kickin'," Victor sneered, "You really think setting me on fire would do the trick? Don't get me wrong, it hurt like nothin' you can imagine." He crouched down. The fluid coating the tattooed man and pooled around him gleamed in the flare's brightness, as did the mutant's eyes. "It was fuckin' life-altering, in fact. An experience like that, I just gotta share it. And the way I see it, I owe you." He lowered the hand with the flare a couple of inches closer to the puddled liquid.

The man with the tattooed neck gaped. "Aw, Christ no! Don't—"

"Ever burn your hand on the stove?" Victor asked conversationally, bringing the flare even closer.

The man began to hyperventilate. His heels scraped against the ground in a vain attempt to scoot away. The metal post dug into his back. "P-please!" he stammered, "I'm sorry! Please god, don't do this to me!"

Victor grinned, his fangs agleam. "You know, burnt human smells just like pork. Kinda appropriate, don't you think?"

The man burst into tears, snot dribbling from his nose. "Please don't? I'm sorry! Ididn'tmeanitI'msorrypleasechristpleasedon'tburnme!" Terror made his pleas incoherent. Victor laughed and let the flare drop from his hand.

"NO!"


Victor hated flying, though not for the same reasons his brother did. All Jimmy had to deal with was vertigo and nausea. Victor had to contend with something far worse; boredom. The interminable hours, the crappy food, the passengers. Christ, the passengers were the worst! Screaming brats kicking the seats, old women chatting up whoever was unfortunate enough to be seated near them, fat guys in business suits who snored like asthmatic hippos. Victor lost count of the number of times he was tempted to either go on a bloody rampage through the plane or pop the nearest emergency exit and leap to freedom.

The flight attendant wasn't so bad. A woman, thankfully. Nice tits, dimples on her cheeks when she smiled, wearing just a dab of scent that complimented her natural musk. She wasn't even put off by his claws. "Would you care for a drink, sir?"

"Yes." God yes! He might not be able to get drunk, but he was willing to make the effort under the circumstances. "I'll take a scotch."

The flight attendant, whose name tag introduced her as Penelope, emptied a tiny bottle of scotch whiskey into a plastic cup with a couple of ice cubes in it. As she passed it over, one of Victor's claws nicked the tip of her finger. Penelope gasped and sucked the bead of blood from her finger, yet her scent didn't change. No fear.

"Sorry," Victor mumbled, then blinked in surprise at what he'd just said.

"It's okay." She dimpled at him. Damn, she was cute. Victor wondered why he wasn't fantasizing about fucking her and cutting her open, as he so often did when confronted by attractive women. "My niece is a mutant," she told him.

"Oh?" Victor feigned interest, if only to encourage the pretty frail to linger a while.

"Yeah. She goes to this special school called Xavier's."

"Oh," he responded in a much flatter tone.

Someone pressed the call button. "I gotta go," Penelope said apologetically, "Let me know if you need another drink, okay?"

"Sure thing." He watched her mince away. In the seat beside him, a slumbering man let loose another foghorn snore. Victor rolled his eyes and tossed back his drink in a single gulp.

The flight ended with all emergency releases untouched and passengers unmauled. Victor breezed through the terminal and out into the cloudy afternoon. No luggage for him; he was traveling light. He managed to hail a cab that took him to one of the many apartments he kept scattered throughout the country. It was strange, everything familiar yet somehow alien. The entertainment center with its 60 inch flatscreen TV and surround sound system; the bathroom with its huge shower stall custom made for his dimensions; the bed with its emperor-sized mattress; the kitchen with its stainless steel appliances. Everything new and shiny, modern, sterile.

Victor took a shower, washing away the last traces of the forest from his skin, then changed into the clothes that waited for him in the closet. Dark jeans, charcoal gray shirt, black workboots. Then he picked up the handset from the charger on the coffee table and dialed the first of many numbers he would call that day alone.


"What the fuck have you been doin'!" Guy's irate voice brayed from the phone.

Victor replied in a reasonable tone that he knew would infuriate the man further, "I said I'd call when I was done with all my personal shit."

"It's been three fuckin' weeks, man!"

"Turns out I had a lotta shit." More than even Victor had expected.

"Like what?"

"Oh y'know, accounts to pay up, loose ends to tie." He let Guy draw his own conclusions from that remark.

"Fine, whatever. Now you've got all that straightened out we can get back to business."

"Yeah, about that," Victor lay back on the hotel's bed, eyes closed, feet hanging over the end, "I'm not comin' back to work."

A long silence. "Come again?"

"I'm done, Guy. I've closed up shop." He was exhausted. Three weeks of jumping from State to State, emptying bank accounts and money drops, selling off properties, grabbing a few hours' sleep in some fleabag motel and hopping a plane to his next destination; it was enough to drain even the toughest mutant's stamina.

"I … I … I dunno what to say." Guy's voice had the dazed sound of someone who'd just been told the sun was about to go nova. "Uh … What exactly am I s'posed to do while you're plottin' your grand-scale midlife crisis?"

The corners of Victor's mouth quirked in a tired smile. "Don't sweat it. I lumped all my assets together into an offshore account. I'll give you the number on one condition."

Guy's tone was understandably wary. "Go on."

"There's this flight attendant named Penelope. Works for American Airlines." He proceeded to give a detailed description of her along with the flight number she was on when he met her; more than enough info for the savvy Brit to locate her. "Ten percent of what's in the account goes to her. You get the rest."

"Are you shittin' me? What about you?"

"I won't be needing anything where I'm goin'."

"Aw hell, you're not quittin' cos o' this Penelope bird, are you?"

"No," Victor sighed tiredly, "Not her."

"But it is a woman."

He didn't answer.

"Oh. My. God! You'll never believe this, man, but I think a pig just flew right past my bloody window."

"Shut the fuck up, geek," Victor growled.

"I'm serious, man! There was a little devil in a snowsuit ridin' its back."

"You want the account number or not?"

"Right. Give it 'fore you come to your senses."

"And don't forget about Penelope."

"Believe me, man, last thing I'd ever do is cross you. I enjoy bein' alive too much."

Victor gave him the number, then hung up the phone without so much as a final goodbye. He had just enough cash left on him for one last flight. He rolled onto his side and let exhaustion pull him into sleep. In a dream he saw Tessa in a pale yellow sundress standing beneath a tree whose branches hung naked and lifeless. Her hands were cupped over her ears. When she pulled them away, the palms were stained with blood, with more dripping from her ears. I can't hear them anymore, she said in a voice filled with sad confusion. She held her arms out to him, face pleading. Don't ever let me go.