Dedicated with the outmost respect and admiration to the Pagan Wolf, Psycho Dave, and the rest of the regulars on the WeirdCrap forums. The 'Fuzzy' argument is credited to them, too.

A/N 1: You know the drill - ideas for fic and character development, questions, plotbunnies, suggestions, flames, character pictures, ficlets, corrections, additions, comments, and everything in between can be mailed to hack_heaven@usa.net.

A/N 2: DaHippo: *blush* Thank you :) I'm honored that you like the story so much, even though you don't have a character in it :) And Zach and Deirdre...oh, I have plans for those two *grins*

A/N 3: Since I'm moving into my own apartment, and start at college on August 22nd, things will be a bit chaotic for a while. This means that that I probably won't be able to update until the beginning of September - I'll try to update next week, but I can't guarantee anything. Sorry ^^

Italics indicates thoughts/telepathy

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Chapter Fifty-Three: Hell's Furnace

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Darkness...heavy and suffocating, engulfing her mind. Pain...dull, lingering, clear even through the disgusting murkiness. Voices...faint, distant, but increasingly clear as the darkness slowly disappeared. Voices...next to her?

Laetitia's instincts went on high alert as she realized how close the voices were, and she felt the adrenaline enter her blood. Surging through her body, it burned away the grogginess where it went, making her hum with energy and made it hard to remain motionless. Her instincts told her to get away from the possible threat - and if necessary fight it - but Laetitia suppressed the notion. She didn't know where she was, or who the people were, and getting into a fight without any knowledge of opponents or battleground was a bad idea. No...pretending to still be unconscious would be a better solution. It would give her the chance to find out a few things about the owners of the voices, and it would also give her the time needed to clear her head completely.

Laetitia concentrated on her body, slowly managing to suppress the natural instincts of fight or flight, and then forced herself to remain still and listen to the world around her.

"The burden of evidence lies on the religious people, not the rest of us," a female voice explained, apparently continuing an old argument. She sounded young to Laetitia, but still there was a certain edge of hardness to her voice. "They have a theory that our world is controlled by this invisible, vengeful father figure, and the only 'proof' they have, is a book written by common men."

"But...if so many people believe in God, there *must* be some truth in it, right?" a male voice replied, a hint of confusion shining through the words. He sounded like he was about the same age as the girl, but somehow his voice held a note of youthfulness that the girl's voice lacked. "I guess...I mean, I just find it hard to believe that there's nothing out there, and that there's no paradise, or Summerland, or Nirvana waiting for us," he continued, but not with nearly the same confidence as the girl had spoken with.

Religion...? Interesting, Laetitia thought, still forcing herself to remain unmoving. Already as a child she'd learned that the more you knew about your enemy, the stronger you would stand in a fight against them. And these two people had yet to prove that they were not a possible threat.

"They have no *proof*! They claim he's out there, but they can't prove it!" the girl argued, anger entering her voice. She paused for a moment, then continued in an almost disturbingly cheerful way. "If that's the way things work, I think I'll start a new religion - the Order of Fuzzy, the Pink Bunny."

"The *what*?!" the boy explained incredulously, and Laetitia was hard pressed to keep the small smirk off her face at the sound of his obvious confusion.

"You haven't heard of our High Lord and Bunny yet?" the girl asked with a deceptively innocence. "But he's the only way to eternal life. Really. He lives on the moon, and his arch nemesis is Hairball, the Evil Kitty. Hairball wants to eat all the fish on earth, and Fuzzy wants to stop him." Somehow the girl managed to continue her strange reasoning while keeping a straight face, not a small feat considering the absurdity of her words.

"That doesn't make sense! What does bunnies have to do with anything?!" the boy objected, his frustration clear in his voice.

"But you can't disprove his existence, now can you?" the girl challenged.

"And you can't prove that he *does* exist," the boy shot back

"I don't have to. Religious people have no proof that there's some divine entity out there, remember?" A certain smugness had entered the voice now, Laetitia noted. The smugness that came only with the knowledge that you had won the battle, while your opponent had yet to realize that.

"But-" the boy tried, making one last attempt to argue with the girl. It was useless, though - his companion obviously knew what she was doing, and played her cards brilliantly.

"They refuse to produce any real evidence, and challenge the rest of us to disprove his existence instead. The same logic must apply to me, then - I claim Fuzzy exists, and until you can disprove that claim, I'm right," the girl stated, challenge now replaced by smug satisfaction.

"Zahra...that doesn't make any sense at all," the boy said, sighing softly. Obviously, this was something he'd tried before, with the same result.

"Religion rarely does, Daryn." This time the voice was kinder, less defiant - almost understanding, even, and Laetitia knew that the argument was slowly dissolving into nothing. She considered her options, then decided to 'wake up' before the two young people turned their attention to her, and realized that she had been listening to them.

Laetitia moaned faintly and moved with a deliberately weakness, belying her real strength. The motion caught the attention of the two, and Laetitia heard one of them move closer.

"I think she's waking up," the boy - Daryn - noted, a hint of relief in his voice at this possible distraction from the argument. The fact that it was Daryn and not Zahra, who acted concerned about her, did not escape Laetitia's attention - much could be told about a person from the way they acted, and she was already building up a mental file about the young duo.

Laetitia opened her eyes and got her first look at her two companions. As expected, they were both young - Zahra seemed to be a few years younger than Laetitia herself, and Daryn was probably even younger. Both were dressed in similar clothes - dark blue pants and shirts, the style giving it a military look.

Calmly, Laetitia let her eyes take in their appearance, adding to the mental file she kept. Thick, black hair, dark skin -

The Middle East, Laetitia decided as she looked at Zahra. Iran...Iraq...she wasn't sure, but it was probably in that general area. Hard features, too, and an angry look in her black eyes, giving her a slightly older look. Zahra's ears caught Laetitia's attention, and she frowned imperceptible. Strange, slightly pointy ear, apparently angled forward.

A result of her mutation, or a mutation in itself? Laetitia wondered, but pushed the thought aside and focused on the boy instead.

Daryn was almost the exact opposite - his face held none of the hardness that Zahra showed, and his brown eyes had a glint of seriousness that was unusual for someone his age. His hair-color belied that apparent seriousness, though - light blue streaks and tips, somehow reminding Laetitia of Jordane.

She frowned at the thought of her teammates, wondering where they had ended up, but reluctantly had to admit to herself that right now, there was nothing she could do. Ignoring Daryn's concerned look, Laetitia slowly sat up, wincing only slightly as the faint, throbbing headache intensified for a moment.

"Hey, be careful - it takes a while before the pain disappears," Daryn said. Laetitia didn't reply, and the boy continued. "I'm Daryn Kogatana, and that's Zahra..."

"Malik," his companion supplied with a vaguely annoyed look. "Zahra Malik."

"Umm...yeah. What she said," the boy added, sounded a bit embarrassed.

Laetitia nodded, filing the names away for future reference. "My name is Laetitia Tatapoulos," she introduced herself, deciding to go with the truth. It was highly unlikely that these children - yes, compared to her they were hardly more than children - had heard of her, anyway. "What is this place?"

Daryn hesitated slightly before answering.

"Well...I don't know what happened to you before this, but you see, the thing is..."

"Would you just tell her where we are?" Zahra demanded and then answered Laetitia's question before Daryn had the chance to finish. "You're in a mutant camp. Officially, its name is Outpost Five, but everybody calls it Hell's Furnace. You're in the low-security wing with the rest of us beta-level muties."

Laetitia nodded slowly, her mind processing this new information. A mutant camp...well, that certainly explained the clothes the two were wearing. She looked to her side, and found several similar sets of clothes lying on an unused bed.

Mutant camp...low-level security?

She frowned. That didn't make sense - the police had her name and photo in their database. They *knew* who she was, what she could do. They would never make a mistake like that, not-

Sergey.

The answer was so obvious that she wondered why she hadn't thought of it before - he had the resources to do something like this...and he was also the reason why she, Blade, and Jordane had been caught in the first place. It had been a trap, Laetitia didn't doubt that for a moment, and judging from the situation she now found herself in, she hadn't been the main target.

You sold them to the government, Laetitia thought disgusted as she realized just what had taken place. You handed over two fellow mutants to the humans...you traitor!

But why had he gone through all that trouble? Or actually, why had the government been willing to pay him to go through all that trouble...unless...

No.

It was so simple once she thought about it - the government had long been under pressure to do something about the mutant problem, and they desperately needed a victory to show that they *were* doing something. And what would be more efficient than the widely publicized trial of two notorious mutants?

Except...they would never actually get to the point of the trial. Laetitia knew Blade, knew how he thought and acted. He would never accept the humiliation of a trial, especially not a public one. He would die before letting the humans put him in that situation, Laetitia didn't doubt that for a second.

This was bad...very bad.

The hollow sound of a door being opened nearby tore Laetitia out of her musings, and she looked sharply at the door to her own cell. Zahra noticed the motion and rolled her eyes.

"Would you calm down? It's just one of the daily, little walks," she explained, her voice clearly telling what she thought of *that* idea. "They let us walk around outside twice a day to prove to the media that we actually have it pretty good here, and that we aren't just animals in cages." The last part was added with a biting sarcasm, but Laetitia ignored it and focused on the possibilities this little piece of information revealed.

"Where, exactly, are we?" she asked, and Zahra sent her a look.

"Death Valley. Why?" No reply from Laetitia, and Zahra snorted. "What? Are you thinking about escaping? It's suicide - why do you think they build this prison here? If you head out there on your own, you'll die from dehydration or heatstroke within a day."

"It's happened before," Daryn added quietly. "They brought back the bodies to set an example."

Still no reaction from Laetitia, and Zahra looked like she wanted to say something else, but the sound of their door being opened stopped her.

Four soldiers stepped inside the cell, their weapons aimed the mutants. Obviously used to it, Zahra and Daryn headed to the door, while Laetitia hesitated for a few, brief seconds, giving herself the time needed to remember the amount of weapons the soldiers carried, and how much training they seemed to have. One of the soldiers motioned towards Laetitia, and the young woman got up with a deliberate confidence. The trio followed the soldiers outside, joining up with a larger group of mutants down a larger hallway

Laetitia quickly searched for any familiar faces, but not surprisingly, she found none. A motion from one of the soldiers, and the group moved further down the hallway, occasionally pausing to wait for another small group of mutants to join them.

Never taking her eyes of the surrounding, Laetitia followed the group down to a pair of large doors, imprinting the details of the prison in her mind. Another motion and the doors were opened, the mutants reluctantly heading outside, guarded by the soldiers.

The burning sun hit Laetitia like a kick to the head and made her eyes sting as she looked at the dusty white landscape beyond the heavy fences. A small gust of wind reached her, not cooling her down like usual, but instead only serving to intensify the already unbearable heat. One of the human guards looked at Laetitia, but the mutant just raised an eyebrow defiantly, refusing to let the desert heat break her. She surveyed the area again, letting her eyes linger on the small, distant mountains, and suddenly the camp's name made all too much sense.

Hell's Furnace? She paused, watching the heat radiate from the ground, giving everything a twisted, distorted feeling.

Fitting.

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