Wiser Days: Part 2
by Alicia McKenzie
DISCLAIMER: The characters belong to Marvel, and are used without permission for entertainment purposes only.
AUTHOR'S NOTE: This story is based on my version of Cable and Wisdom's first meeting, related briefly in True Believers. Many thanks to Luba for never letting me forget this little story; Luba, I promise not to wait another year before I finish this....;) I've even got part three started already! ;)
Rated PG for some bad language.....;)
*Bloody--fucking--hell.* I put on my best innocent face - it took something of an effort at the moment - and stared right back at the man I was supposed to kill. "Following you?" I asked, letting bewilderment creep into my voice. "Sorry to burst your bubble, mate, but I think you've gotten me mixed up with someone else."
"Oh, I doubt that," Cable said, that sardonic smile returning. "You've been trailing me for three days, intending to put me out of your employers' misery." I swallowed, and his smile actually widened, his eyes boring into me with an intensity that made me flinch. "You think too loudly, Mr. Wisdom."
Well, the meaning behind that was more or less perfectly bloody clear. I made a mental note to kill Walsingham at the soonest possible opportunity. *Bloody bureaucrats--you'd think they'd bloody well tell me if my target was a sodding telepath!*
"Life's just full of surprises, isn't it?" Cable asked, stepping up to the bar and calling something out to the bartender in fluent-sounding Spanish. The man came over and served us both, giving Cable a wary look as he did. Cable merely smirked and paid him, only then turning back to me. "Have a drink, kid. You look like you need it."
"Not that I'm not grateful for the drink, mate," I said almost desperately, "but I really don't know what the bloody hell you're talking about."
Cable snorted, tossing his drink back in one swallow. "Drop the act, boy," he snapped, setting the glass back down on the bar. He glared down at me, his expression shifting, swiftly and completely, from amiability to towering irritation, as if he'd just dropped a mask. "I've got business in this city that's too important for me to be splitting my attention between it and you."
I picked up my glass, grimacing. Bloody tequila. Hated the stuff. I took a sip anyway, wondering what the hell I was supposed to do next. I'd never had an assignment go wrong in quite this way before. Seemed pretty futile to keep bluffing, though.
I downed the rest of the drink, set the glass on the bar, and whirled, letting go with a full spread of hotknives, right at him.
Only he wasn't there. They hit the bar instead, nearly incinerating the man who'd had the poor luck to be standing on Cable's other side. The unfortunate bloke jumped back, screaming bloody murder, and I had about a split-second to wonder where the hell my target had gone before a very large fist slammed into my jaw like a piledriver and sent me sprawling.
"Now I know you're an amateur," Cable growled, hauling me up off the floor by the collar. "You want to try that again?"
I was already in the process of doing just that, but something knocked my aim off, as if an invisible hand had just reached down out of the sky and wrenched my arm downwards so that the knives wound up scorching the floor instead of Cable. Whatever it was, it felt like it had wrenched my arm right out of the socket. Swearing in pain, I brought my other hand up, but Cable grabbed my wrist and squeezed, hard enough that I heard something crack. For some reason, he looked frustrated. My head still spinning from that first punch, I couldn't quite understand why.
"It was a rhetorical question, boy!" he snapped.
I don't know what possessed me to try and kick him in the balls at that point. Sheer bloody-mindedness, probably. It didn't really matter, because as soon as I started to move, he growled something in a language I didn't recognize and proceeded to throw me halfway across the room. I came down hard on a table, which broke beneath me as if it had been made of toothpicks. I laid there for a moment, stunned. The part of my mind still functioning properly pointed out, helpfully, what a stupid idea it was to be going hand to hand with the man. I told it to sod off and somehow managed to roll back to my feet and stand up straight. My jaw was still numb, my right arm was next to useless, and I was sure I was going to be black and blue in the morning, but I'd been damned if I was going down this easy.
Cable was still standing over by the bar, not even breathing heavily. Looking bloody well pissed, though. "Why does it always have to be the hard way?" he muttered and lunged at me. I managed to send a few more hotknives at him. He brought his left arm up to shield his face, and the hotknives hit him, scorching through the sleeve of his jacket. Now, generally, when I hit people with the bloody things, they do a lot of screaming and falling down. That's just the way it is.
I wasn't nearly concussed enough not to be a little perplexed by the fact that Cable stopped for just long enough to rip the smouldering sleeve of his jacket off at the shoulder, revealing a very large and muscular arm bigger around than both of mine put together. Which, incidentally, looked like it was made of steel. Which was odd, really--I was still staring at him when he slammed into me like a freight train and I found myself on the floor again.
"I am in no mood for this!" I heard him bark as he dragged me back up again. A kick to the gut doubled me over, another fist to the jaw snapping my head around to the side so hard I saw stars. I staggered backwards, striking out feebly. The blow didn't connect. My head connected with the wall a moment later, though, and everything went black.
***
"Wisdom."
Garbage. Why did I smell garbage?
There was a metallic click, an unmistakable sound that snapped me out of my haze immediately. I opened my eyes, blinking rapidly to try and clear my vision, and found myself propped up against an exterior wall - *the alley?* - with Cable crouched in front of me, holding a gun to my head.
*Fuck.* I stared at him silently. Raising an eyebrow, he stared right back at me, and I noticed for the first time that his eyes were mismatched, one gray and the other blank gold, with no pupil or iris. It was bloody creepy. I was fairly sure they hadn't looked like that back in the bar--
"They didn't," Cable said calmly. The barrel of the gun was still pressed lightly against my temple. "You saw what I wanted you to see." I swallowed, judging my chances of getting him with a hotknife at this range, before he pulled the trigger and blew my head off. "I wouldn't. If you do, I WILL blow your head off. Don't mistake the fact that you're still alive for soft-heartedness on my part."
"So why, then?" I grated. "Care to enlighten me?"
"Whim," Cable said with a thin, humorless smile that chilled me to the bone. "I was curious to see what you'd do, if I let you live."
I forced myself not to look at the gun. "You still deciding?" I asked, as dispassionately as I could, still meeting his eyes. Fuck him. If he wanted information, he was going to have to work for it, the bastard. And I sure as bloody hell wasn't going to beg.
Something changed in those strange eyes as I spoke. "Depends. Are you willing to listen to me if I put the gun away?" The smile grew into a decidedly nasty smirk as I opened my mouth. "Keep in mind, I'll know if you're lying."
"Listen to you about what?" I temporized. He lowered the gun, as if I'd given him the right answer. I didn't take advantage of the opportunity, mostly because I wasn't sure I could hit him with a hotknife before that gun came back up.
"About why you're on an unauthorized mission," he said calmly. "And why your employers would have disavowed you, even if you'd carried it out successfully."
I gaped at him for a moment. "What are you soddin' well on about?" I finally said, more unsteadily than I intended. This was insane. This was just him trying to mess with my head—
But if he was a telepath, he didn't need to do this. He could play better head games, ones I couldn't do a thing about--right?
He holstered the gun and rose, offering me a hand up. After a moment, I took it. "You were sent here by a faction in British Intelligence working for a third party," he said, very precisely. "The operations I'm 'interfering' in are being run by that third party."
I snorted. "Sure, and I'm just supposed to believe that?" I tried to be surreptitious about working my jaw, which was still numb. I could barely move my right arm at all, and my head was pounding. He certainly had kicked the crap out of me with very little effort. Clearly, frontal assault was not the way to go--
There was a gun pointed at my forehead before I could blink. "Let's just make this really clear," Cable said calmly. "I'm willing to prove it to you. I'll show you what these operations are all about, and I suspect that will be enough." The safety clicked on the gun. "But if I sense you plotting to stab me in the back or something, Wisdom, I will kill you without a second thought. Do you understand me?"
A few different possible quips sprung to mind, but I didn't use any of them. "Fine," I grated. "Show me." I didn't trust the man, couldn't be sure he was telling the truth - he might just be a good liar - but what he'd said about how I'd be disavowed even if I did kill him--that bothered me. I wasn't overwhelmingly attached to my career, but I liked my head where it was, and I'd heard too many stories about what could happen to agents who wound up on the wrong side of the street for whatever reason.
Cable lowered the gun. "Good choice," he said curtly. "You might get out of this in one piece after all."
"Look, fuck you, you sodding--"
"Let's go," he said, cutting me off. I opened my mouth, and he glared at me. "It's a limited-time offer, Wisdom," he said warningly, and turned away.
Pretty bloody trusting of him, or maybe he knew I wouldn't take advantage. Curiosity was going to be my fatal flaw one of these days.
***
He took me over the rooftops, rather than through the streets. The air wasn't appreciably better up here, I noted a little sarcastically. I was going to be glad to see the end of this bloody miserable city, when this was all over--assuming, of course, that it ended with me leaving here on my own two feet rather than in a box, or not at all.
"Think positively," Cable muttered and jumped from the roof of the building we were on to the roof of the warehouse next to it. I eyed the empty air between a little warily, and then jumped, managing to stumble as I landed. Cable reached out and prevented me from doing a face-plant, hauling me back upright by the collar. I jerked away, glowering at him, and he shrugged. "We're here," he said, inclining his head towards the ramshackle access door. "Stay quiet, and stay behind me."
He was already halfway to the door by the time I managed to pull myself together and follow him. I wasn't usually this slow off the ball. Maybe I had a concussion--he HAD been using my head to put dents in the wall of the bar, after all. "Now, wait just a--"
#Be QUIET.#
I nearly jumped out of my skin. *Stay the fuck out of my head, you bleeding wanker!*
He stopped dead in his tracks, shaking his head as if I'd just shouted in his ear. Suppose I had, in a way. Turning slowly, he gave me the sort of level, tolerant look you gave a child who'd just done something stupid. "If there are any telepaths down there, you just announced our arrival," he murmured softly.
Bloody hell. Good show, Wisdom. I didn't let the flash of chagrin show on my face, though. Bloody telepaths. Put on earth to make the job more difficult, I swear--
Cable turned back to the door. "Come on," he said softly. I swallowed whatever retort I might have made and followed him. He wouldn't be walking in there so casually if I'd tipped off someone in there, would he? Didn't strike me as the type to be that reckless--
The stairs were narrow and unlit, rundown enough that I couldn't help a sigh of relief once we were down safe. But the warehouse was empty, looked like it had been for years. "There's nothing here," I grated.
Cable gave me a withering look. "Follow me," he muttered. "And keep your eyes open." He pulled something out of his pocket, something pen-sized with a glowing light on the end, and I frowned as he rotated the top half of it and then stuck it back where he'd gotten it.
"What's that?"
#I'm covering our asses, boy. Now shut your flonqing mouth before I do it for you.#
Bastard. But I followed him to over to the east wall, and watched him kneel beside a grating on the floor. He pulled it up slowly, obviously taking care not to make too much noise. "There's a ladder, with about a six foot drop at the bottom." he said in a low voice, and then raised an eyebrow when I didn't move. "You can either go down first and take the chance of me shooting you in the head, or be climbing down wondering if I'm going to jump you at the bottom. Your choice."
I glowered at him, but climbed down into the hole anyway. Cable shook his head, his expression amused. "I'll pull the grate down after us," he went on. "When you're at the bottom, stop."
The ladder went down at least fifty feet, and there was a thin layer of filthy water at the bottom. Sewer, maybe? Didn't look quite right, though. Tunnels ran in four directions from the ladder, elevated and dry as a bone, as far as I could see. "You didn't bring a light, did you?" I muttered as Cable jumped down beside me.
He smirked again. I was getting really tired of that bloody smirk. "I see in the dark. Just stay behind me and try not to fall."
"I'm really beginning to wish I'd killed you," I muttered. A soft laugh echoed inside my head, and Cable walked forward confidently into the shadows. I grumbled to myself and followed.
Twenty minutes, maybe more, in complete darkness. Then down into another ladder, into what had to be air ducts of some sort. *You sure you're going to fit?* I thought at him tentatively.
#Positive,# his voice whispered in my mind. I decided not to shout at him this time. #I've been this way before. No noise from this point, though. Their security isn't going to pick us up, but I can't vouch for them not hearing us.#
We emerged out into a bigger space, some sort of junction, and I looked down and scowled. A huge fan was sunken into the floor--the ceiling, rather, and even though it was turning rapidly, I had a pretty damned good view of the room below us.
I looked up at Cable, who'd moved around to the other side of the crawlspace. He'd taken the pen- thing out of his pocket and was fiddling with it again, frowning. I decided I liked the frown about as much as I liked the smirk.
Cable grimaced, and then gestured down at the room. #This is what you came to see. So watch.#
I peered down into the room, still scowling. Some sort of lab, I decided, noting the equipment. A lot of tables--nearly a dozen that I could see, and probably more, given that there was a lot of the room out of site.
Tables. Tables with restraints. Something clicked in my mind and I looked up at him sharply. Cable stared back at me grimly, and then nodded.
I managed to keep quiet and watch. A bunch of white-suited sods came in and worked with the equipment for a while; preparing it, from the look of it. I didn't know what half the stuff was supposed to do; it sure didn't look like anything I'd ever seen before.
Then guards started to bring in people, one by one, and one of the 'doctors', in a voice with an accent that could've been a twin to my own, started to order them strapped to those bloody tables. I still managed to stay quiet, even when it started to become obvious what the equipment was for.
But something started to fray in me when they started bringing in kids.
I looked up at Cable, breathing hard, and he shook his head vehemently. #No.#
*You're just going to watch?* I thought at him, outraged. What the fuck was this? He brought me here, showed me this, and he just wanted to sit here?
#It's the only thing either of us can do.#
Each table I could see had a pair of whitecoats stationed at it, like some sort of assembly line. The image made me swallow hard, and I held onto my self-control with both hands. Watch, he said. What had happened to him 'interfering'?
I leaned forward, forgetting the mission, even Cable's ominous prediction of what would happen to me if I killed him. To hell with watching. I didn't bloody well care who was behind this, what the truth was. All I knew for sure was that I was NOT just sitting here and watching--
#Wisdom. Don't be stupid.#
"Fuck that," I muttered, and burned through the floor.
I managed to fall on a guard and break his neck, rather than mine. Lucky me. I put two hotknives through the throat of the next one who rushed me, and one through the eye of the closest doctor. Had to be careful--couldn't hit any of the people on the tables--
An alarm started to shrill, and suddenly there were doctors scattering and guards coming out of the woodwork. I threw myself behind one of the tables to avoid a hail of bullets. It only made me angrier. They didn't care if they hit their guinea pigs, that was for damned sure. Bastards.
Bloody fucking hell, but there were a lot of them. "A little help, here?" I shouted in the direction of the ceiling as I popped back up.
More guns. I hated guns. Some sort of bio-blast whizzed over my head as I launched myself into another knot of guards, and I swore. Then again, guns might be preferable. Start throwing other mutants into the mix, and things could get messy fast.
"Cable!" I snarled, and broke the jaw of the guard in front of me. "If I'm not interrupting something sodding well IMPORTANT, could you give me a hand?" I didn't get an answer. Fuck. He'd left or something. Not that I blamed him. If I'd been him, I'd have left me. Stupid. This had been really stupid. Altruistic shit like this could get a bloke killed--
The boy on the closest table screamed as bullets flew over him. I swore a blue streak, burning through his restraints as quickly as I could and pulling him off the table to the floor. "Stay down!" I snapped, and came back to my feet just in time to see Cable jump through the hole I'd made in the ceiling and start moving back and forth between the tables as leisurely as if he was out for a Sunday stroll, picking off the guards one by one.
So he hadn't left after all. Nice of him. I took down a guard trying to shoot him in the back, turned to the next bastard--
Then pain, as if my brain had just exploded inside my skull.
Then nothing.
to be continued...