Logan paced incessantly outside the Professor’s office. Charles and Magneto had been cloistered in there for over two hours. Even with his superior hearing, Logan hadn’t heard a single sound from the other side of the door. Storm was trying to explain everything to the junior X-Men as they cleared some of the rubble from the hangar, but Logan and Marie stayed by the closed door. Marie winced as Logan popped his claws again, a savage grimace crossing his features. Logan noticed her look and slid the claws back in.
‘Sorry,’ he mumbled, coming to perch on the floor next to her. ‘So what’s your excuse?’
‘What?’
‘For staying here. I want to shred the guy, how ‘bout you?’ Logan’s eyebrow quirked. Marie gave a short, humourless laugh.
‘Ah didn’t feel like shifting all that metal,’ Marie muttered, dropping her head back against the wall.
‘Uh-huh. So which one made a crack?’ Logan’s eyebrow lowered back to the familiar growl position.
‘How did you guess?’ Marie asked sarcastically and sighed. ‘It doesn’t matter.’
‘Yes it does.’
‘No, Logan, it doesn’t. They’re all thinking it, at least he had the guts to say it.’
‘The Cajun.’ Logan said flatly, his fists tightening.
‘”Why are we liftin’ all dis heavy metal when da chére here could do it with a flick of her wrist”,’ Marie mimicked, rolling her eyes. ‘Ah hate to say it, but he’s got a point. I could move it by just wavin’ my arms around, but Ah don’t want to.’
‘With him so close in there?’ Logan jerked his head at the door.
‘No, let them do it. The way they’ve been acting around me the last few months, why should Ah help?’ Marie sighed in frustration. ‘How childish was that?’
Logan sniggered. ‘Sounds fair to me. What?’ he asked when Marie glared at him.
‘You’re supposed to say ‘yes Marie, that’s childish and silly, go and help them’.’
‘Why?’ Logan looked confused.
‘Ah have no idea. That’s just what Scott would say.’
‘Well darlin’, you know I’m nothing like Scott.’ Logan snorted at the thought.
‘Yeah, don’t Ah know it,’ Marie replied, tapping her head. She looked at the door again and shivered. ‘How did he get so powerful so quickly? He was cured a couple of days after me, but Ah swear he’s almost stronger than he was before.’
‘You weren’t checking every minute to see if your mutation had come back. I bet as soon as he realised the cure didn’t work he pushed and pushed until he was back to how he had been. Plus you haven’t exactly been runnin’ around naked huggin’ people, so you don’t really know how long your skin’s been…’ Logan trailed off, cursing himself for the images now flooding his mind; his Marie, cavorting around naked. Think about Magneto, think about Magneto, he repeated to himself.
Marie noticed the slight flush on Logan’s cheeks and mentally raised an eyebrow. Good god, he’s realised Ah’m female, she thought wryly. The Logan in her head growled at her amusement, but she ignored him. ‘As fun as that sounds, no, Ah haven’t been doing any naked cavorting. Ah’ll bear it in mind though, sugah.’ She had to bite her cheek to stop herself from laughing at his expression, but her laughter quickly died when she saw his eyes darken with desire. They stared breathlessly at each other for a few seconds, before a loud crash made them both jump.
‘Remy, what did I say about making it explode!’ Storm’s exasperated voice came floating to them.
* * * *
200 miles away from the X-Men, alarm bells began shrieking. A maximum security prison shone like a beacon in the night as searchlights panned every inch of the grounds. Faint screaming echoed through the corridors as guards flooded to the source.
‘Every body listen up!’ The Captain shouted. ‘There were three guards inside when the riot started. Two we know are dead, the third, Coleman, could still be alive. They’ve broken through from B-wing to D-wing, so he could be anywhere. Keep your eyes open. He’s our main priority. Subdue the inmates with any and all force!’
The doors were unlocked and they ran through, weapons at the ready. Once the doors were securely locked behind them again, they moved slowly through the halls. Bedding had been set alight, smoke floating through the air, giving everything a surreal look. The distant sounds of rioting could be heard, but there was no movement around them. As they progressed through the hallways, the feeling of unease grew in the men. There should be prisoners, or at least the injured, but there was nothing.
Once they turned on to B-wing, they found the reason for the silence. Bodies were strewn across everything. Blood drenched the floor and smeared up the walls, sticky handprints showing the last moments of desperation. One of the guards stumbled across a severed arm and stumbled backwards before vomiting helplessly. The lights weren’t working and sparks intermittently showered through the air, lending the corpses a golden quality.
‘Keep moving,’ the Captain ground out, his stomach clenching at the sights around him.
‘What could have done this?’ One of the guards whispered, afraid to speak any louder. His companion offered him a terrified look, saying nothing.
Hearing movement ahead of them, they all froze, weapons raised. A figure stumbled down the corridor towards them, covered in blood.
‘Stay where you are, or we’ll shoot!’ the Captain shouted. The figure stopped, sat unsteadily on the floor and tried to raise its arms.
‘It’s me, Captain,’ it said in a faint voice. ‘Coleman.’ Two guards ran forwards and picked him up, moving slowly as he moaned.
‘Coleman, what happened?’ snapped the Captain, gesturing his men back.
‘They went mad. Completely mad. They killed the others, but I got away. I hid until I heard you coming.’ Coleman muttered before slumping between the two men, unconscious.
‘Let’s get him out of here. We’ll gas the entire wing once we’re out. That ought to stop them.’ The guards began moving back the way they came, so focused on their task that none of them saw the yellow flash in Coleman’s eyes.
‘There’s only one problem with that, Captain,’ Coleman’s voice stopped them all again. ‘Coleman’s dead, and so are you!’ Snapping the neck of the guard who supported him, Coleman grabbed his gun and shot the Captain. A flicker passed over Coleman and he shuddered, changing from his toes up. A shapely blue foot appeared, followed by another. The transformation went faster, the blue rushing up the figure of a woman with sleek red hair. ‘Hello guards,’ she said contemptuously, leaping at the nearest. The guards tried to follow her movements in the gloom, flashes from the guns giving her a strobe-effect. Mystique used a guard as a shield, firing at the others with deadly precision. Casting the dead man aside, she flipped over the lieutenant’s head, grabbing his neck as she went and pulling him down to land with a sickening thud on her knee. Swiping out the legs of another, she crushed his windpipe with her foot, before lashing out with a roundhouse kick and stunning the next. Quickly dispatching him, she turned to the one remaining frightened man.
‘Last man standing,’ she drawled, slowly walking towards him.
‘Please, don’t hurt me,’ he stammered, dropping his gun and backing away. ‘I won’t stop you.’ He flinched as Mystique laughed.
‘You couldn’t stop me even if you wanted to, you pathetic little man.’ She grabbed him and slammed him against the wall.
‘Please!’ he shrieked as she squeezed his throat.
‘You’re all the same,’ she whispered savagely. ‘Work in a women’s prison, take what you want, when you want. After all, they can’t fight back, can they?’ She tightened her grip, pushing her face up close to his. ‘You were wrong. This one does.’ She laughed again as she ripped out his throat, blood spraying across her face.
Licking her lips clean, she let him fall to the floor. Hunting through the carnage around her, she found the Captain and took his wallet. As her features rearranged to mimic his, she smiled.
‘One more door to go. Then we’ll see who used to be beautiful, Eric.’
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Author's Chapter Notes:
This one gets quite violent towards the end, with some icky bits, so if you're squeamish you might want to skip it.