Cruel Country: Revenge
Apr. 11th, 2007 05:12 pm![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
x-marrow.livejournal.com posting in ![[community profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/community.png){kind=small}
xp_logsSarah and Remy draw the soldiers outside of the city. It's a golden opportunity for Sarah.
Once outside of the city, the ride wasn't so bad. Keep driving --straight--? Sarah could handle that much. And when they started shooting at the Jeep, she just drove faster.
Fortunately, Remy hadn't seen any helicopters yet, and they left the main road shortly after clearing the city, tracking roughly north over the scrub. He was hoping to get west of Moyo, loosely following the Nile north into the Sudan. From there, he would have access to contacts that could get them to the Red Sea or Egypt, and escape. Assuming they made it over the border.
While driving the getaway car was exciting, and driving it straight was easier, driving the getaway car straight until they ran out of gas was, well, tedious. As she drove, Sarah was beginning to get antsy again, just waiting for the gasoline gage to reach the empty stage.
"Stop." Remy said, as they approach the wadi. She pulled the jeep over into the cover of the rocks, but Remy made he back up, so it was out in the open plain. He jumped out and began to pull the supplies from the back. "We going to make a temporary cache here. Dey looking, which means de second dey spot de jeep, dey going to assume it's all of us going north. Dat will make de border harder to pierce, but it will draw dem away from de others. When dey come to response, we going to 'borrow' more transport."
Filling the water jugs at the wadi, they backtracked up into the rocks, carefully camouflaging themselves and settling in to wait for more troops.
Sarah shielded her eyes with a hand, wondering if the others had made it out safely. "Why is it I always get stuck doing these things with you? I swear to god, I will be seriously pissed off if you are the last person I see before I die."
"De reason is dat we most likely to survive dis. Besides, Remy wouldn't take 'way de possibility dat you might get to watch me die." LeBeau said dryly, staring through the binoculars and looking for dust trails.
Sarah cracked a smiled then, though whether it was because she found humour in what he said or because she was imagining watching him die was unclear. Either one would have produced an equally cheerful grin. Returning her attention to the task at hand, she finally spoke again. "You think they got out okay?"
"Non. It's likely at least one or two of dem got taken." Remy said quietly, pushing always the thoughts. The chance of any of them getting it was extremely thin, much less all of them. He stiffened as he saw the dust cloud. Three jeeps were approaching. Based on the numbers, they had spread the forces against them much thinner than he's dared hope. "We got company."
Pulling a bone club sticking out from her shoulder, Sarah nodded. "Good. I was beginning to get bored."
"Dere's going to be at least ten men, maybe fifteen. We need to work fast." Remy moved their supplies under the rocks, and started down the slope. "I want you to loop around, and draw dem towards de water. We wanted dem away from de jeeps. I'll hit dem from behind."
Sarah nodded silently, making her way down towards the water. She stepped out from behind her cover, stirring up dust to catch their attention. "Hey assholes! Come and get me!"
A spate of gunfire greeted her comments, as the men predictably began to follow her down. Remy ghosted behind, waiting for them to get far enough forward to not hear as he snuck up behind the guard and snapped his neck with a swift jerk. The man slithered to the dirt in front of him, and LeBeau crouched behind the jeep for a moment, watching Sarah pull them further back, avoiding the fire.
She backed up slowly, almost imperceptibly back towards the water to keep them moving away from the Jeeps. Waiting for Remy's backup, she put off attacking, waving her bone club in the air.
Remy waited another minute, and finally stepped out to throw a series of cards into the back of the group of soldiers. They did little damage, but fatally distracting them from Sarah long enough for Sarah to close with them.
Having the distraction she desperately needed, Sarah leapt forward, slamming her bone club into one man's temple, kicking him backward into the men behind him. In the confusion, they all stumbled backwards.
Remy rushed forwards, a card exploding with enough force to nearly decapitate one of the soldiers, leaving the lifeless force to crash to the baked dirt of the wadi. His follow up card knocked a rifle clear from sighting on Sarah.
Sarah pulled a bloody bone knife from her hip, catching an oncoming soldier with it in the gut, and forcing it upward with a growl. Looking up, she saw a gun pointed straight at her and dropped to the ground, scrambling for a good spot to find her feet again.
Remy saw the gun, pushed himself up and over the man in front of him, and brought both feet down between his shoulderblades. Both shattered and the gun sputtered only a couple of rounds as he fell. The move pushed LeBeau off balance and he landed awkwardly, still taking down another soldier with a card as he did so.
His spatial awareness flared, and Remy twisted away desperately as the soldier opened up. LeBeau had been seen dodging bullets before with ease, but he had always said that it was a combination of dodging the person and the movement of the barrel, and not the bullets themselves. This time, it just wasn't enough, as the impact of two rounds spun him around and put him back on the ground.
Sarah hadn't seen him go down, but suddenly she was fighting the remaining men alone, or at least as far as she could tell. At least he'd taken out most of the guns, she thought darkly.
Sarah headbutted one of the remaining men, one of her horns catching him in the throat. Then out of the corner of her eye, she saw the last armed man walk over to something on the ground, gun ready to finish the kill. Throwing a bone knife from where she stood, it embedded itself in the back of his neck. As he dropped, she smiled grimly. "That's not your kill, asshole."
Remy tried to struggle to his feet, but he couldn't seem to make his legs work right. The bullets had passed through his hip and his side, the wrong place for a spinal injury, the analytical part of his brain processed. It must have hit something else, maybe his sciatic. The bullet through his side had been shallow enough to pass through, but there was a throbbing there that worried him. It must have nicked either his kidney or the upper GI.
In all, he wasn't able to stand and was likely leaking poison into his torso. And Sarah had an unreadable expression as she looked at him. It looked to LeBeau like he'd been right about the possible fatality of this mission.
She let him struggle, going over the soldiers carefully to make sure they were dead. When she returned, she leaned back against the rocks, dripping blood onto the sand. "So now what's the plan?"
"Dey left three jeeps." Remy forced the pain out of his voice. "We drain de petrol from de other two, and between dat, we should have enough fuel an supplied to make it past de border and up north through de Sudan."
"I don't know about 'we', but I probably could." Dragging her foot in the sand, Sarah dragged an X in the dirt. "I couldn't let him shoot to kill. That's too quick for what you deserve. I thought maybe I'd just leave you to the elements. Maybe they'll send more men out. I bet they'd have a field day with you."
Remy regarded her silently for a moment before pushing himself painfully over, so he could at least prop himself against a rock. It was bound to happen. "Just do me one favour. Tell 'Ro dat it was quick."
"Of course." Sarah stood over him, bony hands balled up in fists at her hips. "You died selflessly, to buy me more time to get away." Her smile twisted into something wicked. "I might even manage not to laugh when I say it too."
"You can tell her whatever story dat you want. Just say dat it was fast. Dere's no need to make dem suffer for no reason." Remy's voice had gone calm, almost distant. He'd be expecting this for months, ever since he'd brought Sarah in. Honestly, he didn't even blame her. Many had forgiven him for Gambit. Sarah, the one hurt worst by him, never had. He couldn't fault her for that. "Go. If dey focus on me, you'll have a better chance getting over de border."
"I wouldn't say 'for no reason'. They took you in."
She walked away then, quickly preparing one of the jeeps for her own escape. And as she drove away, she waved goodbye.
It was closing on the evening. LeBeau welcomed the coolness, even though he knew how cold it could get. The savannah wasn't as bad as the desert, but not by a significant margin. He dragged himself painfully closer to the rocks, where he was slightly better covered and had a view of the south, where the pursuers would likely approach him from.
His side ached dully, and bleed in a slow persistent flow, despite his attempts to staunch it. Already the skin around was starting to flare red, and it wouldn't be long before infection in his guts and at the wounds sapped his strength. He was honestly surprised that he actually regretted his imminent death. For so long, the guilt of his years as Gambit had convinced him that dying wouldn't matter to him. It was only what he deserved. But now he had things to live for, and that realization turned over in his increasingly feverish thoughts for a while. He would have liked to have seen 'Ro one more time. Or gotten a chance to say goodbye to Amanda or Lorna. Death illustrated how much they did mean to him. Still, he couldn't blame Sarah. In a strange way, he was sort of proud. Before coming to Snow Valley, she would have tried to finish him off herself. Even injured, Remy knew more about the craft of killing than Sarah could even dream, and he would have taken her with him at worst. Now, she saw the opportunity that she needed, and took perfect advantage of it. It was a play worthy of Wisdom or himself. As Gambit, Remy had taken her entire life from her. It was only fair she got the right to do the same to him.
He squirmed on the hard ground, trying to keep some of the pressure off the wounds. Distantly, he heard the sound of a jeep, and picked up his last deck of cards. The more he could take with him, the more likely they would assume there were more mutants close by, hopefully giving more openings to the others to escape.
The jeep came in from the north, and there was a long pause as the engine went silent just out of sight. Finally, a voice came out of the darkness. "Put the cards away LeBeau. I might not want to leave you to die, but I refuse to carry you out of here if you blow up our fucking getaway car."
Well, obviously the infection had reached his brain and he was experiencing auditory hallucinations. Remy carefully moved his cards to his other hand. "Sarah?"
"No, it's the Tooth Fairy." She took another couple of steps towards him, adding, "I'm here to welcome you to hell."
"Hell doesn't smell like exhaust." Remy said, as she stepped into view. He stowed away his cards, still wondering whether or not she'd come back to get him, or had decided to finish him on in the first place.
"Whatever. Shut up and let me get you into the Jeep." She approached, still careful in case he panicked. She had threatened to kill him after all. "The sooner we get the hell out of here, the happier I'll be."
"You not de one shot in de ass." Remy braced himself and pushed up close to a standing position. His right leg just hung lifeless, and the left one was shakey and weak. Only the strength in his arms got it partially under him, and he needed her help to stay upright.
"You probably deserved it." Sarah flinched as she took on his body weight, moving them both slowly towards the jeep. "Almost there."
"'course I did. Rescuing dat blonde once should have been enough for either of us, neh?" Remy joked weakly, referring to both of their headlong dives into Limbo once Illyana had been kidnapped by Belasco. He winced as Sarah eased him into the seat, but it didn't stop him from reaching around to grab the first aid kit. It was pretty primitive, since medicines were always a big market in Africa, but it did contain a bottle of alcohol and some sulfa. He applied both to his side wound, grimacing as he did so.
"Dere's a town just north of de Sudanese border called Ngumno. I marked it on de map."
"I saw. You got people there?" Sarah hopped in her own seat, turning the keys in the ignition. "Or are we just hoping that -they- don't?"
"Bit of both. Ngumno is one of de links to de railway system along de Nile and up into Egypt. Dere's an ex-CIA agent dat retired to Africa who routinely uses it to smuggle guns between de Mediterranean and East Africa. He also still provides intelligence. If we can catch up wit' him, he can arrange secret transport up to Cairo, where we can leave from." Remy groaned and sank into the seat, wincing with every jar and bounce as they started.
Sarah didn't look his way, eyes focused on what little she could see in the headlights. "Don't start that. If I have to listen to you all the way there, I may reconsider coming back to save your ass."
"I'll try to bleed quietly." Remy said, letting his head loll. "By de way, merci beaucoup."
"Yeah, sure." She waved a hand dismissively. "It's my job."
Once outside of the city, the ride wasn't so bad. Keep driving --straight--? Sarah could handle that much. And when they started shooting at the Jeep, she just drove faster.
Fortunately, Remy hadn't seen any helicopters yet, and they left the main road shortly after clearing the city, tracking roughly north over the scrub. He was hoping to get west of Moyo, loosely following the Nile north into the Sudan. From there, he would have access to contacts that could get them to the Red Sea or Egypt, and escape. Assuming they made it over the border.
While driving the getaway car was exciting, and driving it straight was easier, driving the getaway car straight until they ran out of gas was, well, tedious. As she drove, Sarah was beginning to get antsy again, just waiting for the gasoline gage to reach the empty stage.
"Stop." Remy said, as they approach the wadi. She pulled the jeep over into the cover of the rocks, but Remy made he back up, so it was out in the open plain. He jumped out and began to pull the supplies from the back. "We going to make a temporary cache here. Dey looking, which means de second dey spot de jeep, dey going to assume it's all of us going north. Dat will make de border harder to pierce, but it will draw dem away from de others. When dey come to response, we going to 'borrow' more transport."
Filling the water jugs at the wadi, they backtracked up into the rocks, carefully camouflaging themselves and settling in to wait for more troops.
Sarah shielded her eyes with a hand, wondering if the others had made it out safely. "Why is it I always get stuck doing these things with you? I swear to god, I will be seriously pissed off if you are the last person I see before I die."
"De reason is dat we most likely to survive dis. Besides, Remy wouldn't take 'way de possibility dat you might get to watch me die." LeBeau said dryly, staring through the binoculars and looking for dust trails.
Sarah cracked a smiled then, though whether it was because she found humour in what he said or because she was imagining watching him die was unclear. Either one would have produced an equally cheerful grin. Returning her attention to the task at hand, she finally spoke again. "You think they got out okay?"
"Non. It's likely at least one or two of dem got taken." Remy said quietly, pushing always the thoughts. The chance of any of them getting it was extremely thin, much less all of them. He stiffened as he saw the dust cloud. Three jeeps were approaching. Based on the numbers, they had spread the forces against them much thinner than he's dared hope. "We got company."
Pulling a bone club sticking out from her shoulder, Sarah nodded. "Good. I was beginning to get bored."
"Dere's going to be at least ten men, maybe fifteen. We need to work fast." Remy moved their supplies under the rocks, and started down the slope. "I want you to loop around, and draw dem towards de water. We wanted dem away from de jeeps. I'll hit dem from behind."
Sarah nodded silently, making her way down towards the water. She stepped out from behind her cover, stirring up dust to catch their attention. "Hey assholes! Come and get me!"
A spate of gunfire greeted her comments, as the men predictably began to follow her down. Remy ghosted behind, waiting for them to get far enough forward to not hear as he snuck up behind the guard and snapped his neck with a swift jerk. The man slithered to the dirt in front of him, and LeBeau crouched behind the jeep for a moment, watching Sarah pull them further back, avoiding the fire.
She backed up slowly, almost imperceptibly back towards the water to keep them moving away from the Jeeps. Waiting for Remy's backup, she put off attacking, waving her bone club in the air.
Remy waited another minute, and finally stepped out to throw a series of cards into the back of the group of soldiers. They did little damage, but fatally distracting them from Sarah long enough for Sarah to close with them.
Having the distraction she desperately needed, Sarah leapt forward, slamming her bone club into one man's temple, kicking him backward into the men behind him. In the confusion, they all stumbled backwards.
Remy rushed forwards, a card exploding with enough force to nearly decapitate one of the soldiers, leaving the lifeless force to crash to the baked dirt of the wadi. His follow up card knocked a rifle clear from sighting on Sarah.
Sarah pulled a bloody bone knife from her hip, catching an oncoming soldier with it in the gut, and forcing it upward with a growl. Looking up, she saw a gun pointed straight at her and dropped to the ground, scrambling for a good spot to find her feet again.
Remy saw the gun, pushed himself up and over the man in front of him, and brought both feet down between his shoulderblades. Both shattered and the gun sputtered only a couple of rounds as he fell. The move pushed LeBeau off balance and he landed awkwardly, still taking down another soldier with a card as he did so.
His spatial awareness flared, and Remy twisted away desperately as the soldier opened up. LeBeau had been seen dodging bullets before with ease, but he had always said that it was a combination of dodging the person and the movement of the barrel, and not the bullets themselves. This time, it just wasn't enough, as the impact of two rounds spun him around and put him back on the ground.
Sarah hadn't seen him go down, but suddenly she was fighting the remaining men alone, or at least as far as she could tell. At least he'd taken out most of the guns, she thought darkly.
Sarah headbutted one of the remaining men, one of her horns catching him in the throat. Then out of the corner of her eye, she saw the last armed man walk over to something on the ground, gun ready to finish the kill. Throwing a bone knife from where she stood, it embedded itself in the back of his neck. As he dropped, she smiled grimly. "That's not your kill, asshole."
Remy tried to struggle to his feet, but he couldn't seem to make his legs work right. The bullets had passed through his hip and his side, the wrong place for a spinal injury, the analytical part of his brain processed. It must have hit something else, maybe his sciatic. The bullet through his side had been shallow enough to pass through, but there was a throbbing there that worried him. It must have nicked either his kidney or the upper GI.
In all, he wasn't able to stand and was likely leaking poison into his torso. And Sarah had an unreadable expression as she looked at him. It looked to LeBeau like he'd been right about the possible fatality of this mission.
She let him struggle, going over the soldiers carefully to make sure they were dead. When she returned, she leaned back against the rocks, dripping blood onto the sand. "So now what's the plan?"
"Dey left three jeeps." Remy forced the pain out of his voice. "We drain de petrol from de other two, and between dat, we should have enough fuel an supplied to make it past de border and up north through de Sudan."
"I don't know about 'we', but I probably could." Dragging her foot in the sand, Sarah dragged an X in the dirt. "I couldn't let him shoot to kill. That's too quick for what you deserve. I thought maybe I'd just leave you to the elements. Maybe they'll send more men out. I bet they'd have a field day with you."
Remy regarded her silently for a moment before pushing himself painfully over, so he could at least prop himself against a rock. It was bound to happen. "Just do me one favour. Tell 'Ro dat it was quick."
"Of course." Sarah stood over him, bony hands balled up in fists at her hips. "You died selflessly, to buy me more time to get away." Her smile twisted into something wicked. "I might even manage not to laugh when I say it too."
"You can tell her whatever story dat you want. Just say dat it was fast. Dere's no need to make dem suffer for no reason." Remy's voice had gone calm, almost distant. He'd be expecting this for months, ever since he'd brought Sarah in. Honestly, he didn't even blame her. Many had forgiven him for Gambit. Sarah, the one hurt worst by him, never had. He couldn't fault her for that. "Go. If dey focus on me, you'll have a better chance getting over de border."
"I wouldn't say 'for no reason'. They took you in."
She walked away then, quickly preparing one of the jeeps for her own escape. And as she drove away, she waved goodbye.
It was closing on the evening. LeBeau welcomed the coolness, even though he knew how cold it could get. The savannah wasn't as bad as the desert, but not by a significant margin. He dragged himself painfully closer to the rocks, where he was slightly better covered and had a view of the south, where the pursuers would likely approach him from.
His side ached dully, and bleed in a slow persistent flow, despite his attempts to staunch it. Already the skin around was starting to flare red, and it wouldn't be long before infection in his guts and at the wounds sapped his strength. He was honestly surprised that he actually regretted his imminent death. For so long, the guilt of his years as Gambit had convinced him that dying wouldn't matter to him. It was only what he deserved. But now he had things to live for, and that realization turned over in his increasingly feverish thoughts for a while. He would have liked to have seen 'Ro one more time. Or gotten a chance to say goodbye to Amanda or Lorna. Death illustrated how much they did mean to him. Still, he couldn't blame Sarah. In a strange way, he was sort of proud. Before coming to Snow Valley, she would have tried to finish him off herself. Even injured, Remy knew more about the craft of killing than Sarah could even dream, and he would have taken her with him at worst. Now, she saw the opportunity that she needed, and took perfect advantage of it. It was a play worthy of Wisdom or himself. As Gambit, Remy had taken her entire life from her. It was only fair she got the right to do the same to him.
He squirmed on the hard ground, trying to keep some of the pressure off the wounds. Distantly, he heard the sound of a jeep, and picked up his last deck of cards. The more he could take with him, the more likely they would assume there were more mutants close by, hopefully giving more openings to the others to escape.
The jeep came in from the north, and there was a long pause as the engine went silent just out of sight. Finally, a voice came out of the darkness. "Put the cards away LeBeau. I might not want to leave you to die, but I refuse to carry you out of here if you blow up our fucking getaway car."
Well, obviously the infection had reached his brain and he was experiencing auditory hallucinations. Remy carefully moved his cards to his other hand. "Sarah?"
"No, it's the Tooth Fairy." She took another couple of steps towards him, adding, "I'm here to welcome you to hell."
"Hell doesn't smell like exhaust." Remy said, as she stepped into view. He stowed away his cards, still wondering whether or not she'd come back to get him, or had decided to finish him on in the first place.
"Whatever. Shut up and let me get you into the Jeep." She approached, still careful in case he panicked. She had threatened to kill him after all. "The sooner we get the hell out of here, the happier I'll be."
"You not de one shot in de ass." Remy braced himself and pushed up close to a standing position. His right leg just hung lifeless, and the left one was shakey and weak. Only the strength in his arms got it partially under him, and he needed her help to stay upright.
"You probably deserved it." Sarah flinched as she took on his body weight, moving them both slowly towards the jeep. "Almost there."
"'course I did. Rescuing dat blonde once should have been enough for either of us, neh?" Remy joked weakly, referring to both of their headlong dives into Limbo once Illyana had been kidnapped by Belasco. He winced as Sarah eased him into the seat, but it didn't stop him from reaching around to grab the first aid kit. It was pretty primitive, since medicines were always a big market in Africa, but it did contain a bottle of alcohol and some sulfa. He applied both to his side wound, grimacing as he did so.
"Dere's a town just north of de Sudanese border called Ngumno. I marked it on de map."
"I saw. You got people there?" Sarah hopped in her own seat, turning the keys in the ignition. "Or are we just hoping that -they- don't?"
"Bit of both. Ngumno is one of de links to de railway system along de Nile and up into Egypt. Dere's an ex-CIA agent dat retired to Africa who routinely uses it to smuggle guns between de Mediterranean and East Africa. He also still provides intelligence. If we can catch up wit' him, he can arrange secret transport up to Cairo, where we can leave from." Remy groaned and sank into the seat, wincing with every jar and bounce as they started.
Sarah didn't look his way, eyes focused on what little she could see in the headlights. "Don't start that. If I have to listen to you all the way there, I may reconsider coming back to save your ass."
"I'll try to bleed quietly." Remy said, letting his head loll. "By de way, merci beaucoup."
"Yeah, sure." She waved a hand dismissively. "It's my job."
![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
no subject
Date: 2007-04-11 09:45 pm (UTC)This is because he is fucked in the head, when it comes to certain things.
no subject
Date: 2007-04-11 09:53 pm (UTC)