A/N: I have no excuse for the delay. I just really tend to procrastinate when it comes to writing anything vaguely resembling a 'fight scene' because I am a slug. The next chapter should follow fairly soon as I ended up splitting this in half for flow.

There is also a bit of gore in this one and the next, just, you know, FYI, if you're squeamish.

Eight

Victor pulled the stairway door open only for his idiot brother to shove it back closed.

Too late for the quick escape, so, it looked like they'd be falling back into old habits of beating the shit out of each other.

"You got something to say runt?" Victor turned, letting his claws lengthen.

"Just who the hell are you, bub? Where did-"

The elevator dinged, and Sabretooth's hackles rose. In and of itself, the sound was innocuous enough, and exactly what Victor had been willing to happen just moments prior.

No one exited, but that wasn't odd. He'd been the one to call it.

The scent of ozone wafted to him an instant before he felt the bite of a bullet rip through his chest.

God fucking dammit.

They'd been tracked after all.

The blur- teleporter, his mind supplied- angled to grab the kid, next.

Like hell-

Laura beat him to it, though, stabbing at her assailant.

She missed anything vital, and the injury wasn't quite enough to stop the man's disappear-reappear act.

If the asshole got away, it'd be bad for all of them. He watched as the man made another grab for the kid, and the kid parried back, baring her little sharp teeth.

The thing about teleporters, though- they couldn't be truly random. Every move was signaled, if one knew how to see the pattern. They also had to relocate into clear space; if their path was interrupted...

Victor moved at just precisely the right moment interrupting the man's spinal column, and it was lights out for the would-be kidnapper.

Unfortunately, the girl didn't get the memo in time.

Laura saw her opportunity and decapitated the teleporter, making the whole thing a hell of a lot messier than it ought to have been.

Incidentally, that mess occurred all over Victor.

She realized her error and drew up short before colliding with the larger feral man.

"Aim. Aim away from your partner, kid, for fuck's sake," Victor complained, swiping blood from his eyes.

Gore aside, their current assailant was dead, and there were likely more waiting in the wings.

Whoever wanted the kid had to know it was a suicide mission to send in only one operative, which meant this was either a trap or a message. The sooner Jimmy got Laura back to that damned school-

"Shit, Jimmy!"

Victor found his brother slumped against the door, and it took him moment to realize why.

Victor fumbled with his coat pocket, fishing out his phone.

"Get your damned team and your damned plane here now. Jimmy's injured and he's not healing."