Room 514
Logan cursed mentally. He shouldn't have allowed himself to become distracted. He swallowed against the searing heat tucked into the nook beneath his chin. Logan had waited about fifteen minutes for Fury's response before deciding that he never was one for following orders and developed his own plan. It should have been easy. The girl was already in bed and the boy was in the shower. Logan knew from a couple days of eavesdropping that the boy took ridiculously long showers. He decided to go in real quiet like, grab the girl, and drag her back to his room for his own special brand of questioning. The boy shouldn't have even been wise to her disappearance until after he got his answers. All in all, not the most sophisticated plan. Apparently it wasn't one of his better plans either. He had underestimated the girl, gotten distracted, and the boy had managed to sneak up on him.
Normally, the sudden appearance of the boy wouldn't have bothered him, but he still didn't know what the kid's powers were. If there was one thing he learned during his short stay at the mansion (other than Summers was an ass who didn't deserve a woman like Jean) it was that young mutants who had just come into their powers rarely had much control over their abilities and could quickly become a danger to everyone around them when they were put under too much pressure. Wolverine had no doubt that he could easily get the better of two teenagers in a fight (although maybe not quite as easily as he had originally assumed) but he wasn't as confident that the structure of the hotel or the other guests would survive.
Wolverine swallowed a frustrated growl. There was no need for the kid to think he was threatening him until he actually did so. This was not going well. The girl had reacted more quickly than he expected and proven to be one hell of a fighter. He just barely managed to get the gun away from her before she fired at him and he had been forced to reveal his claws to do it. Something he regretted because the initial shock of seeing them often helped him 'negotiate.' So now he was stuck in a position that he wasn't sure how to get out of gracefully. He didn't want to risk a full fight in a crowded hotel until he knew how much damage the boy could cause, and the source of his distraction was still lurking outside the young couple's window.
"Look kid," he started, "I can't let your wife up because she'll go for that gun and then we're going to have unwanted attention."
Remy was careful to keep his face impassive as he replied, "I don't see why anyone but you should be worried about unwanted attention." He felt like he was caught in a stalemate that he didn't know how to get out of. "You broke into our hotel room," he continued, "and are pinning my girlfriend, a young woman in her nightgown, to the bed against her will."
Remy was trying desperately to find a way out of the mess he and Belle were in, knowing that the mutant abilities he displayed were not enough to intimidate the man with foot long claws, but his own words drew his attention to the one thing he was trying not to think of. Belle's baby doll nightgown had ridden up about her hips and low around her shoulders during the struggle and now she lay on her stomach trapped beneath the larger man with his claws positioned above her neck in a manner that ensured any attempt she might make to buck him would only harm her. Remy cringed at the idea that the only thing protecting his wife from the man's claws was the thin wisp of silk she'd chosen to wear to bed. For a moment he thought longingly of the body armor that she'd sported three years ago when the violence between their guilds had broken a temporary truce and hit new peaks for a couple of weeks. He wished that he could will it onto her body, but he couldn't, and he didn't know what he could do to protect her.
Remy quickly threw away the idea of charging something else and allowing it to explode in order to show the man what he was really capable of, despite his words he really didn't want to risk unnecessary attention, and he doubted it would have the desired effect on the man. Likewise he discarded the idea of increasing the charge within his staff and therefore the heat against the man's throat. Remy wasn't sure he could stop a larger charge from blowing and he really didn't think intimidation tactics would work with this man. For some reason Remy had absolutely no doubts that the claws were extremely dangerous and could cause quite a bit of damage very quickly with very little force. He was unwilling to do anything that might cause the man to simply flex his wrists a bit and leave Belle headless on the bed before fully focusing his attention on Remy.
Wolverine glanced out the corner of his eye, trying to get a good look at whatever the boy held against his throat. The teenager was standing slightly behind him and was out of his line of sight so long as he could not turn his head. Wolverine swore that the object smelled metallic but all he could see was a pinkish glow that alternated between dulling towards red and brightening towards white. He wasn't sure what would happen if he tried to cut through it. He was distracted from his train of thought once again when he heard a soft scraping on the ledge by the window and his nostrils flared, trying to catch the scent of whomever lurked there. Every instinct he had screamed that the lurker was a danger and he knew he needed to regain control of the situation fast. He could smell the lie on the kid the minute he claimed that he didn't care if they drew attention to themselves but chose not to address it. Instead he calmly stated, "Look, kid. I ain't letting your girl up unless I know she won't go for the gun."
Remy hesitated. He knew that even if Belle agreed not to go for the gun she would reach for it the first chance she got. He considered trying to remove it from the area but was afraid the man would take it as a threat if he attempted to retrieve the gun himself. He scoured his memory for anything that he might have been taught about hostage situations but the only thing he had learned through the guild was that it was against guild law to take hostages in an attempt to escape a failed job.
Belle was incensed that she was being left out of the discussion taking place above her. She wanted to retort hotly that she would agree to no such thing but knew better than to act rashly. She bit her lip in frustration. She knew that Remy was silver tongued and could talk just about anyone into or out of just about anything but she didn't think that he could talk their way out of this and she didn't understand why he wouldn't just do something. He should have just cracked the man's skull with his bo staff before the clawed man noticed he was there.
"Why should we agree to that?" Remy finally asked.
"'Cause we're about to have company and I for one don't want to be in this position to greet them," Wolverine hissed.
"What do you mean?" Remy asked. He was alarmed but managed to keep his voice level. Was the man expecting reinforcements?
Wolverine lowered his voice further before replying, "There's someone outside your window and there ain't no telling when their patience will run out."
Neither Remy or Belle was sure what to think of that. Belle wanted to look and check for the play of shadows that might indicate someone's presence but her head was turned the wrong way and she couldn't change position. Remy was not comfortable taking his eyes off of the man in front of him so he loosened his mental shields and extended his empathy, searching for any foreign presence. He registered one just outside the window and, while he did not know who they were or if they were connected to the clawed man at all, the coldness that their mind radiated made him shudder. Remy noted that the primary feeling from the lurker was a detached professionalism but there were certain undertones of anger, possessiveness, and maliciousness that frightened him. He realized that he'd actually brushed past the surface of the lurker's emotions and bile rose in his throat. He hadn't meant to enter anyone's mind; he hadn't meant to do anything more than open his senses and see if someone was there. He slammed his shields back in place but couldn't help noticing that he still felt the coldness radiating from the area by the window and wondered how he hadn't noticed it before.
Remy swallowed. "Can you retract your claws?" he asked.
"I can," Wolverine replied but made no move to do so.
"Retract your claws and I'll kick the gun under the dresser where no can get at it," Remy instructed.
Wolverine still made no move to retract his claws.
Remy sighed and slowly reabsorbed the charge from his bo staff. He wasn't at all sure that it was the right thing to do, but he decided to take the gambit and hope that lowering his defenses would convince the clawed man to do the same. After all, if the man wanted Belle dead she already would be and they couldn't stand there all night.
Wolverine slowly withdrew his claws and after that things happened very quickly. Even as Remy stepped around Wolverine and kicked the gun under the dresser Belle bucked and twisted in her captor's grasp but found she was no match for his strength. She did manage to drive an unsecured heel into his groin just as Remy's uncharged staff came whipping around to meet his chest with as much force as the athletic teenager could muster. The combined attack came as a surprise and did what neither of the young criminal's could do alone and knocked the older man backwards about a foot, but his grip on Belle was not immediately broken and she was pulled half the distance along with him.
The figure outside the window decided that this was the best opportunity they were likely to get.
As Wolverine was carried backward by momentum and his own weight Remy moved to position himself between the larger man and Belle. None of the three occupants noticed the small object that landed at their feet until it started issuing a thick, clinging, fragrant smoke that obscured their vision and caused them to choke. Wolverine's heightened senses were immediately assaulted. His sinuses burned as though they were suddenly filled with acid and tears streamed from his eyes. Remy rubbed at the moisture in his own eyes and tried to make out the shapes of his companions through the dense smoke. His unusual eyes could see more than most and he could see the heat their bodies produced but the tears blurring his vision made their two bodies look like one unidentifiable blob. Belle lacked the sensitivities of the two men but even her eyes watered as she yanked the one good strap of her nightgown back up over her shoulder and tried to make out her surroundings, wishing for a weapon.
The lurker was now fully within the entrance of the window and taking aim with the aid of infrared goggles at the female form within the smoke. The lurker alone felt in control of the situation and was pleased that the smoke bomb had been so effective in disorienting the room's occupants. The dark figure silently sent a small dart sailing through the air towards the young blonde assassin. Wolverine might have heard the dart as it whizzed through the air were his senses not so completely overwhelmed that he could think of nothing else. Belle herself suspected nothing, expecting a more physical attack, and readied herself for it. Remy's head swam and his world turned upside down as his view of the room and everything within it changed.
There were no adequate words to describe what Remy's world had become. He might have described it as great swirling masses of light, but he knew that wasn't the right word, for light was something he was familiar with and this wasn't light. He was surrounded on all sides by a buzzing that he felt rather than heard. It wasn't homogeneous either. All around him the buzzing pulsed at different speeds and had no cohesive harmony. Even the floor beneath him had been yanked out from under his feet and replaced with a vibrating mass. He was adrift in a spinning world and was lost in the chaos. His mind frantically tried to map out the areas which pulsed at different speeds, trying to give this strange world some structure, but it was overwhelmed and he frantically searched for something, anything, on which to focus. He finally noticed that one of the masses of vibrations, a very small one at that, moved through the rest with great speed. He focused his attention on it with desperation and no sooner had he fixed his mind upon it than there was a great explosion. Remy's world righted itself and the three occupants of the smoke filled room were thrown off their feet by the force of the explosion.
The only benefit the explosion seemed to have was that it dissipated the smoke enough for Remy and Belle to make out the dark figure crouched in the moonlight that still streamed through the open window. This time when the figure took aim Belle was able to dodge the dart headed for her and it sank into the mattress of the bed. Wolverine, whose senses were clearing as the smoke rapidly thinned and his healing factor kicked in, pulled the dart from the mattress and smelled it. "Poison," he said succinctly and moved swiftly towards the dark figure in the window.
Beneath their mask the figure in the window frowned. That had been unexpected. The first dart, which was certain to hit its mark, had flared for a split second with heat and then exploded in midair with a great deal of force. There was nothing in the chemicals contained by the dart that should have caused such a reaction and the person crouched within the window frame was taken aback by the inexplicable occurrence. Too late the would-be-assassin tried to dodge the hands of the powerful man that grasped the black swathed figure and threw it bodily into the room.
Belle threw a glance towards her husband, wondering what they should do. She was unarmed and there was no one between them and the door. The two strangers were currently struggling to fight one another in the cramped space of the hotel suite, but she knew that both meant her harm, and the hotel fire alarms were blaring. If she had expected to receive aid from the fifteen year old boy that she had married in secret, she was sadly mistaken. He sat, half sprawled, on the floor, blinking owlishly at the two people struggling in front of the window. The glazed expression in his eyes frightened Belle because she didn't know what had caused it and Remy was normally very alert.
Remy felt inordinately drained. He couldn't remember ever feeling so tired before and he fought there urge to sleep. He knew that it was important that he stay awake, although he couldn't think of why at the moment. He heard the word poison spoken and saw a man moving towards a huddled figure in a window but his brain refused to process the meaning of the word, the actions in front of him, or to recognize the new danger to the girl that he loved. He felt an arm slip behind his back as the world around him slowly faded to black.
The Streets of Kyoto
Julien Boudreaux's mind was completely focused on one thing, his younger sister. His father might have been proud to know that his oldest son had finally been able to concentrate so fully on a single subject, assuming that he did not know the subject or nature of those thoughts. Marius Boudreaux had often despaired when faced with his heir's inability to pay attention something for longer than thirty seconds and had frequently considered naming his daughter his successor rather than his son. It would have defied Guild tradition to appoint anyone other than his first born son leader of the Guild but the matter was inconsequential now that marriage preparations were underway. The Thieves Guild and Assassins Guild would be united beneath the leadership of Belle and Remy when Marius and Jean Luc felt the children were ready for the responsibility and chose to step down. It was a drastic measure and many members of the Guild resented it, none more so than Julien, who detested the idea that a thief would be given such power over his people. Julien despised the idea of Belle and Remy ruling the Guilds almost as much as the idea of the mutie thief touching his little sister. He paused in the streets and his eyes sought out a window in the building before him, the window of what he presumed to be his sister's hotel room.
Julien frowned when he saw the smoke leaking from the window. Fear clutched his heart as he recognized the wail of alarms within the building and he fought against the crowd that streamed out the doors of the hotel before he finally spotted the golden halo that indicated his sister's presence. She wore a torn nightgown that threatened to expose her ample bosom on one side and it was obvious that she had been fighting. She had a duffle bag slung across her shoulders and carried her large suitcase with her as she scurried down the street in bare feet. Julien was perplexed by his sister's state, but was far more confused by the fact that she was following a tall man, splattered with blood, and carrying a limp figure with auburn hair. Oddly the man alone in the trio was fully dressed and the boy, whom Julien now recognized as the mutie thief, was clad only in a pair of damp boxers. They would have been quite the spectacle in the streets of Kyoto had there not been so many guests streaming from the hotel in various states of dress and undress. Some carried bundles, some were empty handed, and as Julien watched his sister and the men she followed were once again lost within the swell of the crowd.