Creed's knees were tense, and he was only half awake when she crawled back into the car. Her bag thumped into the back seat, and she backed down the drive and onto the two-lane.
"Whuzzat?"
"In the bag?" She squirmed around in her seat, still uncomfortable.
"Yeah."
"Um….can you speak or read Russian?"
He cracked one eye slightly and slid it toward the driver's side of the car. "You ask the DAMNEDEST questions."
"Well, I had to ask." She picked up her thermos and took a long swig of coffee. He was silent.
For the next two hours, that was how it went. They got on Rt. 40 and followed it east into Hinton, where it was necessary for Katya to refill on coffee and for Creed to eat. No music was played. No small talk. More hours went by. And then, about fifteen miles on the east side of Edmonton, it got to him.
"WHY do you want to know if I can speak Russian?"
She snickered. It hadn't occurred to him, she was certain, that she wasn't the only one that had a particular scent when she was thinking. And the way his brain behaved…..what a lab rat he would make.
"Because it'll save me time. We aren't out here just for you, you know."
He glared, snaked one arm back into her bag, and tugged the whole thing up into his lap.
"The green one's the oldest."
He cracked the journal open, raised a brow at the date, and then, despite himself, began to read out loud.
o00000000ooooooooo00000oooo
Creed came up for air about fifty pages in, somewhat concerned with Katya's level of alertness. She'd dropped the tires off the burm four or five times in the last twenty minutes, and her face….he'd seen the woman in pain, he'd seen the woman frustrated, he'd seen the woman angry. He'd never seen her drop so far inside herself that her own features were beginning to follow suit. She was hunkered over the wheel, head tilted down. Her eyes were narrowed in response to the midday sun. She'd begun chewing her lower lip about eight pages in and now she nearly had the whole thing in her mouth. Chunks of her dark hair had escaped the braid and hung to the side or across her eyes, depending on which way she moved.
"Squeak."
"Hmmm." There was a pause. "Why'd you stop reading?"
"Cause that's the sixth time you've dropped off the side of the road in the last twenty minutes. It's buggin' me."
"Okay." She pulled over to the side of the road, whipped the keys from the ignition, and handed them to Creed. "You drive then. I'll read."
Which was fine by him. His throat was starting to get raw.
So she read. Clear into Saskatchewan. Didn't come up for air. Didn't come out for food or drink. Didn't blink when he came within an ace of nicking a bull elk with the car. She completely tranced out of existence, and it was a marvel to him how her scent changed as she did it. First, it was the ozone, strong enough to make him gag. Then a copper, like blood but not. It wasn't organic enough to be blood. Then, in an odd twist, about five hours into the process it went completely citrus, like a cross between a lime and an orange. And then, slowly, the orange scent outweighed the lime and mixed with a cinnamon that was…familiar. A very quiet, creamy, cinnamony smell that should have killed him it was so familiar. So sweet. And until 2AM the next morning, it stayed that way.
She looked up from the fifth journal, her little booklamp burning dim. "Creed, I'm hungry." Her stomach growled in agreement. He couldn't help but chuckle.
"What, no coffee?"
"That's after."
"There's an all night truck-stop a couple of kilometers ahead."
"That'll do."
The waitress was a wizened old bird that was expecting a pair of creepy crawlies, and was a little surprised when she only got a mutant and a drained academic. She took their orders, raised a brow at Katya's long list of food, and then strolled off. Nothing surprised her any more. She'd seen it all here, and besides. Who needed TV when you had a truck stop?
Katya leaned back into the red pleather and concentrated on keeping her eyes open.
"So." Creed's boredom was beginning to crank. There had been no stimulus in that car save the driving of it and paying attention to Katya. "Facts found?"
"Yeah." She stifled a yawn.
He waited. The waitress brought them coffee, which Katya drained on the spot and laughed with the beak-faced woman as she filled the cup again.
He waited some more. And then he couldn't wait any longer. "SO?"
"Um. I….I honestly don't know where to start on it. Because if I'm reading between the lines right, then….then there's a really logical explanation for the reason I am the way I am. And the reason my brother is the way my brother is."
Creed snorted. "Genetics?"
"Nope. We're experiments."
"Loooogical."
She took another pull on her coffee. "More so than you would think. My grandfather was Russian military. I don't know what branch. I don't know what he did. But the way Irina talks, Arkady was selected, about a year after they were married, to become part of some kind of research team. She doesn't say what he was doing with that team, and to be honest, knowing what I know about the Soviet Union, Arkady probably didn't know either. But he started getting sick. Started coming home with aches and pains that he couldn't explain. And then rages. Sudden stomach complaints. Oh, BEAUTIFUL!"
Her stomach growled as the waitress plopped a five-stack of pancakes in front of the girl, and Katya tended to more imminent business. Creed followed suit, and they ate neck and neck for the next fifteen minutes. When Katya came back to the world of the living, she had inhaled five pancakes, three eggs sunny side up, eight links of sausage, half of Creed's bacon, a tall glass of orange juice, and three more cups of coffee. She sat back with a lady-like burp and smiled happily at Creed.
"MUCH better. Not that you care."
He couldn't help but agree. She smelled more like herself. "Anyways?"
"Huh? Oh!" She kept it short. And he very pointedly made no comment about Wade Wilson. Arms races. Gotta love'em. She paid for the meal, and the waitress gave him a dirty look because he didn't . Cunt.
0oooooooo000000000ooooo0000
Back in the car, she yawned. "I'm sleepy."
"Well what do you want me to do about it?"
"Motel?"
He'd stayed at the one across the street. It hadn't been pleasant. But they went there anyways. And she passed out on the bed without even taking her clothes off. He couldn't help but laugh at the fact. It was as if she didn't know who she was in the company of. Or that she had no idea who was actually controlling the situation. She was so….casual. Calm. That deep cinnamon still clung around the edges of her body, and he had a suspicion that it wasn't going to go away. He sat down on the bed across from her and studied.
Wow. So…..what did you refer to someone who was the product of genetic experimentation? He couldn't call her a mutant any more. She still wasn't sure what had happened to Arkady, but apparently, the man had died and her grandmother had run screeching out of Russia a few hours after. It sounded like, reading between the lines of her explanation, that the KGB was running some kind of project a hell of a lot like Stryker's Weapon X. Made Creed wonder where the man had gotten the idea in the first place. And then it went bad. They killed their subject. And the woman that he'd married had the poor judgment to get pregnant by the man. So when Irina ran, she wasn't just running away with her unborn child. She was running away with millions of rubles' worth of research. Whether she knew that or not remained yet to be seen. HE wasn't going to read any farther into the journals. Not tonight anyways.
He stretched out, kicked his boots off. Katya stirred in her sleep, drawing one leg up underneath herself, still face down. Both her arms were stretched forward as far as they could go, as if she'd been trying to catch herself before she fell into sleep. Her face was turned to the side, and, as usual, away from him. She was all dark lines and draping, except for the pale patch of skin he could see at the base of her braid. He wasn't sure what was keeping him from touching her. Taking her right there without even half a thought. Everything in his existence belonged to him. He was a demi-god set to walk the earth as he pleased. But he'd never had anyone make a point of turning their back on him on a regular basis. Even Stryker knew better than that. And it had been a long long time since anyone had shown any kind of concern for his well being-misguided or otherwise. It was weird. Uncomfortable, even. It made him want to beat the living hell out of her because it was stupid, what she was doing, but….. But what. He didn't know. And whether he wanted to admit it or not, he was going to find out or die trying.
