For when the one Great Scorer comes
To write against your name,
He marks - not that you won or lost -
But how you played the game.
G. Rice
Rogue77: Time will tell. Don't worry, Things will be revealed soon enogh.
Flamingo1: *sweatdrop* So many questions. But I'll get around to answering them soon enough.
HoneyBug17:Heh. It should be. Actually it should be more fun next chapter.
Asteria: Arcane is in this chapter.
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\That was so cliché! I can't believe you! /
I rolled my eyes as I walked. Judging b the directions we got from various anonymous creatures, I was almost right below where we needed to be.
\Grim. The Reaper. But it was worth it to see the look on his face. What possessed you to tell him that anyway? /
"Well, I figured he might not know what Necromancers were, so I improvised. I just wanted to make sure I sounded scary enough to keep them away."
\I think the whole, 'tick me off and I'll hit you killer mist' thing you pulled off probably scared them worse than the codename. Are we keeping it? /
"Probably for now. I can't see us keeping it though."
\Too true. /
I stopped below a manhole cover. It was night. I couldn't even see the stars.
"Next stop: A guy who's gonna be seriously sorry he ever messed with us."
\I wanna beat him up! / Dahk said happily.
"We have to get information first."
\Info Shminfo. Who cares? He just needs a butt-kicking! /
"I care. Behave yourself."
Dahk grumbled something I couldn't hear. I smiled and climbed up the ladder, shoving the cover aside with great effort. Cupcake stood below, watching me climb out. I poked my head back over the lip after I climber out and beckoned to him.
It was amazing that the sound of him tearing off a piece of concrete so he could worm his way to the top wasn't heard by anyone.
We were in an alleyway, with graffiti painted in bad words and symbols I couldn't recognize. There were broken bottles everywhere, and my breath hissed against my teeth as my bare feet kept on coming into contact with shards. Cupcake stayed close to me, huddled as if he were just a baby, which in a way he was.
Sudden loud banging noises caught our attention. I led Cupcake back into the shadows and watched as some guys in black coats exited a building. They were just young guys, but they acted as if they were tre cool. They had several packages in their possession, brown. Judging by the way one of them was acting, it had to be drugs. They laughed and carried on as they left the alleyway in the opposite direction of us. I looked over at where they had come from. Cupcake needed a place to stay. It wouldn't do for him to wander around in New York after me.
I walked carefully towards the door. My feet had gotten bloody and dirty. The door was unlocked.
"Come on Sweety, we're gonna stay here for awhile."
Men?
"Oh, I wouldn't worry about those guys." I walked in. It was quite a shock to the remaining guys in the building. An even more surprise when my little treasure walked in too.
"You have a choice." I announced. "You may leave or we will make you. Savvy?"
The guys looked like they were about to argue until Cupcake stood up to his full height, which is a whopping eight and a half feet. They decided discretion was the better part of valor and ran. They squeezed past my baby and took off down the alley.
The place was just a go between, there were no labs or products. It was pretty nicely furnished. I checked the fridge. There was a bunch of hamburgers from Mickey Dee's and a cherry pie, store bought. I unwrapped the burgers and the pie and set it out on the table in front of Cupcake while I explored the rest of the apartment.
It was simple, a kitchen, a closet with clothes, a living room with a couch and TV, a bathroom, a bedroom with nothing in it. Unless one counted the gun taped over the doorjamb. I left it. No sense taking it down, my skill with guns was less than legendary.
I walked back to the kitchen. Cupcake was curled up on the floor. I glanced at the table.
"I like cherry pie too." He had eaten the entire cherry pie and some of the burgers. I patted him on the nose. "Go to sleep and guard this place when I leave, alright? I need to walk around in the city in the morning."
I come.
"I think not. I need you here, if we lose this place we may lose each other. I don't want to lose you. So you need to stay here."
He snuggled down and fell asleep. I went to the bathroom and cleaned the cuts on my feet and took a shower. I pulled the bandage that had been keeping up residence around my head for several days off and threw it into the trash. I should have been starving, but I wasn't. The dirt and grime and grim feelings washed away with the water. I stepped out of the shower and grabbed a towel which was oddly enough folded in clean, albeit the same way they are in the stores, and wrapped it around myself as I dug through the closet for some clothes. I picked out a pair of brown pants and a black T-shirt, and put them on. I did some more searching and came up with a pair of boots and some socks. I put them down near the couch and went back to exploring. I found a brown back pack with tags still on it and stuffed set it next to the couch as well. More searching led to the discovery of several thousand dollars hidden under a secret panel in the floor. I cleaned it out and stuffed it into the bag. Then I lay down on the couch for a rest.
Tomorrow begins the hunt.
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"Bayville High school bug problems? There's a front line you don't see everyday," He mused as he flipped through the paper. "Sudden appearance…settling in one area…why does this have all the ear markings of a mutant empath?" He asked no one, as indeed, there was no one there.
Arcane folded up the newspaper with a sort of deliberate thoughtfulness. "I don't suppose Danny decided to make Bayville into a home for all bugs…It has her written all over it."
He got up and stretched. Then he walked over towards the car dealership. He would need a car if he was going to get to Bayville.
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Evan leaped up the steps to the institute and burst in at three o'clock in the morning.
"Hey! Auntie O!" His yelling and general noise got several people, including Ororo, to run into the main hall.
"Spike!" jean hugged him around the neck. He gave her a slight hug and then ran over to his Aunt.
"Auntie O, this freaky mutant chick just showed up in Morlock territory! She's super creepy! She had this Frankenstein thing walking after her and-"
"Evan! Calm yourself. What did she look like?"
"She had real short brown hair, and she was really thin, like she hadn't eaten for a year and she had blue eyes and lots of freckles…"
"Danny." Scott whispered.
"Who?" Evan looked at them confusedly.
"Danny is a new mutant. She's been acting very strangely, like she isn't Danny anymore." Jean informed him.
"What's goin' on?" One of Danny's baby sisters poked her head over the banister. Jean floated up towards her quickly.
"Nothing dear…why don't you go back to sleep, I'll read to you," she said assuringly as she ushered the child back to bed.
Ray stood back a bit. "That was Danny's sister. They came when she fell into a coma about three weeks ago. A couple days ago she woke up and left the hospital and then disappeared into the sewers. We wanted to warn you but we couldn't find you."
"What's her power?" Evan asked.
"Animal speech. But I think it's changing pretty fast for some reason. And she's less than accepting towards anyone who gets close to her." Scott filled in.
"Tell me everything." Evan said.
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I got up happily. Today was the day!
\Don't go overboard. /
"You're such a killjoy," I informed Danny as I rolled off the couch. Nobody had tried to get back in. Or they did and discovered why you shouldn't burst in on a sleeping patchwork Sweetie.
I put on socks over my feet, which stung terribly. I ran into the bathroom to look at my hair, but judged that there wasn't anything to look at. It was far too short to do anything with. Plus the fact that most of the hair on the sides of my head had been shaved off. It was just growing back and it itched. But it was clean, due to Danny's pickiness. She always liked having her hair clean. And now it was shiny and flake free.
I wandered back to the living room and put the shoes on, which were too big for me. I left the bag in the care of Cupcake, who had gotten up and was watching me work. I patted him on the muzzle.
"Be good—make sure nobody gets in here, alright?"
Okay.
"I'll bring you back a cherry pie." I told him as I took a small bit of money from the stash I had in the bag. I stuffed it into my pockets and walked out the door.
The hunt begins. And I would find the prize.
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Looks like Dahk is back again!
Tune in next time:
Gathering info
Juju will take reviews today! I have decided that he will take reviews for a few chapters.
Juju: Rub Juju's head for good luck!
….Scary….Any who, please review!