The X-Men aren't mine, so don't be surprised if you don't see Claremont - quality story lines



Dysis sat in her lab, drumming her fingers against the side of her face, which held an uncomparable grimace. It was uncharacteristic of her to be in such a situation - outside of leading or acting or somehow being productive, the idea of straight out scheming was long lost on her. She found herself at a loss. Experiment after experiment was lacking success, and she knew why... she wasn't working with the right stock.

"A mutant," she thought to herself. The experiments had always been on humans... she had seen them as lesser creatures all her life, as they acted merely as servants to her will. However, she could not isolate the genes to enhance a human's physical prowess as much as she needed for her purposes. A mutant though... studies on mutants have existed for many years, especially recently. Nearly the entire genome was broken down by one scientist or another. The alteration of a single gene would be simple of a genius of her magnitude.

A simple heist. She wasn't fond of such... antics. In light of the way things have been going though, she didn't see much of an option. And short cuts were always nice, especially upon achieving something she deemed necessary.. Dysis stood up and paced across the lab, looking towards her servants as they watched TV and stuffed their faces. A grumble murmured deep in her throat. Yes... this was necessary.

* * *


An older man looking to be in his late 50s walked into the room. Despite his age, he appeared to be in excellent shape, with well-formed arms sticking out of the sleeves of a sweeping black trenchcoat, and a solid jawline being one of the few accents on his face. The trenchcoat itself seemed to pull him towards the shadows, and those who saw him come in naturally drew their focus away from him, whether they wanted to be paying attention to him or not. He looked over to the door leading to the backroom and headed towards it, opening it to find a flight of stairs and followed them down.

Touch found himself in the basement of a pub on Main Street. Though he was a heavyweight when it came to drinking, it was not on his agenda tonight. Bills were coming in and money was hard, and whenever that happened, he could always resort to Andrew Fontaine, one of the most personable and professional crime lords on the East Coast, and a fan of the work that Touch has done for him in the past.

"Alright, here's the building," Fontaine pointed to the blue prints, spilling is coffee over the corner of gigantic piece of paper.

"Having me break in through that brown murky lake," Touch murmured sarcastically, lifting the floor plan up and letting the coffee drip over the edge of it. "We don't need to get you a bib, do we Andy?"

Fontaine smiled, but looked back down at the slightly soiled blue prints as Touch placed them back down and continued with his speech. "Here's the building. It's a really easy in-and-out job, and I don't expect too many problems with you on it. There's just two things."

"Last time it was two things, it was 'defcon four security system' and 'live guards at every corner'," Touch mentioned with a hint of sarcasm. Fontaine was probably the only guy Touch said more than five words to in a sentence, but even with him, they came out cynically. Fontaine couldn't help smiling, though he knew that hint of sarcasm was just a hint, covered by a thick coat of professional standards in crime and a great amount of experience in his field.

"Well, I won't play around than. Thing one is we've had these guys tapped for a few days now in preparation, and it seems like there's already been someone spotted scoping the place out, and it wasn't our guy... so keep your eye out. Thing two is not a sound... the place shouldn't be too bad to get into, but the guards are the best of the best, and that's where you'll lose it."

"What's the grab?"

"It's actually quite priceless, in essence. It happens to be from a ra-"

"What's my grab?" Touch said shortly.

"Oh... um, 10, standard." Fontaine replied. Touch stood, nodding in acceptance. "Just send recon info in a bit?"

Fontaine got quiet and nodded silently, giving up the desire to be jovial. His comrade was strange at times... more often than not, a sense of humor would shine through after Fontaine joked around a bit, but it wasn't to be today. Fortunately, these moods were when Touch did some of his best work. He watched the older man walk away with his trench coat flowing behind him. He was definitely in his zone.

As his "business partner" left, he grabbed a phone and dialed a few numbers, sending a few orders out to have the floor plans and a few timing notes sent out to Touch. Fontaine leaned back in his chair and thought for a moment... he'd done thousands of these jobs in his time, and yet... there was something about this one. He shruged it off as just nerves - that happened every so often - and got back to finishing up his other deals from the past week.