*******************
Ninth Fragment ~ 'Clemency'
*******************
Elf was staring at him as he drove. It was heading into the wee small hours and everyone else was long asleep. Yet two glowing orbs hardly blinked at all, and watched.
It was damn unnerving to see the Elf in the dark. He looked like he was hardly there at all. A novice at seeing him at night would only spot the lights of his eyes if they were lucky. Logan, however, was long used to his habit of invisibility, and could pick out the parts that weren't completely transparent.
"Somethin' buggin' you, Elf?"
"Were were you?" he asked. "Where were you when they came?"
No accusations, just a simple question. "I was out gettin' supplies," he said. "'Ro wanted to cook you kids somethin' special, buck up morale. When I came back... I saw the mob, saw 'Ro get out with Porcupine... smelled the blood..." he winced. "I couldn't go an' look, Elf. I'm sorry, but I couldn't bear to look." A minute of silence. "Tearin' the mob apart wouldn't've done anything. You know that, now."
"Ja. I know." The look in his eyes had said it all. He'd tried vengeance. It hadn't tasted as good as he thought it would.
"Took me a few decades to learn *that* lesson," said Logan. "I always knew you were quick. Anyway, I dropped the supplies an' bugged outta there. Caught your scent a coupla times, early on, an' nothin' after that. Figured they'd got ya. Went lookin' for 'Ro. Been on the road ever since."
"That's all you've been doing for four years? Looking?"
"Lotta land to search, Elf. Managed to help some survivors start a settlement, but most of the time I've been scavengin' an' tradin'." He looked briefly at him. "You?"
"Scavenging," said Kurt. "I found Robyn shortly after the virus hit. I made a little home and looked after her. Buried anyone I knew. Survived."
Logan nodded. He knew that song.
"They cut Jean's throat," he said. "She wore herself out protecting them, and they walked right up to her and cut her throat. Scott must have been distracted. A fatal moment. They shot him twice and let him bleed. They shot the Professor..." One hand touched the middle of his forehead. "Shotgun. Point blank."
Logan winced again. He knew what that did to a body. He knew what finding the bodies must have done to the Elf. _God, I'm too sorry, Elf. I shoulda done it for ya. Let you keep your innocence one more day. I shoulda stayed. Shoulda fought. Shoulda died with 'em..._ He'd had roughly two hundred years of surviving, and knowing when to cut and run. It was a tough habit to break.
"They finished Scott off afterwards. And some bastard cut off his hand for a keepsake. I never found Evan or Ororo." He sighed. "At least they got a Christian burial."
And the human race was still paying for that one year of madness. What a sad, battered world they'd all made.
It had taken four years, but some folks were picking up the pieces and making good.
*******************
She stumbled along without looking at many landmarks. They were difficult to see in the dust, and her eyes itched if she opened them too wide. All she knew was that she was on the right road. The minister had said so.
Cracked tarmac slashed her feet on many occasions, but the soles were well worn and hard. A result of travelling cross-country without shoes, no doubt. Her skin was leathery in places, where it'd been exposed to the elements. She didn't care. Aesthetic beauty was something consigned to the past. She had no need of it anymore. No need for anything.
Except the path home, of course.
She passed many places - dark, desolate, dead. They offered up no survivors, and she went on, stopping only long enough to raid nearby homes for food that she tore at whilst still on the move. There was no time for rest. No time for sleep. No time for anything, save plodding onwards towards her destination.
She came upon it quite suddenly. It seemed she'd fallen into a waking dream again, her mind cloudy with thoughts not her own, for when she looked up, tall buildings ringed her sight, leering over at her like a canopy of bricks and glass. The tarmac river became wider, and marked with various lines that criss-crossed beneath her feet like snakes. A pavement appeared, smashed and broken, but *there* all the same, and from it sprang dusty lampposts and pillar-boxes, besmirched with grime and filth.
Then she saw it. A single white placard hanging haphazardly from its roost. The bottom half had long since been lost, but enough writing remained for her to gasp with happiness.
_Welcome to Bayville_
"Bayville...." she whispered, and quickened her step.
She'd done it. She'd returned.
But not quite yet. There were still a few more streets to travel before she truly reached her journey's end, and she sped through them at such an unswerving pace that it was difficult to believe she'd ever been away.
Then, there it was. The Boarding House hove into view, and she all but ran up the driveway to the door. It swung open on its hinge, but she didn't care. She'd finally done it!
She was home.
But wait! Something was strange. Something was... wrong.
Where was everybody?
The house stood empty and deserted, thick puddles of dust testament to the absence of people for a considerably long time. She ran in, making footprints as she went, and burst into the kitchen.
Nothing.
The sitting room. There was always somebody in the sitting room. The TV in her memories blared relentlessly, and a small green figure was always curled up on the sofa, laughing at some gameshow or Spanish soap opera he didn't understand; while a thin, pale body draped over the back of the couch, mocking him.
But there was no-one.
Upstairs proved just as fruitless, though the staircase creaked exactly as she remembered it. Their rooms were the same too. One held the last remnants of a pungent aroma akin to mould, and another was festooned with several mirrors and various athletic medals and winning ribbons.
But they held no people. Nor had done for quite some time, either. The showy one was no different, if a little cleaner. Gold glittered harshly, mocking her with its empty glare and metallic sheen until she ran to her own room.
Her room.
It was exactly as she'd left it, even down to the pair of dirty socks in the corner. She'd meant to do the laundry the next day before... before she was taken. Collect it from the two boys and Boss Lady and beat the washing machine until it worked. It was always playing up. Ever since Boss Lady brought her here. There wasn't enough money for a new one, she'd been told. Most stores didn't serve mutants anymore...
She held her head as memories thrummed against her skull. This wasn't right. This wasn't *right*. They were meant to be here. Her team - her family - they were supposed to be waiting for her! It was what she'd been telling herself ever since she escaped. Now she was here, and they weren't.
Why weren't they here for her? Why?
She staggered downstairs and out of the door, clutching at her skull. Alien thoughts mixed with her own, taunting her and her useless journey. All that effort, and for what? An empty house in an empty street in an empty town. Big deal. She'd have been better off staying at the lab, where she could've at least done some *productive*, instead of wandering out in this wasteland chasing rainbows.
"All gone," her mantra slipped from her lips, tinged with desperation. "Gone. All gone. All gooooooone!"
And she screamed. screamed for all she'd lost and hoped to regain. Screamed for her pain, and the pain of others left behind in order for her to reach this place once called home.
"Aaaaaaaall gooooooooooooone!"
The street echoed with her grief as she fell sobbing to her knees, scratching at the old sewn-up wounds *They* had inflicted on her head, and *Their* voices laughed at her inside her own brain as she wept for what she'd been denied.
Bayville was a ghost town. Everybody dead, just like everywhere else.
"All gone," she cried, pressing her face into the dust. "All go-o-one."
She stumbled to her feet, mourning all the while.
"All gone. Gone. Gone, all. All gone. Gone, gone, *gone*!"
Houses passed in a blur, smeared with tears into a blotch of meaningless colour and shapes. They didn't matter. None of this mattered. What use was it when the things she'd come back for, the people she'd sacrificed so much to return to, had up and left without her?
Or were dead.
Finally, she came to rest on the steps of what had once been City Hall. The stone was cold and hard, and she climbed it on her hands and knees to perch behind one of the great stone lions, as she'd done so many times before in sport and just for a quiet spot to read. There she was out of sight, but could see everything if she wanted to.
Exhaustion at last came to claim her, and her weary eyelids began to droop through her tears. She drew her knees up to her chest, wedging herself further in between the pillar and stone rump so that she wouldn't fall out in her slumber.
This was wrong. It was all of it wrong. Something must have happened to make it so wrong, she reasoned, logic warping slightly in her befuddled brain.
She'd find out what had happened. She'd find out, and avenge her kin if they were dead.
And that was a promise.
"All.... gone..."
*******************
Pietro had taken a long time to work up to being angry. He'd been afraid of Mystique for so long that any other motion had to have a decent run-up to get in.
Finally, he decided to ask.
"Where were you when they killed him?"
Mystique gaped. Then she looked down and away. "Not in front of the children. Please? They need a mother... I need to try. Please, I need to try to do it right, just once. I failed all my babies. I even betrayed some... I-- please? Don't ask. Not now. Not in front of them?"
It was no act. She was genuinely upset and ashamed of something.
"It's bigger than running away," he said bluntly. "Isn't it?"
Mystique managed a mute nod. She shed a tear.
Click. It hit him like a ton of bricks. His knees buckled at the very thought, and his voice came out as a hoarse whisper, inaudible above the noise of the bus. "You were *in* the mob."
Nod. "Safest place to hide. I've done it before[1]... I even tried to let him escape. But the mob wouldn't let him. There *was* no escape. Half of them were sick with the plague. They thought killing him would cure them..." She shook her head. "Thank whatever God you love that you didn't see what I saw that night, Pietro. It sent me mad..."
Pietro snorted. "Mad? You don't even know what madness *is*! Try living alone for four years with only a bunch of corpses for company, Mystique, *then* tell me you know what madness is. Try going to sleep every night, only to be taunted by *things* that only you can see. Ghosts that haunt you every waking moment because they're all in here," he tapped the side of his head, "Just waiting for you to let your guard down enough that they can start again!"
Mystique shifted protectively in her seat, holding the sleeping forms of Robyn and Daisy close. Her eyes were full of hurt, but the albino kept going. Everyone else was asleep - even the elf. Everyone save for Logan, and he seemed quite willing to let the recently awakened shapeshifter and speed-demon carry out their little conversation unhindered.
Logan knew the value of airing grievances instead of letting them fester.
Except these had already festered for four years.
Pietro narrowed his eyes. "You know what, Mystique? I used to be afraid of you. You were my boss, and my principal for a while, and my nightmare for even longer. Even when you were gone, your memory hung over my head, worse than any ghost. But d'ya know what? I'm not scared anymore." His hands balled into fists, but he kept them firmly to his sides where he sat, a few seats back from her. "You disgust me. Bad enough you abandoned us when we needed you the most; but to think that you actually took part in that... that..." Words failed him.
"Pietro, I'm sorry - "
"Sorry doesn't cut it, Mystique. You saved your own carcass at the expense of Todd's life. You sold him out, just like that." He snapped his fingers. "Guess Kurt was right to stay at Xavier's. I mean, who'd want *you* as a mother? What're you gonna do if the going gets tough this time? Huh? You gonna sell out Robyn and Daisy as easy as you did Todd and me? As easy as you did Rogue?"
Tears welled in Mystique's eyes, and she shook her head, choking out; "Please, stop. You know I went after her when... You know... I-I didn't mean to lose you - any of you."
"So you say," he shot back coldly. "But what am I supposed to think now, Mystique? You killed Todd. How do I know you didn't do the same to her to save you own skin?"
A loud sob escaped Mystique's throat, and she bowed her head. She looked so broken and lost it was difficult to believe she was the same domineering woman who had terrorised Bayville High four years ago.
Pietro looked at her, but he felt nothing but contempt, and opened his mouth to voice it some more.
"That's enough, kid." Logan finally entered the fray, and turned his head a fraction to fix one beady eye on the pale boy. "She's down. Don't kick her anymore."
Pietro paused a moment, then shrugged. "Whatever."
He swivelled to the window and leaned against the inside of the bus, closing his eyes as if in sleep. Yet the line of his mouth remained grim, and the lack of muttering to his nightmares indicated that he was still very much awake.
Mystique watched him. "I'm sorry," she whispered. "I'm so... so sorry."
Pietro didn't know it, but he was wrong. Mystique *was* insane, but it was the quiet sort of insanity that didn't show up well to the intuitive observer.
He couldn't know, for example, that she was haunted.
"Pie-Pie's right, yo. Sorry doesn't cut it."
Every time she was in human form, he found her. Over the years, she'd learned that thinking at him was just as effective as talking to him, and much less likely to scare off roving traders.
_It's all I've got,_ she thought. _I tried to steer them. I tried to make them humiliate you, instead. I *tried*... but they had other ideas._
"You *betrayed* me. I trusted you, Boss Lady. I thought you were gonna protect me. You *promised*, yo."
_I know. I know. But all I have is 'I'm sorry'._
"Remember? When I was just a kid?" His battered, abused corpse changed into the half-starved and grubby little boy she'd found in the home of a murder-suicide. "Am I gonna go to a home? I heard they do things to kids my age in homes... Stuff worse'n Dad n' Uncle Harry."
Mystique remembered what she'd said. "No," she'd said. "I have a better place. A better future. I'll protect you. Keep you safe. I promise."
_I'm so sorry... I tried. I tried so hard..._
"Yeah. Right," he snorted. Back to the bloody, broken body they'd left when their rage was done. His voice turned mocking. "'He's just a kid. You're gonna kill a *kid*?' That's it. That's all you said. You coulda come up wit' some speech, yo. You coulda said somepin' bout *me*. Somepin' good for a change... but all you had to tell 'em was that I was a kid. Yo, that was *stupid*."
_What did you want me to do? Die *with* you?_
"Maybe."
_And what would dying have done?_
"At least I wouldn't have been alone, yo. Alone's the worst. You know that. I'd do anything rather than be alone. *Anything*."
_I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'd do anything too... that's why I want a second chance._
"You want a second-chance, Boss Lady?" He tipped his head, like he'd been waiting for her to say something like that. "Have a son. Call 'im Todd. And look after him every second of the day. *That's* your second chance."
*******************
Kurt silently watched his mother, mixed emotions ghosting over his face.
She was crying and shaking and silently screaming, as if demons were tearing at her mind. Her arms hugged the two small forms beside her as if she could steal their strength, their oblivious dreams.
And he was torn. He had awoken to hear Logan say something to Pietro. Something... he did not know what. But now Raven was shaking. And he was watching. Some sort of realisation came over her cerulean features and she glanced around the bus. Their eyes met and she gave the slightest shake of her head, as if dismissing something.
"Are you all right?" she whispered.
"Are you?" he said by way of answer. She started slightly and turned to stare out the window. "Why are you here? And why a cat?"
"I... I... when I discovered that... when I saw you alive..."
Kurt nodded. Nothing else needed to be said. They had all been through things that no living being should ever have to endure. The past was the past, in many way irrelevant now...
She must have seen the forgiveness in his eyes, for she shook her head, fresh tears flowing down her cheeks. "I might as well tell you... Pietro will if I don't... I-I-I... I let him die. Todd. I saved myself... and let him die. I helped him die."
Kurt nearly choked on the emotions welling in his throat. He attempted a watery smile. "Like mother, like son, eh?"
She blinked.
"I... I ran too. I was scared and I ran. And they died."
Raven's eyes grew wide with sympathy. "Oh, Kurt," she whispered. "I never... please... I never wanted such things for you... you never deserved... you still don't..."
Kurt closed his eyes and let out a breath he felt like he had been holding all his life. "Maybe there's hope... for us..."
Raven Darkholme hugged the two sleeping forms closer and silenced the voice of the past for but a moment.
"...hope..."
*******************
Noise.
That was the first thing that heralded her return to consciousness.
Noise.
Then, after a few moments, it diverged into voices.
Human voices.
People?
She cracked open an eyelid, sleep still clinging to her and dragging it back down again. The voices continued, and she opened her one eye again. It was still dark out, and most of her body had gone numb with cold and being hunched too tight into her nook.
Instinctively, she mistrusted the voices, and froze into place. Yet they made no move to come any closer, and in the ensuing pause she realised the stupidity of what she was doing.
Voices meant people. And people meant survivors.
Maybe even people she knew.
Invisible hands prodded her from her place, and she squeezed out from behind the stone lion with a creaking of bones and cracking of vertebrae. Blood rushed back into her extremities, and she stumbled down the steps even as feeling was still returning to her deadened limbs.
She homed in on the voices, tracking them. They weren't too far away, but when she rounded the corner only a blank alleyway greeted her eyes.
Was it another illusion then? Another trick her mind had played? She heard so many voices, it was difficult to tell sometimes. They talked incessantly at her when she was tired; shouting and crying and babbling words that made no sense to anyone but themselves. Sometimes her hands tingled as one of them fought against her; but she always won any fights that emerged, and the tingled stopped after a while.
Turning dejectedly, she started to walk back. There was nobody here.
She'd just reached the mouth of the alley when a dark shape darted out in front of her.
She halted.
Was that just a flicker her tired mind had created?
No. There it was again. Elusive, but there, just out of her field of vision. She turned her head, widening her eyes to catch every speck of light this gloomy place had to offer.
Movement. A slight shift, like a living shadow. She tensed, and tried to call to whatever it was, but all that came out was a strangled gurgle not unlike a dying groan.
The murk rippled again, and a small figure slid from the darkness. It was slender and lithe, with a pair of shiny eyes watched her like a magpie.
A cold shiver ran the length of her spine, and suddenly she found herself looking for a way to retreat. It was ridiculous and backward, but she was suddenly fearful of this strange, silent survivor.
The figure came forward, moving as if with the shadows themselves. She took a step backwards and it stopped, cocking its head and scrutinising her. A long time ago she might've been embarrassed by her tattered and begrimed appearance, but she was past things like that now. At this moment only trepidation washed through her, and she edged sideways towards the other side of the alley mouth.
A flicker, and another, taller shadow detached itself from the gloom there, effectively cutting off her exit. This one was close enough for her to see the reams of leather covering his body, and the face with one beady eye and one rolling white orb that glared with savage sightlessness at her. He was burly, and carried something coiled up in one ham-fist.
She took a step back when another figure materialised and advanced towards her. This one was much more audacious than the other two, and stood virtually nose-to-nose before she even realised what was going on.
Twin pools of cold green stared at her, and dark clouds of lank black hair fell either side of them, greasy, and in dire need of a wash.
"Who're you?" demanded a husky, female voice. "Haven't seen you here before."
"All gone," she said warily. "All gone." She spread her arms and repeated; "All gone. Gone, gone, all gone."
A snort. "Another one lost its mind. What's the matter? Cat got your tongue?"
"All gone - "
"I know it's all gone," the woman snapped. "Everything's gone. The whole frikkin' city's gone. Don't need you to tell me, girlie. Been living here long enough to figure that one out for myself."
"All... *gone*." Dejection. It was true then. Her eyes hadn't deceived her. "Gone..."
The first, smallest figure crept forward, revealing a gaunt frame - also in leather - and strange Mohawk-like haircut, obviously done himself. "Hey, Audrey," he growled. "She loopy like the last one?"
"Probably." Green-Eyes looked back and clicked her long, bony fingers. Her hands were wreathed in fingerless leather gloves. It seemed there was a running theme to their outfits. "You gonna talk? Where've you come from? What's your name?"
"All gone," she said sadly, not looking up. "All gone. All gone. Gone. Gone, all gone, all gone. *Gone*."
Green-Eyes sighed and twisted a finger close to her temple in the universal gesture of insanity by those more fortunate. "Round the twist. If she could talk, I bet she'd have some stories to tell. I mean, who in God's name walks around *this* place in their pyjamas?"
"Someone dropping hints?" suggested Mohawk with a leering grin.
The woman shook her head. "Nu-uh. She got scars on her head, see? Those've been stitched up recently, too. I think this one's been *made* loopy, not sent that way. Y'know, had some grey matter taken away?" She tapped her forehead for emphasis.
"She no good then?"
"Not for conversation, at any rate. I'm surprised she'd not drooling."
The man with one eye stepped forward and spoke at last. His voice was booming, and seemed to have been dredged up from the soles of his feet. "Is she one of them?" he asked simply. "A mutant?"
"Maybe," Green-Eyes looked warily at their find. "She *looks* normal."
"Looks can be deceiving," One-Eye said sagely.
"I *know* that Chug," Green-Eyes snapped. "We took care of enough of the freaks for me to work that out a long time ago."
She tensed again, eyes roving their hard, scarred faces. These were warriors of some description. A gang, perhaps? She'd heard whispers of mutant hunters back at the lab from newbies brought in, those still able to remember the outside world. Supposedly, they hunted mutant survivors down and made sport out of killing them. Like foxhunting or bull-fighting in the times before things went bad.
"G... ga -a... a... a... ng," she coughed.
All three of them spun to face her.
"What did you say?" demanded Green-Eyes. She was evidently their leader, or at least their spokesperson. "Is there a brain in their after all?"
"G... an... nnn... g..." she grated again, slowly, as if it was hard to get out - which it was.
"Gang?" Green-Eyes pursed her lips. "Yeah, we're a gang. The Vanguard, to be precise. What of it?"
She retched a little, her tongue not practised anymore in the art of speech. "Mew... tan... m... ewt... ants... sssss."
"Mutants!" Mohawk spat on the floor. "Freaks. We take care of 'em. Like pest control, geddit?"
"K... kk... iiiiiii... kiii... lllll...."
"Kill," Green-Eyes translated venomously, and added her own saliva to the pavement. "As soon as look at them. They're responsible for all this, y'know?" A leather-coated palm waved at the desolate city beyond the alley. "Freaks, the lot of them. Should be burned at birth."
"We already done that," Mohawk laughed humourlessly. "Remember?"
Green-Eyes clenched a fist. "Enjoyed every second of it, too."
She watched them. This wasn't right. This was wrong - so wrong. Brief memories flitted back to her mind. Recollections of placards with stark black lettering, and insults thrown as freely as rotten fruit. 'Mutant scum', 'Are we safe?' 'Who will protect our children from this menace?' Voices sounded out inside her head, echoing the taunts that had forced Boss Lady to bring her here in the first place, to keep her protected from those kinds of people. From mutant haters.
Mohawk jumped as the pyjama-clad girl suddenly fell to her knees with a wail. What little hair she had, she clawed at, and her face was set into an expression of fear and loathing so potent it made her appear positively gruesome.
Green-Eyes dropped to her side. "You OK, kid?"
A wordless cry answered, and the Vanguard leader reached forward to lay a hand on the strange girl's shoulder. She started rocking backwards and forwards, muttering something unintelligible with eyes wide like new moons.
"I said, are you OK?" Green-Eyes cupped her face to pull it up so that she could look at her more easily, but a burning pain abruptly lanced through her fingertips, and her mind exploded with stars that vanished again as though caught in a riptide. "What the f - " she yelled, yanking away and reeling backwards in shock. "Holy fuck! It a stinkin' mutie!"
The girl just stared blankly as a swarm of new memories and thoughts ploughed into her brain uninvited. They pounded and whirled against the sides of her skull.
"Kill it!" shouted Mohawk, and lunged. He reached briefly to his waist, and something flashed metallic in the poor light.
Her eyes shifted back into focus in a second. She dived sideways out of the way before she even realised what she was doing. Turning the throw into a deft roll, she sprang to her feet and spun to face her opponents with an skilfulness not her own.
Again Mohawk sprang, but she feinted left and rammed into him with her shoulder. He grunted, and she took the opportunity to crack the back of his hand with her elbow. The jack-knife went clattering to the floor, closely followed by its groaning owner.
There was little time to congratulate herself. Not as hasty as their comrade, Green-Eyes and the solemn One-Eye had regrouped at the end of the alley, blocking her exit and coming at her together instead of one at a time. They both held a long knife apiece. The Vanguards preferred blades to guns any day, and were excellent fighters, trackers and above all, killers. They could each pin down a man and break his neck before the member of any rival gang had even taken a step, making them the swiftest, most deadly of all Bayville mutant hunters.
She squared off against them, drawing on the slew of combat knowledge suddenly hers from the unplanned contact with Green-Eyes. They came at her quickly, and she singled out the woman as an easier target than the hulking man.
Big mistake.
Green-eyes was small, yes, but by no means an easy target. She'd dashed forward and scored a hit down the mutant girl's exposed back in nano-seconds. It would've been a fatal blow, had it not been for the girl's reflexive leap away.
Back down the enclosed alleyway.
Mohawk rose and joined his gangmates in their advance. His jack-knife was gone, but he liberated another, equally sharp blade for each hand from the stash placed throughout his person. His eyes were hungry, and he dashed forward to strike again.
As if on impulse she fell into a crouch and swung out her leg, neatly sweeping his from under him. He went down hard, skull connecting with the tarmac with a sickening crunch.
As she arose, something suddenly stung her across her chest, and a loud crack rent the air. She backed off, but it came again, lashing her torso and left arm.
One-Eye's face remained stoic as he unfurled the whip for another go, though his victim cried out as it cut her deeply.
She backed off, but soon found her spine meeting the solid mass of bricks that made up the alley's dead end. It was cold and wet, and something oozed down the back of her shirt as her two attackers came in for another assault.
Green-Eye's hands moved swiftly, and a small knife buried itself in the wall next to the girl's skull. A millimetre to the left and it would've impaled her head. In the event, all that struck her this time were loud curses issued from the older woman's mouth at her miss.
It was enough. One-Eye had paused long enough for his gangmate to unleash her throw, and the whip lay dormant in his fist. The girl darted at him before he had chance to use it again, and surprised him by grabbing his hand tightly.
He grunted, trying to shake her off. Then, suddenly, he felt very weak. His fist met her gut, but somehow the contact only served to worsen things, and he was slumped to the floor in an unconscious heap within seconds.
She released him, breathing hard as yet more alien thoughts crowded her own, and she fought to dominate them, to keep her own personality at the top of the pile.
{CRACK}
Blinding pain surged through the back of her head, and she swung out blindly. Green-Eyes leapt away unharmed, and came back in to land another blow, this time hoping to break the freak's neck with the sheer force behind it.
The girl rolled away, and the strike met only empty air. She was on her feet again in moments. Another opportunity wouldn't be so easy to present itself. Not now she had *two* sets of fighting knowledge to draw on.
The pair of females circled each other, but Green-Eyes was careful to keep her prey away from the exit. Another blade slipped into place from where it had been strapped to her wrist, and the steel glinted in the poor light. The mutant girl had no such weapon, and kept her hands free to hold off any close-quarters attack.
Green-Eyes didn't disappoint. One moment she was smiling a predatory grin, the next she was a blur as she dived in to stab at the girl's chest with a practised arm. The girl moved away, but not before a deep gash opened up in the forearm she'd raised to shield herself. She cried out in pain and One-Eye's stolen fury, but wasn't rash enough to try for a counter-attack without a weapon.
Green-Eyes took the sound as a good sign and plunged into the fray again. This time, however, her swing was wild and unchecked, and the girl had no trouble blocking it without sustaining any injury. In fact, she even managed to twist her attacker's arm around and rap her knuckles so hard the knife fell into a flaccid grip where it couldn't do much damage very quickly. Then she thundered forward at the older woman, barrelling into her with one shoulder and knocking the blade away completely.
She had the upper hand, but the Vanguard weren't top dog in the Bayville turf war for nothing. Face a mask of hatred for all Mutantkind, Green-Eyes put on a burst of strength and kicked out, catching the girl in the midriff and knocking the wind from her. A whoosh of air escaped her lungs, and the gang leader grabbed at the fabric of her collar with a knarled hand.
{WHUMP}
She had the girl pinned to the floor in approximately no seconds flat, and wasted no time in grabbing her wrists and pinning her with a knee to her throat. She struggled, but Green-Eyes increased the pressure, and her young eyes bugged slightly as her airway was cut off.
She started losing the fight to take breath.
Trying valiantly to get the other female off, she bunched up her knees and attempted to get the flats of her feet under the other's torso. But Green-Eyes recognised the move and sank down, closing the gap between her body and the mutant's so that any such action was impossible.
Snarling, she leaned in close and growled into the girl's pale and besmirched face. "Stinking mutie! Your kind'll never win out over the likes of us." Hacking a gob of saliva back, she pursed her lips to spit it out onto the freak.
The girl's mind was getting fuzzy through lack of oxygen, and dark spots danced across her vision. She watched as the Vanguard leader drew her head back, and let her survival instincts take over. They'd gotten her this far. She trusted them to get her that little bit further.
As Green-Eyes bopped her head forward to release the gob of spit, she strained upwards at the last second and met her lips as they got just that little bit too close.
Green-Eyes thrashed, and released her captive's wrists in shock as the girl's powers kicked in at the contact. Hands clamped around her skull, simultaneously pushing her off the girl's throat and snatching the energy right out of her skin until she felt weak and dizzy.
Her fighting persona wouldn't let her give up so easily, though, and she pressed her knee down again.
The hold around her head tightened, and the elder woman screamed into the mutant's mouth as her very soul seemed to be ripped from under her and drawn into the freak. She kicked and fought, but it was no use. Her grip slipped from under her, and she went whirling off into a melee of thoughts, emotions and feelings, all caught up in the immutable pull of this one mutant girl.
Green-Eyes' body went limp, and at last the girl was able to let go.
With every ounce of strength she could muster, she threw the empty shell away from her, and it crumpled lifelessly into a mound of leather and flesh by her side.
Her breath came in quick, gulping gasps, and there was an iron band crushing the inside of her skull. She grappled at her head, writhing around in the dirt and sending up thick clouds of dust.
Within, a new mind fought against her own. This one was stronger than all the rest combined. This was no mere shadow, but an essence so potent it was all she could do to hold tenuously onto her thoughts whilst beating it off. It pushed, trying to force her out of her own head, and she screamed with the effort of holding it at bay.
Her cries echoed in the empty alley, and lasted for many minutes as she contended her inner battle.
And then all was silent.
It was over.
She'd won.
For now, at least.
Air hitching in her bruised throat, the mutant girl stumbled to her cut and bleeding bare feet. Using the wall for support, she tottered to the mouth and exit like a frail old woman. She'd won the fight, but at what cost? The strange new consciousness bubbled just beneath her own. She could feel it. She could sense its anger and bewilderment at being transplanted into this new place, this new body.
However, she could also sense something else. Something fleeting, like a soap bubble in warm air. She held onto it, a single image gleaned from this horrific new addition to her being. One of Green-Eyes' memories.
A lurching bus, paint peeling and rusted through in places. It moved clunkily, lurching through the streets of Bayville like a noisy spectre of what it once was. Through the windows she saw faces. Some she recognised, some she didn't, but the thought that accompanied this memory told her all she needed to know.
_Mutants!_
Pausing to get both her breath and her bearings, she picked out the path the memory had taken. Black tyre tracks lined the tarmac like a signpost, and she followed them like a bloodhound on a scent.
*******************
To Be Continued...
*******************
[1] Reference to the comic version of Kurt's date with the waterfall.
Ninth Fragment ~ 'Clemency'
*******************
Elf was staring at him as he drove. It was heading into the wee small hours and everyone else was long asleep. Yet two glowing orbs hardly blinked at all, and watched.
It was damn unnerving to see the Elf in the dark. He looked like he was hardly there at all. A novice at seeing him at night would only spot the lights of his eyes if they were lucky. Logan, however, was long used to his habit of invisibility, and could pick out the parts that weren't completely transparent.
"Somethin' buggin' you, Elf?"
"Were were you?" he asked. "Where were you when they came?"
No accusations, just a simple question. "I was out gettin' supplies," he said. "'Ro wanted to cook you kids somethin' special, buck up morale. When I came back... I saw the mob, saw 'Ro get out with Porcupine... smelled the blood..." he winced. "I couldn't go an' look, Elf. I'm sorry, but I couldn't bear to look." A minute of silence. "Tearin' the mob apart wouldn't've done anything. You know that, now."
"Ja. I know." The look in his eyes had said it all. He'd tried vengeance. It hadn't tasted as good as he thought it would.
"Took me a few decades to learn *that* lesson," said Logan. "I always knew you were quick. Anyway, I dropped the supplies an' bugged outta there. Caught your scent a coupla times, early on, an' nothin' after that. Figured they'd got ya. Went lookin' for 'Ro. Been on the road ever since."
"That's all you've been doing for four years? Looking?"
"Lotta land to search, Elf. Managed to help some survivors start a settlement, but most of the time I've been scavengin' an' tradin'." He looked briefly at him. "You?"
"Scavenging," said Kurt. "I found Robyn shortly after the virus hit. I made a little home and looked after her. Buried anyone I knew. Survived."
Logan nodded. He knew that song.
"They cut Jean's throat," he said. "She wore herself out protecting them, and they walked right up to her and cut her throat. Scott must have been distracted. A fatal moment. They shot him twice and let him bleed. They shot the Professor..." One hand touched the middle of his forehead. "Shotgun. Point blank."
Logan winced again. He knew what that did to a body. He knew what finding the bodies must have done to the Elf. _God, I'm too sorry, Elf. I shoulda done it for ya. Let you keep your innocence one more day. I shoulda stayed. Shoulda fought. Shoulda died with 'em..._ He'd had roughly two hundred years of surviving, and knowing when to cut and run. It was a tough habit to break.
"They finished Scott off afterwards. And some bastard cut off his hand for a keepsake. I never found Evan or Ororo." He sighed. "At least they got a Christian burial."
And the human race was still paying for that one year of madness. What a sad, battered world they'd all made.
It had taken four years, but some folks were picking up the pieces and making good.
*******************
She stumbled along without looking at many landmarks. They were difficult to see in the dust, and her eyes itched if she opened them too wide. All she knew was that she was on the right road. The minister had said so.
Cracked tarmac slashed her feet on many occasions, but the soles were well worn and hard. A result of travelling cross-country without shoes, no doubt. Her skin was leathery in places, where it'd been exposed to the elements. She didn't care. Aesthetic beauty was something consigned to the past. She had no need of it anymore. No need for anything.
Except the path home, of course.
She passed many places - dark, desolate, dead. They offered up no survivors, and she went on, stopping only long enough to raid nearby homes for food that she tore at whilst still on the move. There was no time for rest. No time for sleep. No time for anything, save plodding onwards towards her destination.
She came upon it quite suddenly. It seemed she'd fallen into a waking dream again, her mind cloudy with thoughts not her own, for when she looked up, tall buildings ringed her sight, leering over at her like a canopy of bricks and glass. The tarmac river became wider, and marked with various lines that criss-crossed beneath her feet like snakes. A pavement appeared, smashed and broken, but *there* all the same, and from it sprang dusty lampposts and pillar-boxes, besmirched with grime and filth.
Then she saw it. A single white placard hanging haphazardly from its roost. The bottom half had long since been lost, but enough writing remained for her to gasp with happiness.
_Welcome to Bayville_
"Bayville...." she whispered, and quickened her step.
She'd done it. She'd returned.
But not quite yet. There were still a few more streets to travel before she truly reached her journey's end, and she sped through them at such an unswerving pace that it was difficult to believe she'd ever been away.
Then, there it was. The Boarding House hove into view, and she all but ran up the driveway to the door. It swung open on its hinge, but she didn't care. She'd finally done it!
She was home.
But wait! Something was strange. Something was... wrong.
Where was everybody?
The house stood empty and deserted, thick puddles of dust testament to the absence of people for a considerably long time. She ran in, making footprints as she went, and burst into the kitchen.
Nothing.
The sitting room. There was always somebody in the sitting room. The TV in her memories blared relentlessly, and a small green figure was always curled up on the sofa, laughing at some gameshow or Spanish soap opera he didn't understand; while a thin, pale body draped over the back of the couch, mocking him.
But there was no-one.
Upstairs proved just as fruitless, though the staircase creaked exactly as she remembered it. Their rooms were the same too. One held the last remnants of a pungent aroma akin to mould, and another was festooned with several mirrors and various athletic medals and winning ribbons.
But they held no people. Nor had done for quite some time, either. The showy one was no different, if a little cleaner. Gold glittered harshly, mocking her with its empty glare and metallic sheen until she ran to her own room.
Her room.
It was exactly as she'd left it, even down to the pair of dirty socks in the corner. She'd meant to do the laundry the next day before... before she was taken. Collect it from the two boys and Boss Lady and beat the washing machine until it worked. It was always playing up. Ever since Boss Lady brought her here. There wasn't enough money for a new one, she'd been told. Most stores didn't serve mutants anymore...
She held her head as memories thrummed against her skull. This wasn't right. This wasn't *right*. They were meant to be here. Her team - her family - they were supposed to be waiting for her! It was what she'd been telling herself ever since she escaped. Now she was here, and they weren't.
Why weren't they here for her? Why?
She staggered downstairs and out of the door, clutching at her skull. Alien thoughts mixed with her own, taunting her and her useless journey. All that effort, and for what? An empty house in an empty street in an empty town. Big deal. She'd have been better off staying at the lab, where she could've at least done some *productive*, instead of wandering out in this wasteland chasing rainbows.
"All gone," her mantra slipped from her lips, tinged with desperation. "Gone. All gone. All gooooooone!"
And she screamed. screamed for all she'd lost and hoped to regain. Screamed for her pain, and the pain of others left behind in order for her to reach this place once called home.
"Aaaaaaaall gooooooooooooone!"
The street echoed with her grief as she fell sobbing to her knees, scratching at the old sewn-up wounds *They* had inflicted on her head, and *Their* voices laughed at her inside her own brain as she wept for what she'd been denied.
Bayville was a ghost town. Everybody dead, just like everywhere else.
"All gone," she cried, pressing her face into the dust. "All go-o-one."
She stumbled to her feet, mourning all the while.
"All gone. Gone. Gone, all. All gone. Gone, gone, *gone*!"
Houses passed in a blur, smeared with tears into a blotch of meaningless colour and shapes. They didn't matter. None of this mattered. What use was it when the things she'd come back for, the people she'd sacrificed so much to return to, had up and left without her?
Or were dead.
Finally, she came to rest on the steps of what had once been City Hall. The stone was cold and hard, and she climbed it on her hands and knees to perch behind one of the great stone lions, as she'd done so many times before in sport and just for a quiet spot to read. There she was out of sight, but could see everything if she wanted to.
Exhaustion at last came to claim her, and her weary eyelids began to droop through her tears. She drew her knees up to her chest, wedging herself further in between the pillar and stone rump so that she wouldn't fall out in her slumber.
This was wrong. It was all of it wrong. Something must have happened to make it so wrong, she reasoned, logic warping slightly in her befuddled brain.
She'd find out what had happened. She'd find out, and avenge her kin if they were dead.
And that was a promise.
"All.... gone..."
*******************
Pietro had taken a long time to work up to being angry. He'd been afraid of Mystique for so long that any other motion had to have a decent run-up to get in.
Finally, he decided to ask.
"Where were you when they killed him?"
Mystique gaped. Then she looked down and away. "Not in front of the children. Please? They need a mother... I need to try. Please, I need to try to do it right, just once. I failed all my babies. I even betrayed some... I-- please? Don't ask. Not now. Not in front of them?"
It was no act. She was genuinely upset and ashamed of something.
"It's bigger than running away," he said bluntly. "Isn't it?"
Mystique managed a mute nod. She shed a tear.
Click. It hit him like a ton of bricks. His knees buckled at the very thought, and his voice came out as a hoarse whisper, inaudible above the noise of the bus. "You were *in* the mob."
Nod. "Safest place to hide. I've done it before[1]... I even tried to let him escape. But the mob wouldn't let him. There *was* no escape. Half of them were sick with the plague. They thought killing him would cure them..." She shook her head. "Thank whatever God you love that you didn't see what I saw that night, Pietro. It sent me mad..."
Pietro snorted. "Mad? You don't even know what madness *is*! Try living alone for four years with only a bunch of corpses for company, Mystique, *then* tell me you know what madness is. Try going to sleep every night, only to be taunted by *things* that only you can see. Ghosts that haunt you every waking moment because they're all in here," he tapped the side of his head, "Just waiting for you to let your guard down enough that they can start again!"
Mystique shifted protectively in her seat, holding the sleeping forms of Robyn and Daisy close. Her eyes were full of hurt, but the albino kept going. Everyone else was asleep - even the elf. Everyone save for Logan, and he seemed quite willing to let the recently awakened shapeshifter and speed-demon carry out their little conversation unhindered.
Logan knew the value of airing grievances instead of letting them fester.
Except these had already festered for four years.
Pietro narrowed his eyes. "You know what, Mystique? I used to be afraid of you. You were my boss, and my principal for a while, and my nightmare for even longer. Even when you were gone, your memory hung over my head, worse than any ghost. But d'ya know what? I'm not scared anymore." His hands balled into fists, but he kept them firmly to his sides where he sat, a few seats back from her. "You disgust me. Bad enough you abandoned us when we needed you the most; but to think that you actually took part in that... that..." Words failed him.
"Pietro, I'm sorry - "
"Sorry doesn't cut it, Mystique. You saved your own carcass at the expense of Todd's life. You sold him out, just like that." He snapped his fingers. "Guess Kurt was right to stay at Xavier's. I mean, who'd want *you* as a mother? What're you gonna do if the going gets tough this time? Huh? You gonna sell out Robyn and Daisy as easy as you did Todd and me? As easy as you did Rogue?"
Tears welled in Mystique's eyes, and she shook her head, choking out; "Please, stop. You know I went after her when... You know... I-I didn't mean to lose you - any of you."
"So you say," he shot back coldly. "But what am I supposed to think now, Mystique? You killed Todd. How do I know you didn't do the same to her to save you own skin?"
A loud sob escaped Mystique's throat, and she bowed her head. She looked so broken and lost it was difficult to believe she was the same domineering woman who had terrorised Bayville High four years ago.
Pietro looked at her, but he felt nothing but contempt, and opened his mouth to voice it some more.
"That's enough, kid." Logan finally entered the fray, and turned his head a fraction to fix one beady eye on the pale boy. "She's down. Don't kick her anymore."
Pietro paused a moment, then shrugged. "Whatever."
He swivelled to the window and leaned against the inside of the bus, closing his eyes as if in sleep. Yet the line of his mouth remained grim, and the lack of muttering to his nightmares indicated that he was still very much awake.
Mystique watched him. "I'm sorry," she whispered. "I'm so... so sorry."
Pietro didn't know it, but he was wrong. Mystique *was* insane, but it was the quiet sort of insanity that didn't show up well to the intuitive observer.
He couldn't know, for example, that she was haunted.
"Pie-Pie's right, yo. Sorry doesn't cut it."
Every time she was in human form, he found her. Over the years, she'd learned that thinking at him was just as effective as talking to him, and much less likely to scare off roving traders.
_It's all I've got,_ she thought. _I tried to steer them. I tried to make them humiliate you, instead. I *tried*... but they had other ideas._
"You *betrayed* me. I trusted you, Boss Lady. I thought you were gonna protect me. You *promised*, yo."
_I know. I know. But all I have is 'I'm sorry'._
"Remember? When I was just a kid?" His battered, abused corpse changed into the half-starved and grubby little boy she'd found in the home of a murder-suicide. "Am I gonna go to a home? I heard they do things to kids my age in homes... Stuff worse'n Dad n' Uncle Harry."
Mystique remembered what she'd said. "No," she'd said. "I have a better place. A better future. I'll protect you. Keep you safe. I promise."
_I'm so sorry... I tried. I tried so hard..._
"Yeah. Right," he snorted. Back to the bloody, broken body they'd left when their rage was done. His voice turned mocking. "'He's just a kid. You're gonna kill a *kid*?' That's it. That's all you said. You coulda come up wit' some speech, yo. You coulda said somepin' bout *me*. Somepin' good for a change... but all you had to tell 'em was that I was a kid. Yo, that was *stupid*."
_What did you want me to do? Die *with* you?_
"Maybe."
_And what would dying have done?_
"At least I wouldn't have been alone, yo. Alone's the worst. You know that. I'd do anything rather than be alone. *Anything*."
_I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'd do anything too... that's why I want a second chance._
"You want a second-chance, Boss Lady?" He tipped his head, like he'd been waiting for her to say something like that. "Have a son. Call 'im Todd. And look after him every second of the day. *That's* your second chance."
*******************
Kurt silently watched his mother, mixed emotions ghosting over his face.
She was crying and shaking and silently screaming, as if demons were tearing at her mind. Her arms hugged the two small forms beside her as if she could steal their strength, their oblivious dreams.
And he was torn. He had awoken to hear Logan say something to Pietro. Something... he did not know what. But now Raven was shaking. And he was watching. Some sort of realisation came over her cerulean features and she glanced around the bus. Their eyes met and she gave the slightest shake of her head, as if dismissing something.
"Are you all right?" she whispered.
"Are you?" he said by way of answer. She started slightly and turned to stare out the window. "Why are you here? And why a cat?"
"I... I... when I discovered that... when I saw you alive..."
Kurt nodded. Nothing else needed to be said. They had all been through things that no living being should ever have to endure. The past was the past, in many way irrelevant now...
She must have seen the forgiveness in his eyes, for she shook her head, fresh tears flowing down her cheeks. "I might as well tell you... Pietro will if I don't... I-I-I... I let him die. Todd. I saved myself... and let him die. I helped him die."
Kurt nearly choked on the emotions welling in his throat. He attempted a watery smile. "Like mother, like son, eh?"
She blinked.
"I... I ran too. I was scared and I ran. And they died."
Raven's eyes grew wide with sympathy. "Oh, Kurt," she whispered. "I never... please... I never wanted such things for you... you never deserved... you still don't..."
Kurt closed his eyes and let out a breath he felt like he had been holding all his life. "Maybe there's hope... for us..."
Raven Darkholme hugged the two sleeping forms closer and silenced the voice of the past for but a moment.
"...hope..."
*******************
Noise.
That was the first thing that heralded her return to consciousness.
Noise.
Then, after a few moments, it diverged into voices.
Human voices.
People?
She cracked open an eyelid, sleep still clinging to her and dragging it back down again. The voices continued, and she opened her one eye again. It was still dark out, and most of her body had gone numb with cold and being hunched too tight into her nook.
Instinctively, she mistrusted the voices, and froze into place. Yet they made no move to come any closer, and in the ensuing pause she realised the stupidity of what she was doing.
Voices meant people. And people meant survivors.
Maybe even people she knew.
Invisible hands prodded her from her place, and she squeezed out from behind the stone lion with a creaking of bones and cracking of vertebrae. Blood rushed back into her extremities, and she stumbled down the steps even as feeling was still returning to her deadened limbs.
She homed in on the voices, tracking them. They weren't too far away, but when she rounded the corner only a blank alleyway greeted her eyes.
Was it another illusion then? Another trick her mind had played? She heard so many voices, it was difficult to tell sometimes. They talked incessantly at her when she was tired; shouting and crying and babbling words that made no sense to anyone but themselves. Sometimes her hands tingled as one of them fought against her; but she always won any fights that emerged, and the tingled stopped after a while.
Turning dejectedly, she started to walk back. There was nobody here.
She'd just reached the mouth of the alley when a dark shape darted out in front of her.
She halted.
Was that just a flicker her tired mind had created?
No. There it was again. Elusive, but there, just out of her field of vision. She turned her head, widening her eyes to catch every speck of light this gloomy place had to offer.
Movement. A slight shift, like a living shadow. She tensed, and tried to call to whatever it was, but all that came out was a strangled gurgle not unlike a dying groan.
The murk rippled again, and a small figure slid from the darkness. It was slender and lithe, with a pair of shiny eyes watched her like a magpie.
A cold shiver ran the length of her spine, and suddenly she found herself looking for a way to retreat. It was ridiculous and backward, but she was suddenly fearful of this strange, silent survivor.
The figure came forward, moving as if with the shadows themselves. She took a step backwards and it stopped, cocking its head and scrutinising her. A long time ago she might've been embarrassed by her tattered and begrimed appearance, but she was past things like that now. At this moment only trepidation washed through her, and she edged sideways towards the other side of the alley mouth.
A flicker, and another, taller shadow detached itself from the gloom there, effectively cutting off her exit. This one was close enough for her to see the reams of leather covering his body, and the face with one beady eye and one rolling white orb that glared with savage sightlessness at her. He was burly, and carried something coiled up in one ham-fist.
She took a step back when another figure materialised and advanced towards her. This one was much more audacious than the other two, and stood virtually nose-to-nose before she even realised what was going on.
Twin pools of cold green stared at her, and dark clouds of lank black hair fell either side of them, greasy, and in dire need of a wash.
"Who're you?" demanded a husky, female voice. "Haven't seen you here before."
"All gone," she said warily. "All gone." She spread her arms and repeated; "All gone. Gone, gone, all gone."
A snort. "Another one lost its mind. What's the matter? Cat got your tongue?"
"All gone - "
"I know it's all gone," the woman snapped. "Everything's gone. The whole frikkin' city's gone. Don't need you to tell me, girlie. Been living here long enough to figure that one out for myself."
"All... *gone*." Dejection. It was true then. Her eyes hadn't deceived her. "Gone..."
The first, smallest figure crept forward, revealing a gaunt frame - also in leather - and strange Mohawk-like haircut, obviously done himself. "Hey, Audrey," he growled. "She loopy like the last one?"
"Probably." Green-Eyes looked back and clicked her long, bony fingers. Her hands were wreathed in fingerless leather gloves. It seemed there was a running theme to their outfits. "You gonna talk? Where've you come from? What's your name?"
"All gone," she said sadly, not looking up. "All gone. All gone. Gone. Gone, all gone, all gone. *Gone*."
Green-Eyes sighed and twisted a finger close to her temple in the universal gesture of insanity by those more fortunate. "Round the twist. If she could talk, I bet she'd have some stories to tell. I mean, who in God's name walks around *this* place in their pyjamas?"
"Someone dropping hints?" suggested Mohawk with a leering grin.
The woman shook her head. "Nu-uh. She got scars on her head, see? Those've been stitched up recently, too. I think this one's been *made* loopy, not sent that way. Y'know, had some grey matter taken away?" She tapped her forehead for emphasis.
"She no good then?"
"Not for conversation, at any rate. I'm surprised she'd not drooling."
The man with one eye stepped forward and spoke at last. His voice was booming, and seemed to have been dredged up from the soles of his feet. "Is she one of them?" he asked simply. "A mutant?"
"Maybe," Green-Eyes looked warily at their find. "She *looks* normal."
"Looks can be deceiving," One-Eye said sagely.
"I *know* that Chug," Green-Eyes snapped. "We took care of enough of the freaks for me to work that out a long time ago."
She tensed again, eyes roving their hard, scarred faces. These were warriors of some description. A gang, perhaps? She'd heard whispers of mutant hunters back at the lab from newbies brought in, those still able to remember the outside world. Supposedly, they hunted mutant survivors down and made sport out of killing them. Like foxhunting or bull-fighting in the times before things went bad.
"G... ga -a... a... a... ng," she coughed.
All three of them spun to face her.
"What did you say?" demanded Green-Eyes. She was evidently their leader, or at least their spokesperson. "Is there a brain in their after all?"
"G... an... nnn... g..." she grated again, slowly, as if it was hard to get out - which it was.
"Gang?" Green-Eyes pursed her lips. "Yeah, we're a gang. The Vanguard, to be precise. What of it?"
She retched a little, her tongue not practised anymore in the art of speech. "Mew... tan... m... ewt... ants... sssss."
"Mutants!" Mohawk spat on the floor. "Freaks. We take care of 'em. Like pest control, geddit?"
"K... kk... iiiiiii... kiii... lllll...."
"Kill," Green-Eyes translated venomously, and added her own saliva to the pavement. "As soon as look at them. They're responsible for all this, y'know?" A leather-coated palm waved at the desolate city beyond the alley. "Freaks, the lot of them. Should be burned at birth."
"We already done that," Mohawk laughed humourlessly. "Remember?"
Green-Eyes clenched a fist. "Enjoyed every second of it, too."
She watched them. This wasn't right. This was wrong - so wrong. Brief memories flitted back to her mind. Recollections of placards with stark black lettering, and insults thrown as freely as rotten fruit. 'Mutant scum', 'Are we safe?' 'Who will protect our children from this menace?' Voices sounded out inside her head, echoing the taunts that had forced Boss Lady to bring her here in the first place, to keep her protected from those kinds of people. From mutant haters.
Mohawk jumped as the pyjama-clad girl suddenly fell to her knees with a wail. What little hair she had, she clawed at, and her face was set into an expression of fear and loathing so potent it made her appear positively gruesome.
Green-Eyes dropped to her side. "You OK, kid?"
A wordless cry answered, and the Vanguard leader reached forward to lay a hand on the strange girl's shoulder. She started rocking backwards and forwards, muttering something unintelligible with eyes wide like new moons.
"I said, are you OK?" Green-Eyes cupped her face to pull it up so that she could look at her more easily, but a burning pain abruptly lanced through her fingertips, and her mind exploded with stars that vanished again as though caught in a riptide. "What the f - " she yelled, yanking away and reeling backwards in shock. "Holy fuck! It a stinkin' mutie!"
The girl just stared blankly as a swarm of new memories and thoughts ploughed into her brain uninvited. They pounded and whirled against the sides of her skull.
"Kill it!" shouted Mohawk, and lunged. He reached briefly to his waist, and something flashed metallic in the poor light.
Her eyes shifted back into focus in a second. She dived sideways out of the way before she even realised what she was doing. Turning the throw into a deft roll, she sprang to her feet and spun to face her opponents with an skilfulness not her own.
Again Mohawk sprang, but she feinted left and rammed into him with her shoulder. He grunted, and she took the opportunity to crack the back of his hand with her elbow. The jack-knife went clattering to the floor, closely followed by its groaning owner.
There was little time to congratulate herself. Not as hasty as their comrade, Green-Eyes and the solemn One-Eye had regrouped at the end of the alley, blocking her exit and coming at her together instead of one at a time. They both held a long knife apiece. The Vanguards preferred blades to guns any day, and were excellent fighters, trackers and above all, killers. They could each pin down a man and break his neck before the member of any rival gang had even taken a step, making them the swiftest, most deadly of all Bayville mutant hunters.
She squared off against them, drawing on the slew of combat knowledge suddenly hers from the unplanned contact with Green-Eyes. They came at her quickly, and she singled out the woman as an easier target than the hulking man.
Big mistake.
Green-eyes was small, yes, but by no means an easy target. She'd dashed forward and scored a hit down the mutant girl's exposed back in nano-seconds. It would've been a fatal blow, had it not been for the girl's reflexive leap away.
Back down the enclosed alleyway.
Mohawk rose and joined his gangmates in their advance. His jack-knife was gone, but he liberated another, equally sharp blade for each hand from the stash placed throughout his person. His eyes were hungry, and he dashed forward to strike again.
As if on impulse she fell into a crouch and swung out her leg, neatly sweeping his from under him. He went down hard, skull connecting with the tarmac with a sickening crunch.
As she arose, something suddenly stung her across her chest, and a loud crack rent the air. She backed off, but it came again, lashing her torso and left arm.
One-Eye's face remained stoic as he unfurled the whip for another go, though his victim cried out as it cut her deeply.
She backed off, but soon found her spine meeting the solid mass of bricks that made up the alley's dead end. It was cold and wet, and something oozed down the back of her shirt as her two attackers came in for another assault.
Green-Eye's hands moved swiftly, and a small knife buried itself in the wall next to the girl's skull. A millimetre to the left and it would've impaled her head. In the event, all that struck her this time were loud curses issued from the older woman's mouth at her miss.
It was enough. One-Eye had paused long enough for his gangmate to unleash her throw, and the whip lay dormant in his fist. The girl darted at him before he had chance to use it again, and surprised him by grabbing his hand tightly.
He grunted, trying to shake her off. Then, suddenly, he felt very weak. His fist met her gut, but somehow the contact only served to worsen things, and he was slumped to the floor in an unconscious heap within seconds.
She released him, breathing hard as yet more alien thoughts crowded her own, and she fought to dominate them, to keep her own personality at the top of the pile.
{CRACK}
Blinding pain surged through the back of her head, and she swung out blindly. Green-Eyes leapt away unharmed, and came back in to land another blow, this time hoping to break the freak's neck with the sheer force behind it.
The girl rolled away, and the strike met only empty air. She was on her feet again in moments. Another opportunity wouldn't be so easy to present itself. Not now she had *two* sets of fighting knowledge to draw on.
The pair of females circled each other, but Green-Eyes was careful to keep her prey away from the exit. Another blade slipped into place from where it had been strapped to her wrist, and the steel glinted in the poor light. The mutant girl had no such weapon, and kept her hands free to hold off any close-quarters attack.
Green-Eyes didn't disappoint. One moment she was smiling a predatory grin, the next she was a blur as she dived in to stab at the girl's chest with a practised arm. The girl moved away, but not before a deep gash opened up in the forearm she'd raised to shield herself. She cried out in pain and One-Eye's stolen fury, but wasn't rash enough to try for a counter-attack without a weapon.
Green-Eyes took the sound as a good sign and plunged into the fray again. This time, however, her swing was wild and unchecked, and the girl had no trouble blocking it without sustaining any injury. In fact, she even managed to twist her attacker's arm around and rap her knuckles so hard the knife fell into a flaccid grip where it couldn't do much damage very quickly. Then she thundered forward at the older woman, barrelling into her with one shoulder and knocking the blade away completely.
She had the upper hand, but the Vanguard weren't top dog in the Bayville turf war for nothing. Face a mask of hatred for all Mutantkind, Green-Eyes put on a burst of strength and kicked out, catching the girl in the midriff and knocking the wind from her. A whoosh of air escaped her lungs, and the gang leader grabbed at the fabric of her collar with a knarled hand.
{WHUMP}
She had the girl pinned to the floor in approximately no seconds flat, and wasted no time in grabbing her wrists and pinning her with a knee to her throat. She struggled, but Green-Eyes increased the pressure, and her young eyes bugged slightly as her airway was cut off.
She started losing the fight to take breath.
Trying valiantly to get the other female off, she bunched up her knees and attempted to get the flats of her feet under the other's torso. But Green-Eyes recognised the move and sank down, closing the gap between her body and the mutant's so that any such action was impossible.
Snarling, she leaned in close and growled into the girl's pale and besmirched face. "Stinking mutie! Your kind'll never win out over the likes of us." Hacking a gob of saliva back, she pursed her lips to spit it out onto the freak.
The girl's mind was getting fuzzy through lack of oxygen, and dark spots danced across her vision. She watched as the Vanguard leader drew her head back, and let her survival instincts take over. They'd gotten her this far. She trusted them to get her that little bit further.
As Green-Eyes bopped her head forward to release the gob of spit, she strained upwards at the last second and met her lips as they got just that little bit too close.
Green-Eyes thrashed, and released her captive's wrists in shock as the girl's powers kicked in at the contact. Hands clamped around her skull, simultaneously pushing her off the girl's throat and snatching the energy right out of her skin until she felt weak and dizzy.
Her fighting persona wouldn't let her give up so easily, though, and she pressed her knee down again.
The hold around her head tightened, and the elder woman screamed into the mutant's mouth as her very soul seemed to be ripped from under her and drawn into the freak. She kicked and fought, but it was no use. Her grip slipped from under her, and she went whirling off into a melee of thoughts, emotions and feelings, all caught up in the immutable pull of this one mutant girl.
Green-Eyes' body went limp, and at last the girl was able to let go.
With every ounce of strength she could muster, she threw the empty shell away from her, and it crumpled lifelessly into a mound of leather and flesh by her side.
Her breath came in quick, gulping gasps, and there was an iron band crushing the inside of her skull. She grappled at her head, writhing around in the dirt and sending up thick clouds of dust.
Within, a new mind fought against her own. This one was stronger than all the rest combined. This was no mere shadow, but an essence so potent it was all she could do to hold tenuously onto her thoughts whilst beating it off. It pushed, trying to force her out of her own head, and she screamed with the effort of holding it at bay.
Her cries echoed in the empty alley, and lasted for many minutes as she contended her inner battle.
And then all was silent.
It was over.
She'd won.
For now, at least.
Air hitching in her bruised throat, the mutant girl stumbled to her cut and bleeding bare feet. Using the wall for support, she tottered to the mouth and exit like a frail old woman. She'd won the fight, but at what cost? The strange new consciousness bubbled just beneath her own. She could feel it. She could sense its anger and bewilderment at being transplanted into this new place, this new body.
However, she could also sense something else. Something fleeting, like a soap bubble in warm air. She held onto it, a single image gleaned from this horrific new addition to her being. One of Green-Eyes' memories.
A lurching bus, paint peeling and rusted through in places. It moved clunkily, lurching through the streets of Bayville like a noisy spectre of what it once was. Through the windows she saw faces. Some she recognised, some she didn't, but the thought that accompanied this memory told her all she needed to know.
_Mutants!_
Pausing to get both her breath and her bearings, she picked out the path the memory had taken. Black tyre tracks lined the tarmac like a signpost, and she followed them like a bloodhound on a scent.
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To Be Continued...
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[1] Reference to the comic version of Kurt's date with the waterfall.