“This is the part where you run away,” he said.
They did. Sabretooth let them go without a second look. He resumed his whistling but left the bark behind as he continued on down the path. Eva and Christopher exchanged wide-eyed glances, and Eva started to wonder if they’d gotten in over their heads. But they continued to follow a few yards in his wake, keeping to the trees as much as possible.
Further down the path, a four-member SWAT team stepped out to confront him. This time, Sabretooth took a moment to crack his knuckles. The officers spread out in a wide circle that he couldn’t possibly cover, but he still surveyed them with obvious delight, eager to throw down. One stepped toward him with a shock stick in his hand, hoping to subdue him with an intense blast of high voltage electricity. Sabretooth dashed forwards, teeth bared. As he did, the other SWAT officers moved in behind him, hoping to overwhelm him with numbers.
Eva knew this was her moment. She bubbled, hoping to freeze the three cops who were trying to flank him, but she only caught two, suspending them in a glistening moment in time, their sticks raised moments before they struck. The third sidestepped at precisely the wrong moment and saw her. He drew his gun and took aim.
“No! Eva!”
Christopher shoved her back, his lips pressed firm with determination despite his bloodless face as he protected her with his body once again, his arms held out wide.
But Sabretooth dispatched his attacker with swift efficiency and leaped towards them, taking the bullet himself. Red blood sprayed the air, and he snarled in anger and pain.
The gunman sighted on her again, and she stumbled backwards, wishing for Captain America’s bravery or Wolverine’s anger or someone’s anything, because she didn’t feel ready for this. This fight wasn’t anything like the Danger Room, and she didn’t like it at all.
But Sabretooth launched himself forward a second time, hitting the hapless gunman just as he pulled the trigger, sending the shot wide. The gunman screamed as Sabretooth’s claws descended on him. The mutant mercenary rose from the lifeless body, his tension slowly draining as he realized that they’d neutralized all of their attackers. He reached toward the bloody hole in his trench and bared his teeth but otherwise seemed none the worse for wear.
The two remaining attackers still stood with their batons raised in Eva’s bubble, ready to strike.
“Too bad you can’t turn them so they hit each other when you pop that thing,” he said.
Eva stepped out onto the path. “Do you need healing?” she asked, worried.
Sabretooth’s eyes flashed. “Get your butt back in those trees. The bullet went through. It’s already closing.”
“Don’t talk to me like that,” she snapped, all of the stress and fear finally overtaking her. “I’m just trying to be a decent person.”
“Fine. Get your butt back into the trees, please.”
He didn’t sound any kinder the second time, but she left the path anyway. She didn’t want to get into an altercation with him. He’d been kind enough to them so far, but he clearly had a short fuse. She didn’t want to get on his bad side. She had the feeling that that would be a very poor idea.
“Look, missy, I don’t matter,” Sabretooth muttered. “You help keep Dreadlocks here safe until we get to the garage, OK?”
“Fine,” she said. It came out snippier than she’d wanted, but adrenaline still coursed through her.
“Thanks,” he snapped back, so quickly that she thought she might have imagined it. Then he continued on toward the garage as if nothing had happened. If not for the spatters of blood and the bodies they left in their wake, she might have thought she’d imagined the entire thing.
Chapter 13
Sabretooth led them into a large parking structure. It smelled like rain, old food, and motor oil, a pervasive stench that seemed to have permanently soaked into the concrete. He wrinkled his nose but otherwise didn’t comment. Christopher thought that with his enhanced senses the reek must be overwhelming. He’d spent a lot of time wishing for more useful mutant abilities, but he hadn’t stopped to consider the drawbacks before now.
He was still learning how to use his abilities, after all, and Sabretooth was a mercenary. He could only hope that he had what it took to get the job done so they could get out of here. To his immense surprise, he couldn’t wait to return to that moldy dump of a school so he could listen to David and Fabio complain about tacos. He actually found himself looking forward to it.
Inside the parking structure, a door with chipped red paint led into an echoing stairwell. Sabretooth led them down the twisting flights of stairs into progressive levels of sub-basements. Red. Green. Yellow. Christopher began to wonder if this place might run out of rainbow colors and if Sabretooth’s friend might be hiding on the puce level. But he stopped at the yellow door instead.
On the other side sat a few sports cars and a rusty minivan that looked like it hadn’t been moved in about ten years. Somewhere on the levels above them, a car alarm bleeped incessantly. Something moved in the darkness. Sabretooth stiffened but quickly relaxed as a small rodent emerged into the light, carrying a chip bag across the pavement with happy industriousness.
“This way,” he muttered, gesturing for them to follow.
Christopher and Eva remained shoulder to shoulder as he led them through the warren of mostly empty parking stalls. As they walked, Christopher checked his pocket to feel the comforting presence of the X-Copter remote. After everything that Sabretooth had done to keep them safe, he’d begun to trust the surly mutant, but if something did go wrong, he could call the chopper. The thought reassured him.
Sabretooth stopped at a door designated “Office” with a dingy placard.
“In here,” he said.
At one point, the door had been held closed with a heavy padlock, but as he entered the room, Christopher noticed that the metal panels that had secured the door had been pulled loose as if by some great force. The panels were thick and reinforced, built for inner city nightlife and minimal supervision, but they had offered no obstacle to Sabretooth. Christopher could imagine him blasting through the door with a single well-placed kick, the metal screaming as it tore. He touched the jagged edge of the ripped steel, blew out an impressed breath, and followed the others inside.
The office space left much to be desired. A desk ran along one wall, choked with papers, used coffee cups, and a desktop computer with a cracked screen. A pinup calendar hung on the wall above the desk. Someone with a sense of humor had drawn a bikini and mustache on the model using a black marker. The storage area at the back was cluttered with detritus and junk. A single fluorescent light hummed and flickered, doing its best to chase away the gloom but still leaving the corners shadowed. In the far corner, behind a metal storage rack stocked with jumper cables and warning signs, something on the floor shifted in pain.
A sense of wrongness punched Christopher in the gut, twisting his insides. He had the sudden urge to grab Eva, use the remote, and take off in the X-Copter without looking back. He would have thought that by this time he would have stopped being so frightened, or at least developed some kind of tolerance to it, but if anything, this wave of fear was stronger than anything he’d ever felt before. He felt physically ill. His stomach snarled audibly.
“You OK?” Eva asked.
“Yeah,” he responded shakily.
She looked less than convinced, and he didn’t blame her. He didn’t know what had gotten into him. At some point, he’d have to get used to being in danger if he was going to be an X-Man, but his nerves seemed to be getting worse instead of better, and he didn’t know why. Rather than embarrass himself, he offered up a convenient excuse.
“I’m feeling a little off,” he confessed. “Healing burns through a lot of calories, and I guess I must be low. I’ve got the shakes.”
He held up his hand to demonstrate. It was only half the truth, but it would do for now.
Maybe he’d confess to Eva later, but he’d put his head in Sabretooth’s mouth before he’d confide in him.
Sabretooth looked from the shadowed figure to Christopher and back again. “Can you hold on another minute?” he asked the figure on the ground. “This kid is a healer. I ought to feed him before he keels over. I don’t want him punking out in the middle of fixing you up.”
“I can wait…”
The response was faint, masculine. Jagged with pain. Sabretooth’s face contorted with some overwhelming emotion that Christopher couldn’t place. Fear? Worry? Desperation? Maybe all of them at once. But Sabretooth closed his eyes for a moment and calmed himself with visible effort, only opening them again when he was under control.
“There’s a drink machine back here,” he said to Christopher. “You should get some sugar in you before you pass out. You’ll need it to help him.” He indicated the figure in the corner.
“That sounds great,” Christopher admitted. “But I don’t have any change.”
“No problem.”
Sabretooth walked over to the machine, an older model with a faded-out display panel. He put his ear to it, listened for a moment, and then delivered a single, brutal punch. The panel exploded in a shower of sparks and a feeble electronic whine. He reached into the guts of the machine and pulled out a cold can, condensation dripping from its sides.
“Here you go, kid. Have some soda,” he said.
“I’m from the Midwest. It’s pop. That’s a hill I’ll die on,” said Christopher.
He took the can and chugged the entire contents, then let out an enormous burp right in Sabretooth’s face. He felt mortified, but Sabretooth only laughed.
Christopher felt a bit more human – or mutant, to be more accurate – as the sugar hit his bloodstream. He looked toward the darkened corner.
“OK, so what’s going on here?” he asked. “Can we get some light so I can see what I’m working with?”
“It hurts my eyes,” said the man in the corner.
“Oh, quit being such a big baby,” said Sabretooth, pushing the storage rack over without any apparent effort at all.
Without the storage rack in the way, the light illuminated the damaged figure of a man on the floor. Christopher thought he looked vaguely familiar but couldn’t place the face. He had slicked-back brown hair and piercing blue eyes, currently crinkled in pain. He wore a strange jumpsuit made out of a copper-colored material that looked like it belonged in a science fiction movie. Two holes had been blasted through it, one on his chest and one high on the meat of his thigh. The skin beneath had been cooked to cinders.
Whoever this guy was, he had one heck of a pain tolerance. Christopher couldn’t believe he wasn’t screaming. Probably shock. He’d been waiting all this time for someone to help him. At that moment, Christopher felt ashamed. Someone was hurt, but he’d gotten used to mutants getting injured. Somehow that had become commonplace, and Christopher hadn’t treated it as seriously as he should have, and was just drinking pop while this man was suffering. He would never make the same mistake again.
“My name is Christopher,” he said, dropping to his knees next to the injured man. “I’m here to help you.”
The man grunted. “Are you a doctor?”
Christopher shook his head. What did this guy think he was going to do, perform a skin graft in the middle of this dusty office?
“I’m a mutant. A healer. I’ll get you fixed up right away,” he said.
“No mutants.”
The guy feebly tried to push his hands away, and Christopher looked up at Sabretooth with a question in his eyes. He’d never once run into someone who didn’t want to be healed. Maybe they might fear him after he’d done it, but refusing his help just to prove a point seemed unthinkable to him, especially considering how much pain this guy had to be in.
“This is Graydon Creed,” said Sabretooth, as if that would explain everything.
“Oh, crap,” Eva murmured.
As distracted and exhausted as he was after all of the chaos the day had held so far, it took Christopher a moment to place the name. Now he knew where he’d recognized the face.
Graydon Creed had made a run at the presidency a few years back and seemed like he might actually win the prize. His campaign had been built on hate and fear, most of which had solidly been directed at mutants. People flocked to his messages of us versus them and his promises of safety and a return to the good old days of yore. His ma had voted Creed and even put a bumper sticker on their old station wagon. Even before Christopher had discovered he was a mutant, it made him feel ashamed and uncomfortable, like when he’d discovered that one of his elementary school friends had family members in the Klan.
Then Graydon had been assassinated at one of his rallies, and everyone had assumed that the mutants had gotten to him. Although clearly, the assassination had been a ruse, because the politician was up and walking, if a little charred. Christopher had never been so close to a famous person before, and especially not one who campaigned against his right to exist. It distracted him from his task. He studied Graydon’s face outright.
“What?” asked Creed.
Questions ran through Christopher’s head, but he couldn’t bring himself to ask them. He didn’t think he’d like the answers.
“I always wondered how your teeth got so white,” he said instead.
“Cosmetic dentistry,” spat the injured man.
“Huh. Go figure.”
Christopher reached for him again, and for the second time, Creed batted him away. Without quite thinking about it, Christopher smacked Graydon’s hand, fixing him with a stern glare.
“Listen here,” he said. “I don’t care whether you were almost the president or not. I don’t care whether you’re Sabretooth’s friend or not. Right now, you’re my patient, and it’s my job to keep you alive, and you’re going to quit acting like a spoiled brat and let me do my job. My dad was a Marine, and once he got wounded in enemy territory, and the people who lived there offered to treat his wounds, and do you think he smacked them like a toddler? Heck no, he didn’t. He gave them some extra food and helped them keep watch that night for the patrols. Because that’s what you do when you’re not a complete nincompoop.”
After a shocked pause, Graydon’s ultra-white teeth flashed at him. “Did you just call me a nincompoop?”
“Yes, I did.” His attack of confidence began to fade away as quickly as it had come. “Because you were being one. Weren’t you?”
“He sure was,” said Eva. “Can you get on with it? This office smells like old hamburger, and it’s making me feel ill.”
“Tell me about it,” said Sabretooth. He tapped his nose. “Enhanced senses aren’t always a field of daisies, missy.”
“What happened, anyway? The cops were less than forthcoming,” she said.
He shrugged. “Not much of a story. We were at the Grace when the Sentinels showed up. Seems like the darned things are everywhere these days. They must multiply like rabbits. Anyway, I told Graydon to stay under cover, but somebody doesn’t know how to follow simple instructions. He got hit. So after I took out the Sentinels, I found somewhere nearby to stash him. He was in shock, and I didn’t want to cart him around too much and risk hurting him more. Plus, I knew it was just a matter of time before more Sentinels showed up.”
“I keep meaning to ask somebody,” Eva piped up. “What’s up with the Sentinels? I mean, what’s their beef?”
“Bolivar Trask designed them to hunt mutants. No beef involved. It’s just what they do, so get used to it.” Sabretooth’s eyes narrowed. “Just how new are you?”
“We’ve been at the school about a month or so.”
Sabretooth hit his head on the wall. It left a mark and knocked the calendar down.
“Come on, Summers, can’t you at least send me newbies with some seasoning?” he said,
looking up at the ceiling.
“I don’t think he can hear you,” Eva scoffed. “Besides, it’s not like we’re incompetent. We fought our way out of Limbo.”
“Yeah?”
Flashbacks flooded Christopher at the mention of Limbo, distracting him once again. It had been the first time he’d realized that joining the X-Men could truly kill him, and he’d folded like a paper airplane. Dormammu’s magic had been overwhelmingly powerful, and he’d outmaneuvered Illyana, pulling her into Limbo and forcing her to take her demonic Darkchilde form. Anyone who could dominate Illyana – on her home turf, no less – was someone that Christopher didn’t want to mess with. He’d made a mental note to avoid Dormammu at all costs.
“It was the scariest thing I’ve ever done,” Eva admitted. “I dream about it most nights. Do the nightmares go away after you’ve been at this for a while?”
“I don’t dream,” Sabretooth replied, his clipped tone making it obvious that he lied, and equally obvious that it would be fatal to point that out.
“Could you two pipe down?” Christopher asked, rubbing the bridge of his nose and trying to block them out. “I’m trying to concentrate here.”
“My apologies, Christopher,” Eva said.
“Yeah, sorry, kid.”
Sabretooth sounded legitimately chastised, and the two of them fell into blessed silence. Christopher turned his attention back to Graydon. To his surprise, the politician seemed almost patient. Given that he was sitting there with two holes burned into him by giant robots, Christopher thought that he ought to be writhing in pain. He must have nerves of steel.
“I’m sorry this took so long,” he said. “I didn’t mean to leave you hurting.”
Graydon seemed nonplussed by the genuine regret in his voice, but he scraped up an attitude anyway. “Don’t worry about it,” he said. “It’s not like I wanted your help anyway.”
Christopher ignored the dig and reached for the politician, ready to wrestle him into submission if possible. But this time, Graydon just closed his eyes as if he couldn’t bear to watch. At least he’d stopped fighting.
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