Title: The Victor
Chapter I: The Hunter, Part I
Rating: M for cussing, violence violence, and sex.
Summary: This is a rewrite of the Octoberverse (originally published in May 2009). Victor Creed gets sidetracked on a mission by a lovely piece of collateral.
Disclaimer: If I could wrap myself up in Liev Schreiber's enormous Victor Creed arms every night, I would. Alas…
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When Victor Creed first saw her—face-to-face, real life—he was on a mission to end Dean McQuay's writing career and activism. If Creed was lucky, maybe even his life. The mission was nothing special. If not for what happened later, he might never even have remembered it down the road.
But it did happen. And unlike Logan, no number of bullets—fancy metal alloy or not—could scrub it from his brain.
Dean McQuay was a professor and writer of law. He taught seminars and classes, he published textbooks and pamphlets, and he was a staunch mutant-rights activist. His ties to one October Morgan—a former activist who had become an overnight martyr for something-or-another back in the day—only strengthened his position in the public eye and lent him further credibility.
All of which Victor Creed couldn't have given two shits about, really.
Except for the fact that McQuay's little "movement" had caught the eye of some very important people in the upper echelons of the US government—some very important people who were very invested in keeping things exactly as they were. It wasn't so much that these people were anti-mutant themselves, of course—some of them were mutants, though they could pass—but the goal was to distract the wider populace with some archaic argument about "equal rights" while shifting global power dynamics, capital, and resources.
McQuay was threatening that. His radical, nonsectarian left-wing approach to mutant politics was inviting people to consider new possibilities, new answers. And the shadowy recesses of the US government weren't going to allow that to happen—not when the war for and against mutant rights provided such wonderful political theatre.
And so they called in Victor Creed. It had been long enough, they thought, since a civil rights activist had been assassinated—perhaps it would provide a backdrop for even greater public distraction.
Creed didn't care one way or another about the man's work, or his fight for mutant rights, or his attempts to undermine the US government. After all, Creed himself had earned limitless privileges through his work with clandestine segments of the federal government, and even if those agencies should fall apart, Creed would still survive.
He would always survive.
This knowledge of his own immortality made it easy to dismiss pests like McQuay. His work did not affect Creed one way or another, and the feral had long ago learned that the world operated on the theme of 'every animal for himself'.
Currently, however? The government was what kept him in nice digs and powerful cars. He didn't take orders—and hell was paid by anyone who forgot that—but he loved his job.
McQuay lived at 272 North Forest Street, Apartment 6A. He was "best friends"—how cute, Creed sneered—with aforementioned former activist October Morgan, but lived alone. He called himself both a journalist and an anarchocommunist, freelancing columns for major papers and magazines around the globe. Though no Noam Chomsky, McQuay had quite a following, and had published a number of widely-distributed essays and pamphlets. The world was already experiencing more social upheaval than most global leaders were entirely comfortable with—McQuay happened to be living in a time when more people were willing to listen, to question, and that was bad luck for pretty much everyone.
McQuay also had some sort of mutation that was both a blessing and a curse. Creed was a little unclear on what his strengths were—something about scrambling peoples' brains. Well, Creed had has his brains scrambled before. He'd had his head smashed open with a shovel once, when he was younger, and just a few years back he'd hunted down Jimmy again and found himself with three admantium claws shoved straight through his skull. Having been on the receiving end of a deathblow more than once, Creed figured he could handle anything McQuay dished out.
Plus, McQuay had a weakness. Some mutants did: their mutations gave them great strength in one place, but sometimes the energy funneled into those abilities left them vulnerable in others. McQuay had some sort of series of disorders: bone fragility, craniosynostosis, propotosis, and hydrocephalus. The man had a shunt and had suffered from multiple broken bones in his past. His file said he could probably be killed just by being hit with a truck or shoved down the stairs, but Creed figured they wanted the job done right, which was why they sent him. His job was to end McQuay's work, preferably through more subtle means—blackmail, torture, threats.
However, if that failed, the order was to terminate.
Creed rather hoped for the latter.
So he stalked McQuay, watching him carefully, learning his habits. The man was skinny to the point of gauntness, with one leg that didn't bend right and made him look lopsided. The activist woke up promptly at seven in the morning and ate an egg and a bagel and a glass of orange juice. He wore dark sunglasses over his protruding eyes. Sharply-cut suits. He went to work in a small but clean office on Twelfth Avenue every morning at nine, and went home at three, courtesy of Bus 9G. And when the fragile little man unexpectedly limped six blocks to the library, leaning on his cane and trembling the whole time, Creed was there, following.
Stalking.
Hunting.
He slipped in to the library a few minutes after McQuay, watching as the frail man carefully lowered himself into one of the chairs. A cute librarian paused and stared at Creed over a stack of books on the counter, and he grinned ferally, baring fangs. She jolted and blushed, turning hurriedly back to the books she was checking in. He could smell her fear from where he stood, and he took a moment to savor the scent of it.
And with that inhalation, he caught another scent: feminine, soft, inviting. Almonds—butter. Skin.
"Last week, when I asked you what you wanted me to read this week, do you remember what you asked for?"
He followed the voice, which sounded full of barely-repressed laughter, and peered around one of the columns in the library. There was a sea of children on the floor, mutant and normal alike, intermingled with each other. He could see that some of them had pointed ears, or furred faces, or animalian noses, and some of them were clearly simple homo sapiens.
Hands shot into the air and the young women in the middle of the group smiled, her eyes curling into crescents of laughter. Her hair was a mop of tangled waves, hair more gold and copper than blond, and her eyes were dark and fathomless. She was wearing a white tank-top and black pin-striped shorts, little white heels. Her legs went on forever.
If he hadn't seen the photo of her in McQuay's file, he might not have recognized her. Might not have remembered her. He'd heard her name a few times over the years—there'd been another assassin, name of Gambols, who'd worshiped the ground she walked on. But Creed did not care for rights and politics—his chief concerns were power, and pain—and he'd ignored her till she showed up in his current target's file as an unfortunate attachment. In short, if McQuay's mutant weakness was his fragility, then his human weakness was lifelong friend and former activist, October Morgan.
"Go ahead, Lindsay," the little Miss Morgan said. "Do you remember what you asked for?"
"Romance and dinosaurs, Toby," the little girl said, practically bouncing in her seat on the floor. "We wanted romance and dinosaurs!"
October—Toby—laughed, tossing back her hair out of her eyes. She was a pretty-enough piece of tail, Creed supposed, but he ignored her in favor of watching McQuay, who was staring at her stupidly. Creed could feel a nasty grin begin curling one corner of his mouth. "So you did. Do you think I got what you asked for?"
"No!" the kids chorused loudly. Creed winced. Weren't the brats supposed to be quiet in a library?
"But what do I tell you guys? Marcus?"
A little boy answered. "You said there's a book for every—every interest," he recited dutifully, grinning. He had freckles and mottled hair that looked like it had been electrocuted.
"That's right. So I brought a book today called A Lovely Love Story, and it's by Edward Monkton."
"Edward Monkton," the children repeated. It was obviously a lesson of some sort, combined with storytime. Creed leaned against the pillar and watched McQuay, watching her. The fucker looked enraptured.
"The fierce Dinosaur was trapped inside his cage of ice," the Morgan frail read dramatically. The children sat forward, rapt. "Although it was cold, he was happy in there. It was, after all, his cage."
Creed flicked his eyes over to her, watching as she showed the pictures to the children.
"Then along came the Lovely Other Dinosaur," she continued. "The Lovely Other Dinosaur melted the Dinosaur's cage with kind words and loving thoughts."
He snorted at the sentimental nonsense, then sniffed the air again. She was beautiful, and fragile-looking. Her shoulders and legs were golden with hours spent in the sunlight, but the skin of her throat and at the edge of her shirt was so pale and translucent that he could see the blue shadow of her veins.
She might be a fun little distraction while he was on this painfully simple mission. He could fuck her raw in front of McQuay, before maybe ripping out her throat with his teeth. The thought made his cock twitch and he straightened, grinning to himself, fangs denting his lip.
"I like this Dinosaur, thought the Lovely Other Dinosaur," she read. "Although he is fierce, he is also tender, and he is funny. He is also quite clever, though I will not tell him this for now."
Creed watched as one of the little girls with pale, slit-pupiled eyes leaned over and whispered something in a normal boy's ear. The kid blushed like a tomato, but his hand crept across the floor shyly to hold hers. The gesture did not touch Victor Creed. He knew that when the boy's friends teased him later, he would deny it entirely, and say cruel things to the little girl.
"I like this Lovely Other Dinosaur, thought the Dinosaur. She is beautiful, and she is different…and she smells so nice. She is also a free spirit which is a quality I much admire in a dinosaur."
"But he can be so distant and so peculiar at times, thought the Lovely Other Dinosaur. He is also overly fond of things. Are all Dinosaurs so overly fond of things?"
Creed's eyes flickered to McQuay. The skinny man had an expression of utmost peace on his face.
Fucking sick.
"But her mind skips from here to there so quickly, thought the Dinosaur. She is also uncommonly keen on shopping. Are all Lovely Other Dinosaurs so uncommonly keen on shopping?"
Her expressions played over her face as she read, eyes widening, brows furrowing, mouth softening in seriousness or widening in a smile. Creed bit back a growl, realizing his eyes had been drawn back without his noticing.
"I will forgive his peculiarity and his concern for things, thought the Lovely Other Dinosaur. For they are part of what makes him a richly charactered individual," she read. "I will forgive her skipping mind and her fondness for shopping, thought the Dinosaur. For she fills our life with beautiful thoughts and wonderful surprises. Besides, I am not unkeen on shopping either."
Her hair tumbled over her forehead, unruly, and she brushed it back with a delicate and careless hand. Creed could crush that hand, if he wanted.
"Now the Dinosaur and the Lovely Other Dinosaur are old," she recited, turning the book to display the pictures. The children leaned forward. "Look at them. Together they stand on the hill telling each other stories and feeling the warmth of the sun on their backs…
"And that, my friends, is how it is with love," she added, turning the page. "Let us all be Dinosaurs and Lovely Other Dinosaurs together.
"For the sun is warm. And the world is a beautiful place."
She closed the book slowly, chuckling as the kids started chattering inanely.
"Tell me your favorite part. Ummmm…Brianna."
"I like the Lovely Dinosaur's red purse," said a girl, presumably Brianna.
"It was a lovely purse," the Morgan frail agreed. "And…Donald?"
"I liked that the Dinosaur was fierce," said Donald. "And I liked it when the one was dancing. That was a good picture."
"I liked the part with the flowers and the stars melting the ice!" squealed another little girl. "And the part with all the dinosaurs hugging!"
"What did we say about raising hands?" October reproved gently. "But yes, Sandra, I agree. The flowers and stars were pretty. What do you guys think about all the hugging dinosaurs? Joan?"
"Dinosaurs need hugs too," said Joan.
"Very true. What else? Rahn?"
"You can love someone even if they like shopping," a little dark-skinned boy answered, wrinkling his nose.
October laughed. "That's right. Okay, so think about the people you know who are different from you, or like different things from you. What does that say about them? Ummm…Antonio?"
A pudgy boy with straw-colored hair lowered his hand. "I think it means you should be nice to people even if they're different, like if they're fat, or they don't like hockey, or look funny, because you could maybe melt their cage or they could maybe be your Lovely Other Dinosaur."
The smile that curled over her mouth was ineffably soft. "I think that I the perfect way of stating it, Antonio. Does anyone else have any other ideas?"
The kids were quiet, a few of them whispering amongst each other.
"Very well," the Morgan woman said, smiling indulgently. "What shall I find for you next week? Umm…who hasn't chosen yet? Darla, put down your hand—you chose three weeks back; I remember. Um…Devon?"
"Tigers," the boy said firmly, his eyes lighting up.
She smiled. "Tigers it shall be. And…Marcie?"
The girl named Marcie smiled shyly. "Flowers," she whispered.
A smile broke out beatifically on the woman's face. Creed rolled his eyes.
"Flowers it is then. How lovely, Marcie."
The kids scrabbled to their feet, a clutter of high-pitched conversations, and shouts of "Bye, Toby!" and "See you next week, Toby!" ringing out over the library floor.
Creed watched as McQuay started to rise, and he moved over to the man stealthily, gripping his shoulders firmly. McQuay choked out a gasp and sat heavily in the seat, his frail bones bending and bowing under the pressure of the assassin's hands.
"Hello, friend," Creed purred mockingly. "Let's talk a bit, shall we?" He squeezed the man's shoulders painfully.
"Who are you?" McQuay demanded, a little breathless from the pain, turning his dark glasses up to look at the main. Creed could see the faint shape of the man's eyes behind the glasses, and he watched them widened as he took in the size of his aggressor.
"The name's Creed," the big man said conversationally, baring his teeth in a savage grin. "And let's just keep this quiet, okay, kid? Recent evidence aside—" he gestured briefly to the dissipating crowd of children— "I always thought libraries were meant to be quiet places."
"Dean!" A feminine voice rang out. Both men turned, watching the blond woman jog toward them. "It's so good to see you. I'm so glad you made it! Who's your friend?" she added expectantly, turning to Creed and rocking on her heels.
McQuay opened his mouth to answer but Victor squeezed his shoulder warningly. The bones ground together dangerously, making the man's lips tighten and grow white. "Hey, princess," Dean said after a moment, his voice a frightened rasp. "This is—"
"The name's Creed," Victor repeated, a dangerous smirk playing at the corner of his mouth. He flashed a fang. "Victor Creed."
She didn't flinch, her eyes smiling, her face open and welcoming. She thrust out a hand to him. "It's a pleasure to meet you, Mr Creed. Do you work with Dean-o?"
"Dean-o?" Creed repeated, smirking. He took her hand in his and engulfed it entirely, careful to give her a clear view of his claws. She was so fine-boned in his hand. He was unmoved by her fragility—it only made him scornful and dismissive. If he'd maybe been at war, or angry and alone and looking to kills something, he might have yanked her by the arm and thrown her against a wall, cutting through her shorts till he could thrust inside her while she squirmed and sobbed and screamed against him. As it was, for the moment, she meant nothing to him. His mission was McQuay.
She laughed softly, dropping her voice to a more library-appropriate level. "We—well, I—call him that sometimes because he's always listening to the Rat Pack. You know how it is." She grinned. "So? Do you work with him?"
He flicked a glance down toward McQuay and grinned. "You could say we're talking business," he conceded, reluctantly releasing her hand. He let his nails scrape lingerly over her wrist and she sucked in a breath at the slight sting, but said nothing. Didn't even flinch, really. It was disconcerting. His lips twitched on a barely-stifled growl and he took a step forward, looming over her. Her smile faded a touch and she took a half-step back. A faint whiff of apprehension caught his nose, combined with the faint, underlying fragrance of something musky and sweet.
"I'm new in town," he added without thinking, tilting his head to eye her like prey. He could see the shadow of her cleavage from this angle. He thought about rolling his hand over her breast, squeezing as she struggled.
"Oh," she said faintly, finishing her step back. The underlying fragrance grew stronger, along with the apprehension. Then, her brow furrowing in concern, she asked, "Do you have a place to stay?"
"Toby!" McQuay rapped out in alarm, his voice cracking.
And the thought that had been growing like a cancer in Victor Creed's brain suddenly bloomed in a flurry of bloodshed and mockery. Perhaps the little Miss Morgan had a purpose after all. He might not have thought of it if McQuay hadn't sounded quite so horrified.
His smile widened viciously. "Actually, I'm between locations right now," he lied easily, flicking his tongue over his fangs. It made him happy that he hadn't given into the temptation to crush her hand in his grip a moment before.
"I have an extra room," she offered guilelessly. "It's not much—it'll be tight for you, I imagine—"
He grinned ferally at the image that phrase brought up. His cock twitched again in his jeans.
"—but you're welcome to it."
"Um, princess? Mr Creed has plenty of more comfortable accommodations at his disposal," McQuay broke in sharply. "And your apartment is small enough as it is."
October scoffed. "Any friend of yours is a friend of mine, Dean-o," she said firmly, leaving no room for argument.
Kitty has claws, Creed thought with delight. It would be fun to use his own on her. Cut her to ribbons. Threaten her with a claw to her—
"He's not my—"
"I'd be happy to take you up on your offer," Creed cut in smoothly. "I have some business to wrap up with Dean-o here—" he clapped a hand loudly against the frail man's back and October jolted with wide-eyed empathy for her friend "—but I'd be happy to meet you at your apartment. Where do you live?"
Her smile was scintillating. "12501 Lakeshore Avenue, at the Generous Suites apartment building. I'm in number forty-three. You can walk there from here—it's just four blocks east, by the Lakeshore Bakery. I'll be waiting."
He almost licked his lips in anticipation. "I appreciate it, Miss—ah—"
She smiled. "October Morgan, but everyone calls me Toby," she offered. She turned on her heel, collecting up a ruffled purse and tossing a smile over her shoulder. "It'll be nice to have some company," she added mildly, then blew a kiss at McQuay. "Thanks for coming, Dean. Are we still on for dinner Thursday?"
"Absolutely," he replied weakly from his chair. He looked utterly defeated, and the taste of triumph was already thick in Victor's mouth. McQuay rose slowly, enveloping her in a careful hug while Creed watched suspiciously, waiting for the thin man to say something stupid. He didn't, though, and in a matter of moments they were watching her walk away.
Dean McQuay leaned heavily on his cane. "What do you want?" he asked quietly. He sounded empty, hollowed-out.
"I want," Creed replied silkily, "for you to stop writing your shitty little subversions." He paused, watching her ass as she stepped out the library doors and disappeared. She was a tight little thing. He turned a sharp smile back to McQuay. "Cut off your contracts. Stop freelancing for your leftist rags. You need to disappear off the face of the planet, and I never wanna hear your mouthy shit again."
"You're a mutant," McQuay protested. "Why do you want to stop me? Don't you understand the importance of—of destroying a system which not only profits from but is founded on the oppression of everyone who is different? The oppression of—of us, among others?"
Creed grinned. "Equality won't keep me in fancy cars and raw steaks, asshole."
McQuay clenched his jaw. "So what'll you do if I don't stop? Kill me?"
The bigger man chuckled. "Stupid question," he reproved. "But I'll answer it anyway, 'cause I'm nice like that." His grin was hard and sharp. "I'm gonna be living with your gal Friday over there till I know you're being good. You got me? I imagine it'll take a month or two to cut off all your contacts, but if you try to get word out—if you fuck up—then she pays."
He licked his teeth, eyeing the door she'd passed through with speculative glee. "And believe me, I'll enjoy making little Miss Morgan pay. There are a hundred ways I can hurt her, and a few of them involve that tight little ass of hers—"
McQuay whitened, and Creed paused mid-smirk and shrugged. "And if you still don't get it, and I hafta kill her, I'll make sure you watch me do it." His eyes narrowed. "And believe me, I'm very imaginative."
His shoulders slumped, and Creed rolled his eyes. Too easy. He'd thought there might be a fight. He thought he might get to have fun.
But then McQuay straightened, and he half-turned toward Creed and pulled off his sun glasses. There wasn't much that startled Creed these days, but he was intrigued by the man's protruding eyes: there was no white or iris or pupil, just wide orbs of mercuric silver. They flashed like twin mirrors in the sunlight.
"Are you a feral, Mr. Creed? Nice regenerative factor?"
The larger man was silent, watching him.
"I thought so," McQuay said after a moment, his voice resigned. "Did you know Toby and I used to go to school together?"
Creed raised one eyebrow and flashed a fang. His gaze was predatory, speculative.
"Listen to me," McQuay said tightly. "I'm going tell you how we met. We had math class together in sixth grade. We never talked. She was—she was always like she is now. Dresses clean, looks like a cute piece of—of fluff. But she didn't hang out with the cheerleaders and the jocks. She hung out with the—the goth kids and the punks and the nerds. She stuck with them, and she was loyal. Me, I didn't hang out with anyone. I didn't try. I'd had to leave my last school because people were pricks, and I wasn't gonna make the same mistake at this school. So I didn't talk to anyone. Especially her." He jerked a thumb back in the direction October had gone, and Creed wondered why the little man thought he cared. "I had no time for princesses." He spat the word, and Creed suddenly understood that once upon a time, it had been an insult.
"Then one day, Toby was riding home with her mom. It was early fall of freshman year, still warm out. Three years of school together and we never talked. And these jocks started picking on me. Knocked my books out of my hands. Knocked me down. Told me they'd heard I break easily. They started kicking me. Not too hard—I think they were afraid still—but I could feel things cracking. And somewhere through the fog I hear someone yelling through rolled down windows—Stop the car! Stop the car! And I look up, and here's Princess October Morgan, pulling back her fist and punching Derek Thompson in the gut as hard as she could."
The silver-eyed man paused and shook his head at the memory. "Thompson was easily four times her size. Big guy. Not like you, of course, but huge compared to Toby. Her fist ran into him the way a bird runs into a speeding car's windshield. He didn't even flinch. He just stopped, and stared at her, like he was wondering where the hell she'd come from. And she pulls back her fist and gets ready to hit him again. And she said something to him—my head was too scrambled to even register it—and he just left, like he didn't know what to do. And she put me in the back seat of her mom's car and let me put my head in her lap and took me home and patched me up as well as she could."
"Is this going somewhere, McQuay?" Creed asked, polishing his claws on his coat and making a display of letting them lengthen. "Beyond making her your personal fuckin' messiah, I mean."
The crippled man scowled. "Yes. I'll tell you where." He leaned closer . "One of the things my mutation allows me to do is mess up people's heads, Mr. Creed. Your brain is like loose jelly in your skull, and I can shake it up like cottage cheese. It's an earthquake in your brain. You'll be drooling all over yourself. And once you finally start getting back to normal, thanks to your nifty little re-gen factor, I'll just mess you up again. I'll keep you like that forever."
Creed growled and leaned over, his hand gripping Dean's on the handle of the cane. The fine bones cracked audibly and the little man's face whitened, but to his credit, he didn't make a sound.
"I don't take kindly to threats, you little shit," the feral said coldly.
"It's not a threat," the younger man replied evenly, despite the obvious pain in his hand. "It's a consequence. You be nice to her, and I don't care. Be polite. Buy her flowers if you want to. But hurt her, and I make every moment of your eternal life a living hell."
Creed sneered. "I've taken down scarier things than you before, little man," he mocked, tightening his big fist over McQuay's once more. "Bigger men than you have tried and failed."
The man's lips were virtually white. "Be that as it may," he choked out, "I assure you there's a first time for everything."
Creed scoffed, releasing McQuay's hand with a snort. The frail man stumbled, grabbing his can with his other hand and freeing the one that had been virtually crushed in Creed's grasp.
"It'll be funny to watch you try your hand at me," Creed jeered. "Especially since you can't use that one anymore." He grinned and winked. "Don't worry, Imma keep an eye on your pretty princess. I think I'll each her how to kneel." He laughed aloud at the furious expression on McQuay's face before slapping the man hard across the back in a false gesture of camaraderie. "Wait and see. You just do what I tell you, shithead, and everything'll be just fine." He grinned on his way out, mock-saluting Dean McQuay. "I'll be keeping in touch."