Okay, I promised three chappies, but I've been taking care of a sick baby for two days straight in a hotel that hates anyone under the age of 35. Excuses, excuses, I know. Don't feel sorry for me. I probably passed the germs to my brother anyway. Please forgive me and accept these two measly chapters.
If it makes you feel better, the next chapter is a Remy POV.
***
The two mutants had switched trains for the third and final time. Someone had once told Kitty that taking the train was the most restful way to travel. He had obviously never ridden with Mystique.
Training with the blue woman was torture, often quite literally. An hour with her felt like solid week of one-on-one with the Wolverine. A six hours straight and then another twelve with Mystique turned the girl into a wreck. Yet she had made progress, unbelievable progress. Simply put, Kitty was years ahead of where she had been only a day and a half ago.
It seemed to be a miracle. At least the results did. Her body felt like a thousand curses had been placed upon her. Katherine supposed there were only two true miracles. One was that she was still breathing. The second miracle was that Mystique hadn't transformed Lance into a walking warrior. Katherine had been shocked when she learned her new teacher had taken in the boy. At least it explained why he had suddenly shown up in Bayville. Bayville…
The girl berated herself for thinking of the past. She barely even allowed herself to think of Kurt, and he was the reason she was polishing her skills with Mystique, as the older mutant put it. Katherine herself thought of it as completing torture training. Kurt, the demonic blue Furbie she could barely stand, had become a friend she would risk life itself for. What had caused the change of heart didn't matter. Wasn't it enough that she cared for him now?
The needle bit in the girl's right arm and she fought valiantly to remain in control. In and out the tiny bit of metal jabbed. It was the least of her worries, however.
Katherine sat on the floor of the newest train car. There were perhaps twenty steel rods impaling her. Most of them went through vital organs. If she lost control, she wouldn't lose tiny chunks of skin and receive only light scars, she would be dead. The relentless jabbing from the needle threatened her concentration with each puncture. Katherine desperately wanted to phase the arm out and away from the reach of the pain. But Kurt…
The image of the blue boy curled up unconscious on a bed in a metal cell came to her. All Mystique had to do was throw a switch and deadly gas would fill his prison.
It infuriated Katherine as she fought to think how a person who could teleport could possible be held prisoner. It seemed impossible. No wall could stop him. After a moment, the Shadowcat shook her head, feeling the coolness of the metal chill her brain.
What wall could stop her? What physical thing could stop her? Nothing, but she was still caged. Blackmail: that could imprison a teleporter, that could freeze a girl who walked through walls in her tracks. The only question remaining was: how was Mystique controlling Kurt? After another moment, Katherine shook her head again. She was putting too much into it. Keep a person drugged enough and it didn't matter if they couldn't be contained. She knew it was very hard to teleport or phase while unconscious, past experience of waking up in the basement put aside. Even then it had only been during a nightmare when her powers were first waking up. From what she knew, Kurt had been teleporting for years and such accidents would not occur.
The needle stopped. Startled out of her thoughts, Kitty nearly went solid. Mystique grabbed the arm that had taken the torture and pulled her from the assortment of metal bars. Brusquely, the older mutant cleaned off the wound and examined the flesh. "Yes, I suppose that will do."
What did she mean by that? Katherine looked at her arm. A midnight blue M stared back at her from the irritated skin.
She looked up incredulously. "You gave me a tattoo?"
Mystique ignored her. The redhead stood and gestured for her pupil to follow suit. While walking towards the tiny kitchenette in the corner, she breezed, "Of course I did. Surely you can see that. Now you know why I told you to keep that arm perfectly still. Come here."
Katherine stood but didn't move. She felt a nerve ticking in her forehead. Folding her arms, she glared into yellow eyes. "I apologize, Mystique, Raven, Sensei Darkholme, whoever the Hell you really are. I wasn't exactly clear before. What I meant to say was: Why the fuck did you give me a tattoo!" She felt like a cattle just given the prod, like the poor beast that had become the steak Mystique had forced her to eat earlier. She was a branded animal line up for slaughter.
The blue woman quirked an eyebrow, otherwise unfazed. "To conduct an experiment," she quipped with something deadly in her light tone. "Come here so I can test the theory."
Katherine walked docilely towards the monster. What did a lamb do when her shepherd wanted mutton for dinner? Did she run away? Did she attack him? No, she walked docilely towards the monster. She paused a moment to mentally kick her imagination, and then walked towards Mystique slowly.
"Hold out you arm over the basin."
Katherine did.
"Ghost your arm but not the ink."
Katherine did. Mystique poured a pitcher of water through her arm and the ink washed away with it down into the sink. It drained away harmlessly, leaving the girl's skin unblemished as ever. Her arm was still raw, but it would go away.
"It seems the term permanent tattoo is a misnomer," Mystique said with a slight smirk. "At least for you." Katherine scowled.
The blue woman led her into a different box car and pointed to a chair surrounded by machinery. "We'll be spending the rest of the day building an alibi for you. I believe a large tattoo on the left arm, a spiral around the right wrist and forearm, and something on the back and neck will work nicely."
Katherine cringed. "How would tattoos give me an alibi? Why do I need an alibi."
"Video cameras, possible witnesses," the teacher replied coolly to her student. "If the enemy is looking for you, then the less you resemble the wanted picture, the better. For me, it is no matter. I simply change my face." She morphed into a younger Principal Darkholme in jeans and a sweater to cement the point. She continued her lecture. "We must be more creative with you."
Mystique became a Katherine Pryde covered in tattoos with a serious attitude. Biker Katherine pointed at exhausted Katherine. "Permanent tattoos Katherine, that is how you avoid getting caught. They will look for someone with a panther tattooed on her arm: me, and pass this by." She morphed into sweet little Kitty complete with pink sweater and perky ponytail. Kitty took off the dreaded sweater and showed off perfect untouched skin. A small voice murmured wistfully in the back of Katherine's head, 'Like, I wish my breasts were that big.'
Katherine squashed the Kitty persona. Silently, she admitted tattoos were a good idea, especially if she got caught red-handed doing whatever Mystique wanted her to do. Yes, it was, but she rubbed her aching arm. Mystique –back in blue skin- put a hand on her hip. "Really. Will this hurt more than the tomb that fell on you?"
"No," the teenager admitted.
"Then you have nothing to complain about. The machines will hold your arm in place, so I want you to play with this in the meantime." She tossed something to Katherine.
Pryde looked down at the gun in her hands. It was rather heaver. She had always though a pistol would be light. Pistols looked light and silly, especially next to rifles. The seemed harmless. In her grip, the gun felt deadly. Mystique went on, "Memorize that position. The safety is off, the gun is loaded, and it is ready to fire. Never aim a gun if it isn't set up like that. It's suicide if you do. Sit down now."
Katherine dropped into the chair and let Mystique clamp down her left arm. What do you want me to do," she brandished the pistol, "with this?" She clenched her teeth as a needle stung her arm. The arm went numb and she relaxed a bit. At least she would have anesthesia for her tattoo that time.
"I want you to get used to it, Katherine. It's a mistake to look awkward with a gun. A weapon of any kind, for that matter. A person who looks uncomfortable with a piece of metal death in her hands is forced to shoot to show her resolve. Something tells me you don't want to shoot."
The machine whirled to life and Katherine felt an odd tickle of her left arm. She hoisted the pistol up and aimed it at a target set conspicuously into the wall. "I assume this thing only shoots blanks."
She pulled the trigger and then there was a small dent in the target, dead in the black. The recoil wasn't very much at all, but her sore arm didn't like it. Her ears rang a little from the noise. "I also assume this car is soundproof."
Even though Katherine couldn't see it, the smile was apparent in Mystique's voice. "Of course to both assumptions. You've played with guns before."
The deceptively simple statement demanded an explanation. The Shadowcat sighed and slid the safety on, a difficult task with one aching hand. She looked sadly at the target she had just killed. She had shot it straight though the heart, just like before. Quietly, she began to speak.
"My dad, he's a hunter. A beer drinking, football fanatic hunter. He always wanted a boy or six, but mom couldn't have any more kids. He made the best of it and taught me to hunt instead.
"It was great. As you can see, I'm a dead shot. Dad was always so proud of me. It really brought us close together in a way most fathers and daughters can't have.
"When I was little, we fished. Then we shot birds, waterfowl and pheasant. Then I finally was old enough for the big game.
"Dad took me deer hunting in northern Wisconsin. It was beautiful up there. The buck was huge."
Kitty turned off the safety, aimed, and fired.
"I shot it, shot it dead. Damn if it wasn't the biggest thing I'd ever seen. The way it seemed to stare at me, though. Those eyes looked right into mine and asked why, why would I do such a thing? I felt sick to my stomach. I sucked it up for Dad, though. He was so proud."
Another shot, another bull's-eye.
"We went home. Mom made a sort of celebratory meal of the buck. I though I was over it."
She laughed and fired again.
"I took one look at that meat on my plate and I saw two dewy eyes staring at me. I saw Katherine Pryde at four years old, asking her Daddy why her doggie wouldn't wake up. I saw her at age ten, stopping when she saw a nestling that had fallen from its nest to bury it under the leaves. I saw her when I fired the gun at the buck. She was the deer and I shot her dead."
The gunshot accented her statement.
"I saw Katherine Pryde, her flesh, stare up at me from my plate."
Katherine leaned back and the tattoo machine moved with her. "We moved to a different part of the state soon after. I left Katherine behind, buried under the leaves. I became Kitty, the perky girlie-girl who would never touch a gun and couldn't stand the sight of meat. Even then I couldn't forget.
"For months I dreamed I was running from a hunter, though a graveyard of all things. I had forgotten that by the time I came to Bayville, can you believe. It always ended with me in a coffin: mine. Is that irony? Jesus."
Mystique chuckled in a way that could be described as kindly, had the laugher been a different person. "And the record says you are Jewish."
"I'm a Jew who believes in Christ. I sort of relate to him, I guess. My dream came true. I'm dead. Dead to the world and the Institute, anyway, if what you told me about this earpiece is true. There's nothing holy about me, but I'm a ghost. I'm not Kitty anymore, she died in that graveyard. I'm Katherine resurrected from her gave underneath the leaves. The question is, when this is over, will I go back to my life or stay a ghost?
"I'm tired of mall crowds and dozens of friends I barely know. The fits of depression, the urge to seclude myself, I had thought it was just normal teen angst. Now I just cant' help but wonder if I'm meant to be a Ghost and leave the world behind."
The machine released Katherine's arm and she studied the Black Panther lounging on her slightly scarred skin.
"That was fast," she mused.
Mystique said plainly, "it's a machine's work. Technology is fast. It will hurt like Hell when the pain killer wears off."
The woman went to the machine and started working at the console. "Don't," she said, out of the blue.
"What?"
Mystique let the machine start on Katherine's right arm. "Don't seclude yourself from the world. Listen to yourself. You have let fear make rash decisions that compromise who you are. You are compassionate and emotional, but you turn it into a weakness. Look at what you've accomplished because you care for one person. That is your strength.
Lose it and you'll become a specter. People will fear you, priests will attempt to exorcise you, believe me when I say you will be forced to hide from the world. You'll watch everything you ever cared about slip through your fingers, leaving only death."
Mystique sighed and walked away. At the door, she stopped. "When you arm is finished, begin the exercises I showed you earlier. Think about what I said. You still have a life to go back to when this is over."
The door shut behind her. Katherine studied the cardboard target. Numbly, she raised the gun in her left hand and fired. She looked at her handiwork. It looked like she had made one bull's-eye, not six.
"Like riding a damn bicycle," she muttered and threw the gun to the floor. Her left arm began to bite with pain and the prickling sensation on her right wrist was maddening. With no shots left, she had nothing to do but wait. And think.
~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*
Mystique sat in a chair, studying her child on the computer screen. "Good morning, my little Echil," she whispered to the scanned cave painting of her firstborn. She touched a button and the hundreds of renderings of her children began to flash. She said hello to each, fighting to keep up with the computer's pace. The images of scanned paintings, sketches, sculptures, and very few photographs cycled so fast that the mother gave up and just thought each name as the renderings went past.
Finally, the images were done and the last page stayed there. Mystique smiled at the little blue spaded tail curled about her image's wrist. She reached out and touched the little girl in the other painting scanned onto the screen. "You never knew me, my daughter who isn't, my little Southern Belle. The only thing I ask is that you remember me when this is over."
