xp_logs | Saturday Afternoon at the Angel's Clinic: Callisto, Tabitha, Sarah Morlock, Kyle, Garrison and Kurt

The kids didn't leave unnoticed and the responsible parties (unsurprisingly) called in some help.

Kurt's face was grave as the group approached Callisto and Tabitha, concern mixed with some confusion. "What has happened?"

Callisto was frowning, and she scrubbed a hand through her wild hair. "Gone. With Annalee. Headed for the tunnels, I guess." Her scowl deepened. "There was something fucked-up about them," she added. "The way they were... I dunno. Acting."

"According to our files, those tunnels go anywhere. If she's got a bolthole set aside down there, it could take forever to find them."

"My ass it will." Kyle said. "We're only really screwed if she split 'em up, as long as somebody who knows those tunnels can get me down there, I can find 'em." He shrugged sheepishly. "Might need to break into their rooms and steal laundry but whatever, I'll eat a violation of privacy speech if I gotta."

Sarah could not believe she was going through this again. At one time she had been willing to let those who wanted to live in the sewers continue to live there, but this whole forcing mostly well-adjusted mutants to come back with them was bullshit. "Well, you've got two people who know those tunnels like the back of their goddamn hands," she gestured to herself, and then to Callisto before continuing, "and I doubt she'll split them up. Morlocks believe in safety in numbers."

Tabitha's hands clenched in and out of fists. She couldn't help a little bit of a possessive streak toward the kids. "You'd be better to use me as a distraction or something. Otherwise I'm limited to hand-to-hand." Not that a nice knock-down with the woman who'd stolen her kids didn't sound appealing.

"We don't know that it will necessarily come to that," Warren said, arms folded across his chest. "We don't know what we're likely to face once we get there, and the important thing is finding the kids and getting them out of there, not starting a fight. And we should be able to do the former with little difficulty, between Kyle, Sarah and Callisto. Going in on the offensive isn't going to help us get them back."

"Unless the person who kidnapped them doesn't feel like giving them back even after we say please." Kane pointed out, running the scenario over in his head. Despite the assurances of the others, it was still going to be close quarters and underground on someone else's home turf. The tunnels neutralized the advantages of both Tabitha and Warren's primary powers, and considering the condition of the area, a punch in the wrong place from himself or Callisto could bring the whole sewer down on top of them. Why couldn't their enemies choose reasonable locations to fight, like flat open fields with no obstructions or bystanders? It was plain inconsiderate. "We need anything else, Kurt?"

"Apart from knowledge of exactly where they are, which we are not going to get, I think not", he said after a moment's thought. "Sarah and Callisto, and of course Kyle's nose, are the best assets we have for this mission. I just hope she really did do this meaning well."