UNUSUAL HUNTERS

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Jack awoke, his his head dizzy, his back aching.
He noticed that his hands were bound to something, in a quite uncomfortable position.

He tried to think back, what had brought him here. He only remembers standing in his hallway, about to shoot the Wolverine once more. Then a sharp flash of pain, and the next thing was already waking up here, lying on the floor of a cheap motel room, his wrists bound to the upper end of a radiator that wasn't even switched on. It was cold in here, wearing only a pair of jeans.

The TV was on, showing a football game.

He looked around and found Logan, sitting on the bed, watching the game, a bottle of beer in his hands. That mutant didn't even care whether he was awake or not, even though he must have noticed him waking up.

Slowly, Jack pulled himself up into a sitting position. Logan kept watching the game. Took a sip of beer.

Jack looked around, but didn't find that girl who had been in his house, too.

As Logan still didn't pay any attention to his captive, he asked him "Why am I here?"

Logan drank a bit more. "Sounded like she wanted a pet. Now she has one." It had been Rogue's idea not to kill Bauer. Whatever... he could still get rid of him later.

A pet. What a disgrace, being called like that. "Beware, some of them might bite.", he hissed, pulling at the rope around his wrists.

For the first time, Logan turned his head, sneering. He let out his claws of his right hand, delighted in seeing his captive jerk at hearing the metallic noise. "Won't take me long to break you of that." Showing them was often enough.
He turned back to the football game. 4th and 12.

Even Jack took the few seconds and watched the play. He couldn't change his miserable situation anyway.
1st and 10. He turned back to Logan. "Where are we?", he asked him. As far as he realized, there were no scratches on his body, no three parallel bloody marks, no single stab wound at all.

"motel room." Logan thought of knocking him out just so he could watch the game in silence. Rogue should have been back a while ago, with something to eat.

"How did I get here?", Jack asked again.

Logan turned his head, saying nothing. Wouldn't that guy understand his mad view? Why did he keep begging to get hurt?

"Where's your girl?"

Now that was enough. Heatedly, Logan put the beer down on the bedside table and got up, wordlessly walking over to Jack. He looked down on him.

Jack knew that this guy could kill him within the blink of an eye. But something had made this guy abstain from doing it - at least so far.
"Guess you ain't allowed to hurt your lady's pet, huh?"

WAHM.
Logan rammed his knee into Jack's chest. "Guess I am.", he remarked.

Jack gasped. He fought for air. This blow had been harder than anything he'd ever experienced. And yet it had looked like Logan hadn't even used all his power.
He coughed, trying to figure out if one of his ribs was broken now. They all hurt, immensely.

Logan took his bottle of beer again, finding it almost empty. He took another one out of the fridge and sat down on the bed again, without so much as looking at his captive. He could smell him, hear every breath and groan that man made... no need to look after him.
He turned back to the game, just because he didn't want to talk. Almost breaking his chest had hopefully made that point clear.
3rd and 5.
As he had bound that man's hands to the radiator, he had noticed the scars on his back and chest. He knew how all kinds of cruelties looked like. They were lash marks, acid burns and some deep cuts which had healed without getting any medical attention.
1st and 10 again. At least he could watch the game in silence now. Bauer didn't speak any more to the beginning of the next quarter.
But the longer he sat there, knowing that his captive was awake, Logans curiosity grew, wanting to know what had mangled him that way.

Rogue still wasn't back. She had left an hour ago, taken the car with her to find a place to get some take-away burgers. They were somewhere in the outskirts of the city, where they had never been before. It could take some time to find a good place.

"What happened to you?", Logan finally asked.

Jack lifted his head, tiredly. He hated the position he was in and he swore to himself not to be cooperative. "A damn mutant tied me up.", he growled, giving him the same nonsense as an answer that the other had given him before.

It drew half of a smile off Logan's face. Part of him admired him for that answer. He obviously had no will to live - and in combination with that, no fear of being hurt again.
"I meant the scars on your back."

"That's none of your concern."
Those wounds had healed off years ago. He hadn't really ever spoken to anyone about them. And for sure, he'd not start now.

Logan noticed how Jack shifted his position, leaning his back against the radiator, almost as if he wanted to hide it. Must have been one hell of a nightmare to go through whatever he'd gone through.
He turned back to the game. The defensive end and the quarterback were almost getting into a fight after the quarterback had gotten sacked.
Rogue still wasn't back. He could still ask her about the wounds on Bauer's back. She had absorbed him, she would know.

And suddenly, a very bad feeling came over him: She had absorbed that man. Getting hurt like that. The thoughts. That pain.

Years ago, after she had absorbed the those 15 years of his life that he could remember at that time, she had changed a lot. She'd had his nightmares, she had lived through his pain, through all the thins that Strkyer had done to him and that had still been burnt into his memories.

Logan glanced at Jack. That man was a big mess, through and through, and his Marie had him in her head now!
He got up and went over to him. "How did you get those?", he asked him again, pointing at the scars on his back.

"None of your concern.", Jack looked away, over to the game again.

"It is.", Logan added. "She's got you in her head now."

In her head? He didn't understand a word of this mutant stuff. "Poor girl, then.", he just remarked, watching the game.

And another cold shiver ran down Logan's back.

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x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x

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Rogue stopped the car in front of the gates to a large building. The burgers that she'd bought lay on the front passenger's seat, but they had gotten cold long ago. She hadn't even cared to eat her own one.

Something had told her to come here, she hadn't been able to fight that feeling.

She felt like she needed to do this, to go in there and kill somebody.

After all he had done to her.

She looked at her wristwatch, the one that she'd taken off a few hours ago.. to put it back on with the cock-face now on the inner side of her wrist. It was six in the morning. Too early.

Finally, she settled into the seat, grabbed her burger and decided to wait until the people who worked here would come. The one she was waiting for always came at ten minutes to eight, staying until ten minutes past five.

The rain washed over the windshield, blurring the view at the golden sign next to the entrance.
She didn't need to read it, anyway, because she already knew what was written on it: EMBASSY OF CHINA.

x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x

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"I asked you half an hour ago how I came here."

"She touched you."

"And?"

"That's her mutation. She touches people and draws their life out. First, their feelings, then their memories, followed by their mutations and finally their life force."

He could hardly believe that there was somebody else out there now, with his mind... with everything he knew, all the national security stuff, all the access codes - it was a perfect mutation, for anybody in the intelligence sector.
But finally, he realized what made Logan so protective of her, leading him to asking about the scars on his back: she hadn't only gotten the access codes and national security matters. She also had the memories now, the ones that he had once tried to kill with drugs, and also those of China... losing Audrey... being tortured, beaten up, lashed and left to rot in a small cell. The memories of how this country had treated him when he came back: taking away all he still had, making him a fugitive. Being interrogated. The infection. The everlasting therapy to get back on his feet, at least somehow.

He wanted nobody to have to live through that.

"Where is she now?", Jack asked. He saw Logan pacing around in the room, restlessly. Jack hadn't yet found out what their relation was, but the Wolverine seemed to be very protective of her. Right now, he looked close to panicking.

"She went to get something to eat, but that was more than an hour ago.", Logan began, "She should have been back long ago."

What would somebody do who lives through my thoughts? Jack asked himself. He couldn't answer it. It had taken him years to fight down his rage at everything, the lust to kill and the craving for revenge. At one point, he had given it up. There was no sense in taking revenge and holding on to the fight. He had found out long ago, that if he wanted to bring peace into his life, he needed to let go of the past. If she had all his thoughts, then she'd realize this as well.

"Who would you kill if you had the chance to?", Logan asked him.

Jack looked up. "No-one."

"Really?" He didn't believe him. Somebody who had gone through whatever had happened to him must have some outstanding scores.

"Yes." Jack sighed. "I'm not like you, Logan. Whenever I do something, things have consequences." He put a stress on that last word, because it was the most important one. He would have enough people on the list to kill. But he didn't do it because of the consequences. "The world is different when you get old and face your own death or whatever worse there can be. It looks different from when you live nearly forever and can't be harmed by anything."

Logan stopped pacing about.
Marie had them both in her head: The Wolverine, sure of nothing would have consequences. And now Bauer, whose past, paired with the Wolverine, could finally break free.
"It does, and that's the problem." Logan grabbed his jacket and put it on, and then threw the other one over to Jack, the one that he'd given him before.

He knelt down in front of his captive. "She could be your revenge trip now."
He needed Bauer's help to find her. That man was the only one to know where she would be. Looking into his eyes, he wasn't so sure, if he would help him at all. He hesitated with untieing his hands.

Jack saw him hesitate. "I won't kill you.", he remarked, halfway smiling.

"Sure.", Logan shook his head, "I won't ever find her without you, and I'll make sure you won't run away, even if I have to cut off your legs for that." He didn't trust that man, after all. Xavier had told him he was a fighter. It's been a while since an ordinary human being had brought him down in a fight. Bauer had been the first one in years.
Slowly, Logan reached out and cut the knot around Jack's wrists apart.
He expected hell to break loose, but it didn't.

Jack reached out for his old jacket and put it on. "If she's on my revenge trip, she will eventually fuck up my life with it. Can't let that happen.", he murmured and stood up. "Where's my gun?"

"No way.", Logan spoke. "We're gonna do this my way."

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