No Way Out// Tommy, Kyle

[x-traitor.livejournal.com]

On his return from physio, Tommy is stalked to his room by Kyle, who makes his view on the former-FOH very clear. Words and some blows are exchanged and neither leaves quite satisfied.


The door to his suite was in sight and Tommy breathed a sigh of relief. He hadn't wanted to leave his suite but he also knew better then to try to get out of his physio, plus...he didn't want anyone to think anything was wrong with him. He could deal with this himself...or at least he was convinced he could. Still, the less time out of his suite, the less likely chance of running into anymore of the freaks in this place. Tommy wasn't about to admit he was scared, at least, not outside the safety of his room. With one hand supporting himself on the wall, he was so concerned about getting back that he didn't notice he was being followed.

All those months of watching Catseye stalk everything from mice to mercenaries had paid off. The deer hunting, and a dose of his own instincts didn't hurt any either as Kyle crept down the hall silently.

He barely noticed the ache in his toes from pulling his claws in, all too intent on following Tommy to his suite. Someone needed to explain, in small ugly words, what Tommy needed to quit doing, saying, and probably thinking. Kyle decided that he was ideally suited to that, being, in his eyes, the only one willing to do so.

With a sigh of relief, Tommy stopped in front of his door and opened it, gladly to finally be in the one place he felt safe. His steps were still slow as he moved into the common room. He was half way to the couch when he realized he should shut the door. Cursing his forgetfulness, he turned to do just that.

Tommy started violently, falling back against the back of an easy chair when he saw someone he didn't recognize in his doorway...a very unhappy looking someone.

Kyle grinned, quite deliberately showing off his set of all too sharp canines and leaned casually against the frame of the door, arms crossed. "You know, I totally get that you're like, mutants aren't -people- or something, but you really should learn how to shut up about it while you're around us."

Searching his brain for when he had said something to that extent around this particular freak, Tommy didn't think about what came out of his mouth in a purely defensive mode. "Why should I? I'm free to speak my mind, same as you!"

Kyle rolled his eyes. "Oh, I dunno, because it's disgusting and you're a stupid bigot? Or, hey, maybe because we've got little kids here who don't need to hear that crap? Oh, and maybe because we were born this way, you ignorant shit?" Tommy infuriated Kyle. Like he could help the fangs and claws. Kyle cracked his knuckles, claws sliding out of his fingers and toes. His hands -hurt- just from the tension of talking to this idiot.

"I'm sorry the truth is too much for you." Who was this guy anyway ? Well it didn't matter, Tommy wasn't about to succumb to another freak attack without at least fighting back a bit, though with how weak he still was and the obvious physical mutation of this freak he doubted this verbally sparing would last long. Maybe he will do what I have been to cowardly to do... "It's fact your going to have to bare, freak."

"Blah, blah, blah, what the fuck?" Kyle made one hand into a little mouth, all the more to mock Tommy with. "What, are you -trying- to get beat up?" He shook his head. That was an all too appealing thought.

That made Tommy raise an eyebrow though mentally he was telling himself to back off and just go hide in his room, remembering everything Empath had said. But another part of him won, the part that wanted to prove that this place was just as dangerous to him as the outside world now was. "Are you going to be the one to do it?"

"What? No, you idiot.." Kyle was going to say that. He really, really was. It's just that his right hand disagreed with him, and caught Tommy on the ear. Not hard enough to leave a mark, or to knock the boy out. A flash of wrist, hand, fingers, and four pink lines crossed Tommy's cheek, barely scratches.

To Tommy's credit, he didn't make a noise even though the barely scratches hurt like hell. He raised a palm to his face then glared at the mutant. "What the fuck? You go through all the effort and you can't even draw blood?" The little voice of reason in his head was insisting he shut up...Tommy made a mental to note to start listening to that voice someday. It probably would have stopped him from going further. "I did better with less effort on your red-winged friend."

Kyle made a point in his regular day to day life to restrain the urge to growl at things and to keep the claws in his fingers and toes mostly sheathed. It made people nervous, to hear a deep bass growl coming from the throat of someone six feet tall with pointy things in their hands and feet.

He didn't growl at Tommy either. It was more like a snarl, as he rushed forward. Tommy was the reason Jay'd been hurt, the reason his roommate had spent time with his wings bandaged, miserable and hurting. Jay had hurt, therefore, Tommy needed to hurt. An eye for an eye, so to speak.

It was at the last second possible that Kyle remembered that while Jay had a healing factor, while -he- had a healing factor, Tommy didn't. He'd meant to scare the bigoted jackass, not kill him. Claws retracted, as fast as they'd slid out, and instead of the rake across the boy's face, flaying skin, Kyle's fist met Tommy's jaw.

It took everything Tommy had to take a step back to support himself against the couch and not fall to floor, though he steeled his expression to make it look like no effort at all. Now was not the time to show weakness. He forced himself up tall and his voice cold, as he knew he could only hurt with words, his arms were stronger but not enough to throw a decent punch in a situation such as this. "Well well...looks like I got personal. Are you the fag freak's boy toy then?" Tommy sneered, "Or will any excuse to do to give you justification? Whose the bully now?"

"What the -fuck- if I am?" Kyle spat out. "And I ain't a bully." He loomed over Tommy, glaring. "Here's a clue, ass. You hurt us first. Without any mutant powers, you burned down the coffee shop, and hurt Terry, and now you're the fuckstick who beat up Jay too? It isn't bullying if you deserve it." He brushed back the hair that had been hanging over his face, pushing it back behind his ears deliberately. "Here's what I think. I think you're more bugged about Jay being into guys than Jay having a big set of wings on his back." It was a cheap shot, he knew it. But cheap shots were all this ass was worth. "Hiding something, flatscan? Or, wait, no, you're here now, right? So that'd be ex-flatscan, I guess."

"Oh so I deserve this do I?" Tommy decided to pointedly ignore that last jab since it was so cheap, or so he told himself. "Thank you for justifying what I did. Because frankly, I thought ya'll deserved it. Doesn't sound so good when justified against you does it?" His knuckles were turning white as he held himself up, but he still refused to back down and so much was going into hiding his physical weakness that he was beginning to rely on automatic, engrained responses. "You don't like to hear it, but all of your freakish kind does! It's why the Friend of Humanity exist! To put you in your place!"

Kyle growled loudly, stepping up close to get all the way into Tommy's face. "The difference, you fucking asshole, is that if I could, I'd go back to having a normal face and feet and hands, and not have to deal with all this shit. You think I chose this? You decided to burn down the coffee shop, you decided to beat the fuck out of Jay..." He bared his fangs, barely inches from Tommy's face. "I didn't decide -shit-. You're a bigoted homophobic asshole because you want to be. I'm a mutant because I got born this way."

"You think I don't want those things?!" Tommy practically growled in his face. "Do you think I'm proud there's a lead tree in the middle of the fucking park? Or that my friends and family tried to kill me?" It was then, for some odd reason, that Tommy remembered the emptiness left by Empath. He tried very hard to push it back by closing his eyes. "If I had my way, I wouldn't have lived at all. Is that what you want to hear?"

Kyle really, really, -really- wanted to just tackle Tommy to the ground and beat the idiot out of him. It felt like a really fantastically good idea. He got as far as grabbing him by the throat before his own good sense kicked in. Pushing Tommy away, he turned and stalked towards the door, pausing at the doorway. "Whatever, man. You're too dumb to get it, which says a lot, because I'm barely pulling B's with genius tutors, and I get it."

He briefly considered trying to explain. That what you're born with doesn't make you deserve anything, that what you do, does. But anything he said would be wasted, he figured. Tommy was an idiot bigoted jackass, and there was shit-all he could do to change that.

Tommy just stayed where he was until Kyle was out the door. Then he finally unclenched his arm muscles from their grip on the back of the couch and with a small cry, let himself slide to the ground. His breath was coming in gasps as a shaking hand went up to touch the fresh scratches on his neck. He'd honestly thought the mutant was going to kill him...and the idea really wasn't that bad. It wasn't so much the escaping from this place and the freaks who lived here...

...it was escaping the emptiness inside of him.

But could he prove Empath wrong and take the easy road?

With a loud sigh, he banged his head back against the couch and closed his eyes. Right now, Tommy just wanted to get up the strength to get up and back to his bedroom.


(posted slightly early due to being afk this afternoon)