you want to take the little one?” Victor’s growl was loud enough for the small party in the camp to hear. There were three of them sitting just outside a large tent, and the two ferals had approached undetected, a sign that they were unprepared. “He looks kind of tasty. What do you think, Jimmy?”
Logan growled at the bigger man, moving forward with his arms spread wide. “Knock it off, old man. I doubt they’re much of a threat.”
“If you come closer, we’ll be forced to kill you,” the oldest of the group warned, standing to meet the new threat head on. He was of average height, and had long black hair with streaks of silver that was pulled back into a ponytail at the base of his neck, though he wasn’t really that old. His dark complexion and high cheekbones beautifully highlighted his Native American ancestry. “Who are you?”
“Name’s Wolverine,” Logan said slowly, keeping his arms spread before him, trying to be non-threatening. Of course, the growl coming from Victor wasn’t helping much. “You’re all mutants, right?”
“Yes,” the man replied slowly, keeping two others behind him. The boy had the decency to look scared, but the girl looked like she was just waiting to attack, probably itching for a fight. “We will not go with you. We will not be contributed to that man’s games.”
“What man’s games?” Victor asked slowly, becoming more serious. His tone was less playful now, full of the promise of death and more if they didn’t speak. “What exactly are we going up against here?”
Logan knew that he wouldn’t be able to stop Victor if he decided that the group hadn’t given them everything they knew. If he was honest with himself, he wasn’t sure if he wanted to stop him. Rogue was in there, and if this was something bigger than any of them realized, she could be in for a hard fall. Logan would tear out every throat in the place to get her back.
The girl’s nervousness rose as the seconds dragged on, and Logan noticed her fidgets increasing. She was afraid of them, but not because of what they were; she wasn’t sure which team they were on. As if she were trying not to scratch a terrible itch, her hands twitched and he noted her muscles flexing as her eyes darted between he and Victor. He could hear her heart racing, her scent oozing animalistic fear, along with a mixture of adrenaline and strength that was hard to ignore.
The animalistic note to her fear was what caught his attention, though. She was definitely a feral, too many of her mannerisms screamed animal and alpha. He had a feeling that if Rogue were with them, a fight neither he nor Victor could stop would already be under way. It was bad enough getting two alpha males to play nice, but females? An alpha female was infinitely more dangerous when provoked.
Logan slid his glance to Victor and noted the twitch in his jaw. His eyes stayed on the girl, watching her every move. The older man had gone quiet, moving away from the three ferals. He knew danger when he saw it, and he didn’t think either party would think twice about ripping an old man and small boy to shreds to get at each other’s throats.
“Don’t do anything stupid, lady,” Logan whispered slowly, putting his hand towards her. He knew she was a feral, but not how extreme her mutation was. For all he knew, she could only have the acute senses, but the soft growl coming from her throat and the way she kept twitching told him not to be a fool. She was dangerous, even if only to herself. If she attacked…
He didn’t get the chance to finish his thought before she was on him. But it wasn’t her, at least not in human form. As she lunged for him, the muscles in her body rippled and shifted, growing in strength and hair sprouted through the rips in her clothes. Even her face changed as her nose elongated with her mouth to form a snout and her canines grew razor sharp.
All of this occurred while she was still in the air. Within seconds, Logan found himself face to face with a rather large, overgrown wolf doing her best to rip his face off. He growled in return as his arms crossed and pressed against her throat. With a grunt, he used all his strength to throw the girl off him.
Releasing his claws, he stepped forward even as she began to pace back and forth, still growling.
“Call your dog off,” Victor told the others even as he allowed his own growl to escape. He wasn’t going to jump in this one, knowing that Logan would be able to handle himself. “He will kill her if he has to.”
“How do you know she won’t kill him? Or that we won’t kill you?” the man asked cautiously, his voice soft and low. Then he raised his left arm, which appeared to be made of wire.
Victor watched as parts of the arm shifted and opened, revealing a pretty little gun that made him smile. He shrugged slowly, crossing his arms and looking back toward the fight. The combatants were still circling each other, growling. “Because even if she rips his throat out, it will grow back. Just like me. So go right ahead and use your little toy. Whatever you shoot will just grow back and I’m going to be just as pissed as Wolverine over there. I can guarantee you and your little… group will not survive.”
The man looked from the animal before him to the two still circling each other. The woman was loudly snapping her dripping jaws together, while Logan emitted a deeper, terrifying growl from deep inside his chest.
The man with the gun didn’t get the chance to call her back, though. A small voice spoke up from behind him before she could lunge again.
“Wolfsbane… Please?” The boy stepped from behind the man, swallowing his fear as he made his way to the wolf, his blue eyes large with determination even has his hands shook from the fear he was trying to force down. His longish brown hair was shaggy around the back of his neck and ears, and hung low over his eyes. He was small for his age, and for a moment, Logan was sure the wolf would attack him. She continued to growl at Logan, even as the boy came closer and reached his hand out to touch her.
They all watched as she slowly began to relax, the growl subsiding as the boy began whispering to her. The man couldn’t hear the boy’s words, but Logan and Victor picked everything up as if he were having a regular conversation.
“It’s fine, Bane. I promise. They aren’t here to hurt us. They’ve come to help us,” the boy murmured comfortingly as he continued to run his hands through her fur. “It’s fine, we’ll be fine. They aren’t here to hurt us. I promise.”
The wolf calmed, sitting back on her hind legs, her ears lowering as she looked away from Logan to the boy. Logan allowed his claws to retract, not taking his eyes off the figures. The wolf began changing, her muscles recoiling even as her bones began shrinking. Within seconds, she appeared human again. Her long hair was a brownish red color he had never seen before, with a tan complexion, and deep green eyes. She wore absolutely nothing, since her clothes had been shredded during her shift to wolf form. Her full breasts were on display for all to see, yet she showed no modesty by trying to cover them up.
“If you would please put something on, Bane,” the leader of their little group suggested. Logan was trying hard not to take in the view, but he knew Victor was probably leering at the woman known as Wolfsbane.
Slowly, she turned without taking her eyes from the other ferals, and took her time stepping into the large tent. Logan couldn’t help looking at and comparing her to Rogue. As nice as they were, her breasts weren’t as big as Rogue’s and her butt wasn’t as firm and high. Logan couldn’t help but smirk; she had nothing on Rogue.
“I’ve seen better,” Victor chuckled from behind him, and it took a lot of willpower not to join him. They weren’t here to check out the other team.
“Who are you?” the child asked, tilting his head towards them. His eyes held no fear now, and his scent was only tainted by the rich scent of curiosity.
“I’m Wolverine,” Logan answered, choosing to give his mutant name. He still didn’t know who or what he was dealing with, and still did not trust them. If they asked about Wolverine, they would get stories about a vicious animal-like man who was not to be messed with. “What are you doing out here? All of you?”
“We’re waiting,” the boy answered slowly. He stuck out his hand, waiting for Logan to take it.
Logan only cocked a brow, understanding what he wanted. “I’m not touching you, kid. I just saw what you can do. I ain’t letting you mess with my head.”
The boy’s eyes beamed as he smiled broadly. “I wasn’t going to change your feelings, Wolverine. I just wanted a friendly handshake.”
“All the same, I don’t wanna take the chance,” Logan replied, still not accepting the boy’s offer. “What are you doing out here?”
“Waiting for our friends, keeping an eye out for anything… unusual,” the boy explained, shrugging at the other man. “We have some people in the DA’s house, posing as security. He’s up to something big and we are here to stop him.”
“So are we. A friend of ours is in there right now, pretending to be a helpless, trapped mutant. Is it safe to assume that she will get help if she needs it?” Logan arched an eyebrow at the child, wondering who was really in charge here.
The boy shrugged his shoulders again, the only answer Logan received. “My name is Raymond. That man in there took my sister from me and left me to die on the streets. The only thing that he said to me was that she was going to be his new pet. Three weeks later, Forge found her dead in the park a block from where we were staying.”
“I take it, you’re Forge?” Logan asked, raising a brow toward the other man. He only nodded, confirming Logan’s suspicion. “Where do you come in to this?”
“I lived next door to Raymond and his sister since the boy was a baby. Their parents were both mutants, and good friends of mine. Neither was very powerful in their own right, but the children turned out to be quite exceptional,” the man elaborated, fighting the memories. “When the incident at Alcatraz happened, there was a riot and our building was set on fire. I was able to save the children, but their parents didn’t make it.”
Logan nodded, understanding that no one really wanted to speak about what happened that night.
“I took care of the children as best I could, but we were all homeless after the fire. His sister Jessica was already 16 by that time,” Forge continued, his shoulders tensing as he spoke. “She looked out for the boy while I was trying to find food and shelter. Her abilities had come in a year before, while his mutation was triggered the night of the fire. They both have empathy, but hers is not as powerful.
“She wasn’t the first to disappear. We’ve found others like us, people whose loved ones have disappeared. Most wanted to leave it alone, chalk it up as another mutant experience. But a few wanted to fight back. They are in that compound right now, posing as security, hoping to access any information on why this is happening.”
“And the one in the tent is…”
“Wolfsbane,” the voice came from the tent, soft and melodic, a slight accent only barely detectable. She stepped out wearing a pair of shorts and a small shirt. “You really think your friend will make it? If she’s another feral, she won’t last the week.”
“Rogue isn’t a normal feral,” Logan replied slowly. “She’s there to do a job and she’ll do anything she can to make them believe she’s playing their little game until the job is done.”
“Then she is a damn fool. They use mutants to the point of death, and discard them like trash,” Wolfsbane told him slowly, a growl threaded through her words.
“Not Rogue,” Victor replied slowly, taking a seat on one of the boulders the trio had pulled into their campsite. “They’ll want to keep her as long as they can. They were looking for her, specifically.”
“And what makes her so damn special?” the female feral demanded indignantly, crossing her arms across her barely clad breasts.
Victor’s lips twisted into something that could have been a smile or grimace. His eyes narrowed as he cocked his head to the side, maniacal thoughts running through his head. “They don’t even know she’s a feral. Her original mutation is her skin. She can take lives and abilities, even thoughts and memories with a single touch. She is death incarnate, so to speak.”
~*~*~*~*~*~
“He’s in the office on the third floor. Last door to the right at the end of the hall,” Rusty whispered to her as they walked through the halls. There were three other doors before it, two bedrooms and a bathroom. There were three more bedrooms on the other side, but they were all for show, even the office. “He only uses this room for situations like this.”
“Do you know where his real office is? Where he keeps his documents?” Rogue whispered. She needed those documents. From the memories she had garnered from Savannah, she wasn’t the only targeted mutant. She still didn’t know exactly what was going on. Savannah hadn’t been as close to Creed as she would have liked to believe, and the holes in Savannah’s information were now hers. If she could get to those documents, she would be able to find out not only who they were after, but also who was involved.
“I don’t know for sure. I don’t even think that it’s kept here,” Rusty mused, glancing around to make sure no one was watching them. The stairs were deserted, and the rest of the guards were outside, watching for any sign of her team. “But if he does decide to keep you, you will travel everywhere with him, and his set of bodyguards.”
“When will he decide?” Rogue asked slowly, a plan forming in her mind. She really didn’t want to touch Creed if it could be helped, and if it would be easier to go along with this psycho’s plans, she would gladly do it.
“It could be as soon as right now,” Rusty replied with a shrug of his shoulders as they came to the top of the third floor.
“I need you to get a message to the men in the woods. Tell them to lay low, but stay close. They’ll know what you mean.” As she was lead by her chains, Rogue didn’t take her eyes off their destination. She would finally look into the eyes of the man she had promised to kill.
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Author's Chapter Notes:
Sorry everyone, I posted the unedited version!! Here is the edited. Thanks Mel, I totally would have never caught that!!!! And thanks for the beta!
Chapter End Notes:
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