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Chapter 2

Where are those guys?! Emma was growing increasingly worried as each minute passed by. They should have been back by now; I hope something didn't happen to them. Emma thought for a bit, checked Shalimar again and decided that Jesse and Brennan ran into trouble. If they didn't run into trouble, why would they linger around. no. they would never linger when Shalimar needs help, especially if I know Brennan well enough. I just hope they're okay.

A barely audible sound emitted from Shalimar, but Emma picked up on it since it was what interrupted her thoughts. She quickly moved her ear closer to the feral's mouth to listen for anything that she might say. She didn't hear anything except for Shalimar's harsh, ragged breaths. The telempath pulled back and gently placed her hand on Shal's forehead. She immediately pulled back at how hot she found it.

Emma quickly sent images of snow and cold places to lower Shalimar's temperature and was relieved when she found it had worked.

The redhead then noticed that Shalimar had opened her eyes a bit, but then closed them again at the brightness.

"Emma? Where's. where's Bren.Brennan?"

Emma looked at her friend, still concerned at her condition. Then she replied,

"He and Jesse still aren't back yet. Remember they went to get help."

There was silence, as Shalimar hadn't the strength to answer or ask more questions. But she heard Emma say that they would be back soon with help and then everything will be fine.

As Emma reassured Shalimar that everything will be okay, she had a feeling of unease. She knew that if Shal detected any kind of doubt in her voice, the feral would immediately want to go find the guys, even if she couldn't get up and Emma just couldn't let her friend do that based on some feeling that she had. Besides, she knew that Brennan would kill her if she ever let that happen.

She sighed and kept close watch over Shalimar. She just hoped everything that she told the blond would turn out to be true.

Brennan groaned as he regained consciousness. It took a few moments for him to open his eyes. When he was sure that this action was a good idea, he scanned his surroundings. His gaze landed on Jesse. It seemed that the molecular had regained consciousness long before he did. Jesse had his arms chained to the wall and Brennan soon found out that he was fashioned the same way.

"Hey, glad to see you awake," stated Jesse, while he struggled with his chains.

"Yeah." replied the elemental, "Any idea who's responsible?"

"Let's see. I'll give you one guess."

Brennan groaned, "Don't they make you wish Ashlocke or Eckhart were still around?"

Jesse laughed, "Yeah."

Just then, the heavy metal door opened. The two Mutant X members saw two men and one woman enter. The taller and older male stepped forward, as he was the one in charge.

"So we meet again," he stated.

Brennan struggled with his bonds. He wanted so badly to beat the crap out of this guy and his two friends.

"What? Not happy to see me?"

Jesse jumped in before Brennan could do anything stupid.

"You know if you people are as powerful as you say you are, why'd you have to send henchmen to get us? I thought you said your group works alone."

The three laughed. Then the woman, blond and average, said.

"Well, you see, we thought that if we sent those stupid idiots to retrieve you, then we could save our strength for things like this."

With that, the woman sent her fist into Jesse's stomach. He couldn't mass because the other man, a psionic, had made him think he was powerless, so he took the blow. It made him gasp for breath.

"That's enough for now Kat," the leader told the woman.

Then, the leader turned his attention back to the glaring Brennan. Brennan knew that if he made a wrong move or if the other man wanted to, he would be burned within a minute. He had seen the power that these people had when they had a confrontation the first time around. This man, who he had learned was called Blaine, was a fire elemental. The woman was apparently a feral, while the other man, Vince, was a telempath/telepath. The group had named themselves NexGen and claimed to be new mutants that wanted to others like themselves not to hide, but to live with the rest of the world.

Brennan knew that Blaine was well aware of his intention of killing him. In fact, the last time Blaine had mocked how helpless the elemental was. How he couldn't even help the woman whom he loved. He saw Blaine get a spark in his eye and before he knew it, he was an inch away from being barbecued.

He was surprised when the fire elemental retracted the ball of flame. Then his captor spoke.

"Don't worry. You aren't spared yet, in fact, I think it would be more fun when we find that beloved feral of yours and torture her even more. Yes, that would be more fun."

It was then that Brennan had a flashback.

Jesse, Emma, Shalimar and he had just been captured and were all chained to the walls, except Shalimar, who was lying on the ground. He had tried to wake Shalimar up, but couldn't since she was near the wall opposite him. The oldest mutant had been extremely worried after watching her get shot in the stomach and shoulder. He could barely make out the blood that flowed from the feral's body, but he knew and was relieved that she was still alive. At least he hoped.

Flash to the scene a few minutes later. Shalimar was awake, but weak. NexGen was in the room and Blaine was exposing Shalimar to her greatest fear. Fire. Blaine laughed, as did Kat and Vince. "This is what you get for talking back to me you little bitch!" Brennan was struggling to get to Shalimar and kill their captors. Then, he saw Blaine take out a taser and start shocking the scared feral who was still staring horrified at the flame in Blaine's other hand. He and the others were kept in check by Vince, who had abilities strong enough to project the feeling of helplessness to the remaining members of Mutant X, even Emma.

Brennan snapped back to reality and immediately tried to lunge at Blaine, who just laughed and punched him in the stomach. Then, he turned around and called to the other two members of his team.

"Come on, let's go, don't want to keep the ladies of this sorry rescue team waiting. Besides, I'm sure Brennan here would love to see his girlfriend."

NexGen laughed as they exited.

TBC

What's gonna happen now? Well, please leave a review and you'll find out.