Tested
Disclaimer: Characters and Premise are borrowed from the Marvel, I'm not making any money.
Skye Dragon: Thanks for the review. Rien means nothing, at least according to the last English to French online dictionary I found (I don't speak it either).
Part 8
"Look who's awake," Delores announced, her voice filled with pride at having an unorthodox cure work out. She helped Remy into the other room.
Then she stopped dead. An older man was tied to a chair in the center of the room, Singer leaned over him, knife poised over his cheek.
She turned and smiled at Remy. "Bien seein' yo' back wid us. Hope yo' don' mind mais I got an early start on t'ings. 'Llow me to introduce yo' to de aide-de-camp who over saw Belle's 'moval from de local jail."
"I told you, I know nothing," the man protested.
"He's lyin'," Remy said as Delores helped him to a chair.
Without a second's hesitation Singer sliced off the man's ear.
Remy's lips tightened.
"Can't yo'… yo' know?" Lapin asked Remy staring at the bloody lump of flesh lying on the floor.
"Non," Remy said shaking his head. "I can see 'motions wit'out strainin'. Mais I couldn' touch 'nother person's mind right now, not after what happened."
"No worries, neh?" Singer said. "Yo' play lie detector, I'll take care of de rest." She leaned in close to her prisoners remaining ear and purred. "I figure yo' still need dis an' your tongue, mais yo' got ten fingers, ten toes and two eyes for me to play wit'."
Pierre stared at his girlfriend with horror, listening to the sexy rasp of her voice sounding exactly like when she was turned on. He looked from her expression to the blood dripping down her prisoner's face. His hand flew to his mouth as he gagged then turned and hurried out of the room.
"Dey don' need us," Delores said to Lapin.
"Oui, we'll jus' wait in de other room," he said with a quick nod to Remy.
"Now isn't dis more intimate?" Singer asked trailing her hand down the man's side as she knelt behind him pressing the blade of her knife to the first joint of his pinkie. "Where'd dey take, Belle? 'Member he'll know if yo' lie."
Remy nodded. "I don' want to do dis, mais I gotta save her. Tell us 'bout Belle."
****** ****** ******
Belle sat in the cell waiting. "Her plan would work," she told herself. She would go home. She'd see her baby born and see Remy again. She'd find the bastard that had set her up and kill him, painfully.
It would work. She just had to wait for one last piece to fall into place. One more piece then she could go home.
****** ****** ******
"Now dat wasn' so hard now was it?" Singer said cleaning the blade of her knife.
"Some doctor took Belle, I don' like dis Singer," Remy said. "We gotta get to Belle quick."
"S' do your petite trick, make dis guy go poof an' we'll be on our way to de mountains," Singers shrugged.
"Charge him? I can't, he's 'live. I can't charge livin' tissue," Remy stammered. "It feels wrong."
"If dat's all," Singer said.
"Please let me go," the man begged.
Singer snapped his neck. "He isn't 'live now," she said. "Yo' can take care of de body right?"
"Oui, I can do it," Remy said pushing himself to his feet. Remy hesitated for a moment then put a hand on the dead man's shoulder, the man was so freshly dead his soul barely even knew it. He felt a lingering black film clinging to the body; Remy instinctively knew it was the emotional residue of the man's violent death. He bit his lip and sent his power into the man's corpse, ripping his cells apart, reducing the body to its elemental components.
Remy shivered as the black film flew apart with the body, where the metaphysical shards came in contact with him they burned like dry ice, lingering on the surface of his mental shields like the residue of some evil bug squashed on a windshield.
"Let's go," Remy said when it was finished.
****** ****** ******
" 'M a hypocrite," Jean-Luc said quietly "If I tried I could find where de kids went, follow dem, like I tol' Marius he should've, mais I don'."
Theoren sat down beside his old friend and Guild leader. "Yo' can't, after de attack here not to mention de near nuclear disaster in Miami t'ings are too uncertain here, de Guild needs yo'."
"Magneto's captured, de government likes mutants, least de X-Men anyways, 'gain," Jean-Luc said.
"Even s', de Registration Act is still on de books," Theoren pointed out. "Dey'd call if dey found too much trouble."
"Pierre an' Delores, oui, Lapin mebbe, Singer I jus' don' know an' even if she did she wouldn' call us, she'd call de Assassins, for all de good dat would do. As for Remy, he won' call, no mattah what happened, not now… I nevah should've let him go back to New York."
****** ****** ******
"We could hike de last leg of de trip," Remy suggested.
"Den dey catch us on de way out," Singer argued. "Dat's 'ssumin' Belle is in any condition to walk when we find her an' dat none of us get hurt in de process. Hell boy, yo're hardly in top condition now. Face it Remy we need 'nother pilot, helicopter dis time."
"Easy for yo' to say chere," Remy snapped. "Yo' ain't de one got to kill de man."
"Oh spare me your hero's morality, Remy. It's simple, yo' want Belle an' de baby back yo're gonna get your hands bloody." Singer said. "Anyway, jus' 'cause de firs' guy suicided don' mean it'll happen 'gain."
"If dere's 'nother way…" Delores began.
"Dere ain't," Singer said. "Yo' know dat don' yo' Remy. De only question is do yo' love her 'nough or are yo' goin' to bail on her?"
"Singer's right," Remy said. "Mais I gotta be more careful dis time, try not to wreck de pilot in de process. Stay put, gimme a couple days."
"Remy yo' didn't really kill dat firs' pilot did yo'?" Lapin asked.
"I changed him, twisted him till helpin' me was all dat he cared 'bout, all dat he lived for. Den I tol' him to go 'way an' he kilt hisself. Who's fault was dat do yo' t'ink?" Remy asked.
"An' now yo're gonna do it 'gain?" Pierre demanded with disbelief.
"Yeah, I am," Remy said. "What other choice d' I have?"
****** ****** ******
The lights outside the cell never went out. They wanted to be able to see what she was doing at all times.
Belle generally slept with a pillow or her arm thrown over her eyes to block out the glare from the bare bulb. She'd broken it once, before they'd taken away her shoes and anything else hard that she might throw.
Tonight it seemed especially bothersome to her as she tossed and turned. Finally she got up and started prowling restlessly around her cell. Eventually she came to a halt in her favorite spot, standing behind the door to her cell, forehead leaned against the cool bars, hands dangling out on either side of the lock.
Her long hair fell forward hiding her face from the cameras, assuming anyone was paying attention after all the work she'd done training them to think that all the action was going to happen while there were people around for her to fight. After her first failed escape she could hardly try making them think she was helpless again. Oh it wasn't impossible, the guards in particular were macho enough to think she wasn't as good as them, so they gave her chances to test them, but they weren't quite dumb enough to give her a real chance to escape.
But now they all thought she was stupid, skilled enough to be dangerous but too stupid, too stubborn to quit beating her head against a brick wall.
Belle had heard the helicopter fly in the day before, it hadn't flown out yet.
She stood behind the locked door to her cell, head lowered, hands clasped loosely, innocently hiding the lock from view just in case someone was still bothering to watch her when she was alone and presumably helpless in her cage, at least as long as their was no one around for her to kill for a key.
She smiled and thought about what a wonderful person her boyfriend, no husband, was to force her to practice picking locks. Belle slid the broken frame from the glasses of the last lab technician she'd killed into the old fashion lock on the door of her cell and gently began nudging the tumblers into place.
It took time, especially with her crude tools, but Belle had time, the whole night if need be and eventually the lock clicked open for her.
Belle opened the door and started running. She knew exactly where she was going, each of her earlier, doomed attempts had told her something about the lab's lay out.
She was half way to the landing pad when the first guard intercepted her flight. Belle threw her erstwhile lock-pick like a dart, driving it into the man's throat. She paused by the corpse, almost laughing with delight as she scooped up his handgun, they never carried anything but stun guns around her, just in case they got tempted to use them or in case she got her hands on one. This nice gentleman hadn't bothered to take the time to trade weapons before coming after her.
With a fully loaded clip and her opponents being restrained by a fear of harming her baby Belle reached the helicopter with relative ease.
Getting it off the ground was more difficult, the wide array of buttons and gauges effectively camouflage the starter and Belle had to shoot two more guards before she got the rotator blades spinning.
The helicopter rose unstably into the air under Belle's inexperienced control. Her face was drawn into an intense scowl of concentration as she directed the ungainly machine away from the lab where she'd been held.
The radio crackled to life. "Belladonna, there's a storm in the mountains!" Cornelius exclaimed. "An expert pilot would be challenged to make it out alive, land before you hurt yourself!"
Belle rolled her eyes, "Yo're a'ways s'negative Doc: 'Yo' gonna die, de bebe's gonna die,' ain't yo evah gonna find a new refrain to sing? Not dat I'll be hearin' it if yo' did 'cause I be sayin' bubbye."
Cornelius continued ranting but Belle tuned him out to focus on her flying.
As she rose out of the sheltering valley where the lab was situated gusts of wind started battering at the helicopter offering credence to Cornelius' statements.
Belle's lips pursed into a hard line as she fought to keep from being blown down into the rocky forest landscape beneath her. When she cleared the ridge a blast of wind sent the 'copter rocking, Belle over compensated and lost control. The last thing she saw was the ground spinning toward her.
****** ****** ******
Remy superstitiously watched the silver-haired mercenary across the cantina. He'd stolen a car and driven all night to get back to a large enough city to find the type of person he needed. This big, rough looking man could do what they needed and in Remy's unique perceptions he radiated misery.
Nervously Remy wetted his lips then, modulating his empathy to radiate sympathy and familiarity he approached the man, hoping the rumors about the mercinary's motives where accurate and that he'd be naturally inclined to take up Remy's cause without too much manipulation. All the while fearing he'd wasted too much of Belle's limited time.
****** ****** ******
Dr. Cornelius worked frantically on Belle's broken body, trying to stabilize her, desperately working to save the child. A chill wind swept through the operating room. "I will take over from here," a cold voice announced.
Cornelius spun to face the intruder, beneath his surgical mask his mouth gaped open at the sight of a toweringly tall man with cold, dispassionate eyes flanked by two women, one slender and lithesome, the other athletic and muscular. All three were dressed in surgical garb, behind them a spinning whirlpool of darkness crouched in one corner of his surgery.
Cornelius drew a breath to call for his guards when the man spoke again. "I have merely come to reclaim what is mine, do not force me to destroy you in the process. Your endeavors to date have shown promise… it would be unfortunate if you were prevented from reaching your full potential."
"Dr. Essex," Cornelius breathed with something like awe in his eyes.
"I have been know as that," Sinister admitted.
"I could work for you," Cornelius offered on impulse as he backed away from Belle.
"I will consider it at a more opportune time," Sinister said as Vertigo and Archlight moved Belle to a stretcher a moment later the four of them disappeared back through the portal.
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