(Another chapter at last. The story will be moved to Archive of our own from now on, due to the easier interface and options. I'll leave the story here on , but it will not be updated. Only the AO3 story will be updated. The link is as follows: /works/4863314/chapters/11145815 thank you for reading my story!)
If there was one thing Ace hadn't foreseen, it was how easily she slipped back into her old habits. The moment they arrived at the motel, a cheap one, where the employees could be tipped into ignoring any amount of blue fur, she was back in her role. She'd almost felt for one of her fake credit cards in her pocket, before remembering that Hank had made her throw them all out. They probably wouldn't have worked anyway, at least she didn't have to test it now. Since Logan was more used to this kind of thing, and to shady motels in general, than Hank, he handled the people while Ace parked the bike and Hank stayed hidden.
The room was not small, nor was it overtly large. And it only had one bathroom, which might prove difficult, though Ace didn't really care. There were a lot of things she found herself ignoring, instinctively knowing that they would obstruct the hunt. Such as the worried gazes Hank was sending her. He was concerned for her, this woman before him was a far cry from the Ace he knew, and the sudden shift in mentality seemed far from healthy. Still, she wasn't exactly a pitch perfect example of mental health, and he did his best to subdue his concerns. He couldn't help but feel that he was the odd one out, compared to Logan and Ace. They were both quiet, focused and set with gritty determination. For Logan, of course, that wasn't exactly unusual. But for Ace… Well, it was unusual for the woman he knew. He'd only ever glimpsed this side of her, and all those times he had been unsettled. Somehow, he knew it would get worse before it got better.
When the day was coming to an end, which was no more than an hour or so after their arrival, Ace had covered a whole wall with maps, informative pages and newspaper clippings, as well as pictures so gritty, Hank would've feared for the sanity of most people who saw them. Not the three of them, of course. As sad as it was, they had all seen worse things, much worse, though under different circumstances for Hank.
"We move out tonight, starting from the crypts at the old cemetery and moving in a clockwise pattern through the city's local dens of inequity. If we don't find them tonight, no sweat, but they'll most likely find us tomorrow. Either way…" Her façade suddenly gave way, and she hesitated, looking at them both with hesitant looks and a troubled expression. Something in her eyes told Hank that she was genuinely concerned on their behalves, as well as uncertain about herself. Ace truly was uncertain, maybe she should call off the hunt, tell them to go back. That would be suicide for her, but what if something happened to either of the two men? Even worse, what if the vampires caught one of them, and changed them? She would have to kill a friend, and she hadn't had one of those, not like this, for a very long time. As a hunter, she kept people at a safe distance, friends and partners included. She hadn't had to in this dimension, but now the danger was there, and she was weak in the face of them. Plus, if any of them turned into vampires, she was big time screwed.
"Either way what?" Logan's gruff voice interrupted her line of thoughts. She took a deep breath to steady herself. "Don't get bitten, either of you. And don't drink their blood of let them bleed on you, I don't wanna have to cut your heads off." She turned around, facing the rocky, weapon-laden table to avoid having them see her pained expression. She grasped a handgun and loaded it, then unloaded it and re-checked the bullets before loading it again, mostly just to get her head on straight. "Hank, did you get what I asked for?" She asked, turning around again after stuffing the gun into a holster in her belt. The blue mutant shifted uncomfortably, but drew a small canister from one of his inner pockets. At least it looked small in his hand, but it wasn't so tiny when Ace took it. She nodded, examining it carefully before pressing the button that seemed to be correct. She was rewarded when the canister opened, and she could remove three phials of a red liquid.
"I don't want to think of the strings I had to pull to get that." Hank mumbled, looking at the phials with mild disgust, before he shook his head. Logan looked from one to the other, slightly puzzled. "Are ya gonna tell me what that is, or do I have to guess?" He asked, looking mildly annoyed. Ace smirked, not a comfortable, nice kind of smile, but one that sent shivers down Hank's spine. It was a smile that held crude joy over the impending violence. "This, my clawed friend, is dead man's blood. Blood from the deceased is like poison to vampires, it paralyzes them and renders them incapable of fighting, even of coherent thought." She carefully placed the phials in an inner pocket in her jacket, handing Hank the now closed canister. "Damned handy to have." She said, offering Hank a small, comforting smile. She knew he disliked this, but if he continued acting with the hesitance he did now, she was going to have to restrict him to the motel room. She had told him that she needed decisiveness, and she wasn't going to have anything else from him, whether he liked it or not.
With her jaw set with determination, she handed Hank a stake. "I'm not giving you a gun, figured the diplomat in you would be opposed." She said. Of course, she was not telling the entire truth. She wasn't giving him a gun because she didn't trust him to, in the heat of battle, actually be able to use such a weapon. No doubt he'd have the resolve, but she'd read his files, curtesy of the Professor and a good deal of convincing, and she knew he'd be better with a stake. Much, much better.
"Thank you for your concern." Something about the way he looked at her, slightly indignant, told her that he did not understand her meaning with this gesture. Well, it was better that he was annoyed because he thought she didn't think him decisive in battle, than if he was angry with her knowing exactly how he really worked in battle. Ace had a feeling that his bestial side, the animal, was not something he was particularly proud of.
"As for you, Logan, I'm thinking you can handle the beheading without any help." The slight smirk she got in reply was more than enough to convince her that his answer was very much affirmative. She turned around and picked up a crossbow from the table, tossing the quiver over her shoulder. Then she turned back around, facing them with a deadly gleam in her eyes.
"Well, boys. Let's go hunt some suckers."