She almost forgot about her leg and jumped off the cot. Almost. Instead she frantically contorted her body around to best face him.
"Ya can talk!" She practically squealed.
He lifted an eyebrow at her than turned his back around.
"Wait, damn it," she huffed. "Wolverine!"
That got his attention and he jerked back around, growling menacing at her again. Her heart fluttered briefly at the sight before she willed it back down and forced up some of her wounded courage.
"Oh, stop it. Ahm sure if ya know 'prick' ya speak a few otha words," she said in a false bravado she was proud of.
He shot her a glare than stepped closer to the dark but she yelled at his name again. He looked expectantly at her and she realized she didn't have anything to say necessarily. She looked around herself for some kind of inspiration, her mind grabbing at nothing. And then her eyes fell down to the covered gray that amazingly was still undisturbed after all the action.
She gingerly swung her legs over the side of the cot and Wolverine took a cautious step back. She winced and wobbled as she got to her one good foot and with the help of the time tested airplane technique she found her balance.
"Ah guess ah probably scared tha food service away for tha night." She looked up out of the corner of her eye to assure she had his attention. "Ahm not really that hungry, queasy stomach an' all. Ya could have mine...if ya want."
The starring contest immediately began. It was almost funny the way he studied her. It sort of reminded her of her old dog BowBow, when he would twist and turn his head and lift his ears when you were doing something he didn't understand. Except for the chilling cobalt eyes were nothing like BowBow's warm, calming brown ones.
"Really. Big guy like ya gets pretty hungry, right?" she said demurely. He took the bait and edged himself closer to the bars.
Pushing the pain back she eased down onto the floor. She could feel his eyes burning into her as she moved so she made sure to keep her movements slow and deliberate as possible, like one did around a skittish horse.
With a shove she launched the tray across the smooth floor first. He didn't like that very much and snarled as he jumped back.
"Sorry," she muttered and chided herself. Moving back forward he seemed to accept it, although his face didn't look like he trust her in the least.
She began scooting forward and it hurt infinitely more than backwards had. The ache in her leg reminded her of who exactly she was dealing with. "Ya not gonna jus' attack me again, are ya?"
He crouched down in front of the bars and looked from the tray to her. Then he sniffed a few times, probably trying to pinpoint what was on the menu. She was amazed that he could even get a small sniff because she detected nothing leaking out from the thick plastic cover. But he must have pick up something because he gave her one short no fuss shake of his head.
With each scoot she unconsciously whimpered until she was right in front of the bars as well. She knew she was taking a big gamble, he hadn’t exactly proven he was trust worthy, and could easily rip her into pieces if he was so inclined. But he was a mutant, and the only other one within whispering distance from her, that meant at some point she would need him.
“Okay.” She smiled nervously then reached for the cover on the tray. Underneath was a thin slab of some kind of meat, beef it looked like. Then counter clock wise was a pile of baby carrots, green beans, beets, and even a roll. It was a feast she hadn’t seen since weeks before she left home and she was beginning to regret offering it up to him.
She sighed and looked longingly at it. She could always just take the food and scurry back into the corner and horde it for herself. That was probably what he would do if it was the other way around. With that roll sitting right in front of her, her stomach didn’t hurt nearly as much as she thought it did. But she already gave him claim and she could have sworn she saw his tongue dart out briefly to lick his lips.
“Ah guess ya want tha meat first,” she guessed.
He didn’t answer with words, like she hoped he would. But instead a non-descript rumble vibrated from the back of his throat. She assumed that meant ‘yes’.
Picking up the slab of beef with her fingertips she almost groaned when juices began dripping down from it onto the tray. She swore at herself for foolishly giving away juicy, tender meat. To a man that practically shattered her knee cap, no less.
She swallowed down her vicious inner voice screaming at her to just stuff it down her own throat in front of him and ripped the meat in half. The side bars didn’t have the same gap above the floor that the door did so she eased her shaking hand through, praying he wouldn’t eat it too. To her surprise he used his hand, not his mouth, to take it from her. And then with no ceremony or etiquette he stuffed it into his mouth, chewing ferociously. At least he chewed with his mouth closed.
“So…” she began and he slowed his chewing and looked questioning at her. “Wolverine, huh? That’s kinda a cool name.”
He gave no answer. Besides that he swallowed the masticated lump with a loud gulp and held his hand out again, although he stopped short of putting it through to her cell.
She ripped the remaining half in half again and he shot her annoyed glance, but she ignored it. “Back at tha labs they started callin’ me ‘tha Rogue’ ‘cause ah’d neva do anythin’ they wanted. Always tryin’ ta escape,” she gave a short, curt laugh as she handed him the remaining piece. “As ya saw ah ain’t really that good at it. Still here. But a few people got out in some a our little revolts, so that’s good. So ah guess ahm a little proud of it, tha name. Carrots?”
He nodded and she grabbed a handful of them. Again he surprised her by only taking one at a time. She smirked shyly at him. “Ah’ll jus’ bet ya got tha name Wolverine ‘cause ya got one of those naughty wolfish grins.”
‘Not that ah’ve seen one from ya’ she thought to herself. He seemed to share the same sentiments because he pursed his lip as he chewed and gave her a fleeting glance from under his thick, black eyebrows.
“Anyway,” she shrugged. “It’s pretty cool. This one guy, at the labs, the employees called him ‘Bugger’. Ya know, ‘cause he was always sick.”
His chewing slowed as he her watched her face drop. Her eyes because lost and cloudy as they went down to the number on her arm. His eyes followed her finger as she traced it along the mark with a ghostly touch of her fingertip. She snapped out of her dazed when he grunted and stuck out his hand again.
She smiled at him, it was weak but it was all she could manage. Instead of passing anything else through the bars to him she scooted back enough to put the tray in front of her and pressed it flush against the bars. His eye brows pinched together as he looked confused at her, evidently unsure of the sudden change in the process.
“Ah happen ta know ya arm will fit through tha bars. At least up ta ya elbow, anyway. It should be close enough,” She explained. He stiffed and looked down unsure at the tray.
“It’s okay,” she assured him. “Ya can jus’ reach through. Ah trust ya.”
He visibly balked but adjusted from his crouching position to sitting Indian style on the floor with his knees up against the bars. She moved as well, a slow exhaustion had creped up from somewhere deep in her and she eased onto her side, lying down on the cool concrete floor.
His piercing blue eyes followed her every movement and he shifted uncomfortably, rubbing his hands together. She propped her head up on her elbow and nodded at the tray. “Go on. Ah won’t scream bloody murdera, ah promise.”
With her permission for the third time his huge paw of a hand came through into her cell. For some reason she was fascinated by it. It was wide and strong, like everything else about him. It also had a thin scruff of dark hair on the back of it, also like everything else about him. And there was odd bright red shading that ran up from between his fingers to between his knuckles before it finally faded.
He ate slowly, but she was far past being surprised by it at that point. Her mind wandered as she watched him eat. She missed Bugger. And Lauren and Eleanor and Steven and Rick and Jenney, all of them. The labs were a horrible hell hole that put her body through things it was never intended to be able to cope with. But they were all in it together. They helped each other when they were in pain and supported each other when they just mentally collapsed. They were tortured but they were still allowed to be people.
Here they left her alone, so far anyway. And the guards seemed to acknowledge her humanity. But they stuck her in here and she couldn’t help up wonder how long it would take for her to become Wolverine or the insane beast-man down the hall, moaning and thrashing and slamming herself against her cage?
Well, she wasn’t going to lay down dead for the labs and she sure as hell wasn’t going to give her humanity to the government without a fight. And what she found out was that the mutants at the lab were eager to get their freedom back, they just needed a little push, an extra backbone that they weren't naturally born with. Maybe these guys would be just as hungry for their humanity.
“Can ah…Can ah have tha roll?” She asked him. An animal would quickly snatch it away.
He looked at her and then the roll. He was starring down at the roll with such intensity she wondered if he could devour it with his eyes. But when his hand came through the bar again he grabbed some more carrots and nodded at her.
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Author's Chapter Notes:
I know, I’m sorry, this should have been updated sooner but it took longer for me to recover from this weekend than usually and I just didn’t have enough brain function for writing. And it’s a story about intellectual degeneration. Oh, the irony. Action should pick up after this chapter. :)