Chapter Three - Prison Break
The Pentagon, Washington D.C, Virginia, later that day.
It was supposed to be a quick-in-and-out, hopefully with minimal amount of bloodshed. The most secure prison in the world...Peter was up for a little challenge. He had to admit, it was a good day to commit a major crime.
The tour guide continued to prattle on, "Built in 1943, the Pentagon is the world's largest office building...housing more than 25, 000 military employees... stretched out over six million square feet…"
It was easy for Logan and Charles to give the tour group the slip, it wasn't exactly as if they were on high alert for a couple of unarmed guys trying to break-out their most wanted prisoner. Hank remained with the tour group waiting until the next part of their plan.
In the surveillance room, something was jamming their camera signal feed, broadcasting instead some inane TV show.
Peter zips past the kitchen and sneaks his way into the elevator behind the armed guard carrying a plastic tray of food. He bats the guard's hat off of his head, after the man picks it up and places it back on, it was already too late. The guard barely registers the boy who grins and moves inhumanly fast as he worked to duct-tape him against the elevator wall, then proceeded to wear his uniform.
Peter, now in disguise, carries the tray out to bring to the prisoner, passing by a narrow hallway lined with guardsmen who looked bored but dutifully resolute.
As Peter enters the antechamber he sees not one, but two cells adjoining each other, sunk below the room, the first, holding a disinterested looking figure. This must be Magneto.
The second, was strapped to a cold marble table, her limbs held down, she looked fast asleep, an IV continuously dripping beside her. She was irrelevant, however, he came for the man, who knows what kind of whackjob the second prisoner was to get herself remanded here.
Then again, this Magneto guy was probably a crazy old coot too.
Peter slides the tray of food down a chute, making it's way to the first prisoner. Strangely, Erik finds a note stuck inside the unappetising tray. "MIND THE GLASS", it read, garnering his prison guard an odd look. He's certainly never seen him before.
His guard just beams back innocently.
Well, this is new. Prisoner One had thought.
A second later the unnamed guard crouches, putting his hands firmly on the glass. His hands seeming to vibrate at supersonic speed while his body is held in place. The glass continues to vibrate quickly until the guard smiles knowingly as it shatter to pieces. Erik just had time to duck before the shards fell around him.
Though not having seen action in some number of years, Erik, that is, Prisoner One, makes quick work of climbing out of his hole, as the alarm sounds. In a commanding voice he points to the cell next to him. "Her too." he says.
Peter flinches. "They told me to get you."
"Her too." he repeats in an uncompromising tone, staring the other male down.
Peter sighs, "Ah, hell. I guess since I'm already here." Why not? A thought inside him whispered. Peter destroyed the glass in the second cell too, jumped down and unstrapped the second prisoner from the table. She was out cold.
Woah. On closer inspection he noticed that the second prisoner looked about his age, just a girl. It could have easily been someone like Wanda strapped onto that table. Inside him grew a swell of pity and a rapidly building protective intict. But damn, she was a babe. The girl had long dark hair that hung pin straight, her bangs ended just below her brows and her eyelashes fanned down her freckle covered nose and cheeks. She wore a grey jumpsuit, the very same Magneto wore, the numbers: 0002 stitched stitched to the breast. He slung her over his shoulder as he climbed out.
Magneto took him from her and into his arms. "In three seconds, those doors are going to open... and 20 guards be here to shoot us."
The man sped right behind him, a warm hand placed at the base of his neck. "I know. That's what I'm waiting for."
"What are you doing?" Erik asked.
"I'mholdingyournecksoyoudon'tgetwhiplash." he replied quickly, "Heytuckherheadinwillyou?"
"What?" Erik said.
"Whiiiipplaaaash." the speedster repeated slowly. "We'll be moving veeery fast so you need to make sure to tuck your heads in! You really do."
Erik did as he was told, silently readjusting his hold on the sleeping female.
The cell door opens, the guards blocking their only way out, guns poised, ready to kill. "Don't move!" an officer yells.
Gripping tightly onto Erik, Peter speeds past between the armed guards in a split-second, leaving twenty unconscious officers in their wake. They step inside the elevator where Erik props the still-unconscious girl unto the corner of the wall, he braces himself for a second, nauseous.
Erik turns to the guard beside him only to find him already having changed clothes. As he suspected, the guard was not a guard, after all. What does shock him is realising he was a boy. A teenager, really, in a silver metallic jacket with two combination locks stuck to the lapels and he wore Pink Floyd shirt. A set of goggles was perched on his head. The boy checked the time, meeting his eyes casually as Erik tried to regain his footing.
His mutation was a useful one, Erik had to noted.
The boy pulled a sympathetic face. "You're good, it'll pass, it happens to everyone." the boy beside him comments as he eyes the girl in the corner. "You must've done something serious. What'd you do? What'd you do? C'mon, what you dooooooo? Why did they have you in there?"
Erik figured that the kid would never shut up until he gave an answer. "For killing the President."
"Oh… wow." Peter remarks, mouthing an astounded "Shit!" quietly to the duct-taped guard, who concurs with his shock by the raising of his brows.
"If there's one thing I'm guilty of, it's fighting for people like us." Erik concludes, ignoring his antics. Peter didn't quite know what to make of that.
"You take karate? You know karate, man?" He eggs.
"I don't know karate. But I know crazy."
The boy next to him laughs. "They told me you could control metal."
"They?"
After a beat, Peter talks again, recalling a memory, "You know, my mom once knew a guy who could do that."
Dear God. A wave of panic hits Erik, but he buries it in rigid denial. No time for it now.
They soon arrive at their floor, the elevator dinging. They hear a voice from the other side, "I'm sorry, I'm just not very good with violence…" The doors slid open to reveal Charles talking to Logan.
Peter smiles proudly to bring them their prisoner-er, prisoners. Recognition hits both Charles and Erik, "Charles?" Erik asks.
Bu karma hits back, in the form of an angry Charles Xavier socking Erik Lehnsherr square on the jaw. Erik drops on the floor and Charles promptly does as well, tripping over the legs of a figure in the corner. "The hell?"
Erik nurse his lip, "Good to see you too, old friend. And walking."
Charles gets up from where he tripped, "No thanks to you."
It was then that Logan focuses on a figure in the elevator, "Zoe?" he breaths in utter shock. Peter had defensively put himself next to her, tensing, though not knowing why. Logan just ignored him before scooping her up into his arms protectively. "So this is where they kept you for all this time...Those pricks." he muttered to himself.
"You know her?" Erik asks the stranger incredulously.
"Better than you think." Logan counters with a worried look. Peter backs down and continues to stand awkwardly to the side next to the immobile guard who was somewhat growing on him.
He had a cigar in his mouth, his hat, perched over his eyes to block out the sun. James felt the air move around him and smelt the woman before she even sat down across his table.
"So," she points out, her voice was even. "You're The Wolverine. They talk so much about you."
"Yeah, well, when you travel a lot in the same circles, it's not hard to make a name for yourself, 'Abyss'." It appears he has heard of her too, then.
She met his eyes coolly. With her kill count, he would have to watch his back. She wasn't someone you'd want to get on the bad side of.
Abyss, or whatever she was called, smiled tightly. "Still, we might as well be civil, after all, you're my new partner." she leans back on the bench, crossing her arms over her chest, she looked young for her age. Then again, mutants were never as they seemed.
She was his new partner? He suddenly wonders what the hell Stryker was thinking putting them together. "Uh huh, no sweat off my back, sister." He wasn't the type to be intimidated. Usually he was the one doing the intimidating.
The woman before him extended a gloved hand, "Zoe Kinney,"
He takes the fat cigar from his teeth, holding it in his fingers, gauging her for the shortest while. Alright, he thinks, Let's see how this goes. "James Howlett." He replies, shaking the proffered limb. "How long have you been here?"
"Awhile now."
"And what did you do, before all this?" he says, a hand gesturing vaguely.
She paused for some time, "...I don't know, actually. 'This' is actually the only place I've ever known. There's some childhood bullshit in there somewhere, probably, but it's vague."
"You don't remember anything from before?"
"No, you?" Zoe asks, cocking her head to the side.
"More than I'd care to." he says, growing quiet.
Zoe sighs, "Probably better I'm this way. Then I can't hurt anybody but myself."
"Or who they want you to." James finished for her.
"You're the last person in the world I expected to see today." Erik says, turning to Charles.
"Believe me... I wouldn't be here if I didn't have to. If we get you out of here, we do it my way. No killing." he reminds adamantly.
Erik points to his head, "No helmet. I couldn't disobey you even if I wanted."
"I'm never getting inside of that head again. I need your word, Erik." he says to his former friend who nods.
In the next moment, more guards burst through the kitchens, surrounding them. Nobody move! Hold it right there!"
"Charles." Erik says.
"Don't move. Hands up, or we will shoot!" another officer threatens.
Logan's hold tightens on the girl in his arms, his expression ferocious.
Erik continues to address the man next to him, "Freeze them, Charles."
"I can't." was the only answer he gets.
"Hands up!" voices the third guard.
Erik grimly looks back to the six armed guards before them and the industrial sized kitchen they were in, filled with all assortments of metal utensils, pots and pans. The metal begins to clatter, his manipulation taking hold. The guards notice this and opens a barrage of weapon-fire.
As Erik begins his assault by turning all metal towards the men, Charles shoves him back, "NO!" he shouts. At the same time, Logan tries to turn his body away as to shield the girl in his arms, his bone claws extending.
What none of them factored in, was Peter. And so, they were all too unaware of the boy who quick as a flash - dons on his headphones before incapacitating the whole room of Pentagon Security forces. Peter smiles widely, admiring his handiwork; he was very proud, and placing a Pentagon cap more firmly on his head. Yes, he liked showing off. As if it wasn't clear already.
They exit the kitchen, Logan gripping his shoulder with one hand, the other still carrying Prisoner 0002. "Thanks, kid." he says, impressed with the spectacle he pulled off.
Peter nods slightly as he follows after them, the sprinklers not doing a whole lot of wonders to his equipment.That was fun, he thinks...If only the whole thing lasted more than seven minutes. They regroup with Hank outside who was already running their get-away car. It was going to be a long drive to the airport. There was some serious explaining to do.
The car was crowded, Hank was at the wheel, Logan and Charles at the front beside him. In the back, the mystery passenger lay unconscious, sandwiched between Erik who had placed a concerned hand on her neck to check her pulse, and Peter who seemed intent on watching every move concerning the girl.
Logan was watching in the rear-view mirror, secretly glad to see that even now, in a different time, and a completely different life for them all, Peter and Zoe continued to be inexplicably drawn to each other. He hopes to keep this alternate timeline whole, praying to whatever god that they don't screw up.
"Concerned for my friend there, bub?" Logan questioned who he had considered to be a long-time adversary, twisting his body to face the back seat.
Erik met his look darkly, removing his fingers from her pulse. Satisfied of her stable condition. "They brought her in about three years ago. I don't know her very well, they never really leave her awake for very long for me to get to know her any better." Erik divulged, sighing tiredly. "They experimented on the both of us, you know, more her than me, they don't know the full extent of her powers yet and were to afraid to push. When they finish with their tests they make me take care of her, feed her at times, they always keep her so sedated so she doesn't fight. They shock her otherwise, or threaten her, then they started threatening me when they realised that I've befriended her...Now, I've been resigned to the fact that I had to be held responsible for my actions for Cuba, for Kennedy...but she's just a child. I doubt she's deserved any of this."
Logan nodded, content with his words. "She never did."
Peter, meanwhile, was purposefully distracting himself by looking outside the window, pretending to be bored.
Logan rubbed Zoe's hand until she began to stir, mumbling incoherently. The drugs were wearing off.
She groaned once or twice. Before jolting awake, suddenly, a dark energy began to cocoon her, she looked ready to tear someone apart.
"Jesus!" Peter exclaimed beside her.
A type of polarity was surrounding her, dark spots of energy almost sucking away the oxygen around them. It sent the vehicle spinning out of control.
They were barrelling into oncoming traffic.
"Time flies over us, but leaves its shadow behind." - Nathaniel Hawthorne
/A/N:
I know, I know, it's a cliffhanger. But it grabs attention, don't you think? So Erik and Zoe are out of their cage now, things should be revealed soon. Actually, the next chapter. I've written chapter four, but not chapter five so I think I will write that before I publish the next chapter. I'm not really sure what's happening next, your guess is as good as mine. But if you have any suggestions, I'll certainly consider it.
To my reviewers:
x XRoweenaJAugustineX x:Thanks! You're too sweet. I'm glad you like my story, honestly seeing so many people pleased with it is s rewarding. I've kind of developed a habit checking my email at all times of the day for new favourites or follows or reviews. I hope I don't disappoint; as always, this chapter is for you, the people who enjoy reading as much as I do and consume as much fanfic as I do. :) You've made my day just by reviewing.
anonymouscsifan: I always feel like watching the extended editions are just the best treat, because you're getting so much more of the story and it's a lot more richer. I always try and watch alternate or deleted scenes too, I've been guilty of watching and re-watching the special features of a lot of films. All my copies of Lord of the Rings are extended versions and when I watched it on TV I was confused as to why a lot of pars were skipped until I realised those extra scenes were cut for the theatrical version.
Have an opinion? I want to hear it. PM is always open for a chat, or leave a review if that floats your boat.
I do not own any characters you might recognise, they are the property of Marvel (and maybe Sony Pictures?). I do own my OC Zoe.
Many thanks! And happy fanfic hunting!
-HannahBananasxx