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stormxpadme · 2 years

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Whumptober 2022 No. 25 - Duct tape & “You better start talking.”

Thanks to @sneakymystique for the idea for this prompt!

2032

No matter how Scott had managed to piss off one of his enemies this time – in a bad year, it was enough to breathe too loudly certain peoples' way –, this was not how he had imagined his Friday evening to go.

With Ororo and Kurt watching the school, this had been supposed to be the first night off in months, reserved for two far-too-expensive concert tickets and the other half of Katja's and his polycule promising them, they'd be there to get them after the gig for a very special kind of aftershow party in some exclusive kink club. Scott had been fully prepared to wake up from a few hours of fun with the hangover of his life and being sore in all the best places ... But definitely not from a far too high dose of some anesthetic, judging by dull nausea in his stomach, and with whatever damage a too-close enemy encounter would bring this time. For the moment, he was cranky more than anything, opening his eyes to some bright headlight aimed straight at him, silently cursing at a killer headache throbbing behind his forehead. How was this always happening on date night? The odds to make it home anytime soon were frustratingly slim, as became clearer with every second.

Whoever was behind that new kidnapping – with the X-Men's questionable luck lately, it wasn't unlikely, someone up there in that damn ice dune in Alaska had gotten bored of the still so shaky peace between their groups … They seemed mad enough to want to clear this in private.

Scott was pretty sure, had seen this dusty interrogation room between half-collapsed rock walls before, though, with the distorting tint of red gone that had colored decades of his life, he could make out a lot more details this time. The sounds of waves crashing against sharp cliffs behind uncovered windows, somewhere far below him, were a pretty unmistakable hint too. Scott's already lousy mood dropped to another all-time low instantly. Yeah, he could have done without ever setting foot on Genosha again in his life. With that damn battery-operated spot on the ceiling right in front of him, stinging uncomfortably in his eyes, as the only source of lightning in a room that had somehow been far scarier when he'd first met most of the Brotherhood here at the age of 17, there was no telling where his enemy was. But suddenly remembering a glimpse of yellow and brown in some stranger's eyes right next to him at that damn garage counter earlier, right before the ground had suddenly come to meet him, the hated sting of a syringe in his neck faster than even an instinctive response of his powers, chased the last of disorientation from his mind.

It meant, for all he knew, his enemy could be standing right in front of him, her appearance blending in with the wall behind her, or hanging from the ceiling right above him, just waiting for him to do something stupid before trying to run him through with some blade … Only none of this made sense. Not with how comparatively calm and sometimes even mutually fruitful this truce between Westchester and New York III had been so far. Mystique didn't risk her position of power by endangering her city for some petty revenge anymore.

So maybe they could actually try to talk this out for once. Whatever it was. With an unnerved sigh, Scott stopped trying to free himself from where his wrists were bound behind the armrest of his chair, his ankles fixed to its rusty legs. If a conversation wasn't happening, he would be out of this predicament within five seconds anyway, without even the need to conjure his powers.

Mystique had apparently been in a hurry, or maybe she was just looking for a good spar. No hostile was usually careless enough to not slap Scott in heavy chains when they actually managed to get their hands on him for once. Which, thankfully, had become increasingly rare since the last Phoenix crisis. "Duct tape, huh? Kinky."

"If you don't want it on that big mouth of yours next, spare me your perverted fantasies."

Right behind him but out of reach for a headbutt or for crashing that damn chair into her. What a surprise. Scott made a mental note to cancel all appointments and workouts for at least the next two weeks when he got home. It would have bordered on a small miracle to not get out of this situation once more with half the tendons in at least one knee shredded. That his enemy hadn't actually started yet to use some of these cruel toys littering the room on him, or that impressive strength in her body, might mean, she was indeed in a mood to negotiate.

Scott supposed he should be thankful she at least hadn't decided to stop by in the shape of one of his lovers earlier, just to fuck with his head. One memory of that kind was more than enough. "You didn't complain when you shoved your tongue down my throat last time."

"30 years, and you're still hung up on that." A screeching hurt in Scott's ears when Mystique dragged another chair across the uneven, rocky ground to sit down in front of him, still in an angle in the punishing light that made it impossible to make out more than her slender frame, the impatience bounce of her crossed legs. Still no punching though. Something was definitely off.

"Feels like you're the one hung up on something here. Again. We've talked about the whole kidnapping thing, you know. Etiquette in times of truce and all?"

"My people being attacked in times of truce wasn't part of the contract either." Mystique was twirling something in her hand that, judging by the sound of it sanding her already far-too-sharp nails, Scott didn't think he wanted to get any closer to. "You're just lucky I got outvoted on pulverizing your house before we know what the fuck is going on in your damn head this time, Summers. You better start talking. Or I promise, Stryker's little visit back then will look like finance inspection to you when my people are done."

Scott's face hardened immediately, his willingness to settle this without drama rapidly waning, just at the prospect of the students and his family, once more, suffering from one of Mystique's goddamn seasonal depressions. "That settlement paper also said we don't take it out on each other's homes when you and I got a problem with each other."

"Should have remembered that earlier." His enemy leapt at him too suddenly to call upon a reflective blast in time, her strong knee painfully digging into his midsection, the diamond-sharp coldness of her dagger right against his throat. "But don’t worry, I'll take my time with you first before I think about taking over management in Westchester. If you think I was being harsh in New York, brace yourself. I should try taxidermy on some other part of you this time. Let's see how well your enthusiastic in-house healer is doing with re-growing those for you. If he survives my people going all Marie Kondo on your school, that is. Or do you want to try and explain yourself before the fun starts?"

Though it became increasingly harder, with that simmering worry for dozens of children and teenagers, for his lovers and his teammates simmering in his veins, Scott shoved that package of distraction where it belonged for the moment, into the deepest hidden corner of his soul, and forced himself to look his enemy straight in the eye, every mild scorn, every exasperation replaced by honest soberness. Something that at least on good days, with a lot of luck, got even through to this woman's sick mind. "I have not the slightest idea what you're talking about, Raven."

That, she hadn't expected. The blade actually retracted half an inch or so. Not enough to risk an attack of his own yet, sadly, with Mystique's leg only pressing down harder against sensitive body parts, drawing a quiet hiss from his lips. A clear warning to not try and fuck with her – not that he'd ever felt the wish for that on any kind of level. "Is the memory loss of that feral in your house infectious since you guys are fucking? Energy blast to our external main generator mill? Yesterday? Ring any bells? It's the middle of the fucking winter. If I didn't an engineer able to recreate lifeless matter on a cellular level in nanoseconds, you'd have killed half of our population. Do you even realize that?"

Well, that explained a lot and nothing at all. "And you think I'd do that because ...?"

That honestly offended tone in his voice must have been convincing enough since Mystique finally withdrew for good, sitting down again. Which was courageous after what she'd just done, but from experience, Scott knew of course that even on such a short distance, that woman could dodge his blasts when it came to it, especially with his head still feeling like being hit by a truck. "Last time I checked, people on your side of the moral high ground don’t need a reason for killing." But that actually sounded more absent than aggressive now; in her head, Mystique was visibly already busy considering whom she could try to pin this shit on next.

Scott was very much willing to leave her alone with that inspiring task. If he wanted to spend an hour exchanging useless reproaches and bitterness, he'd accept one of his birth family's yearly invitations for Thanksgiving dinner. "Last time I checked, it was the Brotherhood attempting genocide a couple of times, not us."

Yellow eyes and too-white teeth were flashing at him again immediately, the blade still ready in his enemy's hands. Someone wasn't finished yet seeing ghosts. "And we were pardoned every time, in case you forgot, by the highest powers. So you might want to take these pathetic attempts of vengeance of yours and shove it where …"

"Pants. Right side. What? I can't exactly get to it myself right now, can I?" Scott added with a grunt when Mystique just stared at him in a combination of confusion and disgust.

"Fine. Just don't blame me when your wife tries to fry your condescending ass for the whole groping part." She leaned over with tight lips, her dagger held right between them in a warning, making it a point to touch him as little as possible while she pried his phone from his jeans as if she'd not spent the last 50 years or so leaving as much damage as possible on his body in countless close combat duels. "You're gonna unlock it too or do I need to stare at your Spotify playlist for the rest of the night? Jesus, Summers, you have really shitty music preferences."

"I'm not taking taste commentary from someone who spends his life running around naked." Ignoring his enemy's next scathing glance, Scott forced the faint drawl of his hometown in the north that was left in his speech from his voice, to address, in flawless Oxford English and with the necessary deep cadence, the artificial intelligence from his home network that was always lurking on standby in all his electronic devices, exactly for emergencies like this. "LUCY, activate restricted external limited mobile access. Full lockdown on any X-Men network data and entry gateways. Temporary unlock display, two minutes countdown. Photos." The last order was aimed at Mystique, similarly reluctantly as she was taking it. The fantasies for tonight had not included his enemy looking, among others, on compromising pictures of Scott's wife and him stealing away from yesterday's trip for a few much-needed minutes of adrenaline. Those images had the advantage of showing the Leaning tower of Pisa through the hotel room window in the background though. And the rest of the photo documentary of that little history class trip should hopefully even convince a paranoid mind like his enemy's that Scott had spent yesterday literally on the other side of the world.

"I did not need to know that." Mystique dropped his phone on his lap as if it had gotten hot, a little too dramatically for his taste but at least finally with most of her aggression gone.

"Could have fooled me with how often you undressed me in the past," Scott gave back tiredly, more vulnerable for a moment in the middle of a still dicey situation than he'd have liked to admit, mostly from Mystique's so very casual mention a moment ago of what had easily been the worst torture of his life. "Think we can stop the bondage session then? Or are you gonna hit me just out of principle? Hurry up then, I've got somewhere to be."

"Not so fast." Mystique started pacing the room, increasingly restless. Now that she knew she had fucked up, she was surely impatient to get back to a city that wasn't half as safe and protected without her around as its location in the middle of nowhere usually promised. But before, they should probably both try to find out which instrument was giving off the wrong harmony here. "I've seen the damn footage, Summers. Not a face but I know how it looks when someone uses powers like yours. Maybe it was that batshit crazy brother of yours."

"Good luck kidnapping him." Scott showed an honest shrug. He couldn't think of a single reason why Alex of all people should try to start a war with the Brotherhood, but he simply didn't know his birth family well enough to rule anything out. And his interest in pulling his little brother's ass out of trouble once more was extremely low. "Usually takes me a year or so to find him. Besides, Havok always announces his arrivals since the Defenders almost knocked Dad and him out of the sky by accident once."

"Well, if it wasn't any of you ..." Mystique couldn't finish the sentence before a bright glowing energy blast from somewhere by the door hit her entirely unprepared shape, from someone neither of them had even known was on that damn island. The attack sent her flying into a wall so harshly, she blacked out immediately.

"It wasn't, no. It was me."

For the first time in this unfortunate situation, Scott's stomach clenched painfully. That dark, sonorous voice, he wasn't hearing for the first time. Well, there went an evening off duty for good. With that damn headlight still blinding him, he could only vaguely spot that certain, ridiculously tall shape, this unnaturally snow-white skin, a menacing red glint of a diamond-shaped mark, when the next enemy dead set on pissing him off tonight stepped closer. Another bright ray of light flashed through the room before he'd even opened his mouth to speak, hitting him right in his solar plexus, and for a while, he couldn't see anything at all.

*****

He woke up to even worse headaches than before and his whole ribcage hurting. But both of these sensations were paling immediately when Scott startled up, before even being really awake, trying to summon his gift to blast a hole in his enemy if he was anywhere nearby, only to realize it wasn't there. The unforgiving, thick resistance of an inhibitor collar was choking him, making breathing hard for more than one reason.

A second one adorned the neck of the woman standing next to him in a ridiculously tiny prison cell, her skin no longer red and blue, her hair a pale, short-cropped blond. But that look of sheer murder was still the same on that human-shaped version of hers. "Well, finally." Apparently, pissing Scott off for no reason was no longer on her agenda tonight, now that they were both in trouble. "Took your sweet time."

"Didn't realize it was my job to get us out of shit that you people keep on throwing me in," he gave back sarcastically, but too quiet for real bite. Because while they still seemed to be on that damn island, judging by the sight of these disgustingly wet, rotten walls, the lighting was a lot better down here, in what seemed to be a still perfectly good-wired basement. And that meant, Scott had a far better view now than he cared for on Essex standing outside their cell with a broad grin on his lips.

"It's a pleasure to see you again, Scott." His enemy stretched out both arms as if wanted to pull him close for an amicable hug through the thick prison bars. "Now that I'm back in the world, you didn’t think I would forget our yearly appointment, did you?"

Right. Must be past midnight by now. Meaning, it was indeed that time of the year again, though thanks to a couple of physical resets, age had started to become a significantly blurry number at this point. Happy birthday to him or something.

"What charming company you keep," Mystique growled as if it was his fault she'd been stupid enough to fall for this whole trap.

He huffed without taking his eyes off Essex for even a moment who had needed only split seconds to turn a nerve-wracking misunderstanding into a real huge fucking problem. This time, Scott needed to defeat the asshole if he didn't want to deal with this kind of shit every year from now on indeed. "He wishes. Didn't you notice my fanbase tends to gets a little crazy? Charles didn’t think the guy important enough for me to remember him so we shouldn't overstay our welcome."

The blood-red color of his enemy's large eyes seemed to glow for a moment, a sight eerily familiar. "One of your old mentor's many questionable decisions, yes. Well, we will have more than enough time to get acquainted this time. Let me thank you for showing me this place, Darkholme. Here, the three of us won't be disturbed for a while."

"What the fuck do I have to do with your private little war?" Mystique was insufferable any other day too but forced into her human shape and bereft of most her powers, Scott doubted Essex had any idea the world of pain he would be in once she would get her hands on him. She was even mad enough for her bluff to sound too shaky, too agitated, too shrill. Essex was one of the few people who could instill respect even in her. Not least because she knew exactly, she was being one of the keys for that asshole possibly regaining all those artificial mutant gifts that Charles and Emma had robbed him of decades ago. "If you two want to deal with your parental issues, leave me out of it and get me to my helicopter."

"Funny you would put it like that …" Essex stopped even closer, the self-satisfied grin on his lips growing. "Unlike your cellmate, you will enjoy my company for a while, Darkholme. Once you have given birth to a child for my studies with ideally a gift at least as powerful as the two of you possess, you can go back to your people. It's entirely up to you how long that will take. As you know best yourself, the far more tasteful and scientific plan I originally had to conduct this experiment will unfortunately not work on an aged body like yours. My first attempt at that, while you were out, has proven, you will have to manipulate your cells into being ready to conceive. I will leave it to the two of you to give me what I am asking for the natural way."

Mystique let out an almost hysterical laugh, maybe for the first time in her life faced with someone whose twisted ideas about how to conquer the world knew even fewer limits or scruples than her own had before the fall of her New York. "If you studied me well enough to be craving an offspring of mine, Essex, you should also know, mind tricks won't work on me. So what exactly makes you think I will comply with anything that is of no use for me?"

"Two dozen of remote bombs in every corner of both your home bases will be motivational enough, I figure." Pointing two fingers in the air, Essex pulled an ancient but still perfectly working monitor close. With the help of his technical mental powers, he drew up digital maps of both Westchester and New York III, both scarily detailed. The marked spots indeed revealed that even small blasts would destroy the whole area, bringing down every wall, every ceiling.

For a moment, neither Mystique nor Scott were in any mood to joke or provoke anymore.

"I will give the two of you the necessary privacy now. You have an hour before I throw a dice about which of your homes to raze to the ground first." Their enemy strolled towards the exit of the dungeon, a cheerful whistle on his lips. "I will keep an eye on you on the camera though. So do yourselves a favor and don't try anything irrational."

Mystique and Scott stared at the heavy door falling close behind that asshole in utter disbelief and cluelessness. At the first initial shock, the worry about an unhinged psycho like Essex easily going through with a threat like that was too massive a burning hot obstacle of hate probably not only in Scott's mind to even keep breathing, not to mention thinking. They had to get out of here, immediately, stop that son of a bitch, get to their respective homes and make them safe again … Warn the others from something they wouldn't even see coming before dozens – or thousands – of innocents would perish from the moods of a madman. Children, untrained teenagers, babies … Scott hardly even felt the movement of his numbed body away from the cell door and towards the far more substantial obstacle of a wall when it came. His racing thoughts were filled with a blinding red heat of panic that needed an outlet, immediately …

Before he could unload all this surging aggression on unforgiving rock, a harsh hand grabbed his wrists and yanked him back against the door's bars. "Cut it out, you imbecile."

Raven had caught herself faster than he'd been able to which was enough reason to do the same, to take a deep breath, and pant out that threatening overload of wrath before it could further hinder his focus. Before it could tempt him into something as stupid as hurting himself and lowering the chances in the upcoming fight when they would both have to function better than ever. Besides, as they'd just been told, they were short on time, so they better got started.

"No audio," Mystique informed him impatiently when Scott's eyes instinctively wandered to a corner of the hallway outside where he could see the faint glistening of a newly polished camera lens indeed aimed straight at them.

Trying to use the two of them for his newest patch of his experiments in what had once used to be one of their own lairs of all places was just one of those mistakes out of pride that even a brilliant mind like Essex' regularly made. And this time, it would hopefully be his last.

Not wasting another second, Scott ripped the mattresses of the two narrow stretchers in the back of the cell out, throwing them on the floor in a gesture of irritation he didn't need to feign for the camera. Let the asshole think they were actually going through with this. Not being on their feet when the bastard came back might cost them a few seconds, but the camera angle wouldn't be worth shit if they were on the ground. And they had stuff to do. "Clothes." Scott had to grimace at his own sober order. No, there was not a single situation he'd ever been able to imagine when he'd want to get naked in front of this woman of all people. But Essex had rid them of all they'd had on them to use, naturally, Scott knew that without checking. At least until they had what they needed, they needed to keep this show running.

Mystique, less compromising and unfazed with all necessary duties to reach her goal, as usual, was already busy stripping out of some loose, wide shirt and a pair of pants their captor must have found for her somewhere in this deserted hideout of hers that had never been emptied completely. Bared in the cell's now half-dimmed lights, she was ridiculously beautiful in this shape too, Scott found without much surprise. Her cheeks didn't even show the slightest hint of blush when she got down on the makeshift bed, her gaze checking his own unclothed shape in a similar detached examination. "What do you got on you?"

The forceful focus on the task ahead became a lot harder when they ended up in each other's arms, on their side, to give their enemy what he needed to see and to be able to lower their voices to almost a whisper at the same time, in case Essex was listening maybe, after all. "Explosive Cyanide, right lower jaw. Uh, no." Scott turned his head away with a grimace when his enemy promptly tried to kiss him, a gleeful grin on her lips, and not only because this was still the woman who would have happily dissected him an hour or so ago. "I'm not trusting you with not causing some accident with that tongue of yours, Darkholme. I'll get it out when he's close enough to make that shot. There's also a titanium lingual wire we can use. I can't use my nails on the screw while he's looking though."

"Leave that to me. And if you don't want him to come to check on us personally, stop acting like a twelve-year-old, Summers." Mystique wrapped her legs around his hips to leave no doubt about what she meant, and pulled him closer, rubbing her just as smooth, cool middle against his hips shallowly enough to ignore the unwanted stimulation. Facts like that the skin of her unnervingly regular, slow heaving chest pressing against his own was entirely, unsettlingly smooth in this hated shape of hers though, not unlike Jean's after her rebirths … Or a faint scent of lilies where Scott had expected copper and gunpowder … That was much harder for someone to ignore who'd been relying for decades on all his senses doing the job for his eyes in far too many situations. But with Mystique's eyes wide open and blazing, showing the same eons of anger as ever, and her wish for revenge, there was no danger of some unwanted body function getting out of control anytime soon. "Wire could work. I've got half a dozen toxic hairpins ..."

"Thanks for the timely warning." Scott quickly pulled away from where he'd just reluctantly brought himself to bury one hand in those soft, short curls while Raven's soft lips were on his ear, hissing threats and plans and hate into it, for once actually not directed at him.

And a chuckle he hadn't expected in a situation like this. "Don't shit your pants, Summers. They're right on my scalp. I have a cartridge too that I'll need for a proper tool, but you'll have to grope a little deeper to get to it." Mystique backed away for a moment, without stopping that firm but entirely soulless, mechanic massage of her hand on his behind though, her brow shooting up in provocation, with even more amusement, when Scott paused once more.

His posture going stiff against hers immediately, his hand stilled where it had only just begun caressing her waist, agitated fingertips tracing those killer abs of hers she had even in this shape, and the three faint but still palpable scars Logan had left on her at Liberty Island. As far as Scott was concerned, that was more than enough effort for a show that was supposed to be over in 10 minutes tops anyway. That he would actually have to touch that woman in a way he'd never wanted to hadn't been in the rulebook. "If this is one of your sick jokes …"

A snort on her lips, his unwilling partner-in-crime leaned in to get her lips back on his ear, only to bury her teeth harshly in his shoulder next, tight enough not only to almost draw blood but also to send a hard twitch of pain through Scott's body that would hopefully at least make things more believable for a fleetingly watching pair of eyes. "Thinking I'd joke about wanting your fingers in me says more about you than me. Don't be a damn infant. We have no time. Lay back and get to work." Not even waiting for an answer, she pushed him down on the mattress and knelt over him in an unambiguous position with her legs wide spread, reaching for his hand impatiently when he tried to get himself together for another moment too long, pulling it downwards. Only when he very reluctantly put it where it needed to go did she bend lower over him with her mouth back on that spot she'd just tortured, sharp-clawed fingertips wandering over his opposite shoulder, over a couple of muscles there that she'd damaged herself more than once in the course of the decades, a slow caress moving past that damn collar to his jaw, finally coming to rest on his lips.

Even with Mystique being so clearly all business, it still took some effort, to force himself to trust this woman even for five minutes. But when Scott finally brought himself to open his lips, closing them around these long, deadly fingers, the tip of his tongue guiding them to the fragile tiny lock in question that Hank had put in place many years back exactly for such cases of captivities, it was surprisingly fast and painless. Maybe his enemy was just also very aware that with him having two fingers of his own in a very vulnerable spot of hers right now, she shouldn't try to fuck with him in an even worse way than it was happening right now anyway. Both pieces of metal came free faster than hoped which was just as well because unlike his reluctant bed partner, Scott took no joy in hurting someone needlessly, and there wasn't exactly anything around to lube the way. He couldn't help but notice, it wasn't only his hand slightly trembling when it met Mystique's on the mattress in a short squeeze of comfort, feeling the sturdy long wire she'd retrieved on her part in her palm before he gave her what she'd asked for.

Just for a nanosecond, there was something like an almost grateful smile on her lips but Scott didn't get a chance to stare at it because Mystique immediately scooted up higher on the mattress to shove her chest into his face next. Her hands where she was bracing herself on her elbows above his head were already busy putting her plan into motion. "Yeah, that should do for the door lock. I could get your collar open too, I think. But for that, I need something more stable than the wire. Something circular, or bent at least, to hook in."

"You're gonna have to grope a little lower for that." It was his turn to grin when Mystique straightened up again to stare down at him with her mouth wide open, clearly keeping herself with a lot of willpower to stare at his loins just as incredulously and far too conspicuously. When she made a move to scoot down on the mattress, Scott stopped her easily enough with his legs around her fragile-looking waist because there were some lines not even worth crossing in a bad play like this. "Not happening. Use those clever nails of yours again. Carefully, unless you wish me to bite through your fucking jugular."

"Relax. I'm not going to castrate you, Summers. I need you to get out of here, remember?" The weak grin was back on her lips, followed by a clear shudder that had nothing to do with pleasure though when she was the one reaching down this time. "But – seriously? You realize I'm gonna have to live with his image in my head for the next few hundred years, right?"

"Near-immortality sucks, I guess," he answered without a lot of compassion but then hissed through his teeth before he could stop himself. Having someone fumble with a modification on a most sensitive spot without them seeing what they were doing was maybe not the brightest idea after all. Not to mention that this certain piece of jewelry had originally not been meant to come off anytime soon. The unexpected soothing caress of Mystique's other hand on his shoulder was a more comforting surprise than it should have been really.

Once his cellmate had got that last part for her little piece of handicraft too, they were as good as out of here at least. While Scott was making dutifully sure with his mouth back on those soft, full curves that their captor thought them busy with producing his newest test object for him, Mystique was cursing under her breath above him, breaking her nails, scratching and banging noises of parts against the floor to bend them the right way accompanying the next few minutes. Then she was finally pushing herself lower over him again, rubbing her hips against his in a rhythm he might have called sensual with a partner he actually wanted to be with, while Mystique pretended to have her head buried against his shoulder, her lips in truth firmly closed around the lock of the hated device around his neck.

As uncaring as Mystique had pretended to be the whole time: When Scott closed his arms around her fragile shape a lot firmer then, she startled and stiffened immediately, trying to move away from where their loins were still moving against each other without hardly even touching. An instinct of flight at even a hint of force so deeply ingrained, that for an absurd moment of anger for far too many damn assholes on this world, Scott wished he could blast into pieces whoever had left that kind of fear behind. "What …?"

"Don't move." More warning, he couldn’t give her because he couldn't be sure Essex didn't have some energy wave tracker on those collars.

If the bastard had maybe already noticed that one of his beloved torture devices had just come apart, he might already be listening again, or standing behind them in a moment ... If it was to be at all, it had to be now.

With his temporary partner's head against his shoulder, safely held there and away from his own face with a strong grip of his hand on her neck, Scott opened his eyes wide and let go.

*********

It took them a while, but in the end, they managed to find a couple of parts of Essex in what was left of the computer laboratory on the ground floor. Surprisingly, a lot of it, actually, given Scott had blasted his way full force through this damn castle, pulverizing any falling debris, all rock, and metal and furniture threatening to crush his cellmate or him, until the last of tremors in the building had subsided. He tagged some of his enemy's rotting flesh for Hank to take a look at, just to be safe, because his team had already been sure last time Essex was no more, and that guy had more lives than a damn cat.

With that, they were done here, actually, but as it turned out, that asshole Essex had of course sabotaged the damned helicopter that he'd come here with along with Mystique's. All their cells and communicators had fallen victim to destruction too. But at least in the computer lab, there was still a single, lonely radio left working with enough juice to contact Westchester.

"I think this is yours." When they were waiting on the unfriendly, sharp-rocked beach outside then, the Blackbird's shape in the distance quickly coming closer, Mystique was already feeling gleeful enough again to throw a certain piece of metal with two barbells on it Scott's way. "Just so you know: I will never. Ever. Let this go. I can't believe you have …"

"You think we can leave that part of the mission report between the two of us?" Scott massaged the bridge of his nose with two fingertips, feeling a certain headache return.

He didn't have much hope that Mystique would keep her mouth shut about this thing forever. For that, she loved fucking with his head far too much.

But since Katja and Scott had only just managed to say goodbye to the subject of jealousy for good, the last thing he needed right now was all three of his polycule members trying to stab someone through the chest without whom he wouldn't be standing here right now, as much as he hated to admit that.

"Fine. Guess I owe you one for that shot." Mystique sighed, clearly disappointed to be robbed of ammo for one of her beloved manipulations. "That guy?" The grin gone, she thrust her jaw forward in honest-looking aggression. The Brotherhood had done their own share of experimenting on mutants for their goals but nothing on that scale. The last time they'd tried that, it had cost Mystique Magneto, and Scott doubted, she would ever be that stupid again. Yes, that woman had more crimes on her back than he could even come up with enough strength to hate her for sometimes, but Essex represented something they both hated with a passion.

"Yeah. That guy." Scott looked back over his shoulder at the ruins of the castle, his throat tighter than from that collar earlier. It would have been too tempting to think of this building as of today, as a grave for two and not only one of his arch-enemies. "Might not have been the last time. He's got a few dirty tricks up his sleeve. And with Charles and Emma both gone, there's not many who can stop him."

"Time to give him a couple of more problems. Send me all you have on him." Mystique just left Scott standing there before he could think of anything to say to that surprising offer. Even in the dark, she'd spotted before he had that two dark blue shapes, almost blurring with the background, had appeared in the distance.

Whoever was piloting apparently didn't want to waste time looking for a landing space and had rather sent Kurt instead, together with Hank, to make sure there wasn't some medical emergency Scott might only have forgotten to tell his teammates on that short call earlier.

Kurt teleported closer to them immediately and looked back and forth between them with an expression of pure confusion on his face, at the way they were standing there close to each other, both with stiffly crossed arms and stained, half-ripped clothes. "Well, this is awkward." A broad smile broke on his lips when Scott rolled his eyes at him and gestured him to shut up, his sharp teeth glistening in the dark like pearls. "You know, when I told you, two you needed to stop fighting for custody over me, that's not what I meant."

"Hey, Elf, think we can postpone jokes about illegal mutant experiments? I would really like to get to my wife right now. I'm already pretty late."

"Sure thing, Boss Man." Kurt still seemed to think this whole thing hilarious. He kept on chuckling to himself when he gave Mystique a brief, amicable hug and wrapped his tail and arm around her then to get her to the Blackbird.

"Sure you two don't want to take a swim in the ocean first?" Hank was the next who just couldn't shut up once he came close enough to smell with his enhanced senses, apparently, what had gone down here not too long ago. "Not that I mind Darkholme having a few holes in her body but if we get you to Logan like this, my young Captain, I fear for the Blackbird's safety in the air with all that fighting going on …"

Scott knew, of course, his friends were mostly trying to make him laugh because he never felt a lot like that after running into Essex … But that couldn't prevent a very healthy color on his cheeks. "If I give you both two weeks off, will you shut up?"

"No holidays anytime soon," Hank gave back, becoming serious again. "When your powers came back on, Jean could locate your mind immediately, and some of what was going on around you. Essex' telepathic signature was gone from there before you blasted him into parts, I'm afraid."

Well, it would have been too good to be true. "He can't hide forever. We'll get him. Someday."

"Leave that to professionals for once, Summers," Mystique repeated, already with enough composure again to be a bitch. "I'll let you know when you can collect his last head for your living room wall. You guys go. I have my own ride." She nodded up towards the sky where there was another vehicle approaching. The X-Men must have sent a message to New York III before coming here. "I'll see you at the Space Council meeting on Monday, Summers. If I can still remember how you look with your clothes on, that is."

Kurt wisely reached out to grab Scott's arm before he could get tempted to shoot Mystique just on principle and teleported him straight into the Blackbird where he was already awaited sorely by three highly distraught lovers.

One of them immediately started complaining about a very peculiar smell on him indeed which brought the last of sorely needed normalcy back this night, and suppress what could easily have become days or weeks at the hands of a lunatic once more.

Given the relief that Scott had luckily escaped that fate this time, not least thanks to a certain enemy leader, he guessed he could live with another stupid rumor on certain mutant influencers' social media channels for a while.

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@whumptober | @whumptober-archive

#no.25 #Duct Tape #“You better start talking.”#x men #fic #everything after x2 didn't happen sue me #x men original timeline movies #mystique #mr sinister #i fully blame sneakymystique for this :D #long post #crack taken seriously #uuh slightly nsft?#don't think it's close enough to e to tag #nightcrawler #Scott Summers #Cyclops #whumptober2022 #whumptober 2022

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