Hellfire And Damnation
Part Two: Gray Knight
by Alicia McKenzie
Once again, a reminder that this story is rated a very serious R for language, violence, and non-consensual sexual themes.
"They're waiting for you."Sebastian Shaw looked up from his glass and right into Tessa's cool, impassive eyes. "Ah," he said, a humorless smile tugging at the corner of his mouth. "Prompt of them. Particularly Adrian."
"Considering how he was occupied," Tessa said quietly, "yes, he was surprisingly prompt. It usually takes more than a polite invitation to draw him from his--amusements."
That seemed to be the preferred euphemism for Grant's sexual habits, Sebastian reflected a little grimly. "You--invited him yourself?"
"Of course," Tessa said, almost in a whisper. "He knows better than to touch me. One of the maids, on the other hand--" She hesitated. "I thought it was best."
Sebastian raised an eyebrow. "Is that a condemnatory edge I detect to your dulcet words, dear Tessa?" he asked drolly.
"Of course not."
"Of course. You did after all approve of my little plan, and played your own role most satisfactorily." Not that he'd expected any less. Her personal feelings aside, she knew where her loyalties lay.
"I did," Tessa said, calmly. A statement of fact, not a ploy for more compliments. "I do wonder, however, whether the next--variable in the situation will prove to be more volatile than you expected."
"And I'll remind you, once again, that I'm counting on that, my dear." He set his glass down on the table beside the armchair, and lifted the ornate, old-fashioned phone. "Entertain them for a while, Tessa. I have a brief phone call to make."
Tessa nodded, and gave him what seemed like a determinedly diffident smile. "I must confess, I'll be glad to see the end of this."
Sebastian nodded, already dialing the number. "I do understand, Tessa," he said, more gently than he would have anywhere except here, in the utmost privacy. "Take heart. Tonight's the last time either of us will have to put up with him--one way or the other."
"I doubt that will be of very much comfort to Domino."
Another calm statement of fact, not a challenge. Sebastian smiled wryly at her. "One uses tools best suited to the needs at hand. You do realize I don't wish her any particular harm." The sound of a voice on the other end of the phone drew his attention away from Tessa, and he smiled faintly. "Good afternoon," he said calmly to the unfamiliar woman, rather pleased that no one he knew had picked up the phone. He'd planned what to say if he'd had to deal with a hysterical X-Man, but things seemed to be working out quite ideally. "I'd like to speak to Nathan Summers."
***
Cold--I was cold. That was the first thing I registered, the next time I woke up. It didn't take me long to figure out why I felt cold. Knowing why only made the feeling worse.
I wasn't wearing the dark clothes I'd had on when I had come back to the Club this afternoon to do the job. It looked like someone had raided Emma Frost's old closet and then played 'let's dress up the unconscious woman'. Fuck. Lingerie or not, I wouldn't have worn anything like this IN bed--
I'd been moved, too. I was still on the bed, still in restraints, but this time I was tied in a spreadeagled position--and just as effectively immobilized, I found, testing the restraints again. Thrashing would be a better description of what I did at that point, but my pride had been battered enough for the day. Much better to pretend I was calmly assessing my possibilities of escape--
Shit. Shit! Tied up like this, dressed like a whore--damn, damn, DAMN! Grant had been serious. Those pictures, those damned pictures in Sebastian's files--the girls had been dressed like this. Probably on this same bed--
"Shit!" I hissed aloud. Letting it out didn't help. Son of a bitch--he is NOT going to do this to me, he's NOT--
I couldn't panic. Didn't have that luxury. I forced myself to relax against the bed, to slow my breathing and think past the pain. There had to be a way out. I could still feel the collar around my neck, so I couldn't count on wild luck to save me, but that didn't matter. It didn't. There HAD to be a way out.
My face was somehow managing to be sore and numb at the same time, and I couldn't quite see properly out of one eye. I wasn't even going to get into the headache. Terror was a great emotional equivalent of a bucket of ice water in the face, but even semi-clear thinking didn't seem to be making too much of a dent in the facts, here.
I was going to kill Sebastian. Somehow, some way, I was going to kill him for this. I could get around his mutant abilities, and I would. Maybe poison. Poison was good. A nice nerve gas, maybe. Or I could have Nate fry his brain--I mean, what else were telepaths good for?
Nate. Damn it, what I wouldn't give to have him walk into this room right now. I'd happily put up with all the damsel in distress jokes. Pride really wasn't an issue at the moment. I laughed a little wildly at the thought. No, there were times when pride did you absolutely no fucking good at all--
I started to struggle again. "Damn it!" My voice sounded high, too shrill in the silence of the room. "Grant, you fucking coward!"
Nothing. Either I was alone in the room, or he was sitting silently in some corner I couldn't see, watching me and laughing silently.
"This the only way you can get laid, you piece of twisted shit?" I snarled, and sagged back against the bed, breathing heavily. Possibilities spun through my head, and I didn't like any of them. The options sucked, as Tabitha would say.
"No," Grant's voice said pleasantly from somewhere off to my left. "You're missing the point. This is how I LIKE to get laid."
I jerked away from the voice, an instinctive reaction. Cold sweat was trickling down my face, making my eyes sting, and I couldn't stop shaking. "To each his own," I said raggedly, my voice sounding about five years old.
He laughed. "You're not going to tell me what this was all about, are you?"
"Oh, sure I will. Untie me, and I'll tell you who hired me. I'll write you a fucking BOOK on the subject," I offered wildly, not really hoping. But if he did--even if I had only a moment--maybe I could at least get him to kill me.
Cute, Dom. Really cute. Would you really rather die than be--be-- I closed my eyes, my breath catching in my throat. I was not going to cry. I was NOT. No tears from me, not matter what this bastard did--
I heard movement, from the direction his voice had come, and soft footsteps on the carpet. I opened my eyes and looked up. He was standing beside the bed, staring down at me with a faint, pleased smile. "Oh, you'll tell me," he said lightly. "Eventually. But I don't think untying you would be a very good idea."
"Really? I think we could both learn a lot," I said rapidly, managing not to let my eyes widen at what he was wearing. What, he wants to be White King so bad he plays dress-up in his bedroom? His fashion sense seemed to run along the same lines as Emma, scarily so--did that mean something? I thought, frantically. He had me dressed like Emma, he looked like a male version of Emma--"I mean," I said in a deliberately bantering tone, not knowing where the words were coming from, "you need a White Queen, don't you? Or do I have to be blonde and telepathic?"
Grant's eyes went flat, but his voice, when he spoke, was oddly dreamy. It made the hair on the back of my neck stand straight up. I'd hit something, pressed some button--and all I could think of as he sat down beside me on the bed, toying with one of my garters, was how much I wished I'd kept my mouth shut.
"Wouldn't that be nice? If you were her. That's how I choose the others, you know." He drew the garter downward, slowly. "They have her spirit--just a little of her spirit, but they have to be afraid, too. Otherwise I might really start to think they're her, and then I wouldn't be able to touch them." He got bored with the garter, and traced an old scar running along my left side. "She hides her fear, most of the time. Just like you do. But you're afraid now," he said, his hand moving upwards slowly, sliding beneath silk. I bit my lip until I tasted blood. "You're still trying to hide it, but you're terrified."
"I'm not like her," I whispered, my voice breaking. Part of me wanted to start screaming and get it over with. "Go indulge your fetish someplace else. Frost and I have nothing in common."
"I think you do," Grant murmured, his eyes finally lighting. "I did see it in her eyes, just once. The fear. It wasn't for me, and it was only there for a second, but I saw it. Her eyes looked just like yours do now. I think you're closer to her than I've ever gotten before--" He was kneeling on the bed now, not sitting, and he was still moving, looming over me--
Silk tore in his grip, and suddenly I was even more exposed, even more vulnerable. Colder. So cold. I was never going to be warm again. His fingers tangled in my hair again, yanked my head sideways, and I moaned, flinching at the feel of lips at my throat, insistent, seeking, hard enough to bruise.
"Tell me you hate me--" he whispered, his other hand moving down my body to finish stripping me. I knew how little there was to the outfit, but the sound of ripping silk went on forever, echoing over and over again in my ears. My heart thudded crazily in my chest, like it was trying to break free and fly out of the room. I wanted it to, wanted to follow it. "Tell me you hate me."
"No--you're nothing to me--" Feeling light-headed again, but it wasn't him, it was me. Muscles weren't working--couldn't fight, couldn't do anything but shiver--
"But you tried to kill me," Adrian Grant whispered back, his breath hot against my ear. Hot. I could feel him, the heat of him, and I was frozen, colder than ice--"That must mean you love me--please? Tell me you do?"
"No!" A choked whisper, no more. I wanted to scream it at him, over and over, but I couldn't, I couldn't find the voice--
"You do, I know you do--I'll make you beg me to let you say it--" And then there was a hard body crushing me into the bed, hot skin pressed against mine as he moved into position, trapping me so that I couldn't move, couldn't breathe, so close that all I could smell was him--
His face loomed over me, twisted into an animal-like mask, those turquoise eyes blank and lightless. Not human, nothing human in them at all. A last spurt of strength came from somewhere and I threw myself against the restraints once more, feeling them cut into my wrists and ankles--
But they didn't give. Grant laughed, almost breathlessly, and shoved me back down flat against the bed, fingers digging painfully into my shoulders.
I squeezed my eyes shut, bit my lip until I could feel the blood trickling down my chin. I wouldn't feel this, I thought feverishly. I wouldn't--I wasn't here, this wasn't me--
But it was--it was happening, it was real, and I couldn't get away, couldn't fight--trapped, just like before. Hurt, it hurt, and I still couldn't breathe properly--there were stars exploding on the insides of my eyelids, and the world was trying to come apart around me, disintegrating into a nightmarish haze--
I could feel myself slipping--so easy, it would be so easy to black out, just let it happen, but I couldn't. I knew that. It was one thing I knew, the one thing that stayed with me. Couldn't let myself pass out, not if I wanted to live through this--but holding on meant that I had to feel it, all of it. That I had to stay there, trapped in my body--had to stay where there was no one, nothing else but him, hurting me and enjoying it--
***
Tessa poured herself a drink, with mechanical precision. Sipping at it, she went over and sat down on the couch, beginning to methodically reinforce her shields. Layer after layer, until her telepathy was a shadow of its true self, reduced to almost nothing.
Unsafe, perhaps. Certainly unwise. But she didn't want to feel what Adrian was doing to Domino, not when Sebastian had forbidden her to interfere. If only he--but those had been his orders, and given that he had a very clear idea of what he wanted out of the situation, she knew better than to interfere.
Besides--hadn't she done enough? She'd used her telepathy to make Domino hesitate, and given Grant a subtle 'nudge' to make him look up at that window. He should have been dead already. He WOULD have been dead already, if she hadn't done what Sebastian had told her--
So she didn't let herself listen. If she didn't listen, she wouldn't be tempted. Selective deafness was a most useful talent, in this place and in her line of work--
Her door opened.
Her head whipping around, Tessa reached out in a sudden surge of anger to send whatever servant had disturbed her against her express permission away with a monumental migraine. How dare they? Was privacy too much to ask, after she'd gone as far as to do this, after she'd set another woman up to be--
The mind she touched was not that of a servant. Glowing fiercely gold, burning with rage, it lashed out at her with incredible, near-lethal force. The glass slid from Tessa's nerveless fingers, shattering against the carpet as she slumped bonelessly into the couch.
There was no time to fight back, no chance at all. The attack went right through her shields, and her defenses didn't just crumble--they shattered. She would have screamed her throat raw at the pain, at the brutal, merciless violation, but she couldn't. All she could do was lie there, her limbs twitching feebly in uncontrolled reactions as the tall, silver-haired figure stalked into the room.
Cable strode over to the couch and stood over her, the eyes that met hers full of a killing fury, and Tessa began to realize that 'volatile' had been a very poor choice of words on her part. Very poor--
#WHERE IS SHE?# The question rolled through her mind like thunder. #TELL ME! She's behind shields--WHERE? Tell me, or I'll burn out every synapse in your brain!!#
White pain exploded behind her eyes, and Tessa felt blood pour from her nose and ears as sun-gold power raged through her mind, scorching her to the core, incinerating the frail, desperate shield she threw up. All resistance gone, she opened her mouth to scream, but all that came out was a gurgling sound. He reached down and hauled her up off the couch, shaking her violently.
#TELL ME!# His hatred swept over her like a wave, a tsunami of murderous intent, and she somehow found breath for a wail as he tore into her mind, forcing his way into every hidden place, so blinded by fury that he didn't see, didn't find what she would have given him willingly, what she'd been TOLD to give--#WHERE IS SHE? I'll kill you and everyone in this flonqing house, I SWEAR IT!#
Somehow, with the last of her strength, Tessa pushed the memories of Grant forward--what she'd done, what she'd seen when she'd gone to the door of his room and seen Domino tied up on the bed, helpless. What she knew Grant would do to her--
The golden presence quaked with utter horror, and then withdrew from her mind, leaving her a burned-out shell, broken and bleeding and vulnerable. She forced her eyes open, met Cable's gaze, just in time to see shock turn to anguished rage.
"You set her up--" he snarled. "You and Shaw--STAB YOUR EYES!"
And he struck at her once more. Not a killing blow, not quite that---
But almost. So very close. She screamed as her mind exploded, a fireball of pain coalescing at the center of her awareness and exploding outwards like a star going nova, searing everything it touched. She was so caught up in the psychic agony that she didn't even feel it as he flung her body away violently, so hard that her head snapped backwards.
But she did feel the impact with the floor, found herself gasping for the air that it had driven from her lungs. Her eyes fluttered open, saw the blurred shape that was Cable stand over her for a heartbeat longer before he whirled in the direction of the door.
At that moment, the psychic atmosphere shattered with a silent cry of such bloodcurdling, unbearable terror and denial and pain that Tessa echoed it with one of her own as the impact of that sudden explosion of primal emotion sliced into her like a white-hot knife.
#DOM!# Cable's answering cry was as full of terror, but of a very different sort. Half-blinded by pain, her mind quivering in reaction to the outburst and Cable's violation, Tessa listened to his heavy footsteps leave the room at a run. It was the last thing she heard as the pain rose up in a great swell and dragged her down into the darkness.
***
Outside Tessa's room were two dark-suited men, already drawing guns. Men with guns. Flonqing idiots with guns. Getting in his way. Cable lashed out and smashed their minds into unconsciousness, not caring about the damage he did, or even waiting to see them hit the floor as he took off for the main staircase at a run.
They didn't matter. Nothing mattered. Dom's scream was echoing in his mind, her terror and pain piercing every defense he had, so strong he couldn't reach her, couldn't even break free himself to try and do something at a distance--
So he ran. He took the stairs three at a time, everything seeming to blur around him. At the top, he knocked over a terrified maid, but that didn't stop him. The east hallway, he thought, flashing through the images he'd gotten from Tessa's mind. There. That door. Grant's door. He focused on it, nothing but it as he ran. The moment before he hit it, it all but disintegrated under a telekinetic blow. Too much force, wasted energy, but it didn't matter, he was through, in the room, and he heard her scream again, not just an echo on the astral plane but with his ears, too--
Nathan Summers stopped dead in his tracks, what he was seeing searing into his brain, etching itself there forever. A growl started somewhere deep in his chest, but by then, his telekinesis was already lashing out, almost of its own accord.
And Adrian Grant screamed as he was thrown off the bed and against the wall with bone-crushing force. He crumpled limply onto the floor, into a broken heap, leaving a smear of blood and a spiderwebbing of cracks on the wall at the point of impact. Plaster dust rained down on his unmoving body.
Dom's next cry choked off in a strangled gasp, and violet eyes wide with shock met his as he whirled back towards the bed. Taking a step forward, he reached out to her telepathically--and then staggered backwards, her thoughts hitting him like a fist to the jaw as he opened up his shields to reach out to her.
Getawaydon'ttouchmeKILLYOU!
#Dom, it's okay, it's me--# He fumbled awkwardly for what had once been their link, before the Psi-War and the High Evolutionary. Wondering if there could be even a trace of it left, and why the flonq he had to have left it until now to find out--
But something had to be working, because he could sense a change in her, recognition swimming amid the darker emotions. Don't touch me! Her thoughts were slightly more coherent, if no less wild, and he swallowed, nodding jerkily.
#I won't,# he answered, trying to soothe her. #I won't, I promise--# Wincing a bit, he snapped her restraints telekinetically - Bright Lady, don't let her go for my throat-- - and took a cautious step back as she all but erupted off the bed. "Easy," he said aloud, his voice coming out strained - too strained, that's no way to calm her down! - as she fell to her knees and stayed there, shivering. He switched back to telepathy. #Dom, I can't get the collar from a distance--#
She was hugging herself, eyes still too wide, gaze fixed on a patch of floor somewhere to the left of his feet. Cable shrugged out of the duster he didn't remember putting on in the first place - not that he really remembered how he'd gotten here, to be perfectly honest - and took a few very slow, cautious steps towards her before he knelt, extending the coat in one hand.
#Dom--we have to go, Dom,# he sent, a little more urgently. #Dom, please--#
Her hand flashed out and she snatched the coat from him, rising and taking a swaying step backwards as she pulled it on with shaking hands. He didn't move towards her, only watched her as she buttoned it up, her eyes still on the floor. Her face was bruised, one eye nearly swelled shut. He hadn't been close enough to check her for other injuries, but she seemed amazingly steady on her feet, especially after--after--
Cable gritted his teeth, pushing the image away. Getting her out of here was the only thing that mattered at the moment. "We need to go, Dom."
"I know," she rasped, meeting his eyes, just for a moment. The shame and rage and pain there was almost unbearable to see. "Are you carrying?"
Shaking his head - he didn't even have his psimitar, stab his eyes! - he started to look past her, towards Grant's crumpled form. Because he knew, without asking, without even thinking about it, exactly what she wanted with a gun--
A wave of icy cold hit him, so hard and fast that it was almost like a physical blow. It left a strange lightheadedness in its wake, and Cable shook his head again, this time with a wince. He'd overextended himself forcing his way in here, he knew that. But this didn't feel right--
"Nate!"
Cold--so cold, and the room was spinning, going dark. Something soft beneath his face--carpet? He could hear himself gasping for air, but nothing was happening, the pain in his chest was only getting worse--
NATHAN!
Some rescue this had been--
***
No gun. He wasn't carrying a gun. Him, Cable, the walking armory--not carrying a gun.
Should've been funny. It wasn't. But it wasn't a problem, either. I wiped blood away from my mouth, almost absently. Hot blood--almost scalding. The taste of it was still in my mouth. I needed a drink. Maybe more than one. Several drinks. I needed--
I needed to kill Grant. And I didn't need a gun. There were lots of other ways--so many other ways. A thousand and one ways to kill someone with your bare hands, and I knew them all. I could take my pick, and then I could just walk right over there and do it--
I could make him hurt, before I killed him. It wouldn't take me that long. We had that much time, surely.
I'd make the time, if we didn't.
Stop shaking. Stop it. I laid my hand against the elaborately carved post of the bed, and took a few deep breaths. It didn't help. I could still smell him, on me. Could feel every bruise, every--
Stop. Breathe. Don't look at Nathan, don't meet his eyes. Just turn around, and do what you have to do--
It just--brushed me. I barely felt it - I was so cold, already - but I knew that icy, unnatural chill, I'd felt it twice already today. I froze--but nothing was happening. I was still breathing, my vision was staying steady, so why--
Something broke me out of that frozen moment, some flash of emotion that wasn't mine. A warning. My head whipped around just in time to see Nathan hit the floor like a marionette whose strings had just been cut.
No. No, this wasn't happening, not this--"Nate!" It came out cold, peremptory, but some other part of me was screaming at him, telling him to get up off the fucking floor. Get up, get UP, don't do this to me, I need you--
He was gasping for air, his whole body jerking with each futile breath, but more weakly as the seconds went all, and I was frozen again, all I could do was stand there and watch--
NATHAN! that terrified, angry part of me pushed its way to the forefront and shrieked, as he went suddenly limp--
Grant.
I whirled. Grant was hauling himself back to his feet, half-doubled over, clutching at his ribs. Blood was running down the back of his neck, bubbling at the corner of his mouth. "Kill him," he wheezed, "kill him--before you can touch me, bitch--"
Ten feet. Just about ten feet, until I could have my hands around his throat.
I was moving before the thought had even finished forming. Crossing the distance, knowing exactly what I'd do, exactly how I'd stop him--
Grant stiffened, what little color there was left in his face draining away and his eyes going very wide. Something, some instinct brought me to a staggering stop, and I watched in disbelief as his mouth worked silently, as if he had something to say that he had to get out, but couldn't--
He toppled to the floor with a choked noise, and stopped breathing a few seconds later. Blood began to pool beneath his head
He wasn't getting up. Not this time. I swallowed, shaking my head slowly and backing away. Part of my mind registered the dent in the wall, put two and two together, and pointed out that people didn't generally fare very well when slammed into walls by alpha-class telekinetics. But he shouldn't have just--keeled over like that, not unless--
I backed into something, and whirled, lashing out with a strangled cry. The blow caught Nate across the jaw and he staggered backwards for a few steps before he caught himself.
"Easy, Dom," he rasped, straightening. He didn't seem too steady on his feet, but his eyes met mine, level and cold and yet somehow so worried at the same time. "He's dead. Let's go."
I winced, cradling my hand. Felt like I'd broken something, damn it. I should know better than to punch him like that. "What did you do to him?" I asked roughly. I was shaking again, couldn't seem to stop. I wasn't going to get into how relieved I was to see him on his feet, but I was still so cold--
"Gave him a stroke," Nathan growled, and then burst into a fit of coughing. I started to reach out, to steady him, but stopped in mid-movement, something inside me twisting into a cold, hard knot at the idea of touching him, or letting him touch me--
"SUMMERS!" The shout was distant, muffled but still audible. Perfectly recognizable, as well.
"Shaw," I said hoarsely. There was someone I'd like to see dead before I left, too. Unfortunately, that didn't seem to be much of an option at the moment, unless Nate had some trick I didn't know about up his sleeve. "Any suggestions?"
Nathan's expression turned--strange, for lack of a better word. "I guess he found Tessa," he murmured.
Found Tessa? What the hell was he--I blinked at him. "You didn't."
"Why? Are you complaining?" he snapped, his voice brittle. "Don't you wonder why you froze, instead of shooting that motherless flonq when you had him in your sights? You don't freeze like that, Dom. It wasn't YOU."
"She--" I couldn't finish the sentence. He nodded, his eye blazing gold, and turned to face Sebastian as he burst into the room.
"Summers!" Shaw snarled, clearly in a towering rage. He didn't even look at Grant. He'd EXPECTED Grant to be dead by the time he got up here, the part of my mind still functioning logically realized.
Tessa had stopped me. Shaw had planned all this.
Something snapped inside me, and I lunged forward--about two steps, until Nate caught me.
"You bastard!" I hissed, struggling in Nate's grip.
Shaw didn't even look at me. "I was going to let you both walk out of here," he growled at Nathan. "I believe I've changed my mind."
Through the haze of fury, I heard Nathan, incredibly, laugh.
"What makes you think we were ready to leave?"
to be continued...