DISCLAIMER – The X-Men don't belong to me (I wish they did!) but the other characters do.
NOTES – I know Gambit's accent isn't exactly like it is in the comics but I'm bad at writing accents. I don't know how many chapters this will have, I just make it up as I go along. I'm guessing it will have three or four. A big thank you to my two beta readers.
MIDDLE OF NOWHERE – I FELT SORRY FOR MYSELF
Yes I felt sorry for myself, but no one else did so I might as well. The bruises on my stomach were very tender but no ribs seemed to be broken, so I slipped my shirt back on. Gambit was watching me, grinning. If that guy wasn't bisexual then I'm the President of Tonga. I sat back on the leather chair. Somehow Wolverine had managed to persuade us that we would be safer at the blind mans house than we would be back at the motel. Well, I guess it did smell nicer.
"Is the pizza okay?" the blind man, who's name was Jacob, asked.
Gambit who had tomato and cheese all over his face answered with his mouth full, "It is delicious homme." Ugh, I know he was brought up on the street but didn't anyone teach him manners? I made another mental note to teach Gambit proper grammar, teach him to say I instead of Gambit and now, I added teach him to eat with his mouth closed. Oh the things I have to do.
"Glad you think so," Jacob smiled. Wolverine was looking out of the window so I decided to put my leader experience in practice and find out why the hell this guy was being so nice to us.
"We're very thankful to you for letting us stay here."
"No problem," Jacob said looking roughly in my direction. He was sitting opposite me as I sat back on his leather couch.
"You do realize why we were fighting with the guys at the bar?"
Jacob was silent for a couple of seconds before he answered.
"I could hear what they were shouting about you if that's what you mean."
I assumed he knew we were mutants. I had a feeling he might be one too. It's not often you find a human that would offer his home to three rather scary looking mutants. Mind you he couldn't tell what we looked like, definately a good thing.
"It doesn't bother you?" I asked just to make sure.
"No son," Son! He was only a few years older than me. I hated it when people called me son. Logan does it but then everything he does annoys me. I didn't even like my father calling me son, but then he didn't deserve to. I had to spend most my child-hood in an orphanage because of him. Did I mention that time when I was locked in my room on Christmas day because they forgot about me…? I stopped feeling sorry for myself when Jacob said, "I'm a mutant too. At least I was before they took my eyes."
Logan suddenly spoke up.
"Who took your eyes Bub?"
"I couldn't tell you who did it. I was attacked, and when I woke up my eyes had gone. When I still had my eyes they worked as a telescope. I could see for miles just by thinking about it and focusing them properly." He sighed. "Now I can't see at all."
* * * * *
I was tempted to get in his bed wid him but I didn't dink he'd like dat. I watched him drop off to sleep. It had been a long day and we still hadn't found dis guy we were sent to look for. Logan was lying on a blanket by de door. I was lying on de coach a few yards away from Scott. De trouble was dat I was so comfy I was desperately trying to ignore my full bladder begging for relief. I fought long and hard but eventually my bladder won de war and I threw myself off de sofa and rushed to de toilette.
I whacked my petit toe on de toilette door but just about managed to hop in before I wet myself. The relief it brought was very pleasurable and when I had finished I flushed the chain and left de room. As I went back in de living room I noticed that Wolverine had left his place by de door. I wasn't bothered, dat guy always wondered off.
I slipped back into my comfy bed and wished there was a beautiful woman in it wid me but instead I just had to try and sleep wid Scott snoring.
I was just dropping off to sleep when a noise made me alert again. It sounded like de back-door opening. I hoped it was just Wolverine returning from his walk but just in case I leant forward slightly and pulled a couple of cards out of my pants which were on de floor. I intended to hide de cards under my cover until I saw who it was. I wasn't going to charge them up just in case dey went off accidentally and de place where they were at de moment was very important to me.
De room was really dark but I could just make out a figure slowly moving into de room. It wasn't Wolverine, much taller and thinner. I didn't move, pretending to be asleep and I waited until de stranger got a little closer. De problem was de person wasn't heading towards me, dey were heading towards Scott. I was ready to pounce but watched silently as de figure knelt down and looked at de sleeping man. Scott grunted and rolled onto his oder side oblivious to de person beside him. An arm was slowly reaching out towards him, so taking no changes I jumped up off de sofa only to be slammed onto de floor by Wolverine jumping over de coach and onto me. He jumped up and made a dash for de figure dat had now stood up in surprise. I pushed myself off de floor just in time to watch Wolverine throw de stranger across the room.
"STOP!" Jacob yelled from the doorway. Wid his claws out of his fists Wolverine stood over de figure.
* * * * *
It was a damn girl, mind you it didn't make much difference, some women are just nearly, if not more, dangerous than men. She didn't seem dangerous though; in fact I could smell she was a little scared. Gambit was giving me an evil glare after I floored him. Scott was still asleep; he really could sleep through anything. Jacob was sitting the other end of the couch next to my French friend and the new girl was sitting on the chair slightly shaken by my attack.
"Nikki, I'm sorry I forgot you said you might be back tonight. Are you okay?"
She had her eyes fixed on Jacob, her long black hair falling over her face. She nodded.
"I'm sorry," I mumbled. She seemed to ignore me.
"You have to make sure she knows you're talking otherwise she can't lip read you." Jacob told me. She pulled her hair back slightly and I saw the scars that were where her ears would normally be. I immediately assumed the same thing that had happened to Jacob had also occurred to her. Before I could ask though our sleeping beauty finally woke up. He seemed to ignore everyone, threw his cover off himself and rolled off the mattress. Gumbo grinned and Nikki smiled shyly as our leader stood in his full, almost naked glory, in front if us.
"Is it morning?" he asked, adjusting his sleeping goggles slightly.
"No it's not, we've got another visitor." Jacob told him. Being blind he couldn't see Cyke go bright red when he realized there was a young lady trying not to look at his rather tight boxer shorts. He quickly bent down and picked up his duvet in shyness. He's such a prick, if it were me I would let them stare if they wanted. Well except maybe if it was Gambit.
* * * * *
"So, what exactly does this guy know?" Logan asked after Nikki looked towards him so she could lip-read. I would have preferred her to keep her eyes on the road but who was I to talk after our little accident with the tree.
"Harry is always going on about this strange guy which he sees hanging around this town. He told me that there's something about him. He says the guy keeps himself to himself but he must live somewhere around here because every couple of weeks he sees him around. When you mentioned you were here looking for a hit-man it reminded me of it."
I lent forward and gently touched her shoulder so she knew I wanted to say something. She looked at me through the windscreen mirror.
"Does this guy know what he's talking about? Or might he be making it up?"
She smiled at me and said,
"Harry is slightly strange but he isn't a liar. He's been a close friend of Jacob and I since we were all in hospital together after we were all attacked in the same month. Jacob lost his eyes, I lost my ears and Harry lost his legs."
I was going to tell ring the mansion tonight and tell the rest of the X-Men about the strange things going on in this town. We'd have to investigate and it was also a good excuse for me to persuade Professor Xavier that we needed more people on the mission (preferable people I got on with.)
"Jacob offered me a room in his house and Harry decided to move here too." Nikki told us.
Her old car coughed and choked up the dusty road towards the old cabin. I don't know much about gardening but I was sure this guy was way worse than me. Actually he didn't even have a garden, just piles of dirt. Perhaps he could make a rock garden or something. Yeah a rock garden with a nice water feature. As if he could read my mind Wolverine was giving me funny looks from the passenger seat.
"What?" I asked him.
He shrugged them turned his attention to the front again. How did she get a drivers license when she was deaf? What if she didn't have a driver's license?
Anyway, she pulled up in front of the home of the man who was suppose to know something about the mutant we were looking for. I got out of the car and followed Nikki towards the front door. Gambit was mumbling something about how all the dust was ruining his boots. Nikki stopped when she reached the door and looked up at me a little worried. She pointed at the door, which was slightly open. I pushed it slightly when suddenly from behind me Wolverine yelled.
"Cyke don't."
It was too late, I saw a man inside the room but couldn't react before a felt like I was being electrocuted. I feel to the floor, the pain almost paralyzed me. I heard Wolverine growling and Gambit's cards exploding, but I couldn't move.
"Get back Chere!" Gambit yelled I presume to Nikki. I opened my eyes and tried to see what was happening. There was more than just one man fighting against Wolverine and Gambit. The walls of the cabin were being blown open by Gambit throwing his cards left right and centre. I tried with all my strength to reach up to my glasses to try and help but I couldn't move my arms. It didn't matter, two seconds later another shock of electricity hit me and I blacked out.
* * * * *
I could hear an awful voice somewhere in the distance. It was awful, not as in evil or scary. It was gruff and Canadian which could only mean one thing – Logan. It wasn't nice to wake up to Logan's voice especially when it took me a while to figure out why I fell asleep with him. The voice got louder and louder.
"SLIM!"
I almost jumped out of my skin.
"WHAT?" I yelled opening my eyes to see him leaning over me.
"They've got Gumbo."
Wolverine helped me sit up.
"Who's got him?"
I looked around and suddenly realized where I was. I wasn't in bed with Logan, thank the lord! I was lying on the sofa back at Jacob's house. My whole body had pins and needles.
"The same bastards that killed the guy who we were meant to see. The same guys who probably took that guys legs, Nikki's ears and Jacob's eyes."
"Whose hasn't got legs?" I asked rather confused.
Logan gave out a big sigh, "The guy Nikki was taking us to see."
I didn't remember seeing a guy with no legs.
"Logan," I said, "I've just regained consciousness so you're going to have to explain a little more."
Wolverine grabbed my shoulder slightly harder than necessary.
"There's people who are taking parts of mutants for their own weird reasons and now they've got Gambit."
I understood then.
"Well maybe we should get him back," I suggested. He rolled his eyes at me, I didn't know why.
"But what's this got to do with the mutant hit man?" I asked.
"I can tell you," a new voice said. I looked over Logan's shoulder and saw one of the most horrifying things I had ever seen…
* * * * *
NOTES – Next part soon. I hope you like it. Please review and tell me what you think.