Ahab -- The Rescue: Part III

[x-wildchild.livejournal.com]

The chase.

Warning: Graphic imagery



"Release the Hounds."

With that command spoken, Rory had turned and fled the area and was already deep in the tunnels. If his Hounds were successful, then it would be a simple thing to regroup and recollect his possessions; if they failed him, well, staying around would be a fools errand. Even if failed it would be a success in many ways. The process worked, for one, and it had affected the X-Men and Moira exactly the way he had intended. Oh, he'd expected a little more time with his new pets but that couldn't be helped now.

He spared one more look over his shoulder to double check there was no one following him through the tunnels. Barbarians, the lot of them. Let them tear each other to pieces and he would rebuild.

***

God, he -hated- tunnels. They smelled like crap. Always, -always- like crap, even if there was no sewage to be found. There was something about tunnels that just caused the air to smell like shit. It made it harder to track down crazy psychopaths.

It was lucky that he had Ahab's scent burned into his memory. Had ever since the lunatic had given his Mad Scientist speech back.. however many days or weeks ago it was. He wasn't sure, and wasn't sure he cared. He didn't have much time to waste.

Kyle rested on his haunches, and closed his eyes. If he cut out sight, he could concentrate better on smell and sound. He could hear uneven footsteps ahead, echoing off the tunnel walls, and another set, much heavier and more sure, behind him.

Ahab had wanted a Hound, to track and hunt down and kill for him. If Kyle had anything to say about the matter, he was going to get one.

***

Too far behind. He'd caught a glimpse of Kyle running from the lab out of the corner of his eye and followed, but too slowly. On his best day Nathan was far slower than the young feral, and after the fight with George and Jennie, this was far from his best day. He staggered a bit as he stopped, breathing hard, to listen. Without his telepathy he couldn't track him properly, had to rely on the sound of running footsteps. With the echoes in here, it was a chancy proposition at best.

He shouldn't have stopped to find the tranq gun. Nathan took as deep a breath as he could, wincing. The side of his face felt like it was on fire. Focus, Nathan... The footsteps were coming from the tunnel on the left, he was sure of it.

He started off at a run. There was only one reason he could think of for Kyle to have departed the lab with such obvious purpose. You don't deserve any better, Campbell, but I'll be damned if I let Kyle do this...

***

Rory paused at a T-section and glanced behind him, eyes narrowing. If he didn't know better, he would think that he was being followed. Impossible. His Hounds and mercenaries were too busy tangling with the X-Men for anyone to come after him. Still...he closed his eyes and listened. He might not have the power that his test subjects had but this place was his and he knew it.

Nothing seemed out of place, really, but that didn't mean there wasn't something. Being paranoid had gotten him this far and he sped up, determined to make it to the exit before whoever was behind him could come across him.

Disgusting mutants, they all deserved death in the end.

***

The faster that the doctor moved, the easier it was to follow him. Kyle kept to the sides of the tunnels, running full out, his fingertips practically touching the ground. It kept him closer to the sounds and smells and he had to get to Ahab soon. Before the brief moment of sanity wore off, and before anyone could stop him.

When Rory went around another set of pipes, he froze as he spotted a hint of movement. The feral but he should be back in the fight...oh no. Something, he knew, had gone wrong. A brief moment of clarity, complete snapping of the treatment, something. And there was an angry feral looking for blood.

He ran.

The already uneven footsteps sped up, and Kyle bent lower, running on all fours to close the last of the distance between himself and Ahab. He leapt, growling loudly, no further need to be silent, and tackled the doctor, dropping him to the ground.

"Off, I command...oh fuck this." Rory used one arm to keep Kyle from snapping his face off while he frantically felt around on the floor. When the Hound had knocked him off his feet, he'd lost hold of his cane but it hadn't traveled far. Finding it, he quickly pressed a button hidden on the side and swung it up, slamming it into Kyle's side. The cane housed what, essentially, was a cattle prod and it was now up to full power on the electricity. "Bad, bad Hound! Get off me, I command you!"

Kyle's lips curled back in a snarl as the electricity coursed up his chest and down his arm. He swiped at the cane, ignoring another shock to his arm, and sent it clattering against the wall. Reaching down, he grabbed the front of Ahab's coat in one hand, and stood up, holding the doctor off the ground.

"Kyle!" Nathan yelled as he came around the corner, breathing hard. He'd heard Rory's voice, and the unmistakable crackle of electricity, and the young man currently holding Rory off the ground might have his back turned to Nathan, but the rage fairly boiled from him, his body language screaming with it. "Kyle, put him down - Kyle!"

Nothing. Kyle didn't even look back at him. Just snarled audibly and jerked Rory closer, bringing him in from arm's length to close range - and biting him, teeth tearing into the man's head.

"KYLE!" The tranq gun was in Nathan's hand the same moment that he yelled Kyle's name again, and two tranq darts had buried themselves in Kyle's back a second later. The young feral jerked, but didn't fall, and didn't stop gnawing, and the scream Rory let out sounded like an animal being slaughtered.

For a moment Nathan honestly thought he was going to be sick, the cold lurching nausea almost overwhelming him. This was Kyle. Kyle, the boy he'd rescued once, twisted into something else as if he'd never been rescued, as if... Nathan swallowed and forced himself forward, raising the gun again and firing. A second time. A third time.

Kyle finally turned, throwing Rory to the ground, and spitting the man's ear out of his mouth. He glared silently at Nathan, and stalked forward, wiping the blood off his mouth with one arm, and then plucking the darts out and throwing them to the ground.

Pain, blinding pain but he could remember a time when it was worse, lower, so much blood. Like now. Rory realized he was still screaming, unintelligible and loud, but didn't care. Scramble backwards, try to find his damned ear. Could put it back on, Moira could--no no no, all gone. Dust and dust and ashes and so much blood and where was his ear?!

"Kyle." Nathan's voice was almost inaudible, the hand with the gun lowering almost involuntarily for a moment. Please. Please... But Kyle kept coming, stalking forward, the growl building, and Nathan's instincts snapped back into control. He got another shot off before Kyle was on him.

He should've kept the ear, Kyle thought. Now he wouldn't get the chance. And he wouldn't get to finish this if Nate didn't stop shooting him with that damn dart gun. He ignored the sting from the tranq dart, and leapt forward, grabbing onto Nate's arm with both hands, and then sinking his teeth into the shoulder.

Kyle could chew on the leathers all he wanted, he wasn't going to be able to penetrate them with his teeth - or at least, not easily. Teeth gritted, Nathan managed to get the tranq gun around, press it against Kyle's leg. Too close, but the leg wasn't vital. His healing factor could take care of it. Nathan pulled the trigger again, heard Kyle snarl around his mouthful of leather. He didn't let go. Nathan swore and punched him in the head with his free hand, hard.

The darts must have been taking effect, because his head was swimming, and everything was going all red. Red-er. And hazy, and fuzzy, and the flashing white lights were fading away to a greyish sort of fog. Kyle pushed away from Nate, landing on the ground in a crouch, and looked up at the taller man. He opened his mouth, as if to explain, or perhaps apologize. And then slumped backwards, eyes rolled up to the back of his head, all of his limbs slack and relaxed.

"Kyle," Nathan said a bit raggedly, kneeling down beside him, checking his pulse. Slow, but steady. There had to be enough of the sedative in his system to account for that, although he'd burn through it, and probably faster than any of them would really prefer. "I'm sorry," he whispered almost inaudibly, wishing that the damned powers-wipe would wear off, that he had even a little of his telepathy...

Forgotten for the moment, Rory rolled up onto his knees and nearly retched from the movement. One hand curled around the cane but he paused as he located the bitten off, chewed up ear. Glancing over at Dayspring, he slowly reached over and snatched it up, hastily shoving it into his pocket before it could be taken from him again. Not like his leg, oh no, he was keeping this one. And now it was time to deal with the trash.

The cane hummed back to life as he shifted again, raising his arm to bring it right down over the bastard's head. Take her from me, will you?

But Nathan was already rising, and the cane glanced off his shoulder instead. Enough to deliver a sizeable jolt, even through the leathers, and he stumbled before he caught himself, his whole arm gone numb. But he managed to spin around, bringing the tranq gun up and across Rory's jaw, sending the other man reeling backwards.

"You," Nathan grated, gray eyes frozen with anger. Kyle was safe, at least for now, and now, now he could deal with Campbell. "My wife," he said, "would like to beat you to death. Since she's not here..." The gun smashed into Rory's face a second time, shattering his nose.

"Fffuck!" Rory swung the cane once again at Nathan but the charge wasn't built up yet and he missed by a mile. Skittering backwards, gasping in pain, he glared. "You caused this!" he screamed, not bothering to spit out the blood that ran into his mouth from his injuries. "You stole her, took her, used her! It was supposed to have been me, not some mutant piece of filth! Destruction, that's all you wrought and you'll take my precious Moira down with you!"

Nathan didn't dignify the ranting with a response - at least not a verbal one. He tossed the gun aside and moved towards Rory, his expression gone utterly cold. "Shut your mouth now if you want to keep the ability to speak." You're not fit to speak her name.

Back now against the wall, half-hunched over, Rory froze and closed his eyes for a second. They opened again and stared up, no semblance of sanity in their depths anymore. There hadn't been any since that fateful New Years Eve when what little had been there had been shattered completely. "I hear you have a daughter," he said softly. "Red hair, looks just like her mother. Let us give it a few years, shall we, and then see where we are? One generation removed shouldn't make that much difference to me after all."

Nathan stopped, the muscles along his jaw tensing for a moment before his features grew oddly still and calm. One eyebrow went up slowly, almost in an unspoken question. Did he really say that? Did he really mean that? Rory gazed back at him with those empty eyes, and Nathan shook his head slowly.

"No," he said - and knocked Rory out with one last, vicious blow.


***


The fighting was over. She knew that much as the sounds around her died down to a quieter level. Ororo didn't rise, however, from the side of the unconscious young man on the floor. She had plucked the darts from his skin and made sure he was resting comfortably, and then... she had continued to sit there, staring at him, watching the gentle rise and fall of his red-clad chest. Vaguely she knew that she should get up, that there were things to do, but not yet. She couldn't leave him quite yet.

Marie had made her way over to the team leader and she pitched her voice gently when she saw the look on 'Ro's face. "Storm..." she trailed off, wondering if it was the time to ask the white haired woman what to do next. Reaching out, she placed her hand softly on the older woman's shoulder, squeezing. "We got them. They're gonna be ok."

Ororo looked up, startled, relaxing somewhat as she saw it was only Marie. "Hopefully," she amended the girl's statement, pressing her lips together in a thin line. They still had to get them back to the mansion and hope that Moira and Jean and Hank and Amelia could come up with something that might fix whatever hideous process they had been through... Her expression grew a little distant as she got lost in her thoughts once more.

Marie refused to let Ororo's words diminish her optimism - it wasn't that she wasn't realistic about what lay ahead, it was just that she had faith in the skills of the schools and the abilities of the students to overcome what had happened. "Right now we just gotta focus on getting them back and cleaning up here though," Rogue said, keeping her voice gentle. "Then we'll let the docs handle the next part."

Again she was talking. Ororo forced herself to break out of her thoughts and listen to what Marie was saying, though facing the reality of it all was the last thing she wanted to be doing. "Very well," she said when the girl had stopped speak, and she gave a nod and tore her gaze away from Marius' downed form. "You are right, Marie. There is much to be done..." Looking around for the first time, Ororo was struck with the damage that had been done.

Rogue followed Ororo's gaze, shaking her head slightly. 'Ro was still in some state of shock and Marie wouldn't be surprised if most of the X-Men were - even with the missions they'd been on and having had to take down students before, something was different about this time and the way this had happened.

"Ok, authorities have been called to come deal with all them," Marie said, gesturing at the techs and downed bad guys. "Did you call the school yet about how we should get the kids back? Or where we should take them? And if the docs want us to do anything to the kids in transit?" Marie fell silent, realizing that she needed to stop firing off questions if she didn't want to just overwhelm Storm.

Luckily, her question didn't seem to overwhelm Ororo so much as re-order her thoughts, and she blinked twice before straightening up again, then standing. "I do not believe the school has been contacted yet... I would like you to do that." Anything to keep her from having to explain what had happened. "I am going to check with the others; as soon as we can arrange transport, do so. Time is imperative still."