Chapter 9
"Tsk, tsk. You're not being very polite," he said. "Shall I get the yardstick, see if that makes you more polite?"
She didn't have to be polite when he was intruding on her like this. "Get out of my bathroom!" She screamed again. "Get out get out GET OUT!"
The shower door flew open, and she cringed in the back of the stall, trying to cover her body with her hands. He grabbed her arm and hauled her out of the small space, ignoring her efforts to fight against his pull. She tripped over the edge of the tub as he lifted her out, and fell to her knees on the floor, dripping water on the linoleum. He towered over her, dropping the towel beside her as she scrambled back against the side of the tub. "Stop it. Leave me alone!" she screamed at him. Her hands found the towel and she started to pull it around her nude body.
He tried to rip the towel out of her hands, but she clung to it and kicked out at his ankle. Her foot connected, and he grunted in pain. "That's it, girl," he snarled at her "You made me mad now!" He turned and stormed out of the bathroom.
She scrambled to dry herself as fast as she could, but just as she was pulling her regular pajama shirt over her head he exploded back into the bathroom, and he was holding the yardstick. She didn't even have time to react as he raised it and brought it down on her bare, wet thigh. Crying out with the sudden pain, she backed away from him until she was up against the wall. There was nowhere else to go after that, and all she could do was curl up on the floor and try to protect her face as he beat her mercilessly.
She barely realized it when the blows stopped. Her legs, backside, torso, and arms were bruised and smarting from the blows, and the pain was excruciating. She was still sobbing in pain when he grabbed one arm and rolled her over, ripped her pajama shirt off and replaced it with the nightgown. Then she heard the sound of his zipper sliding down.
That sound snapped her out of her pain-filled daze. Screaming in anger and pain, she brought her foot up and kicked him, hard, right where Ororo had told her would hurt most. He gave a funny grunt, and she wiggled out from under him, heading for her room.
It didn't stop him for long, though. She heard him lumbering down the hall to her room, and she thought desperately. Where could she go where he wouldn't find her? The answer came to her as she stared out the nursery window to the greenhouse. Her greenhouse, her refuge. She would be safe there; he couldn't get her in there. She had the key. She could lock him out.
Gathering her legs under herself, she staggered off down the hall and down the stairs. Behind her she heard an enraged bellow as Mr. Hunt came after her. She limped as best as she could down the stairs, out the back door, and through the swirling white snow to her greenhouse, where she fumbled around her neck for the key that hung from a chain around it. She unlocked the door, fell inside the small structure, and sighed as she sank to the floor, sobbing in pain. Her arms were welted and bruised, and the bruises went down her body to her legs. With the way she had been curled up on the bathroom floor he had even hit her feet a couple of times, and her feet were throbbing. Adrenaline had kept her going to the greenhouse, but now that she was safe, the pain made itself felt.
"Get out here!" Came a harsh growl from outside the greenhouse, and Joey trembled. She was safe in here, she had to keep telling herself that, he wouldn't come in here, he couldn't come in here, this was her place. No one came in here.
Then suddenly there was a tremendous crash, and a second later, icy cold flakes were swirling in through the suddenly door-less opening. She screamed in terror as she saw Mr. Hunt standing there, his coat carelessly thrown over his bare shoulders and his pants hanging open, unzipped.
He glared down at her coldly. "You hurt me," he snarled. "You hurt me. Look at me!" And he angled his hips forward, and Joey got her first look at the male body. She hated it. She wanted to throw up. She turned her face away, trying to erase the sight of that long, thick, upright thing between his legs, framed by the open zipper.
He grabbed her hair and hauled her up off the cement floor, bringing her face close to his groin. "Open your mouth!" He yanked her head back so far her mouth opened involuntarily, and he shoved his thing into her mouth.
She gagged, retched, and choked. For one wild moment, she thought about just clamping down with her teeth, but the very thought made her sick. She pounded her fists on his leg, then reached up and raked the exposed skin of his lower belly with her hands.
He thrust her away with a curse, and she stumbled back, right up against the shelves that held her precious rosebushes. With a crash all the shelves on that side came crashing down, and she howled in pain as planters shattered and flying pieces of pottery and thorny branches scratched her. A heavy blue flowerpot fell from a high shelf and broke over her head, and she crumpled, dazed from the impact.
As if from a great distance she heard a roar. "You scratched me!" There was a strange whistling sound, and then suddenly pain exploded along her legs. She screamed in terror as her tear-blurred eyes picked up the sight of the long, thick leather belt, doubled in the fist held over her. It hovered there for a moment, then crashed down on her again. Again, and again, and again.
She was only half-conscious when he finally stopped. She barely felt his hands on her legs, flipping up the hem of the nightgown. The pain, as he forced into her body, snapped her out of her daze. She screamed.
He ignored her cries and shoved brutally into her again. She cried hysterically, begging him to get off her, to stop hurting her, but he didn't stop. Frantic, her hands groped for something, anything, to hit him with, and by chance she grabbed the planter that had hit her on the head. She brought it up in her hands and smashed it over his head.
He grunted in pain, cursed her, and slammed his fist into her cheek. She tasted blood in her mouth. The fresh pain broke her spirit, and she stopped fighting. Her hands dropped limply to her sides and she fell silent, staring with empty eyes at the ceiling of the greenhouse.
He stopped thrusting into her, staring at her empty eyes. 'Move, damn you," he snarled at her. She lay still. He got off her, and the pain of his exit started her crying again. She shrieked in terror as he raised the belt again and snapped her thighs closed. It wasn't her legs he was aiming for this time, though.
She shrieked in agony as he flailed at her front with the belt, striking her breasts. The thin material, stretched too tight, tore as he continued his assault on her, and her bare flesh took the brunt of the beating. She finally collected enough of her wits to crawl to her knees, turning her back to him as she tried to reach the door of the greenhouse.
He threw the belt down and grabbed her ankle with one hand. She tugged, but was too weak to free herself. He flipped up the nightgown, exposing her bare bottom, covered with ugly welts from her beating. And then fresh pain erupted in her body as he forced into her roughly again.
A long time, an eternity later, the pounding stopped. He got up off her body and zipped up his pants, then grabbed her hair and pulled her head up. "Don't stay out here too long, little girl. Lots more fun waiting inside." He left the greenhouse with a cruel laugh.
Joey lay on the floor for a long while, lost in her anguish and pain. The cold snow drifting on the floor and around her ankles finally got her moving. She dragged herself up, and hung onto the doorframe of the greenhouse, gathering up her strength. She wasn't going back. She was not going to walk back into that house and face more pain, more abuse. Instead, her stumbling steps took her away from her house, toward the lake, and the mansion that lay across the lake, and Ororo's comforting arms.
The cold snow numbed her feet as she trudged wearily toward the lake. Her mind was numbed by cold and pain, and she lost her footing on the steep slope leading down to the lake. She fell all the way down the slope, and when she got up, her nightgown was soaked through with snow that melted in the faint heat coming from her body. Her shivering increased, and she fell to her knees in the snow. Her body cried out for rest; she wanted so badly to lie down there and not move again; but her survival instinct was stronger than her exhaustion and pain, and she continued to drag herself, step by painful step, toward Xavier's back door. Her feet, swollen from the beating, split open when she reached the edge of the gravel path leading to the back door, leaving bleeding tracks in the snow. Stumbling now, she dragged herself wearily the last few steps to the door and knocked weakly.
Remy sauntered into the kitchen, opened the fridge, and grabbed a soda. He was about to leave when he heard a faint thump. He frowned; where was that noise coming from? He listened. It wasn't repeated. Shrugging, he was about to leave the kitchen when he heard the thump again.
He dropped his mental shields, the ones around his empathy, and staggered as the wave of raw pain hit him like a tidal wave. He snapped up his shields reflexively, but before he had gotten himself fully under control he was yanking open the back door. A slender figure in a tattered, bloodstained white nightgown fell into the kitchen as the door opened.
Remy knew who it was. He grabbed one limp arm, blue from the cold outside, and dragged the body into the kitchen, then slammed and locked the door. If anyone was after little Joey, they wouldn't be getting her in here. "Joey," he knelt over her urgently. "Joey."
"Remy?" those indigo eyes opened…well, one did. The other was almost swollen shut by a huge, ugly bruise. 'Where's Ororo?"
"I'll get her for you as soon's I get you down in de medlabs," he said, slipping his arms under her body and lifting her carefully. His skin jumped as the snow-soaked, cold material touched his bare chest, but he ignored the instinct to jerk away from the cold and instead leaned into it, hoping to warm her up with his body heat as much as possible. It took a few minutes for him to realize she had started to cry when he picked her up. "What wrong, p'tite?" he asked, slowing in his headlong rush down the hall.
"My…back…" and then she went limp. Remy shook his head. Get her to the medlabs first, ask questions later.
He took the steps down to the Rec Room as fast as he could, her slight weight no real burden to him. Hank and Bobby were playing a video game in front of the TV; Hank abandoned it immediately when he saw Remy's face. He sprang to the hidden entrance to the lower levels and opened the door for Remy. "Down here, Remy, hurry. Bobby," he said to the younger man hovering behind him, "Call Jean, and Charles. And Ororo; if I am not mistaken this is her young friend."
Joey stirred as Remy put her down on one of the biobeds. She cried out weakly as Hank started to try and pull the sodden material off her body, and her hands came up to try and prevent them. "Joey. It's me, Hank, Ororo's friend. Let me take a look at your injuries."
"No," Joey shrank away from him. "No, please, don't hurt me, please…" and her hands flailed at his preventing Hank from looking at her.
Bobby ran as fast as he could down the hallway. Charles was in his study, doing a little paperwork; he looked up as Bobby burst in. He was about to chide him on not knocking when he got a good look at Bobby's face, and what he wanted to say died on his lips. "Joey," Bobby gasped out. 'Remy just brought her in. She's hurt bad. Where's Ororo?"
Xavier flicked a telepathic thought upstairs. Ororo?
Her answer was immediate. Yes, Charles?
Joey is here. Bobby said Remy bought her in, and that she is hurt. I don't know anything beyond that. Hurry down, please.
Ororo jumped off her bed upstairs and ran down the attic stairs. Then, her heart in her throat, she spurned the stairs and flew straight down them, down the hall to the kitchen, and across the Rec Room. Seconds later, she was pelting as fast as she could toward the medlabs.
Joey was there…and Ororo's heart twisted in her chest painfully. She was wearing the remnants of a plain white nightgown that was now streaked liberally with blood and mud. She was crying as she fended off Hank's attempts to remove the sodden nightgown.
"Joey…" The girl turned her face toward her friend, and Ororo gasped as she saw the bruise swelling one eye. "Joey, what happened?…no, don't sit up, let Hank take a look at you…"
"No," Joey pleaded. "No men…please…Mr. Hunt hurt me, he beat me and he…he put his thing inside my body, it hurt so bad…" and she started crying again. Ororo sucked in a gasp of horror and anger as she folded the little girl in her arms and held her. "Ssshh. It's all over. He won't hurt you here…I promise. Here. Hold out your arm, let Hank give you some medicine that will help..." But the terrified child clung to her, refusing to let Hank touch her. Finally Jean took the syringe from Hank and took the girl's arm gently. Joey sobbed a little as the needle entered her arm vein, but seconds later her eyelids fluttered closed, and she wilted in Ororo's arms.