Disclaimer: I do not own, nor am I making any money from, the X-Men movie-
verse. Duncan and Hana belong to Corrinth, as does Ilehana Xavier should
she be mentioned. Star owns Golan, should he be mentioned too. All other
OCs belong to me, especially Blaze and Jessie.
A/N: Post X2 spoilers, and spoilers for Corrinth's Guardians of Destiny, which incidentally is excellent so go read it! Reviews always appreciated.
Scene 13
The room was in shadow almost absolute except for the flickering screen of the computer terminal. Periodically the figure who was working this late into the night would reach out and tap the touch-screen technology to flick over a page of the database, or to highlight a piece of text. If it hadn't been for Logan's exquisite sense of hearing as he wandered to corridors of the X-Men lair he wouldn't have known there was anyone here.
The reason for his late-night wanderings grumbled wearily in his arms. Though now finally and blissfully dozing, Hana had been near to screaming the building down a scant half-hour ago. Somehow the dull, throbbing acid white lights of the underground labyrinth soothed the child as much as her father's arms around her. Instinctively Logan pulled his daughter closer to him as the door to the darkened room slid open. Sniffing before spoke he identified the occupant with ease, charred carbon and smoke like the morning after a bonfire......... Blaze.
"Working late or up to your old tricks?" Wolverine asked in a strangely soft voice. Blaze spun her chair around to greet him, clicking her fingers together to produce a fireball torch so she could see him and his precious burden.
"Just doing my job, Logan." Blaze replied, barely making a whisper herself but knowing he could hear her fine. "The job the Professor gave me long before Cyclops decided it was the principle's responsibility."
"Uh-huh." Logan grunted amicably, leaning over her shoulder to glance at the screen. Kids files, lots of 'em, that Blaze wasn't cleared to shuffle through just like that. "And what job's that? You gotta admit it don't look good for you right now."
"Assimilating information. Looking for patterns, abnormalities, anything that could be something more than it seems. You and Gambit bring in some fantastic information on your travels, but its useless unless someone who knows what they're doing runs an eye over it."
"You don't think old Cyc upstairs knows what he's doin' then? What make you so sure he's missin' stuff?"
"I know he can't do this as well as I can, Logan, and so do you. I used to do this for a living remember; make my money from information gleaned from nothing. And I know he's missing stuff too, because I've already found it."
For a few seconds Blaze flicked the screen, pulling up passages of text, signatures and photographs. Logan simply pulled up a chair and settled the dreaming Hana more comfortably against his arm and chest. He could smell her sleepiness; hear her so soft breathing rasping like a miracle through her nose as she gave a gentle snore. He smiled despite himself.
"Jessie isn't the only child over the last year to be pulled out of the school on the advice of a medical specialist." Blaze began, bringing Wolverine out of his paternal drifting. "More never even made it this far. There are parents who objected that we couldn't help their child as much as we claimed. You know we don't push cases like that, they know we are here if they need us, and so the files on them aren't brilliant."
"What's your point?" Logan asked. "You seem to have just answered your own worries, this stuff happens all the time."
"That's just it, Logan. That's why I can't just ask Scott's permission to go rifling through the students' files like this. It happens too often for him to be worried. So instead I've hacked onto the system, and I have found something. In eight cases, not including Jessica, a male specialist advised parents against getting involved with the Xavier School."
"So?" Wolverine scowled. "There are a lotta male doctors out there kid."
"Yes, and true enough the same name is never mentioned twice. Which is why Scott hasn't spotted the link. But it is the same man, I'm sure of it. Letters of the signatures match each other, here and here on the 'A', again on this one and this with the 'R', you see? And there are some discrepancies in the written stuff too, particular phrases that occur in multiple reports." There was energy in Blaze's words that Logan had not heard from her in a long time, she knew she was onto something big here.
"These differences in Jessica's files too?"
"Yes." Logan felt the air thicken with Blaze's irrational fear for her daughter.
"The Cajun know yet?"
"No, but we had an inkling so he's getting set up in California to find out what he can there about the doctor Jessica was seeing, this McMahon bloke. And if there's any word on what a doctor could be doing with recently empowered children........." Blaze shuddered as her over-active imagination filled in too many gaps. "I'm flying out to meet him as soon as I'm sure there's nothing else I'm missing here. I wish it didn't have to be this way, but Scott's already made up his mind."
"You're forgetting something there Blaze." Logan met his friend's eyes as she glanced from the computer screen to father and child. "Cyclops don't speak for all of us. Gumbo was right, some things are bigger than the X- Men, an' I got a feeling this may be one of 'em."
xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
Night fell in LA like a second dawn of neon lights and incessant sirens. Gambit moved over the rooftops, avoiding the dangerous streets and alleyways below him. He jogged, knowing exactly where he was going, lodging his pole against the roof of one building to allow him to swing onto the next. He'd been here three days, gotten the lay of the land, and now someone had told him an old acquaintance might have the information Gambit was looking for. Information on who was trying to hurt his daughter.........
Alarm sensors on the fire escape door were easily short-circuited. The lock was nothing to Gambit's explosive power, barely even making a noise as it popped and the door swung open. The inside was dull even compared to the sultry lights of the city at night. The Cajun's eyes narrowed in the seconds it took them to adjust to this new limit of darkness. Then he entered, silently as a cat, one slow step at a time down the steep stairs, alert and attentive.
The acquaintance's apartment was the door nearest to the fire escape, nearest to a bolthole. Gambit could understand the man's fears, but scoffed at his lack of intelligence. The Cajun had sneaked up on him without any trouble, and the criminal he sought now had eight floors to descend to make it to the front door. Muffled sounds came from behind the plain, battered door. The TV was on, a hiss was a beer bottle opening, and the creak was a small man leaning back in an old sofa. Shrew was completely oblivious.
"Knock knock." Gambit offered as he popped another lock and swung the door open, trench coat billowing around him as he stalked into the room. The wood made a satisfying crunch as it slammed back in the hole behind him. The aging, balding mutant in the chair stuttered meaningless words as his bland black eyes bulged in their sockets. Never very stylish, Gambit smirked to see how Shrew had let himself go over the years. A beer belly contradicted the skinniness of the rest of him. He wore moth eaten slippers and a woollen cardigan that could once have been green or brown. But most of all he clearly was not impressed to see the ex-thief in his apartment.
"Gambit!" Shrew finally found a way to knock a real word out, "What? I mean......... Why? Where's Blaze?" There was real terror in his voice as Shrew hastily turned his head this way and that, sniffing for the fiery mutant as if he expected her to melt her way through from the kitchen any second. Gambit smiled thinly, knowing how afraid Shrew was of the woman who had nearly killed him. He could use this.
"She's around." Remy offered vaguely. "Word is you been being busy, Shrew. Thought you would've retired from dis game long ago?"
Satisfied that Blaze was not for the moment about to burn down his home, Shrew found a little cheek to snipe back at Gambit with. "Lets just say my pension plans fell through like the bullet you put in Jacobi's head."
"Huh." Gambit grunted, taking two measured strides across the cheap lino to stand over the rodent-like mutant. Shrew grinned a toothy, nervous smile and clambered over the back of the chair to put it between him and the Cajun. Enough small talk, Remy thought, or this loser'll bolt. "What you know about doctors getting involved with mutant kids, Shrew?"
"You payin'?" Shrew quipped, eyeing up his escape route to the door. "I ain't saying nothin' unless you're payin'."
"You owe me Shrew. I keep lettin' you live."
"I thought not." Shrew snapped, breaking for the door like a disturbed rat for the safety of the sewers. Gambit lunged after him, but he jinked away from the other man's grasp. Suddenly the door flew open again, and a beautiful redhead smiled amicably at Shrew as he fell to the floor, backing away and squeaking in terror.
"Hello Shrew." Blaze enjoyed tormenting the little man; the backstabbing scum would sell his mother's soul for a quick buck. She strode forward into the room, stiletto boot heels clicking contentedly on the lino. Shrew scuttled backwards on his hands as she did, sensitive nose twitching frantically at the smell of fire. "Not playing nicely my old friend? Maybe I can loosen your tongue........."
"No! Don't touch me!" Shrew dragged himself to his feet as behind him Gambit folded his arms and waited. "I don't know much I swear, but I'll tell you who might know more! Gambit please, call her off........."
Gambit let Blaze open a palmful of fire inches from Shrew's terrified face before he spoke her name as a warning. Blaze grinned at her love as she pulled the fire back into herself, enjoying her role as his hired muscle.
"Get talkin' Shrew." Gambit ordered as Shrew was forced to turn and face him, putting his vulnerable back to Blaze.
"All I know is there's a gang leader downtown who's real interested right now in mutant kiddies. You know, fresh ones, no records, unwanted........."
"That's old news, Shrew. The underworld been suckin' kids like that in since I was a eight-year-old pickpocket." Gambit replied, but Shrew wasn't done.
"Not like this they ain't. Shark's payin' big money to a doctor or something to hunt the kiddies down. But Shark ain't in control of it either; the doctor's a freelance with his own motives no doubt. I don't know his name, Shark the only one round here who knows how to contact the man."
"How did you learn about this, Shrew?" Blaze inquired gently. "You're not going to run to Shark now and tell him we're on our way to see him are you? Because if you were........." The chair Shrew had been sat in before now started to smoulder at a nod from the fire elemental.
"No, no." Shrew contradicted hastily. "I know where you can find him though, but it wont be easy to get an audience. He's got a nightclub, the Fishtank; he'll be there most nights........."
Blaze and Gambit headed for the door on that, both processing what they had learned quickly. Behind them Shrew stood hesitantly between the departing ex-thieves and the smouldering upholstery.
"Hey! Ain't you gonna put this thing out for me? Blaze? Please?"
Gambit casually flicked an ace of spades back into the room, closing the door behind them as it landed softly on the burning cushion. The ensuing explosion put out the fire as all oxygen was blown away from the gasping flames. Unfortunately when Shrew came round after the blast had knocked his head against the wall, it was proved to also have been the end of his beloved chair.
A/N: Post X2 spoilers, and spoilers for Corrinth's Guardians of Destiny, which incidentally is excellent so go read it! Reviews always appreciated.
Scene 13
The room was in shadow almost absolute except for the flickering screen of the computer terminal. Periodically the figure who was working this late into the night would reach out and tap the touch-screen technology to flick over a page of the database, or to highlight a piece of text. If it hadn't been for Logan's exquisite sense of hearing as he wandered to corridors of the X-Men lair he wouldn't have known there was anyone here.
The reason for his late-night wanderings grumbled wearily in his arms. Though now finally and blissfully dozing, Hana had been near to screaming the building down a scant half-hour ago. Somehow the dull, throbbing acid white lights of the underground labyrinth soothed the child as much as her father's arms around her. Instinctively Logan pulled his daughter closer to him as the door to the darkened room slid open. Sniffing before spoke he identified the occupant with ease, charred carbon and smoke like the morning after a bonfire......... Blaze.
"Working late or up to your old tricks?" Wolverine asked in a strangely soft voice. Blaze spun her chair around to greet him, clicking her fingers together to produce a fireball torch so she could see him and his precious burden.
"Just doing my job, Logan." Blaze replied, barely making a whisper herself but knowing he could hear her fine. "The job the Professor gave me long before Cyclops decided it was the principle's responsibility."
"Uh-huh." Logan grunted amicably, leaning over her shoulder to glance at the screen. Kids files, lots of 'em, that Blaze wasn't cleared to shuffle through just like that. "And what job's that? You gotta admit it don't look good for you right now."
"Assimilating information. Looking for patterns, abnormalities, anything that could be something more than it seems. You and Gambit bring in some fantastic information on your travels, but its useless unless someone who knows what they're doing runs an eye over it."
"You don't think old Cyc upstairs knows what he's doin' then? What make you so sure he's missin' stuff?"
"I know he can't do this as well as I can, Logan, and so do you. I used to do this for a living remember; make my money from information gleaned from nothing. And I know he's missing stuff too, because I've already found it."
For a few seconds Blaze flicked the screen, pulling up passages of text, signatures and photographs. Logan simply pulled up a chair and settled the dreaming Hana more comfortably against his arm and chest. He could smell her sleepiness; hear her so soft breathing rasping like a miracle through her nose as she gave a gentle snore. He smiled despite himself.
"Jessie isn't the only child over the last year to be pulled out of the school on the advice of a medical specialist." Blaze began, bringing Wolverine out of his paternal drifting. "More never even made it this far. There are parents who objected that we couldn't help their child as much as we claimed. You know we don't push cases like that, they know we are here if they need us, and so the files on them aren't brilliant."
"What's your point?" Logan asked. "You seem to have just answered your own worries, this stuff happens all the time."
"That's just it, Logan. That's why I can't just ask Scott's permission to go rifling through the students' files like this. It happens too often for him to be worried. So instead I've hacked onto the system, and I have found something. In eight cases, not including Jessica, a male specialist advised parents against getting involved with the Xavier School."
"So?" Wolverine scowled. "There are a lotta male doctors out there kid."
"Yes, and true enough the same name is never mentioned twice. Which is why Scott hasn't spotted the link. But it is the same man, I'm sure of it. Letters of the signatures match each other, here and here on the 'A', again on this one and this with the 'R', you see? And there are some discrepancies in the written stuff too, particular phrases that occur in multiple reports." There was energy in Blaze's words that Logan had not heard from her in a long time, she knew she was onto something big here.
"These differences in Jessica's files too?"
"Yes." Logan felt the air thicken with Blaze's irrational fear for her daughter.
"The Cajun know yet?"
"No, but we had an inkling so he's getting set up in California to find out what he can there about the doctor Jessica was seeing, this McMahon bloke. And if there's any word on what a doctor could be doing with recently empowered children........." Blaze shuddered as her over-active imagination filled in too many gaps. "I'm flying out to meet him as soon as I'm sure there's nothing else I'm missing here. I wish it didn't have to be this way, but Scott's already made up his mind."
"You're forgetting something there Blaze." Logan met his friend's eyes as she glanced from the computer screen to father and child. "Cyclops don't speak for all of us. Gumbo was right, some things are bigger than the X- Men, an' I got a feeling this may be one of 'em."
xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
Night fell in LA like a second dawn of neon lights and incessant sirens. Gambit moved over the rooftops, avoiding the dangerous streets and alleyways below him. He jogged, knowing exactly where he was going, lodging his pole against the roof of one building to allow him to swing onto the next. He'd been here three days, gotten the lay of the land, and now someone had told him an old acquaintance might have the information Gambit was looking for. Information on who was trying to hurt his daughter.........
Alarm sensors on the fire escape door were easily short-circuited. The lock was nothing to Gambit's explosive power, barely even making a noise as it popped and the door swung open. The inside was dull even compared to the sultry lights of the city at night. The Cajun's eyes narrowed in the seconds it took them to adjust to this new limit of darkness. Then he entered, silently as a cat, one slow step at a time down the steep stairs, alert and attentive.
The acquaintance's apartment was the door nearest to the fire escape, nearest to a bolthole. Gambit could understand the man's fears, but scoffed at his lack of intelligence. The Cajun had sneaked up on him without any trouble, and the criminal he sought now had eight floors to descend to make it to the front door. Muffled sounds came from behind the plain, battered door. The TV was on, a hiss was a beer bottle opening, and the creak was a small man leaning back in an old sofa. Shrew was completely oblivious.
"Knock knock." Gambit offered as he popped another lock and swung the door open, trench coat billowing around him as he stalked into the room. The wood made a satisfying crunch as it slammed back in the hole behind him. The aging, balding mutant in the chair stuttered meaningless words as his bland black eyes bulged in their sockets. Never very stylish, Gambit smirked to see how Shrew had let himself go over the years. A beer belly contradicted the skinniness of the rest of him. He wore moth eaten slippers and a woollen cardigan that could once have been green or brown. But most of all he clearly was not impressed to see the ex-thief in his apartment.
"Gambit!" Shrew finally found a way to knock a real word out, "What? I mean......... Why? Where's Blaze?" There was real terror in his voice as Shrew hastily turned his head this way and that, sniffing for the fiery mutant as if he expected her to melt her way through from the kitchen any second. Gambit smiled thinly, knowing how afraid Shrew was of the woman who had nearly killed him. He could use this.
"She's around." Remy offered vaguely. "Word is you been being busy, Shrew. Thought you would've retired from dis game long ago?"
Satisfied that Blaze was not for the moment about to burn down his home, Shrew found a little cheek to snipe back at Gambit with. "Lets just say my pension plans fell through like the bullet you put in Jacobi's head."
"Huh." Gambit grunted, taking two measured strides across the cheap lino to stand over the rodent-like mutant. Shrew grinned a toothy, nervous smile and clambered over the back of the chair to put it between him and the Cajun. Enough small talk, Remy thought, or this loser'll bolt. "What you know about doctors getting involved with mutant kids, Shrew?"
"You payin'?" Shrew quipped, eyeing up his escape route to the door. "I ain't saying nothin' unless you're payin'."
"You owe me Shrew. I keep lettin' you live."
"I thought not." Shrew snapped, breaking for the door like a disturbed rat for the safety of the sewers. Gambit lunged after him, but he jinked away from the other man's grasp. Suddenly the door flew open again, and a beautiful redhead smiled amicably at Shrew as he fell to the floor, backing away and squeaking in terror.
"Hello Shrew." Blaze enjoyed tormenting the little man; the backstabbing scum would sell his mother's soul for a quick buck. She strode forward into the room, stiletto boot heels clicking contentedly on the lino. Shrew scuttled backwards on his hands as she did, sensitive nose twitching frantically at the smell of fire. "Not playing nicely my old friend? Maybe I can loosen your tongue........."
"No! Don't touch me!" Shrew dragged himself to his feet as behind him Gambit folded his arms and waited. "I don't know much I swear, but I'll tell you who might know more! Gambit please, call her off........."
Gambit let Blaze open a palmful of fire inches from Shrew's terrified face before he spoke her name as a warning. Blaze grinned at her love as she pulled the fire back into herself, enjoying her role as his hired muscle.
"Get talkin' Shrew." Gambit ordered as Shrew was forced to turn and face him, putting his vulnerable back to Blaze.
"All I know is there's a gang leader downtown who's real interested right now in mutant kiddies. You know, fresh ones, no records, unwanted........."
"That's old news, Shrew. The underworld been suckin' kids like that in since I was a eight-year-old pickpocket." Gambit replied, but Shrew wasn't done.
"Not like this they ain't. Shark's payin' big money to a doctor or something to hunt the kiddies down. But Shark ain't in control of it either; the doctor's a freelance with his own motives no doubt. I don't know his name, Shark the only one round here who knows how to contact the man."
"How did you learn about this, Shrew?" Blaze inquired gently. "You're not going to run to Shark now and tell him we're on our way to see him are you? Because if you were........." The chair Shrew had been sat in before now started to smoulder at a nod from the fire elemental.
"No, no." Shrew contradicted hastily. "I know where you can find him though, but it wont be easy to get an audience. He's got a nightclub, the Fishtank; he'll be there most nights........."
Blaze and Gambit headed for the door on that, both processing what they had learned quickly. Behind them Shrew stood hesitantly between the departing ex-thieves and the smouldering upholstery.
"Hey! Ain't you gonna put this thing out for me? Blaze? Please?"
Gambit casually flicked an ace of spades back into the room, closing the door behind them as it landed softly on the burning cushion. The ensuing explosion put out the fire as all oxygen was blown away from the gasping flames. Unfortunately when Shrew came round after the blast had knocked his head against the wall, it was proved to also have been the end of his beloved chair.