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xp_logsAfter tracking the signal from Sharon's collar the X-Men arrive on scene, and they're not in a patient mood.
Perimeter duty was often one of the least eventful jobs at one of these gigs, and that was just fine with Troy. If someone wanted to pay him too much money to stand around while excessively armed then more power to them. For Troy, it meant an opportunity to catch up on his audiobooks. It was strictly against company policy to do so on the job, of course, but it was shaping up to be a long night, and he only needed one ear for the headset. Besides, his particular area gave him a clear view of the surrounding area. Nobody was sneaking up on him.
Well, they hadn't been, anyway. There was a sudden paff of displaced air from behind him, and a strangely polite tap on his shoulder.
"Hello."
A hand gripped his opposite elbow. The mercenary barely turned in time to catch sight of a face so dark it nearly disappeared against the night before his nostrils filled with the scent of sulfur and -- something -- happened. Something that almost turned his stomach inside out. Before he could work out what had happened he found himself in an area that was very definitely not the one he'd been assigned to patrol. Now he was somewhere behind a treeline, and he wasn't alone.
He hadn't survived in this job for this long without developing certain instincts. He wasted no time considering the wheres or hows: he broke the grip on his elbow and made a break for it.
Webs shot out in front of him to impede the path of escape, and two long, delicate tendrils shot out from April's knees to wrap around his ankles like coiled vine. Feminine laughter – layered with a growling, snarling darkness – rang out, growing ever closer to Troy until a perfectly normal-looking woman was standing in front of him.
At least until she smiled.
Razor-sharp teeth were bright in the darkness, a terrifying distraction that made webbing his feet to the ground easier than walking the dog. "Hello!"
"Thank you for agreeing to join us."
Scott didn't move from his position leaning against a wall, using an energy blast to whittle down a stick into a sharp point that he tossed casually at the man, the point slicing through his clothes and pinning his foot to the ground as the other man began whittling another stick.
"In the interests of time, let's assume we've already asked you a question and you've told us you don't know anything so we can get right to the torture. Seem fair?"
"I thought I was the bad cop." Wildchild asked casually, both hands shoved into the pockets of his jacket. "Cyke, we talked about this. Sorry man, he's a little protective of the kids." He walked up to the struggling guard.
"You didn't know it was kids, right? Because if you knew, Cyclops will be the least of your problems." He kicked the stick out of the man's shoe, and then his hands were out of his pockets, one clutching the guard's coat. "Start talking. How many teenagers did you kidnap? Where are they?" He ignored the flailing of kicking legs, and the short knife that the guard had pulled out of a holster. He could have taken it away. He probably should have plucked the knife out of the man's fingers. Ignoring being stabbed in the arm seemed - in the moment - a better tactic for getting questions answered.
An actinic crackle from behind the guard was the only warning as Jean-Phillipe's one arm came up under the man's shoulder, putting him in a sort of half-nelson as the other hand flared with electricity. "Oh, Wildchild," he murmured, the banter of his teammate replaced with deadly intent. "Cops," he proclaimed derisively. "Je ne suis pas un flic," he leaned in close to the captive's ear. People would expect good cop-bad cop, having a third thing would immediately put someone off balance.
"I...am Brotherhood." Reminding people that he was a wanted terrorist never got old.
Every hair on Troy's body stood on end, and it was not because of the breath tickling his cheek. His mouth opened once or twice, but no words came out. The glowing fist mere inches from his face was making it difficult to concentrate.
Maya waved to the guard from several feet away, the white palm print on her face the only affectation toward concealing her identity that she’d allowed.
She’d not bothered to draw any weapons, content to let the others take point on this one. She could always mop up any others that might arrive.
“We’d also really like to know who the person in charge is. If you tell us all that, and quickly, I’m 50% sure they’ll let you go.”
That made Troy's mouth snap shut. He had not chosen a career path that looked kindly upon turncoats. Consequences ranged from summary dismissal to summary execution, and often there was no way to know which employer you'd drawn until it was too late. Certain companies had certain reputations, and if you'd engaged Troy's you were unlikely to be the sort of person who made solid decisions.
Alison, stone faced and hovering around the periphery, took in the show with a sort of semi-fond exasperation. It wasn't that the other X-Men couldn't be properly scary. She'd been party to a fair few DR seshes, ofc. It was just...
She couldn't help it. Her stone face broke, and she snorted. She could suddenly feel the eyes on her.
"I love all of you, but y'all are also such a bunch of drama queens sometimes, I swear." She knew she was shattering the tension, but she couldn't help it! She'd literally seen Kyle get so distracted at breakfast by a picture of a baby fox that he'd poured his OJ into his cereal and not notice until four bites in. And that had just been that morning!
"And people say that I mug for the cam... era..." She trailed off, suddenly distracted. Her eyes rapidly flickered between the others. Something was flittering just on the edge of her subconscious that she should know. There was something she was missi--
She felt the shock of indigo flick between her eyes as she realized it. Silently, she stepped over to, and then around Sooraya, staring at the shadows of her face all the while. Silently she reached out, grabbed her by the shoulders, and gently turned her 90 degrees. She cocked her head like a particularly curious cat, and then turned back to the others.
"We're being recorded," she declared. "Or something like it. Unless anyone else can think of a reason they'd hook up four point lighting around the entrance of a secure hidden compound?"
Dust's eyes narrowed, slowly scanning the treeline after it clicked what Dazzler had been saying. "Well, it looks like we're under candid camera. I wonder what our friend here knows about this." A shiver pulsed over her skin as she shifted from flesh to sand, though the shape of her body remained intact.
"You know..." Dust kept her usual gentleness in her voice. "I bet if our friend here really had the choice, he'd gladly give up what we need to know and get out of here. We might just as well give him the chance... after we do what is needed here." A soft smile flashed over her sandy face as she met the mercenary's eyes. "Now, doesn't that sound like a good idea? Just tell us about the security in place, including the fancy camera system, where we can find our kids and who is behind this... that's all we need to know..."
A finger sharped, just pricking his arm, though no blood appeared. "Just don't lie. Because we'll know. Wouldn't we, Phoenix?"
With so many other terrifying individuals threatening his person Troy hadn't noticed the woman who now stepped forward. Her pale face was expressionless in the gloom.
Then their eyes met, and there was only fire.
A blast furnace opened in his brain. There was a presence in his mind, scorching and pitiless as an inferno. It stripped his thoughts like a bird of prey stripping the flesh from bone. Unerringly, implacably, the presence latched, and suddenly images were spilling from his head like viscera and it pulled-
Then it was over. The searing pressure disappeared, leaving the mercenary gasping and alone in his mind once more.
Jean's distant face hardened, and she looked away from the man, turning back to the group.
"There are more people than just Sharon and Liam being kept here, but he doesn't know how many. Cryptids? There are armed mercenaries everywhere, both as security, and to aid in the hunt," Jean said. She shook her head. "He's heard their boss is some...washed up reality TV star. But he doesn't know the name. And you're right, Dazzler. It is being live streamed. Seems to be keeping with the theme."
A fist lashed out, rocking the man's head back as he slumped to the ground unconscious. Scott didn't even spare him a second glance as he turned away from the crumpled guard, eyes taking in the building, "Someone tie him up so he doesn't warn any of his friends, I think maybe it's time they find out this isn't a game."
Nightcrawler and Spectrum, acting as reconnaissance, encounter the first wave of resistance and get a hint that all is not as it appears to be.
"Compound" was almost the wrong word. The property below her was a hedge maze of a peculiar design: an irregular network of winding paths and sharp angles. Occasionally the allées converged to create wider spaces adorned with the occasional fountain or weathered masonry, clearly designed to evoke an atmosphere of vague antiquity.
The illusion was spoiled by the professional-grade lighting that had been erected atop the hedges. The pathways had been illuminated, but not too much, as if whoever had planned the setup had paid special attention to ambiance. It was a dark night, and they were far from the city. Artistically pooling shadows hinted at secrets an onlooker could only imagine.
"Wow, this is too weird," Nica murmured to Kurt through their direct comms. She had gone with X-rays, rendering herself invisible to the naked eye and likely to mess up cameras as well, and was silently gliding over the maze looking for signs of life. "It looks almost like a set for some kind of reality TV show."
"I think that is exactly what it is", Kurt returned grimly. "But the game is more deadly than most."
"Ugh, I knew there was a reason I hated those shows." Movement caught Nica's eye and she paused in mid-air to concentrate on switching her vision - but not the rest of her - to infra-red. "I think I have someone, other by the birdbath with the cherub on it. The one peeing." There was another pause as she squinted at the shape and switched to ordinary vision. "It's weird, the infra-red is a lot smaller than the shape I'm seeing."
"What does that mean?" he asked. "Have you ever encountered such a thing before?"
"Maybe... I'm not sure if it's possible, but maybe there's some kind of optical illusion? Something making them look bigger than they actually are?" Nica sounded doubtful. "Either way, they don't look like they're a threat. They look like they're trying to hide. One of the mutants that got taken?"
"It could be." Kurt started trying to circle in closer. "Or one of those who took them, who knows we are here."
"I'll cover you while you go in? You're better at stealth than me and I can zap them if it is a trap while you bamf away?"
"A good plan", he said with a nod. "By the cherub, you said?"
Kurt's target proved to be a ginger-furred, simian thing that had taken shelter near what looked like a half-demolished mausoleum. It was bent near the base of one of the hedge walls. As Kurt watched it tugged violently at the bush, as if trying to clear a path, but the branches were so thin and dense only handfuls of twigs came free.
Its nostrils flared.
The effect was immediate. With a roar the thing surged to its feet and reached for the closest weapon to hand: the birdbath. A hand that could have palmed a basketball tore the cherub from its pedestal and flung it in Kurt's direction.
He flung up an arm to defend himself instinctively, before remembering himself and teleporting out of its path. "I am not here to do you harm!"
The cherub struck the ground where he'd been standing like a meteorite as the creature howled again. Reorienting on Kurt's new position, it charged him with outstretched arms.
Its recessed eyes were noticeably glassy even in the dim light. Whatever the creature had been through, it seemed unwilling or unable to believe Kurt wasn't involved.
There was a pop like a starting pistol behind them, and a pair of solid weights joined by a length of kevlar tether bound Kurt's arms to his body. There was the briefest flash of a laser guide before another pop, and suddenly the creature was crashing to the ground over entangled legs.
"No one said there'd be bear-baiting," someone drawled. It was the sort of voice that could make every word sound as if it came at someone else's expense. Two empty restraint cartridges hit the ground as a young Asian man emerged from a convenient shadow, already readying the crossbow mounted on one forearm. Behind Kurt the ape-creature was spitting barely intelligible curses as it clawed at its trapped legs.
"Is this what you call sport?" Kurt snarled at the newly arrived enemy. "I suppose you like to shoot drugged lions, as well?"
"Animals are too easy." The hunter's eyes flicked to the side. "But I'm not above leveling the playing field."
Something small and sharp hit Kurt's shoulder. It seemed to be a dart, fired by a masked security officer that had managed to position himself near the opposite wall while the hunter drew Kurt's attention.
The hunter smirked. "I don't know how you got in here, but that-"
The kevlar tether restraining the other mutant snapped. The simian-creature howled to its feet and charged their tormentor, mouth frothing with foam.
The hunter twitched his raised crossbow to the side and fired.
Kurt could feel himself weakening from the effects of the dart, but managed one short teleport to land between the hunter and the feral, reaching out to swat the bolt out of the air. "Spectrum! Now, please!"
A beam of heated light hit the ground between Kurt and the hunter, drawing a line of scorched dirt between them. "That's enough!" Nica ordered, hovering in the air a few feet above their heads, outlined in infra-red light, her fists glowing dangerously bright as she readied another blast. "Back off, pal, and drop the crossbow."
There was a report of an air rifle as one of the guards fired at the glowing figure, followed by the other. Both darts flew harmlessly through her and she turned in the air with a look of disgust. "Seriously? You're trying to shoot me?"
The two guards, who clearly had been, froze. Without removing his eyes from Nica, the hunter moved his head slightly to sneer. "Power-neutralizers, huh?" he asked them as he moved to unbuckle the empty crossbow fastened to his forearm. "Tell me how that helps if you can't hit-"
There was a click. The man's arm whipped up, and a beam of light flashed in Nica's face. The weapon had a laser sight -- no, a laser dazzler. The green light would have temporarily blinded normal prey.
Except Nica's eyesight wasn't normal. She shrugged as her powers shifted to mimic the dazzler until she was glowing green. "And that's strike two. Here, let me show you how it's done," she replied, raising her hand as if to wave. Instead, a burst of green dazzling light flashed from her palm down at the hunter and his guards.
The crossbow, while sleek and modern, remained a crossbow, and it had not yet been reset. Its arms were therefore still extended when the hunter instinctively threw his arm over his face to shield his eyes, and his future reputation was preserved only by the fact the two men assisting him were equally blinded. He fell to his knees, now clutching his eye.
"You're . . . not with them?"
It was the simian creature Kurt had saved. His eyes were still unfocused, but some of the wildness had left them. Dazed, he kept swinging attention between Kurt and Nica, as if he couldn't fit them into the same reality.
"What is this?"
"As I told you, we are not here to do you harm." Kurt met his gaze steadily. "These people have taken our children. We want them back, and we will help you and any others we find along the way."
"I don't remember hearing any children. They've been bringing people in all week."
"Teenagers", he clarified. "Two teenagers, a boy and a girl. They would look like humanoid cats, or the girl might look like a purple house cat or a puma."
"Maybe. We couldn't see each other." The rescued mutant ran a hand down his face. "It feels like I'm having a bad high. Can I call my sister?"
"Once we get you clear of all this, sure." Nica was hovering lower, keeping watch on the hunter and his security detail, but she gave the young mutant a reassuring smile. "Nightcrawler, are you okay? That dart..."
"I think it was a power suppresser", he told her. "Clearly it was not any kind of sedative, I feel fine, but... a moment." He focused, then nodded. "My powers are off."
Neither Nica nor the rescued mutant had an opportunity to respond, for at that moment the dark sky bloomed with light.
Dust and Phoenix act to evacuate the kidnapped mutants.
Something had happened to his arm when he was abducted. Dislocated shoulder, maybe. It didn't make a difference. Feathered arms didn't mean he could fly. All he could do was run like everyone else.
So far he was doing all right navigating the maze. His strategy was simple: every time he heard the sound of violence he ran in the opposite dimension. He'd been running for a while, and this looked like a new area. This place had to end eventually.
Then the avian mutant turned a corner and almost ran right into three heavily armed men, all in dark body armor. The nearest one raised what looked very much like a cattle prod.
"Two choices," said the masked woman. "First, you head back the way you're supposed to go and take your chances with the rest. Second, we break a few bones and drag you there. Which one is it?"
"I'd go for the third option: leave them alone and go back to where you came from." Sooraya spoke in a harsh voice, only taking her eyes off the guards for the briefest of moments to make sure the young mutant was reasonably okay. "Or that thing will be seeing places where the sun doesn't shine." Her face and hands shivered immediately, sand taking the place of flesh.
The security entrusted to patrol the interior of the maze were clearly of a different caliber to the man they had interrogated: Sooraya's sudden appearance provoked no questions, only action. Instantly, another guard raised his rifle and fired.
The dart thunked into her uniform, shivering a second before a small tendril of sand pushed it out and dropped it to the ground where it remained harmlessly. Dust shook her head at them and exploded into a cloud of sand that quickly formed into multiple tendrils. One wrapped around the rifle and pulled it from the guard's hand before tossing it over the hedge. Another lashed out and wrapped around the guard's ankle, tossing him into the hedge where he dropped down, moaning.
His compatriot swore and turned from the avian mutant to Sooraya. Instinctively, she turned the cattle prod onto the mass of sand.
If she could, Sooraya would have rolled her eyes. Instead she simply plucked the cattle prod from the woman's hand and tossed it after the gun before wrapping another tendril of sand around the woman's ankle and tossed her in the direction of her compatriot. She smacked right in the gut of the man who was just climbing to his feet again and both went down in a pile, groaning where they lay.
The final guard, who'd been watching, processed his odds and made a decision. He slammed his drawn baton into the side of the avian mutant with rib-cracking force and ran, clearly hoping that the man's squawk of pain would distract Sooraya as he fled.
But as the baton slammed down, it was met with an invisible force, causing an echoing crack throughout the maze. Jean stared at the guard, cocking her head to the side as she floated down into view.
"You're done," she said. The muddy ground seemed to open up, sinking the man down up to his shoulders.
"Now you get to enjoy being helpless for a while," Jean said.
Turning back to the young winged mutant, she extended her hand. "Come with me. We're here to help."
The avian mutant had been gaping at the man currently neck deep in the mud, but Jean's words brought a reflexive response. He tried to extend an arm and gasped; now that he was down the muscles in his core were seizing, and even his good arm was weak. He tried to push himself up with his legs alone and failed.
"C . . . can't," he panted.
Sooraya quickly shifted back to her human form, kneeling next to him in the mud. "Hey, I am Dust and that is Phoenix. Let's see if I can help you up, okay? It's probably still gonna hurt a bit though." Shifting a little, she set her hands behind shoulders and gently helped him get to his feet, wincing in sympathy at the deep groan. "There we go."
"Dust, can you cover the entrance to make sure we don't get any more unwanted visitors?" Jean said. "I'll get a triage area set up for the wounded."
"Go with Phoenix. She is a doctor and will want to look you over once she has the chance." Sooraya encouraged the young man, gently nudging him over before dissolving into her sand form again and taking to the air to establish her area of patrol. Hopefully it wouldn't be long before the others returned.
Bevatron and Dazzler infiltrate the command center, where they formulate a hypothesis while indulging in a little light terrorism.
The converted mobile home was full of chatter. Circumstances were currently putting the control room's name to the test. The technicians had been given a very specific number of individuals to follow, all of whom had been outfitted in very distinct costumes by wardrobe. The sudden appearance of numerous other individuals that met the same parameters was complicating the livestream.
"There were only supposed to be five hunters," swore a technician. "Is this some special guest star crap?" On the other side of the room the drone operator was trying not to have a nervous breakdown.
"Just do your best," said another man. "We'll get what's there. Even if the livestream's a cluster Harris can edit it for-"
Alright, Alison thought to herself where she and JPC were crouched on either side of the open door of the motor home, this has gone far enough.
Meeting JPC's eyes, she quickly flashed him a set of (definitely non-standardized) hand signals that effectively boiled down to covering her eyes while sticking her thumbs in her ears, before nudging the cracked door just wide enough and slipping inside.
The place was a madhouse of noise. Even without looking it was almost too much as the volume caught the peaks and troughs like a wave on the beach. There wasn't a single eye that wasn't glued to at least two different screens. People barked orders and attempted to coordinate in the face of the chaos that the other X-Men had thrown into what was clearly already a pit of madness.
It reminded Alison of some of her worst-organized shows, in a way. There wasn't a chance anyone would have caught her entry.
Keeping low, she moved her way over to a table towards the center of the converted 'building'. It was still behind everyone, which made it absolutely perfect.
She quickly felt out the eddies of sound bouncing across the confined space. It was... stale? No, just disorderly to properly hold its shape as a blast marble. Too refined and technical for straight use with her powers. It'd make for a relatively useful Dazzle, but she wasn't willing to take the risk that she didn't catch up everyone. One person's attention wanders at just the wrong time and... well. Best not to think about it. Which was all fine.
First rule of showbiz: always have a backup plan. Alison slipped a small item out of her equipment pouch.
Okay. Just like we drew it up in rehearsals. All she needed was the perfect moment.
A moment later, as she felt the jagged sound fall into a soft lull, she popped up from her spot behind one of the tables, and very loudly slammed an item onto the table in front of her. Instantly, every eye in the room turned to look at her, stunned. It'd only take another second or two before one of the more reactive of them would come to their senses, but by then it'd already be too late.
"Hey, boys. Wanna see a magic trick?" She held up her hands in front of her, in a classic 'nothing in my hands' pose.
On her left index and ring fingers, black metal rings caught the light and gleamed.
"Now you see me...!"
And then the flashbang she'd set on the table in front of her went off.
Jean-Phillipe could not fault Alison's theatricality at all. He could see why she had such a reputation as a performer in her pop music career. And if there was one thing he'd learned in the Brotherhood was the value of theater when it came to intimidation and the like. He'd been prepared for the light and sound show, and in its wake he stalked in, putting on the air of Erik in his most powerful, judgmental aspect. He could practically feel the cape flowing behind him for a moment.
"BUTCHERS!" he roared, arms sweeping upward to dramatic pose. If they wanted a show, as Dazzler had already begun, he would provide. "Your would-be prey has teeth of its own!" he declared, and his wrists snapped in rotation, his hands going from vertical to horizontal in a motion he'd learned from Magneto and never quite managed to train out of himself. But at times like these it was perfect. As his hands moved, electricity arced from them to a pair of monitors that exploded outward in a shower of sparks and fragments of molded plastic.
People at the mansion always focused on the 'reformed' part of 'reformed terrorist', and not the latter bit. Well, sometimes people could use a reminder.
Most of the technicians had had the misfortune to be looking towards Alison when the flashbang had gone off: this unlucky majority were currently dealing with a visual field dominated by the blurry afterimage of the flash. All were dealing with, at minimum, a ringing in their ears. The man who'd been closest tried to rise from his monitor and instantly lost his balance as his inner ear struggled to recalibrate.
The woman who'd been on her way back from the kitchenette had not been so fortunate. She'd missed the flashbang just in time to stumble into Jean-Phillipe's declaration.
A cup of coffee splashed onto the floor.
Spilled coffee was the least of her worries as Jean-Phillipe grabbed the woman by the front of her shirt and pulled her off-balance. Taking a few steps, he pushed her face-first toward one of the still functional monitors, where a person with a clearly feral mutation ran in fear from their pursuer. "Does that look like one of your...comment dit-on...cryptids?" His voice got lower and more menacing as he leaned down over the technician. "Would you care to explain?"
The woman gulped. Every hair on her neck and arms was standing on end. The instant before she'd been swung into the monitor she'd realized the blue eyes glaring at her weren't just piercing, but glowing.
"I only know we had to be careful with the maze lighting because they set something up for the hunters," she blurted. "S-something immersive, I don't know what. It doesn't matter on our end. We're just supposed to broadcast the raw footage."
"Raw footage of murdering mutants for the titillation of...-flatscans-." Jean-Phillipe didn't use that particular supremacist pejorative these days, but he could still make it drip with disdain fitting of the role he was playing to terrify the entire room into keeping their heads down.
"Oi," Alison chimed in from her position at the keyboard of the main computer, "once you're finished playing with your food, come take a look at this."
taptaptap
"God it's like my first twitch stream setup in here, but without any of the personality or verve. Who thought this was acceptable?"
Behind her, one of the techs stumbled noisily to his feet. Alison didn't even bother to turn as she flicked a finger over her shoulder, launching a small pink droplet of light from her fingers. It corkscrewed over and popped right between the man's eyes. He slumped to the ground, cross-eyed.
taptaptaptaptaptaptapataptaptapatpatp
All at once, all the (non-blown-up) monitors flickered over to the same stream. Two very familiar figures were assisting each other through the forest. "Bingo."
"Calisse," Jean-Phillipe hissed as he recognized Sharon and Liam. "Mon tabarnak j'vais te décâlisser la yeule," he growled, the Quebecois swears dropping angrily as he manhandled the technician in his grip. The teenagers looked their normal selves on the screen, but Jean-Phillipe remembered what Nica had said about infrared and the confusion inside the maze. "Something immersive," he repeated the technician's words. "A la verrga," he cursed, switching to his husband's Spanish having already blasphemed his way through his usual swears. "They are hiding the true appearance of the targets for the hunters somehow," he realized. "Dazzler, do what you can with that? Perhaps the lighting they were so cautious about? I will attempt to determine where les chats are on this map," he continued, grabbing a laminated sheet from next to a monitor.
Letting JPC take over the keyboard, Alison turned her attention to the cowering tech he'd dropped to the floor. She could tell that the girl didn't know whether to try and run or hide, and it'd left her just backed up against a wall, clearly terrified out of her mind.
The tech didn't even turn to look at Alison as she walked over and crouched down, leaning against her own knees. Up close, Alison could see how blown her eyes were, hear her hyperventilate and could even literally watch her heart race as the major vessels in her neck pulsed. Intellectually, there was a part of her that recognized that so many would find this sort of thing reprehensible. Another, much more dangerous group would consider such an expression of pure unbridled fear to be an art all its own, something to be preserved and appreciated with no thought for the fact that there was a human life behind it. Alison had to crush the part of her that felt for the woman; she'd put herself in this situation, after all, and was hardly an innocent bystander in all of this.
No. Mostly, Alison just found it annoying. There'd be no getting answers from her like this.
Alison waved a hand in front of her face. "Hey." No response. It quickly upgraded to snapping in front of her face, and then a sharp shake of the shoulder.
Nothing. God dammit.
Alison sighed. "Alright, I guess we get to do this the hard way, then," she said softly.
Reaching to her image inducer, Alison flicked over to her secondary preset. It was exactly identical to her normal one, but with one small change: she'd tweaked the voice ever so slightly to be a touch higher. She didn't sound like a child or anything; it simply re-captured a little bit of that girlish innocence she'd grown out of years ago. Now... how did she want to...? Ah. That'd work. All she needed was to slip into the right headspace and...
Lightning fast, her hand struck out and grabbed the technician's chin, gently turning her head so that her wide eyes met Alison's own. They were clouded by terror, but finally she'd managed to pry the girl's eyes away from JPC and to her own. And sure enough, moments later she was able to watch some of that frightened haze lift. Enough that the girl was becoming coherent again, at least.
Alison gave her best 'benevolent smile', being sure to put her entire face into it. "There you are," she said and wow she had forgotten where exactly this voice's resonance sat.
"Welcome back. We've got quite a few things to discuss."
The girl slapped at her hand, but her arms were shaking so badly that she couldn't quite nail any of the landings. Alison grabbed one of her wrists with her free hand, maintaining a clamp on her face with the other. Squeeze just so, not so much that it's painful but definitely enough to make it uncomfortable and... yep, that terror was slowly starting to resurface again. She'd clearly just remembered that Alison and JPC had come in together, and was realizing exactly how vulnerable a position she was currently in.
"Now, look," Alison said, sounding for all the world like a reasonable and sane person, "My friend over there and I," Alison said, twisting so that the girl could see JPC at the computer before twisting back, "are looking for a few friends of ours, and we--" the tech's eyes skittered back over to where JPC was very intentionally just out of sight. Well. That wouldn't do at all. Alison gave the girl's head a little bit of a shake.
"Now, now," she said, dropping the pitch of her voice. "You had your chance to do this the easy way already," she said. There was a full-body shudder as the girl realized that JPC had been the easy way between the two. It was objectively a lie, but as long as Alison kept the technician off-balance, she'd never have a free minute to realize that. Just in case, she tightened her grip again, readjusting her grip such that one of her nails was digging into the soft tissue under the bottom of the jaw. The tech's eyes quickly snapped back to Alison, who smiled again. "There we go. That's a good girl."
"P-please," and oh dear didn't she sound frightened? It seemed that the stage did have more transferable skills than Alison had thought. "I don't--"
"Shh shh," Alison shushed softly, cutting the girl off. She let her voice drift back to the one she'd started with, at the very beginning. "None of that, now. All you need to do is just keep your eyes on me." The girl had long stopped struggling, so Alison released the limp arm, which fell bonelessly. "There we go. Isn't that better?"
(Alison desperately hoped it was. The next step if she continued to struggle was to make an attempt to break the wrist, and oh gods Alison didn't want to do that. Please, girl, keep your arms down.)
The girl swallowed hard and nodded into Alison's hand, wincing as the motion drove Alison's fingernail deeper into the soft cartilage around her neck. Alison's smile widened.
"Please don't hurt me!" the girl begged.
"Oh, sweetie," Alison said, voice dripping with sympathy. "I'm afraid it's not up to me, now is it?" Alison twisted the tech's head back and forth in a mockery of a 'no'. "No, it's not. You see," Alison let the sort of smoky undertones of charring flames and *threat* slip into her register, "unfortunately the only person who can decide that is you. All you need to do is tell me: how do I deactivate whatever it is that's hiding the people in the forest?"
"I don-- I don't know!" she shrieked, suddenly crying. "Please! They said they'd kill me if I ever went against them! Please..."
(Ugh. The pronoun game. Definitely not a topic worth going into. Let's try something a bit more overt...)
Alison abruptly let go of the girl's jaw, instead moving over to cup her cheek gently. "Well now," she said, and into ever word and gesture Alison projected the concept of Predator, "we certainly can't have that, now can we?" The tech met her eyes again as Alison forced her to look up at her. She was smiling again. "After all, you're far too pretty to die."
The technician had a badge hanging around her neck on a lanyard. Perfect. Time for the climax.
"Don't worry, though," Alison brought up her free hand, and with a flex of her powers a small ball of bluewhite flame-like light sprung from the tip of her index finger. "I'm sure we can fix that first." The technician's eyes snapped to the faux-flame, following the light as it danced on her fingertip. "After all," and here was the payoff for tweaking the image inducer, as tone and words utterly clashed. “I’ve always sort of wondered what would happen if your eyes got hot enough. Would they melt? Or boil? My personal guess is that they’d just… pop.” Alison popped the last word, and the ‘flame’ on the tip of her finger surged in time.
The girl was trembling now like a leaf in a storm, crying and muttering “no” over and over like an oath. Her pupils were blown again… all she’d need was one last push.
Alison made a big show of scooping up the badge and looking at the name.
“So, Taylor, it’s nice and simple.”
With a twist, she wrapped the lanyard around her hand, clenched a fist and pulled until Taylor choked. It also had the added effect of putting Taylor’s left ear right next to Alison’s mouth.
When she spoke, for the first time all exchanged, Alison’s voice was barely above a whisper and was full of malice. Time for the kill.
“So?” Alison asked, smile back firmly in place. “What do you say? Will you tell me, or can I get... creative?”
"I don't know, I don't know! They just kept telling us nothing could be over five thousand lux! The first DP was fired because he thought the footage wouldn't read well enough! But the artificial light, it interferes with -- with some other thing that was set up, I don't know, I thought this cryptid deal was just going to be a Ghost Hunters kind of scam, but--" No longer being able to see Alison's facial expression was causing the tech to babble. When she gulped her throat strained against the lanyard. "I heard -- it's crazy, but during camera tests earlier we saw some old guy walking around the maze dabbing things with this bowl of liquid we kept joking was blood, like some kind of ritual. Then the other hunters started showing up, and those people -- they aren't faking it."
Well, that had been rather unexpected. But quite enjoyable, if Jean-Phillipe were asked. Apparently Alison could be on board with 'be gay, do crimes', judging by the undertones of her performance and the 'I am both terrified -and- aroused' reaction from the technician. Tres bien. Full marks, no notes from the French judge. "Ritual?" he belatedly picked up on a key word. "Merde, that is what did not make sense, now I understand." He picked up one of the laminated diagrams showing the location of cameras among the greenery. The outlines of the hedge maze were all rounded edges, and even within its confines there was a general methodicalness to the design, not the straight edges one would expect in this sort of thing. It looked more like...one of his cousin's sketches of her British girlfriend's work.
He tapped at his comm sharply. "Cyclops, Bevatron. There is magic at play here, that is the reason behind the conflicting reports. Do you read?" He heard nothing, which could just mean that Scott was occupied with something. He wanted to swear again, but restricted himself to a quick noise of frustration. There was work to be done.
"Dazzler." He knew the brightness was not an issue - five hundred lux might be rather bright, but he knew she had created much brighter in the Danger Room. Distance would be the true deciding factor. "How large of an area do you think you can disrupt from here?"
Alison stood from where she was crouched. Taylor, unfortunately, seemed to take that as permission to try and run, so Alison did the first thing that came to mind.
She put a boot on Taylor's hip. The technician froze.
(Asked about it later, Alison would have a dozen perfectly reasonable justifications, including that it being the center of gravity and therefore the easiest way to control or limit movement. Absolutely nobody would believe her.)
"Doubting me?" she asked. "Well, thanks to our new friend here, I think I have a good idea of how to take care of things on my end. What will you be doing?"
"Finding our people," was the quick reply as Jean-Phillipe pocketed the map. "Bonne chance."
Mayhem and Echo take on a duo of their own.
The blade spun in a shining arc or pure showmanship. The hunter, watching the performance with a jaundiced eye, sucked on his teeth and finally asked the question.
"So tell me: why a katana?"
The other hunter didn't even turn to look. "What's there to tell? Kill Bill was my favorite movie."
"You a foot guy, eh?"
"Don't sully my childhood." The younger man drew his back foot back and leveled his blade at the horror before them. The creature's glowing red eyes burned in the darkness. Its moth-like wings had been slashed beyond utility and its furred chest heaved with exertion, but it stood its ground. Behind it hunched an antlered figure in a tangle of emaciated limbs and fresh blood. They'd been backed into a dead end.
Now that the blade was no longer spinning the larger man moved to join him. The axe he slapped slowly against one palm looked dull, as if it were barely more than a club. He gave his colleague a toothy grin that showed brightly against the streaks of woad smeared on his face. Unobtrusively, as dictated by the terms of their employment, the private security accompanying them shuffled a little further away.
"So how d'you want to do this," the big man asked, "one each, or one at a time?"
"One piece at a time," replied the younger hunter. He made a sudden feint towards the moth-thing, and it flinched. Its fear brought a smile to his face. "Remember what she said? 'To the pain.' The more blood the better."
The big Scotsman frowned. "That's The Princess Bride you're thinking of now."
"Have a sense of humor. Both things can be true. " Eyes still on his insectile opponent, the younger hunter began to move the katana in a series of mocking circles. A glimmer of light bounced off the long, silvered scar that cut across one temple as his smile stretched wider. "Now, do you want me to cut you off any souvenirs?"
"I WANT SOUVENIRS." The voice was feminine, but there was a rasping, growling echo to it that reverberated along the concrete slabs and stairs before being swallowed by the trees. Illyana would know someone who wanted the katana, but April was half-convinced that the axe was so dull Lizzie Borden would've had to give her father far more than the 41 whacks. She dropped partially from the tree, body contorted to make her head - and teeth - look exceptionally large. "YOU WILL BE GOOD SPORT."
With that, April dropped fully from the tree, twisting in mid-air to land in a crouch. "HELLO. YOU STOLE MY CAT."
Maya didn't bother with words, merely dropped from her own perch as she trusted April to keep the bad guys contained as she moved around their flank, trying to get closer to the hostages so she could lead them to something resembling safety. It was something she often did. Maya allowed her compatriots to talk, and to draw the notice of their enemies so she'd have a better chance to move from cover and beat the ever-loving crap out of them. No time for that now, however. Hostages. Rescue. Much more important than carnage, no matter how satisfying it might have felt.
The Scotsman's face broke into a delighted smile as he took in April's fangs flashing against the shadows of her face. "Three on two? That's almost a fair fight."
"What are you doing back there?" called the other man without even glancing back at Maya. He gave his katana a casual spin. "Sorry, sis, find your own fun. We've got these three locked down."
The moth-creature took that moment of distraction to bolt. Whip-fast, the Scotsman spun around and hurled his axe directly at the creature's head.
Just as fast, a pair of tendrils shot out and wrapped around the haft, webs following behind to give the known moth a chance to escape. "FAIR." Mayhem chortled in that rasping, echoing laughter. "VERY FAIR." The axe was crushed in her grip, razor teeth grinning with amused menace as splinters of wood dust the ground and a metal ball was hurled into the dark. "GO. CHASE. BRING BACK, SPORT." There was a lilt to the word sport, a pause that marked it as a mocking name. She moved closer, but left herself out of reach. Who knew what these idiots carried? She didn't want them to touch her.
Above them, a four-pointed star flared like a super nova.
Cyclops and Wildchild meet the master of the hunt.
There was no logic to the place. The maze vacillated between curved paths and straight lines, occasionally broken up by the odd fountain or artificially aged masonry. The overall effect was strangely artificial, as if the maze had been designed for maximum drama rather than practicality or flow.
The structures may have been for atmosphere, but the yew shrubs that served as walls were authentically impenetrable. At nearly 12 feet tall they were both too dense to push through and not thick enough to climb. So far they had already managed to send what appeared to be a creature with a skeletal frame and a jackal's head back towards the entrance, but otherwise the violence around them was more heard than seen. Sometimes there was a shout in the distance, or the crash of a body against the hedge maze to their right, but locating the source in time was nearly impossible.
Scott had always prided himself on his sense of direction, his ability to see a path, keep track of velocities and the space around him. It was a part of his mutation, a constant companion since as long as he could remember. Mazes normally presented no problem to him, the kind of obstacles that he could normally complete in his sleep.
Normally.
Only, this maze was different, it seemed to twist and turn in ways that seemed to defy reason, to subtly throw off his sense of direction. A hand rubbed over his face as he glared at the walls that pressed in on them, "I swear, if anyone suggests building one of these at home I'm gonna drop them in the worst training scenario I can think of."
“Bossman, this -is- the worst training scenario I can think of.”
Kyle had already proven the shrubs unclimbable and had healing scratches and a surly attitude to prove it. He had perched himself atop a fountain and balanced, stretching his entire height to see over the maze walls only to report “more fucking wall” and leapt down, landing in a crouch.
Despite himself Scott couldn't help but laugh, a flicker of a smile ghosting over his lips for a moment before he glanced around at the maze. "You know, you're not wrong, add some hunters and I think we could be onto something here. Though first thing first, we need to find our way out of this place so I can recreate it. You can't find any kinda trail?"
"The problem is, I've got about eight of them." Kyle had pinched one of Liam's unwashed shirts, and he could smell his student, but not strongly. "I've got blood, guns, at least one chain smoker, still got some Nightcrawler up my nose from before..." He shrugged, scented the air again and then sneezed several times in a row. "Okay, might have the sulfur out, gonna need a sec to try to pinpoint anything."
The X-Man glanced around before arching a single eyebrow as he crossed his arms over his chest and leaned against a wall. "I'm not going anywhere."
"You think?" Kyle snorted out. The maze had a few openings and Kyle paused at each one, but returned shaking his head. "Best I got is kind of vaguely that way." He pointed with his entire arm.
"There's about..." He paused, and went down to the ground, sniffing again with his eyes closed. Liam's cut wood and grass scent was far more present than Sharon, but both were there faintly - but under layers of sweat and the plant life surrounding them and dirt and alarmingly, blood and gunpowder "Cyke, there's at least eight or nine different trails here, and that's just the distinct ones, I'm not just pulling that number out of my ass. I've got all kinds of smells here."
It had been a pipe dream to hope that it would be that easy, that Kyle would manage to find that one trail they could follow, through no fault of his own, it was one more on the tab for the people behind this that would have to get repaid. "Well, I guess then we're going with plan B....no, plan C I think." Scott's eyes began to glow as he took a step forward, a faint smile touching his lips, "Duck."
And then energy blasts eviscerated the bushes, a testament to why he'd never gotten involved in gardening before.
"Plan C for Cyclops cuts loose." Kyle said, agreeably, from behind the hands clamped over his eyes and mouth. He didn't quite fancy flash blindness or leaves between his teeth. He quite sensibly waited for the scraps of leaf and wood to settle, making a remarkably even carpet along the ground before any movement.
The pure force had cut a path through the maze, so unerringly straight that some of the shrubs would've looked like geometric plant sculpture if it hadn't been for the debris from their now destroyed neighbors coating them. He stood from his crouch and cocked his head. "Footsteps, six." A pause. "No, eight. Maybe." and leapt back onto his fountain perch.
As he scanned over what would probably be a very expensive arborist bill or a reddit post about tree law, a figure came running across the newly opened path, crossing it. Slick brown carapace mottled with amber, and dusted in pulverized leaves. The creature ran head down, tossing a head of sharp horns back and forth. It ran at a six-legged gallop awkwardly, almost stumbling over its front two legs as though they were not always making contact with the ground. It turned the corner, and crashed into a hedge, panting and making a horrific plea, clicking and squawking. "Help" and "kill" the only words clear from inhuman mouth parts that seemed to writhe on their own.
"Bigods, the Ant Men of Khartoum are real! I thought my great-grandfather wiped them out in the 19th century!" Ulysses called as he crashed through the brush in pursuit. "Carl, if you miss this shot, I WILL REPLACE YOUR EYES WITH YOUR TESTICLES AND VICE VERSA! VERY MUCH VERSA, YOU FECULENT WHELP!"
"Whatever he's on, I don't think I want any of it." Scott noted in a stage whisper to Kyle as he nodded in the direction of the hapless mutant who'd crashed into the hedge, a rain of leaves obscuring its shape for a moment. "Why don't you help our friend out of the bushes." Dark eyes flicked towards the still shouting Ulysses as he stopped, positioning himself between the men and their prey, "I'm sorry, Carl is it? I'm afraid I'm gonna have to stop you there, you're not shooting anyone, in fact I suggest you both turn around and go home...though if you'll allow me a moment of curiosity...why in the hells are you out here hunting humans. Surely you're not so lost and debauched that you think this is fun."
He was already in motion, sprinting towards the panicked humanoid rhinoceros beetle. It - he - the few words they had heard sounded male-ish, under the clack of exoskeleton - was burrowing through the densely packed foliage. "Man. Hey. Hey, I got you, we're not gonna let this guy do anything." Kyle moved as slowly as he could, hands visible, speaking calmly. "I know you're not an Ant-Man of Kolkata. Are you injured?" He dug in the pocket of his jacket and showed a roll of bandages. "I'm here to help."
The insectoid creature spun towards the X-Man in a flurry of shredded leaves. Its inflexible mandibles and compound eyes conveyed no expression, but the stench of fear rolled from it in waves. When it saw Kyle, however, it froze.
"You--?"
There was just enough time to register a flicker of movement in the shadows before something small and sharp hit Kyle in the side. A security officer, discreetly outfitted in dark body armor and hanging well out of the frame of Ulysses' camera crew, lowered his rifle and reloaded.
"The fuck." The world spun for a moment, and Kyle's head-shake did nothing to stop the slide of vertigo. He grabbed at his side and plucked a dart out of his skin. "Cyke, he's got tranqs!" Except he didn't quite feel drugged, just muffled and unsettled and off balance. It took just a moment for it to feel familiar, senses dulled and hands that felt a little too heavy, a certain wrongness to his frame and body. He had last felt this with a broken sternum and shattered ribs and a grade E for Emplate concussion.
Scott's eyes widened at Kyle's warning as he threw himself to the side, twisting as his gaze centered on the guard who was hurriedly reloading his gun. It wouldn't be fast enough, the man realised, as energy began building in Scott's eyes before he felt like he'd been punched in the chest, sliding back along the floor as the energy gathering in his eyes dissipated along with his breath. "More than one."
"Who are these... circus actors? Wait, the leathers. Is this a Charlie Hunnan thing! I told him 'no' to 'Sons of Monsters'... unless..." Ulysses rested his gun on his shoulder as he looked at the tranqed X-Men. "This is all wrong. I'm the feature of the hunt. Chet, stop filming... whoever these gate crashers are. Get a production assistant here now. I don't like being off script this far."
"I think they might be-"
"DID I ASK YOU TO THINK? DID I ASK YOUR OPINION? IF I WANT YOUR OPINION, I WILL TELL YOU WHAT IT IS BEFOREHAND AND THEN YOU BETTER BE ABSOLUTELY PERFECT WHEN YOU EXPRESS IT TO ME!"
"Not tranqs!" Kyle pushed himself away from the hedge, got two steps away from the man-insect hybrid he'd attempted to rescue and then vomited, half digested bits of the burrito he'd been eating when the alert came in and yellow Gatorade and the water he'd chugged on the plane. His head had just started to clear when he heard a crackle in his comms, and Bevatron's voice faintly.
He vomited again, this time forced, fingers down his throat, one hand planted to steady himself on a ground that was not moving but felt like a kayak in rough seas regardless, and then met eyes with the security officer - and leapt. taking the man down to the ground. "Fuck off with that thing."
A groan slipped from Scott's lips as her rolled over, one hand coming up to pluck the dart out of his stomach, wincing as the needle slide out, his eyes narrowing at the men in front of him as he summoned a blast to knock them back and stop that infernal yelling...and nothing happened. A cough as the man tried again before he unsteadily pushed himself to his feet. "It's worse...power blocking."
"Yeah I know!" A bruise was blooming on the side of his face from a billy club, and he'd just thrown up twice - it was hard to miss that his powers were doing something fucky. Kyle rolled the guard over - even with his powers not quite there, he was larger - and stronger - and had the benefit of training. The man didn't stand a chance, and ended with an arm wrapped around his throat, pressing into his neck until he passed out. He stood, bracing himself on the guard's ribs for balance, and shook himself. "Cyke, I think..." He cocked his head. There was a high pitched scream faintly in the air, and the smell of blood and distinctly under that, Liam Nelson under a layer of sweat and fear.
Kyle was sure he said something on the comms as he spun and sprinted off. It was probably informative- and certainly not suitable for after action reports.
Unaware help has arrived, Liam and Sharon are released into the hunt.
Warning: Graphic violence
The door rasped up like a metal curtain, punctuated by only one word:
"Out."
The voice gave them no chance to react before an electric current pulsed through the metal flooring. It was mild, causing only a brief convulsion of the muscles, but the shock made it clear the directive was not a request.
Out of the cage wasn't any better than inside it and Liam immediately had 'Rat in a Cage' stuck in his head. The timing was terrible. Stretching, he stared as Sharon emerged, "What the hell's wrong with you?" She was big cat to the extreme!
The figure beside him was no version of Sharon he had ever seen. It was vaguely feline, but a mane of spikes ran down its spine and barbed its tail. Its bipedal stance allowed a full display of the three-inch talons on its forepaws.
It had Sharon's scent.
Still disoriented from the shock of the cage, Sharon instinctively looked to her hands. She registered the fur, the talons, and snapped her attention to Liam. In the moonlight he had been replaced by a stoop-shouldered, saber-toothed apparition that carried a muscular bulk the young mutant's frame only hinted as a future possibility. The stripes she had always coveted had become a network of black scars.
This wasn't right. Sharon knew what it was like to change shape, and her body felt no different than it had a moment ago. She touched her cheek and felt only human fingers against a human face.
"Is not rea-"
A cattle prod hit her between the shoulder blades. Sharon yelped and jerked forward, almost falling into Liam.
"Here are the rules," said the man. His face was masked, anonymous, as were those of the men behind him. "You two start running, or we shoot you here."
Realizing that whatever changed Sharon's appearance, though thankfully not her scent, took a back burner as he grabbed her hand, half running, half dragging her with him. Being separated was not his plan, not that he had a plan. But not getting separated was key.
What had first looked like a garden turned out to be some kind of hedge maze. The walls, shrubs too densely entwined to force their way through, stretched almost double their height. The paths were oddly wide, as if designed to accommodate more than just wandering guests.
Sharon had no choice but to let herself be dragged. Liam seemed less impaired than she was, and -- to her frustration -- faster. She wasn't used to running on two legs.
The wind changed. The girl sniffed.
"Others are here," she said.
In the distance someone screamed.
Yeah, he'd noticed that and was attempting to avoid them, but as they got deeper and deeper in, he realized that wasn't possible. "Oh god," he moaned, pausing to get his bearings. What bearings?? "That's not good."
"This way." Sharon tugged Liam back the way they'd come and down another branch. Her brain was still a jumble, but her body was operating on instinct. What they told her was "run."
They turned a corner, and the wind changed again.
The scent of blood and terror hit them like a wall. The branch let out to a dead end adorned with something like a ruined temple, and on its crumbling steps were two figures. One was a tall woman dressed all in white, knife in hand and humming tunelessly. The other, sprawled beneath her, was what looked like a rabbit poured into a human mould. Its pale fur glowed in the darkness as it whimpered with pain, one hand pressed to the side of its head.
A long, soft ear lay on the stone beside it like a bloody petal.
Liam had hunted and killed his fair share of rabbits, his mom made an excellent stew when he caught enough. "That's not a rabbit," he murmured, stomach sinking. He bet that was a mutant like them, dressed up like they were somehow. It was too late to back up and he discretely unsheathed his claws. He didn't want to fight, but he didn't think there was a choice here.
The older girl grabbed his arm. "Liam, no," Sharon hissed. "We run."
"Run where?" asked the woman in white, attention still fixed on her prey. Her voice was deep and calm, almost amused.
Sharon startled at a sudden movement at their flank. Two more security officers had been positioned at the corner's outlet, presumably to intercept the cornered rabbit if it fled. One of the officers held a baton; the other, a rifle. While they made no further move to engage it was obvious this could change at any moment.
The creature on the steps was staring at Liam. This branch was a dead-end: it could flee no further. Whether or not it perceived Liam as monstrous made no difference. It looked at him like a drowning man catching sight of a distant ship. Voice thready with desperation, it spoke.
"Help m-"
The white-clad woman's knife flashed. The rabbit screamed as the blade took it across the cheek and threw itself back; in desperation it raised its powerful hind legs and kicked. The tall woman jumped back adroitly, chuckling.
Liam launched himself at her, knowing Sharon could take care of herself for a moment at least. There wasn't so much coherent thought, just knowledge that the only way out was through and that rabbit girl was innocent. Liam wasn't a fighter and it showed almost immediately, the woman in white easily countering his attempts, but he disarmed her, which was the first step. Maybe the rabbit girl could get away now.
The knife spun away into the shadows, but the hunter only smiled. As the rabbit scrabbled away the woman's hand flashed to a case at her side and came away with a pair of nunchaku.
Nunchaku were showy weapons, known more for the development of speed and posture than practicality. They suited the theatricality of her flowing hair and immaculate white outfit.
But theatricality and effectiveness were not mutually exclusive.
Her opening move was to use the weapon like a flail to catch Liam a glancing blow across the head. He flinched back, and she flipped the free stick to join the one in her palm. Now wielding the weapon like a baton, the hunter struck Liam twice in quick succession: once across the knee, once across the side of the neck, and finished it off with a solid kick to the chest.
Pain, so much pain radiating from everywhere. Liam yowled at the initial impact, flying through the air and landing hard in a lump, trying to breathe. Was it his knee that hurt worse or his head? Why did he try to help others and not just stick with Sharon? So many regrets. And now he was screwed and Sharon was probably screwed and all he could do was act on instinct trying to scramble away.
Oh, his knee was definitely where the pain was. Gritting his teeth, he did his best to move away without drawing attention with no luck.
Sharon screamed.
It wasn't the scream of a big cat. There was too much fear in it for that, and fear was a human thing. The security made no move to stop Sharon as she charged the hunter, claws outstretched, and leaped to catch the woman across the side as she turned.
The impact knocked the nunchaku from the woman's hand. The hunter pivoted, trying to redirect Sharon's momentum into a throw, but Sharon was tall and her claws were tangled in flesh and fabric. What should have been a throw became a graceless drag that spilled both women to the ground. Instinctively Sharon moved to bite, but her face was too short and her teeth too blunt, and the hunter drove her forehead into Sharon's cheekbone with bone-cracking force. With a yelp the girl jerked away, and suddenly the hunter was straddling her with something long and shining in her hand. As the blade began to flash all Sharon could do was shield her face, thinking that Liam was going to die, that she should have been able to protect him because she was so much older and stronger but she could not change and because she could not change they would both die --
And then there was light.
Perimeter duty was often one of the least eventful jobs at one of these gigs, and that was just fine with Troy. If someone wanted to pay him too much money to stand around while excessively armed then more power to them. For Troy, it meant an opportunity to catch up on his audiobooks. It was strictly against company policy to do so on the job, of course, but it was shaping up to be a long night, and he only needed one ear for the headset. Besides, his particular area gave him a clear view of the surrounding area. Nobody was sneaking up on him.
Well, they hadn't been, anyway. There was a sudden paff of displaced air from behind him, and a strangely polite tap on his shoulder.
"Hello."
A hand gripped his opposite elbow. The mercenary barely turned in time to catch sight of a face so dark it nearly disappeared against the night before his nostrils filled with the scent of sulfur and -- something -- happened. Something that almost turned his stomach inside out. Before he could work out what had happened he found himself in an area that was very definitely not the one he'd been assigned to patrol. Now he was somewhere behind a treeline, and he wasn't alone.
He hadn't survived in this job for this long without developing certain instincts. He wasted no time considering the wheres or hows: he broke the grip on his elbow and made a break for it.
Webs shot out in front of him to impede the path of escape, and two long, delicate tendrils shot out from April's knees to wrap around his ankles like coiled vine. Feminine laughter – layered with a growling, snarling darkness – rang out, growing ever closer to Troy until a perfectly normal-looking woman was standing in front of him.
At least until she smiled.
Razor-sharp teeth were bright in the darkness, a terrifying distraction that made webbing his feet to the ground easier than walking the dog. "Hello!"
"Thank you for agreeing to join us."
Scott didn't move from his position leaning against a wall, using an energy blast to whittle down a stick into a sharp point that he tossed casually at the man, the point slicing through his clothes and pinning his foot to the ground as the other man began whittling another stick.
"In the interests of time, let's assume we've already asked you a question and you've told us you don't know anything so we can get right to the torture. Seem fair?"
"I thought I was the bad cop." Wildchild asked casually, both hands shoved into the pockets of his jacket. "Cyke, we talked about this. Sorry man, he's a little protective of the kids." He walked up to the struggling guard.
"You didn't know it was kids, right? Because if you knew, Cyclops will be the least of your problems." He kicked the stick out of the man's shoe, and then his hands were out of his pockets, one clutching the guard's coat. "Start talking. How many teenagers did you kidnap? Where are they?" He ignored the flailing of kicking legs, and the short knife that the guard had pulled out of a holster. He could have taken it away. He probably should have plucked the knife out of the man's fingers. Ignoring being stabbed in the arm seemed - in the moment - a better tactic for getting questions answered.
An actinic crackle from behind the guard was the only warning as Jean-Phillipe's one arm came up under the man's shoulder, putting him in a sort of half-nelson as the other hand flared with electricity. "Oh, Wildchild," he murmured, the banter of his teammate replaced with deadly intent. "Cops," he proclaimed derisively. "Je ne suis pas un flic," he leaned in close to the captive's ear. People would expect good cop-bad cop, having a third thing would immediately put someone off balance.
"I...am Brotherhood." Reminding people that he was a wanted terrorist never got old.
Every hair on Troy's body stood on end, and it was not because of the breath tickling his cheek. His mouth opened once or twice, but no words came out. The glowing fist mere inches from his face was making it difficult to concentrate.
Maya waved to the guard from several feet away, the white palm print on her face the only affectation toward concealing her identity that she’d allowed.
She’d not bothered to draw any weapons, content to let the others take point on this one. She could always mop up any others that might arrive.
“We’d also really like to know who the person in charge is. If you tell us all that, and quickly, I’m 50% sure they’ll let you go.”
That made Troy's mouth snap shut. He had not chosen a career path that looked kindly upon turncoats. Consequences ranged from summary dismissal to summary execution, and often there was no way to know which employer you'd drawn until it was too late. Certain companies had certain reputations, and if you'd engaged Troy's you were unlikely to be the sort of person who made solid decisions.
Alison, stone faced and hovering around the periphery, took in the show with a sort of semi-fond exasperation. It wasn't that the other X-Men couldn't be properly scary. She'd been party to a fair few DR seshes, ofc. It was just...
She couldn't help it. Her stone face broke, and she snorted. She could suddenly feel the eyes on her.
"I love all of you, but y'all are also such a bunch of drama queens sometimes, I swear." She knew she was shattering the tension, but she couldn't help it! She'd literally seen Kyle get so distracted at breakfast by a picture of a baby fox that he'd poured his OJ into his cereal and not notice until four bites in. And that had just been that morning!
"And people say that I mug for the cam... era..." She trailed off, suddenly distracted. Her eyes rapidly flickered between the others. Something was flittering just on the edge of her subconscious that she should know. There was something she was missi--
She felt the shock of indigo flick between her eyes as she realized it. Silently, she stepped over to, and then around Sooraya, staring at the shadows of her face all the while. Silently she reached out, grabbed her by the shoulders, and gently turned her 90 degrees. She cocked her head like a particularly curious cat, and then turned back to the others.
"We're being recorded," she declared. "Or something like it. Unless anyone else can think of a reason they'd hook up four point lighting around the entrance of a secure hidden compound?"
Dust's eyes narrowed, slowly scanning the treeline after it clicked what Dazzler had been saying. "Well, it looks like we're under candid camera. I wonder what our friend here knows about this." A shiver pulsed over her skin as she shifted from flesh to sand, though the shape of her body remained intact.
"You know..." Dust kept her usual gentleness in her voice. "I bet if our friend here really had the choice, he'd gladly give up what we need to know and get out of here. We might just as well give him the chance... after we do what is needed here." A soft smile flashed over her sandy face as she met the mercenary's eyes. "Now, doesn't that sound like a good idea? Just tell us about the security in place, including the fancy camera system, where we can find our kids and who is behind this... that's all we need to know..."
A finger sharped, just pricking his arm, though no blood appeared. "Just don't lie. Because we'll know. Wouldn't we, Phoenix?"
With so many other terrifying individuals threatening his person Troy hadn't noticed the woman who now stepped forward. Her pale face was expressionless in the gloom.
Then their eyes met, and there was only fire.
A blast furnace opened in his brain. There was a presence in his mind, scorching and pitiless as an inferno. It stripped his thoughts like a bird of prey stripping the flesh from bone. Unerringly, implacably, the presence latched, and suddenly images were spilling from his head like viscera and it pulled-
Then it was over. The searing pressure disappeared, leaving the mercenary gasping and alone in his mind once more.
Jean's distant face hardened, and she looked away from the man, turning back to the group.
"There are more people than just Sharon and Liam being kept here, but he doesn't know how many. Cryptids? There are armed mercenaries everywhere, both as security, and to aid in the hunt," Jean said. She shook her head. "He's heard their boss is some...washed up reality TV star. But he doesn't know the name. And you're right, Dazzler. It is being live streamed. Seems to be keeping with the theme."
A fist lashed out, rocking the man's head back as he slumped to the ground unconscious. Scott didn't even spare him a second glance as he turned away from the crumpled guard, eyes taking in the building, "Someone tie him up so he doesn't warn any of his friends, I think maybe it's time they find out this isn't a game."
Nightcrawler and Spectrum, acting as reconnaissance, encounter the first wave of resistance and get a hint that all is not as it appears to be.
"Compound" was almost the wrong word. The property below her was a hedge maze of a peculiar design: an irregular network of winding paths and sharp angles. Occasionally the allées converged to create wider spaces adorned with the occasional fountain or weathered masonry, clearly designed to evoke an atmosphere of vague antiquity.
The illusion was spoiled by the professional-grade lighting that had been erected atop the hedges. The pathways had been illuminated, but not too much, as if whoever had planned the setup had paid special attention to ambiance. It was a dark night, and they were far from the city. Artistically pooling shadows hinted at secrets an onlooker could only imagine.
"Wow, this is too weird," Nica murmured to Kurt through their direct comms. She had gone with X-rays, rendering herself invisible to the naked eye and likely to mess up cameras as well, and was silently gliding over the maze looking for signs of life. "It looks almost like a set for some kind of reality TV show."
"I think that is exactly what it is", Kurt returned grimly. "But the game is more deadly than most."
"Ugh, I knew there was a reason I hated those shows." Movement caught Nica's eye and she paused in mid-air to concentrate on switching her vision - but not the rest of her - to infra-red. "I think I have someone, other by the birdbath with the cherub on it. The one peeing." There was another pause as she squinted at the shape and switched to ordinary vision. "It's weird, the infra-red is a lot smaller than the shape I'm seeing."
"What does that mean?" he asked. "Have you ever encountered such a thing before?"
"Maybe... I'm not sure if it's possible, but maybe there's some kind of optical illusion? Something making them look bigger than they actually are?" Nica sounded doubtful. "Either way, they don't look like they're a threat. They look like they're trying to hide. One of the mutants that got taken?"
"It could be." Kurt started trying to circle in closer. "Or one of those who took them, who knows we are here."
"I'll cover you while you go in? You're better at stealth than me and I can zap them if it is a trap while you bamf away?"
"A good plan", he said with a nod. "By the cherub, you said?"
Kurt's target proved to be a ginger-furred, simian thing that had taken shelter near what looked like a half-demolished mausoleum. It was bent near the base of one of the hedge walls. As Kurt watched it tugged violently at the bush, as if trying to clear a path, but the branches were so thin and dense only handfuls of twigs came free.
Its nostrils flared.
The effect was immediate. With a roar the thing surged to its feet and reached for the closest weapon to hand: the birdbath. A hand that could have palmed a basketball tore the cherub from its pedestal and flung it in Kurt's direction.
He flung up an arm to defend himself instinctively, before remembering himself and teleporting out of its path. "I am not here to do you harm!"
The cherub struck the ground where he'd been standing like a meteorite as the creature howled again. Reorienting on Kurt's new position, it charged him with outstretched arms.
Its recessed eyes were noticeably glassy even in the dim light. Whatever the creature had been through, it seemed unwilling or unable to believe Kurt wasn't involved.
There was a pop like a starting pistol behind them, and a pair of solid weights joined by a length of kevlar tether bound Kurt's arms to his body. There was the briefest flash of a laser guide before another pop, and suddenly the creature was crashing to the ground over entangled legs.
"No one said there'd be bear-baiting," someone drawled. It was the sort of voice that could make every word sound as if it came at someone else's expense. Two empty restraint cartridges hit the ground as a young Asian man emerged from a convenient shadow, already readying the crossbow mounted on one forearm. Behind Kurt the ape-creature was spitting barely intelligible curses as it clawed at its trapped legs.
"Is this what you call sport?" Kurt snarled at the newly arrived enemy. "I suppose you like to shoot drugged lions, as well?"
"Animals are too easy." The hunter's eyes flicked to the side. "But I'm not above leveling the playing field."
Something small and sharp hit Kurt's shoulder. It seemed to be a dart, fired by a masked security officer that had managed to position himself near the opposite wall while the hunter drew Kurt's attention.
The hunter smirked. "I don't know how you got in here, but that-"
The kevlar tether restraining the other mutant snapped. The simian-creature howled to its feet and charged their tormentor, mouth frothing with foam.
The hunter twitched his raised crossbow to the side and fired.
Kurt could feel himself weakening from the effects of the dart, but managed one short teleport to land between the hunter and the feral, reaching out to swat the bolt out of the air. "Spectrum! Now, please!"
A beam of heated light hit the ground between Kurt and the hunter, drawing a line of scorched dirt between them. "That's enough!" Nica ordered, hovering in the air a few feet above their heads, outlined in infra-red light, her fists glowing dangerously bright as she readied another blast. "Back off, pal, and drop the crossbow."
There was a report of an air rifle as one of the guards fired at the glowing figure, followed by the other. Both darts flew harmlessly through her and she turned in the air with a look of disgust. "Seriously? You're trying to shoot me?"
The two guards, who clearly had been, froze. Without removing his eyes from Nica, the hunter moved his head slightly to sneer. "Power-neutralizers, huh?" he asked them as he moved to unbuckle the empty crossbow fastened to his forearm. "Tell me how that helps if you can't hit-"
There was a click. The man's arm whipped up, and a beam of light flashed in Nica's face. The weapon had a laser sight -- no, a laser dazzler. The green light would have temporarily blinded normal prey.
Except Nica's eyesight wasn't normal. She shrugged as her powers shifted to mimic the dazzler until she was glowing green. "And that's strike two. Here, let me show you how it's done," she replied, raising her hand as if to wave. Instead, a burst of green dazzling light flashed from her palm down at the hunter and his guards.
The crossbow, while sleek and modern, remained a crossbow, and it had not yet been reset. Its arms were therefore still extended when the hunter instinctively threw his arm over his face to shield his eyes, and his future reputation was preserved only by the fact the two men assisting him were equally blinded. He fell to his knees, now clutching his eye.
"You're . . . not with them?"
It was the simian creature Kurt had saved. His eyes were still unfocused, but some of the wildness had left them. Dazed, he kept swinging attention between Kurt and Nica, as if he couldn't fit them into the same reality.
"What is this?"
"As I told you, we are not here to do you harm." Kurt met his gaze steadily. "These people have taken our children. We want them back, and we will help you and any others we find along the way."
"I don't remember hearing any children. They've been bringing people in all week."
"Teenagers", he clarified. "Two teenagers, a boy and a girl. They would look like humanoid cats, or the girl might look like a purple house cat or a puma."
"Maybe. We couldn't see each other." The rescued mutant ran a hand down his face. "It feels like I'm having a bad high. Can I call my sister?"
"Once we get you clear of all this, sure." Nica was hovering lower, keeping watch on the hunter and his security detail, but she gave the young mutant a reassuring smile. "Nightcrawler, are you okay? That dart..."
"I think it was a power suppresser", he told her. "Clearly it was not any kind of sedative, I feel fine, but... a moment." He focused, then nodded. "My powers are off."
Neither Nica nor the rescued mutant had an opportunity to respond, for at that moment the dark sky bloomed with light.
Dust and Phoenix act to evacuate the kidnapped mutants.
Something had happened to his arm when he was abducted. Dislocated shoulder, maybe. It didn't make a difference. Feathered arms didn't mean he could fly. All he could do was run like everyone else.
So far he was doing all right navigating the maze. His strategy was simple: every time he heard the sound of violence he ran in the opposite dimension. He'd been running for a while, and this looked like a new area. This place had to end eventually.
Then the avian mutant turned a corner and almost ran right into three heavily armed men, all in dark body armor. The nearest one raised what looked very much like a cattle prod.
"Two choices," said the masked woman. "First, you head back the way you're supposed to go and take your chances with the rest. Second, we break a few bones and drag you there. Which one is it?"
"I'd go for the third option: leave them alone and go back to where you came from." Sooraya spoke in a harsh voice, only taking her eyes off the guards for the briefest of moments to make sure the young mutant was reasonably okay. "Or that thing will be seeing places where the sun doesn't shine." Her face and hands shivered immediately, sand taking the place of flesh.
The security entrusted to patrol the interior of the maze were clearly of a different caliber to the man they had interrogated: Sooraya's sudden appearance provoked no questions, only action. Instantly, another guard raised his rifle and fired.
The dart thunked into her uniform, shivering a second before a small tendril of sand pushed it out and dropped it to the ground where it remained harmlessly. Dust shook her head at them and exploded into a cloud of sand that quickly formed into multiple tendrils. One wrapped around the rifle and pulled it from the guard's hand before tossing it over the hedge. Another lashed out and wrapped around the guard's ankle, tossing him into the hedge where he dropped down, moaning.
His compatriot swore and turned from the avian mutant to Sooraya. Instinctively, she turned the cattle prod onto the mass of sand.
If she could, Sooraya would have rolled her eyes. Instead she simply plucked the cattle prod from the woman's hand and tossed it after the gun before wrapping another tendril of sand around the woman's ankle and tossed her in the direction of her compatriot. She smacked right in the gut of the man who was just climbing to his feet again and both went down in a pile, groaning where they lay.
The final guard, who'd been watching, processed his odds and made a decision. He slammed his drawn baton into the side of the avian mutant with rib-cracking force and ran, clearly hoping that the man's squawk of pain would distract Sooraya as he fled.
But as the baton slammed down, it was met with an invisible force, causing an echoing crack throughout the maze. Jean stared at the guard, cocking her head to the side as she floated down into view.
"You're done," she said. The muddy ground seemed to open up, sinking the man down up to his shoulders.
"Now you get to enjoy being helpless for a while," Jean said.
Turning back to the young winged mutant, she extended her hand. "Come with me. We're here to help."
The avian mutant had been gaping at the man currently neck deep in the mud, but Jean's words brought a reflexive response. He tried to extend an arm and gasped; now that he was down the muscles in his core were seizing, and even his good arm was weak. He tried to push himself up with his legs alone and failed.
"C . . . can't," he panted.
Sooraya quickly shifted back to her human form, kneeling next to him in the mud. "Hey, I am Dust and that is Phoenix. Let's see if I can help you up, okay? It's probably still gonna hurt a bit though." Shifting a little, she set her hands behind shoulders and gently helped him get to his feet, wincing in sympathy at the deep groan. "There we go."
"Dust, can you cover the entrance to make sure we don't get any more unwanted visitors?" Jean said. "I'll get a triage area set up for the wounded."
"Go with Phoenix. She is a doctor and will want to look you over once she has the chance." Sooraya encouraged the young man, gently nudging him over before dissolving into her sand form again and taking to the air to establish her area of patrol. Hopefully it wouldn't be long before the others returned.
Bevatron and Dazzler infiltrate the command center, where they formulate a hypothesis while indulging in a little light terrorism.
The converted mobile home was full of chatter. Circumstances were currently putting the control room's name to the test. The technicians had been given a very specific number of individuals to follow, all of whom had been outfitted in very distinct costumes by wardrobe. The sudden appearance of numerous other individuals that met the same parameters was complicating the livestream.
"There were only supposed to be five hunters," swore a technician. "Is this some special guest star crap?" On the other side of the room the drone operator was trying not to have a nervous breakdown.
"Just do your best," said another man. "We'll get what's there. Even if the livestream's a cluster Harris can edit it for-"
Alright, Alison thought to herself where she and JPC were crouched on either side of the open door of the motor home, this has gone far enough.
Meeting JPC's eyes, she quickly flashed him a set of (definitely non-standardized) hand signals that effectively boiled down to covering her eyes while sticking her thumbs in her ears, before nudging the cracked door just wide enough and slipping inside.
The place was a madhouse of noise. Even without looking it was almost too much as the volume caught the peaks and troughs like a wave on the beach. There wasn't a single eye that wasn't glued to at least two different screens. People barked orders and attempted to coordinate in the face of the chaos that the other X-Men had thrown into what was clearly already a pit of madness.
It reminded Alison of some of her worst-organized shows, in a way. There wasn't a chance anyone would have caught her entry.
Keeping low, she moved her way over to a table towards the center of the converted 'building'. It was still behind everyone, which made it absolutely perfect.
She quickly felt out the eddies of sound bouncing across the confined space. It was... stale? No, just disorderly to properly hold its shape as a blast marble. Too refined and technical for straight use with her powers. It'd make for a relatively useful Dazzle, but she wasn't willing to take the risk that she didn't catch up everyone. One person's attention wanders at just the wrong time and... well. Best not to think about it. Which was all fine.
First rule of showbiz: always have a backup plan. Alison slipped a small item out of her equipment pouch.
Okay. Just like we drew it up in rehearsals. All she needed was the perfect moment.
A moment later, as she felt the jagged sound fall into a soft lull, she popped up from her spot behind one of the tables, and very loudly slammed an item onto the table in front of her. Instantly, every eye in the room turned to look at her, stunned. It'd only take another second or two before one of the more reactive of them would come to their senses, but by then it'd already be too late.
"Hey, boys. Wanna see a magic trick?" She held up her hands in front of her, in a classic 'nothing in my hands' pose.
On her left index and ring fingers, black metal rings caught the light and gleamed.
"Now you see me...!"
And then the flashbang she'd set on the table in front of her went off.
Jean-Phillipe could not fault Alison's theatricality at all. He could see why she had such a reputation as a performer in her pop music career. And if there was one thing he'd learned in the Brotherhood was the value of theater when it came to intimidation and the like. He'd been prepared for the light and sound show, and in its wake he stalked in, putting on the air of Erik in his most powerful, judgmental aspect. He could practically feel the cape flowing behind him for a moment.
"BUTCHERS!" he roared, arms sweeping upward to dramatic pose. If they wanted a show, as Dazzler had already begun, he would provide. "Your would-be prey has teeth of its own!" he declared, and his wrists snapped in rotation, his hands going from vertical to horizontal in a motion he'd learned from Magneto and never quite managed to train out of himself. But at times like these it was perfect. As his hands moved, electricity arced from them to a pair of monitors that exploded outward in a shower of sparks and fragments of molded plastic.
People at the mansion always focused on the 'reformed' part of 'reformed terrorist', and not the latter bit. Well, sometimes people could use a reminder.
Most of the technicians had had the misfortune to be looking towards Alison when the flashbang had gone off: this unlucky majority were currently dealing with a visual field dominated by the blurry afterimage of the flash. All were dealing with, at minimum, a ringing in their ears. The man who'd been closest tried to rise from his monitor and instantly lost his balance as his inner ear struggled to recalibrate.
The woman who'd been on her way back from the kitchenette had not been so fortunate. She'd missed the flashbang just in time to stumble into Jean-Phillipe's declaration.
A cup of coffee splashed onto the floor.
Spilled coffee was the least of her worries as Jean-Phillipe grabbed the woman by the front of her shirt and pulled her off-balance. Taking a few steps, he pushed her face-first toward one of the still functional monitors, where a person with a clearly feral mutation ran in fear from their pursuer. "Does that look like one of your...comment dit-on...cryptids?" His voice got lower and more menacing as he leaned down over the technician. "Would you care to explain?"
The woman gulped. Every hair on her neck and arms was standing on end. The instant before she'd been swung into the monitor she'd realized the blue eyes glaring at her weren't just piercing, but glowing.
"I only know we had to be careful with the maze lighting because they set something up for the hunters," she blurted. "S-something immersive, I don't know what. It doesn't matter on our end. We're just supposed to broadcast the raw footage."
"Raw footage of murdering mutants for the titillation of...-flatscans-." Jean-Phillipe didn't use that particular supremacist pejorative these days, but he could still make it drip with disdain fitting of the role he was playing to terrify the entire room into keeping their heads down.
"Oi," Alison chimed in from her position at the keyboard of the main computer, "once you're finished playing with your food, come take a look at this."
taptaptap
"God it's like my first twitch stream setup in here, but without any of the personality or verve. Who thought this was acceptable?"
Behind her, one of the techs stumbled noisily to his feet. Alison didn't even bother to turn as she flicked a finger over her shoulder, launching a small pink droplet of light from her fingers. It corkscrewed over and popped right between the man's eyes. He slumped to the ground, cross-eyed.
taptaptaptaptaptaptapataptaptapatpatp
All at once, all the (non-blown-up) monitors flickered over to the same stream. Two very familiar figures were assisting each other through the forest. "Bingo."
"Calisse," Jean-Phillipe hissed as he recognized Sharon and Liam. "Mon tabarnak j'vais te décâlisser la yeule," he growled, the Quebecois swears dropping angrily as he manhandled the technician in his grip. The teenagers looked their normal selves on the screen, but Jean-Phillipe remembered what Nica had said about infrared and the confusion inside the maze. "Something immersive," he repeated the technician's words. "A la verrga," he cursed, switching to his husband's Spanish having already blasphemed his way through his usual swears. "They are hiding the true appearance of the targets for the hunters somehow," he realized. "Dazzler, do what you can with that? Perhaps the lighting they were so cautious about? I will attempt to determine where les chats are on this map," he continued, grabbing a laminated sheet from next to a monitor.
Letting JPC take over the keyboard, Alison turned her attention to the cowering tech he'd dropped to the floor. She could tell that the girl didn't know whether to try and run or hide, and it'd left her just backed up against a wall, clearly terrified out of her mind.
The tech didn't even turn to look at Alison as she walked over and crouched down, leaning against her own knees. Up close, Alison could see how blown her eyes were, hear her hyperventilate and could even literally watch her heart race as the major vessels in her neck pulsed. Intellectually, there was a part of her that recognized that so many would find this sort of thing reprehensible. Another, much more dangerous group would consider such an expression of pure unbridled fear to be an art all its own, something to be preserved and appreciated with no thought for the fact that there was a human life behind it. Alison had to crush the part of her that felt for the woman; she'd put herself in this situation, after all, and was hardly an innocent bystander in all of this.
No. Mostly, Alison just found it annoying. There'd be no getting answers from her like this.
Alison waved a hand in front of her face. "Hey." No response. It quickly upgraded to snapping in front of her face, and then a sharp shake of the shoulder.
Nothing. God dammit.
Alison sighed. "Alright, I guess we get to do this the hard way, then," she said softly.
Reaching to her image inducer, Alison flicked over to her secondary preset. It was exactly identical to her normal one, but with one small change: she'd tweaked the voice ever so slightly to be a touch higher. She didn't sound like a child or anything; it simply re-captured a little bit of that girlish innocence she'd grown out of years ago. Now... how did she want to...? Ah. That'd work. All she needed was to slip into the right headspace and...
Lightning fast, her hand struck out and grabbed the technician's chin, gently turning her head so that her wide eyes met Alison's own. They were clouded by terror, but finally she'd managed to pry the girl's eyes away from JPC and to her own. And sure enough, moments later she was able to watch some of that frightened haze lift. Enough that the girl was becoming coherent again, at least.
Alison gave her best 'benevolent smile', being sure to put her entire face into it. "There you are," she said and wow she had forgotten where exactly this voice's resonance sat.
"Welcome back. We've got quite a few things to discuss."
The girl slapped at her hand, but her arms were shaking so badly that she couldn't quite nail any of the landings. Alison grabbed one of her wrists with her free hand, maintaining a clamp on her face with the other. Squeeze just so, not so much that it's painful but definitely enough to make it uncomfortable and... yep, that terror was slowly starting to resurface again. She'd clearly just remembered that Alison and JPC had come in together, and was realizing exactly how vulnerable a position she was currently in.
"Now, look," Alison said, sounding for all the world like a reasonable and sane person, "My friend over there and I," Alison said, twisting so that the girl could see JPC at the computer before twisting back, "are looking for a few friends of ours, and we--" the tech's eyes skittered back over to where JPC was very intentionally just out of sight. Well. That wouldn't do at all. Alison gave the girl's head a little bit of a shake.
"Now, now," she said, dropping the pitch of her voice. "You had your chance to do this the easy way already," she said. There was a full-body shudder as the girl realized that JPC had been the easy way between the two. It was objectively a lie, but as long as Alison kept the technician off-balance, she'd never have a free minute to realize that. Just in case, she tightened her grip again, readjusting her grip such that one of her nails was digging into the soft tissue under the bottom of the jaw. The tech's eyes quickly snapped back to Alison, who smiled again. "There we go. That's a good girl."
"P-please," and oh dear didn't she sound frightened? It seemed that the stage did have more transferable skills than Alison had thought. "I don't--"
"Shh shh," Alison shushed softly, cutting the girl off. She let her voice drift back to the one she'd started with, at the very beginning. "None of that, now. All you need to do is just keep your eyes on me." The girl had long stopped struggling, so Alison released the limp arm, which fell bonelessly. "There we go. Isn't that better?"
(Alison desperately hoped it was. The next step if she continued to struggle was to make an attempt to break the wrist, and oh gods Alison didn't want to do that. Please, girl, keep your arms down.)
The girl swallowed hard and nodded into Alison's hand, wincing as the motion drove Alison's fingernail deeper into the soft cartilage around her neck. Alison's smile widened.
"Please don't hurt me!" the girl begged.
"Oh, sweetie," Alison said, voice dripping with sympathy. "I'm afraid it's not up to me, now is it?" Alison twisted the tech's head back and forth in a mockery of a 'no'. "No, it's not. You see," Alison let the sort of smoky undertones of charring flames and *threat* slip into her register, "unfortunately the only person who can decide that is you. All you need to do is tell me: how do I deactivate whatever it is that's hiding the people in the forest?"
"I don-- I don't know!" she shrieked, suddenly crying. "Please! They said they'd kill me if I ever went against them! Please..."
(Ugh. The pronoun game. Definitely not a topic worth going into. Let's try something a bit more overt...)
Alison abruptly let go of the girl's jaw, instead moving over to cup her cheek gently. "Well now," she said, and into ever word and gesture Alison projected the concept of Predator, "we certainly can't have that, now can we?" The tech met her eyes again as Alison forced her to look up at her. She was smiling again. "After all, you're far too pretty to die."
The technician had a badge hanging around her neck on a lanyard. Perfect. Time for the climax.
"Don't worry, though," Alison brought up her free hand, and with a flex of her powers a small ball of bluewhite flame-like light sprung from the tip of her index finger. "I'm sure we can fix that first." The technician's eyes snapped to the faux-flame, following the light as it danced on her fingertip. "After all," and here was the payoff for tweaking the image inducer, as tone and words utterly clashed. “I’ve always sort of wondered what would happen if your eyes got hot enough. Would they melt? Or boil? My personal guess is that they’d just… pop.” Alison popped the last word, and the ‘flame’ on the tip of her finger surged in time.
The girl was trembling now like a leaf in a storm, crying and muttering “no” over and over like an oath. Her pupils were blown again… all she’d need was one last push.
Alison made a big show of scooping up the badge and looking at the name.
“So, Taylor, it’s nice and simple.”
With a twist, she wrapped the lanyard around her hand, clenched a fist and pulled until Taylor choked. It also had the added effect of putting Taylor’s left ear right next to Alison’s mouth.
When she spoke, for the first time all exchanged, Alison’s voice was barely above a whisper and was full of malice. Time for the kill.
“So?” Alison asked, smile back firmly in place. “What do you say? Will you tell me, or can I get... creative?”
"I don't know, I don't know! They just kept telling us nothing could be over five thousand lux! The first DP was fired because he thought the footage wouldn't read well enough! But the artificial light, it interferes with -- with some other thing that was set up, I don't know, I thought this cryptid deal was just going to be a Ghost Hunters kind of scam, but--" No longer being able to see Alison's facial expression was causing the tech to babble. When she gulped her throat strained against the lanyard. "I heard -- it's crazy, but during camera tests earlier we saw some old guy walking around the maze dabbing things with this bowl of liquid we kept joking was blood, like some kind of ritual. Then the other hunters started showing up, and those people -- they aren't faking it."
Well, that had been rather unexpected. But quite enjoyable, if Jean-Phillipe were asked. Apparently Alison could be on board with 'be gay, do crimes', judging by the undertones of her performance and the 'I am both terrified -and- aroused' reaction from the technician. Tres bien. Full marks, no notes from the French judge. "Ritual?" he belatedly picked up on a key word. "Merde, that is what did not make sense, now I understand." He picked up one of the laminated diagrams showing the location of cameras among the greenery. The outlines of the hedge maze were all rounded edges, and even within its confines there was a general methodicalness to the design, not the straight edges one would expect in this sort of thing. It looked more like...one of his cousin's sketches of her British girlfriend's work.
He tapped at his comm sharply. "Cyclops, Bevatron. There is magic at play here, that is the reason behind the conflicting reports. Do you read?" He heard nothing, which could just mean that Scott was occupied with something. He wanted to swear again, but restricted himself to a quick noise of frustration. There was work to be done.
"Dazzler." He knew the brightness was not an issue - five hundred lux might be rather bright, but he knew she had created much brighter in the Danger Room. Distance would be the true deciding factor. "How large of an area do you think you can disrupt from here?"
Alison stood from where she was crouched. Taylor, unfortunately, seemed to take that as permission to try and run, so Alison did the first thing that came to mind.
She put a boot on Taylor's hip. The technician froze.
(Asked about it later, Alison would have a dozen perfectly reasonable justifications, including that it being the center of gravity and therefore the easiest way to control or limit movement. Absolutely nobody would believe her.)
"Doubting me?" she asked. "Well, thanks to our new friend here, I think I have a good idea of how to take care of things on my end. What will you be doing?"
"Finding our people," was the quick reply as Jean-Phillipe pocketed the map. "Bonne chance."
Mayhem and Echo take on a duo of their own.
The blade spun in a shining arc or pure showmanship. The hunter, watching the performance with a jaundiced eye, sucked on his teeth and finally asked the question.
"So tell me: why a katana?"
The other hunter didn't even turn to look. "What's there to tell? Kill Bill was my favorite movie."
"You a foot guy, eh?"
"Don't sully my childhood." The younger man drew his back foot back and leveled his blade at the horror before them. The creature's glowing red eyes burned in the darkness. Its moth-like wings had been slashed beyond utility and its furred chest heaved with exertion, but it stood its ground. Behind it hunched an antlered figure in a tangle of emaciated limbs and fresh blood. They'd been backed into a dead end.
Now that the blade was no longer spinning the larger man moved to join him. The axe he slapped slowly against one palm looked dull, as if it were barely more than a club. He gave his colleague a toothy grin that showed brightly against the streaks of woad smeared on his face. Unobtrusively, as dictated by the terms of their employment, the private security accompanying them shuffled a little further away.
"So how d'you want to do this," the big man asked, "one each, or one at a time?"
"One piece at a time," replied the younger hunter. He made a sudden feint towards the moth-thing, and it flinched. Its fear brought a smile to his face. "Remember what she said? 'To the pain.' The more blood the better."
The big Scotsman frowned. "That's The Princess Bride you're thinking of now."
"Have a sense of humor. Both things can be true. " Eyes still on his insectile opponent, the younger hunter began to move the katana in a series of mocking circles. A glimmer of light bounced off the long, silvered scar that cut across one temple as his smile stretched wider. "Now, do you want me to cut you off any souvenirs?"
"I WANT SOUVENIRS." The voice was feminine, but there was a rasping, growling echo to it that reverberated along the concrete slabs and stairs before being swallowed by the trees. Illyana would know someone who wanted the katana, but April was half-convinced that the axe was so dull Lizzie Borden would've had to give her father far more than the 41 whacks. She dropped partially from the tree, body contorted to make her head - and teeth - look exceptionally large. "YOU WILL BE GOOD SPORT."
With that, April dropped fully from the tree, twisting in mid-air to land in a crouch. "HELLO. YOU STOLE MY CAT."
Maya didn't bother with words, merely dropped from her own perch as she trusted April to keep the bad guys contained as she moved around their flank, trying to get closer to the hostages so she could lead them to something resembling safety. It was something she often did. Maya allowed her compatriots to talk, and to draw the notice of their enemies so she'd have a better chance to move from cover and beat the ever-loving crap out of them. No time for that now, however. Hostages. Rescue. Much more important than carnage, no matter how satisfying it might have felt.
The Scotsman's face broke into a delighted smile as he took in April's fangs flashing against the shadows of her face. "Three on two? That's almost a fair fight."
"What are you doing back there?" called the other man without even glancing back at Maya. He gave his katana a casual spin. "Sorry, sis, find your own fun. We've got these three locked down."
The moth-creature took that moment of distraction to bolt. Whip-fast, the Scotsman spun around and hurled his axe directly at the creature's head.
Just as fast, a pair of tendrils shot out and wrapped around the haft, webs following behind to give the known moth a chance to escape. "FAIR." Mayhem chortled in that rasping, echoing laughter. "VERY FAIR." The axe was crushed in her grip, razor teeth grinning with amused menace as splinters of wood dust the ground and a metal ball was hurled into the dark. "GO. CHASE. BRING BACK, SPORT." There was a lilt to the word sport, a pause that marked it as a mocking name. She moved closer, but left herself out of reach. Who knew what these idiots carried? She didn't want them to touch her.
Above them, a four-pointed star flared like a super nova.
Cyclops and Wildchild meet the master of the hunt.
There was no logic to the place. The maze vacillated between curved paths and straight lines, occasionally broken up by the odd fountain or artificially aged masonry. The overall effect was strangely artificial, as if the maze had been designed for maximum drama rather than practicality or flow.
The structures may have been for atmosphere, but the yew shrubs that served as walls were authentically impenetrable. At nearly 12 feet tall they were both too dense to push through and not thick enough to climb. So far they had already managed to send what appeared to be a creature with a skeletal frame and a jackal's head back towards the entrance, but otherwise the violence around them was more heard than seen. Sometimes there was a shout in the distance, or the crash of a body against the hedge maze to their right, but locating the source in time was nearly impossible.
Scott had always prided himself on his sense of direction, his ability to see a path, keep track of velocities and the space around him. It was a part of his mutation, a constant companion since as long as he could remember. Mazes normally presented no problem to him, the kind of obstacles that he could normally complete in his sleep.
Normally.
Only, this maze was different, it seemed to twist and turn in ways that seemed to defy reason, to subtly throw off his sense of direction. A hand rubbed over his face as he glared at the walls that pressed in on them, "I swear, if anyone suggests building one of these at home I'm gonna drop them in the worst training scenario I can think of."
“Bossman, this -is- the worst training scenario I can think of.”
Kyle had already proven the shrubs unclimbable and had healing scratches and a surly attitude to prove it. He had perched himself atop a fountain and balanced, stretching his entire height to see over the maze walls only to report “more fucking wall” and leapt down, landing in a crouch.
Despite himself Scott couldn't help but laugh, a flicker of a smile ghosting over his lips for a moment before he glanced around at the maze. "You know, you're not wrong, add some hunters and I think we could be onto something here. Though first thing first, we need to find our way out of this place so I can recreate it. You can't find any kinda trail?"
"The problem is, I've got about eight of them." Kyle had pinched one of Liam's unwashed shirts, and he could smell his student, but not strongly. "I've got blood, guns, at least one chain smoker, still got some Nightcrawler up my nose from before..." He shrugged, scented the air again and then sneezed several times in a row. "Okay, might have the sulfur out, gonna need a sec to try to pinpoint anything."
The X-Man glanced around before arching a single eyebrow as he crossed his arms over his chest and leaned against a wall. "I'm not going anywhere."
"You think?" Kyle snorted out. The maze had a few openings and Kyle paused at each one, but returned shaking his head. "Best I got is kind of vaguely that way." He pointed with his entire arm.
"There's about..." He paused, and went down to the ground, sniffing again with his eyes closed. Liam's cut wood and grass scent was far more present than Sharon, but both were there faintly - but under layers of sweat and the plant life surrounding them and dirt and alarmingly, blood and gunpowder "Cyke, there's at least eight or nine different trails here, and that's just the distinct ones, I'm not just pulling that number out of my ass. I've got all kinds of smells here."
It had been a pipe dream to hope that it would be that easy, that Kyle would manage to find that one trail they could follow, through no fault of his own, it was one more on the tab for the people behind this that would have to get repaid. "Well, I guess then we're going with plan B....no, plan C I think." Scott's eyes began to glow as he took a step forward, a faint smile touching his lips, "Duck."
And then energy blasts eviscerated the bushes, a testament to why he'd never gotten involved in gardening before.
"Plan C for Cyclops cuts loose." Kyle said, agreeably, from behind the hands clamped over his eyes and mouth. He didn't quite fancy flash blindness or leaves between his teeth. He quite sensibly waited for the scraps of leaf and wood to settle, making a remarkably even carpet along the ground before any movement.
The pure force had cut a path through the maze, so unerringly straight that some of the shrubs would've looked like geometric plant sculpture if it hadn't been for the debris from their now destroyed neighbors coating them. He stood from his crouch and cocked his head. "Footsteps, six." A pause. "No, eight. Maybe." and leapt back onto his fountain perch.
As he scanned over what would probably be a very expensive arborist bill or a reddit post about tree law, a figure came running across the newly opened path, crossing it. Slick brown carapace mottled with amber, and dusted in pulverized leaves. The creature ran head down, tossing a head of sharp horns back and forth. It ran at a six-legged gallop awkwardly, almost stumbling over its front two legs as though they were not always making contact with the ground. It turned the corner, and crashed into a hedge, panting and making a horrific plea, clicking and squawking. "Help" and "kill" the only words clear from inhuman mouth parts that seemed to writhe on their own.
"Bigods, the Ant Men of Khartoum are real! I thought my great-grandfather wiped them out in the 19th century!" Ulysses called as he crashed through the brush in pursuit. "Carl, if you miss this shot, I WILL REPLACE YOUR EYES WITH YOUR TESTICLES AND VICE VERSA! VERY MUCH VERSA, YOU FECULENT WHELP!"
"Whatever he's on, I don't think I want any of it." Scott noted in a stage whisper to Kyle as he nodded in the direction of the hapless mutant who'd crashed into the hedge, a rain of leaves obscuring its shape for a moment. "Why don't you help our friend out of the bushes." Dark eyes flicked towards the still shouting Ulysses as he stopped, positioning himself between the men and their prey, "I'm sorry, Carl is it? I'm afraid I'm gonna have to stop you there, you're not shooting anyone, in fact I suggest you both turn around and go home...though if you'll allow me a moment of curiosity...why in the hells are you out here hunting humans. Surely you're not so lost and debauched that you think this is fun."
He was already in motion, sprinting towards the panicked humanoid rhinoceros beetle. It - he - the few words they had heard sounded male-ish, under the clack of exoskeleton - was burrowing through the densely packed foliage. "Man. Hey. Hey, I got you, we're not gonna let this guy do anything." Kyle moved as slowly as he could, hands visible, speaking calmly. "I know you're not an Ant-Man of Kolkata. Are you injured?" He dug in the pocket of his jacket and showed a roll of bandages. "I'm here to help."
The insectoid creature spun towards the X-Man in a flurry of shredded leaves. Its inflexible mandibles and compound eyes conveyed no expression, but the stench of fear rolled from it in waves. When it saw Kyle, however, it froze.
"You--?"
There was just enough time to register a flicker of movement in the shadows before something small and sharp hit Kyle in the side. A security officer, discreetly outfitted in dark body armor and hanging well out of the frame of Ulysses' camera crew, lowered his rifle and reloaded.
"The fuck." The world spun for a moment, and Kyle's head-shake did nothing to stop the slide of vertigo. He grabbed at his side and plucked a dart out of his skin. "Cyke, he's got tranqs!" Except he didn't quite feel drugged, just muffled and unsettled and off balance. It took just a moment for it to feel familiar, senses dulled and hands that felt a little too heavy, a certain wrongness to his frame and body. He had last felt this with a broken sternum and shattered ribs and a grade E for Emplate concussion.
Scott's eyes widened at Kyle's warning as he threw himself to the side, twisting as his gaze centered on the guard who was hurriedly reloading his gun. It wouldn't be fast enough, the man realised, as energy began building in Scott's eyes before he felt like he'd been punched in the chest, sliding back along the floor as the energy gathering in his eyes dissipated along with his breath. "More than one."
"Who are these... circus actors? Wait, the leathers. Is this a Charlie Hunnan thing! I told him 'no' to 'Sons of Monsters'... unless..." Ulysses rested his gun on his shoulder as he looked at the tranqed X-Men. "This is all wrong. I'm the feature of the hunt. Chet, stop filming... whoever these gate crashers are. Get a production assistant here now. I don't like being off script this far."
"I think they might be-"
"DID I ASK YOU TO THINK? DID I ASK YOUR OPINION? IF I WANT YOUR OPINION, I WILL TELL YOU WHAT IT IS BEFOREHAND AND THEN YOU BETTER BE ABSOLUTELY PERFECT WHEN YOU EXPRESS IT TO ME!"
"Not tranqs!" Kyle pushed himself away from the hedge, got two steps away from the man-insect hybrid he'd attempted to rescue and then vomited, half digested bits of the burrito he'd been eating when the alert came in and yellow Gatorade and the water he'd chugged on the plane. His head had just started to clear when he heard a crackle in his comms, and Bevatron's voice faintly.
He vomited again, this time forced, fingers down his throat, one hand planted to steady himself on a ground that was not moving but felt like a kayak in rough seas regardless, and then met eyes with the security officer - and leapt. taking the man down to the ground. "Fuck off with that thing."
A groan slipped from Scott's lips as her rolled over, one hand coming up to pluck the dart out of his stomach, wincing as the needle slide out, his eyes narrowing at the men in front of him as he summoned a blast to knock them back and stop that infernal yelling...and nothing happened. A cough as the man tried again before he unsteadily pushed himself to his feet. "It's worse...power blocking."
"Yeah I know!" A bruise was blooming on the side of his face from a billy club, and he'd just thrown up twice - it was hard to miss that his powers were doing something fucky. Kyle rolled the guard over - even with his powers not quite there, he was larger - and stronger - and had the benefit of training. The man didn't stand a chance, and ended with an arm wrapped around his throat, pressing into his neck until he passed out. He stood, bracing himself on the guard's ribs for balance, and shook himself. "Cyke, I think..." He cocked his head. There was a high pitched scream faintly in the air, and the smell of blood and distinctly under that, Liam Nelson under a layer of sweat and fear.
Kyle was sure he said something on the comms as he spun and sprinted off. It was probably informative- and certainly not suitable for after action reports.
Unaware help has arrived, Liam and Sharon are released into the hunt.
Warning: Graphic violence
The door rasped up like a metal curtain, punctuated by only one word:
"Out."
The voice gave them no chance to react before an electric current pulsed through the metal flooring. It was mild, causing only a brief convulsion of the muscles, but the shock made it clear the directive was not a request.
Out of the cage wasn't any better than inside it and Liam immediately had 'Rat in a Cage' stuck in his head. The timing was terrible. Stretching, he stared as Sharon emerged, "What the hell's wrong with you?" She was big cat to the extreme!
The figure beside him was no version of Sharon he had ever seen. It was vaguely feline, but a mane of spikes ran down its spine and barbed its tail. Its bipedal stance allowed a full display of the three-inch talons on its forepaws.
It had Sharon's scent.
Still disoriented from the shock of the cage, Sharon instinctively looked to her hands. She registered the fur, the talons, and snapped her attention to Liam. In the moonlight he had been replaced by a stoop-shouldered, saber-toothed apparition that carried a muscular bulk the young mutant's frame only hinted as a future possibility. The stripes she had always coveted had become a network of black scars.
This wasn't right. Sharon knew what it was like to change shape, and her body felt no different than it had a moment ago. She touched her cheek and felt only human fingers against a human face.
"Is not rea-"
A cattle prod hit her between the shoulder blades. Sharon yelped and jerked forward, almost falling into Liam.
"Here are the rules," said the man. His face was masked, anonymous, as were those of the men behind him. "You two start running, or we shoot you here."
Realizing that whatever changed Sharon's appearance, though thankfully not her scent, took a back burner as he grabbed her hand, half running, half dragging her with him. Being separated was not his plan, not that he had a plan. But not getting separated was key.
What had first looked like a garden turned out to be some kind of hedge maze. The walls, shrubs too densely entwined to force their way through, stretched almost double their height. The paths were oddly wide, as if designed to accommodate more than just wandering guests.
Sharon had no choice but to let herself be dragged. Liam seemed less impaired than she was, and -- to her frustration -- faster. She wasn't used to running on two legs.
The wind changed. The girl sniffed.
"Others are here," she said.
In the distance someone screamed.
Yeah, he'd noticed that and was attempting to avoid them, but as they got deeper and deeper in, he realized that wasn't possible. "Oh god," he moaned, pausing to get his bearings. What bearings?? "That's not good."
"This way." Sharon tugged Liam back the way they'd come and down another branch. Her brain was still a jumble, but her body was operating on instinct. What they told her was "run."
They turned a corner, and the wind changed again.
The scent of blood and terror hit them like a wall. The branch let out to a dead end adorned with something like a ruined temple, and on its crumbling steps were two figures. One was a tall woman dressed all in white, knife in hand and humming tunelessly. The other, sprawled beneath her, was what looked like a rabbit poured into a human mould. Its pale fur glowed in the darkness as it whimpered with pain, one hand pressed to the side of its head.
A long, soft ear lay on the stone beside it like a bloody petal.
Liam had hunted and killed his fair share of rabbits, his mom made an excellent stew when he caught enough. "That's not a rabbit," he murmured, stomach sinking. He bet that was a mutant like them, dressed up like they were somehow. It was too late to back up and he discretely unsheathed his claws. He didn't want to fight, but he didn't think there was a choice here.
The older girl grabbed his arm. "Liam, no," Sharon hissed. "We run."
"Run where?" asked the woman in white, attention still fixed on her prey. Her voice was deep and calm, almost amused.
Sharon startled at a sudden movement at their flank. Two more security officers had been positioned at the corner's outlet, presumably to intercept the cornered rabbit if it fled. One of the officers held a baton; the other, a rifle. While they made no further move to engage it was obvious this could change at any moment.
The creature on the steps was staring at Liam. This branch was a dead-end: it could flee no further. Whether or not it perceived Liam as monstrous made no difference. It looked at him like a drowning man catching sight of a distant ship. Voice thready with desperation, it spoke.
"Help m-"
The white-clad woman's knife flashed. The rabbit screamed as the blade took it across the cheek and threw itself back; in desperation it raised its powerful hind legs and kicked. The tall woman jumped back adroitly, chuckling.
Liam launched himself at her, knowing Sharon could take care of herself for a moment at least. There wasn't so much coherent thought, just knowledge that the only way out was through and that rabbit girl was innocent. Liam wasn't a fighter and it showed almost immediately, the woman in white easily countering his attempts, but he disarmed her, which was the first step. Maybe the rabbit girl could get away now.
The knife spun away into the shadows, but the hunter only smiled. As the rabbit scrabbled away the woman's hand flashed to a case at her side and came away with a pair of nunchaku.
Nunchaku were showy weapons, known more for the development of speed and posture than practicality. They suited the theatricality of her flowing hair and immaculate white outfit.
But theatricality and effectiveness were not mutually exclusive.
Her opening move was to use the weapon like a flail to catch Liam a glancing blow across the head. He flinched back, and she flipped the free stick to join the one in her palm. Now wielding the weapon like a baton, the hunter struck Liam twice in quick succession: once across the knee, once across the side of the neck, and finished it off with a solid kick to the chest.
Pain, so much pain radiating from everywhere. Liam yowled at the initial impact, flying through the air and landing hard in a lump, trying to breathe. Was it his knee that hurt worse or his head? Why did he try to help others and not just stick with Sharon? So many regrets. And now he was screwed and Sharon was probably screwed and all he could do was act on instinct trying to scramble away.
Oh, his knee was definitely where the pain was. Gritting his teeth, he did his best to move away without drawing attention with no luck.
Sharon screamed.
It wasn't the scream of a big cat. There was too much fear in it for that, and fear was a human thing. The security made no move to stop Sharon as she charged the hunter, claws outstretched, and leaped to catch the woman across the side as she turned.
The impact knocked the nunchaku from the woman's hand. The hunter pivoted, trying to redirect Sharon's momentum into a throw, but Sharon was tall and her claws were tangled in flesh and fabric. What should have been a throw became a graceless drag that spilled both women to the ground. Instinctively Sharon moved to bite, but her face was too short and her teeth too blunt, and the hunter drove her forehead into Sharon's cheekbone with bone-cracking force. With a yelp the girl jerked away, and suddenly the hunter was straddling her with something long and shining in her hand. As the blade began to flash all Sharon could do was shield her face, thinking that Liam was going to die, that she should have been able to protect him because she was so much older and stronger but she could not change and because she could not change they would both die --
And then there was light.
no subject
Date: 2024-07-14 04:19 am (UTC)The opening log with the X-Men leaning into Being Terrifying just to distract the guard enough to get Jean into his head is delightful. Drama queens indeed, Dazzler.
"Except Nica's eyesight wasn't normal. She shrugged as her powers shifted to mimic the dazzler until she was glowing green. "And that's strike two. Here, let me show you how it's done," she replied, raising her hand as if to wave. Instead, a burst of green dazzling light flashed from her palm down at the hunter and his guards." -- just a fantastic little badass moment here.
Equally badass, Jean just dropping a hunter into a pit, and I love the ""Now you get to enjoy being helpless for a while,"
Oh my GOD Alison and JPC being drama queens together, and Alison's 'be intimidating mode' be kind of 'and I'll step on you and you'll like it' is amazing. In some other universe, people are writing "Dazzler steps on /reader" fanfic. "Absolutely nobody would believe her." indeed.
Oh, poor Mothman, rescued by Singularly Terrifying April, that poor guy.
and last - jesus, Liam and Sharon made me tear up - the fear and terror in that last paragraph is abjectly painful to read.