Chapter 36 - No Words

Rachael Sutter's rural home.

We're currently in a small neighborhood built for the facility workers. It was close by so we literally just drove the Blackbird like it was a car. And the neighborhood was dead silent like it was a nuke town.

"Ok. Logan. Can you watch the prisoner while I help Ms.Sutter." I ask him, looking at Kimura on the floor. I gagged her since I couldn't stand her petty insults. She said some pretty racist things about my big dick. And honestly, I want to reduce its size right now. 13 inches was a dumb idea in the first place. But now's not that time to be thinking with or about my dick. I feel violated by the way she looks at me. Like she wants to beat me up and for me to beat her up. Thankfully I can absorb my own blood so I don't have accidental boners.

"Sure bub, just hurry up. You never know who might show up when there's no public out here." He replies. I walk out with Rachel and over to her house, a traditional 3 bedroom cottage style home. I can hear button mashing and video games on the inside.

Rachael fumbles with her keys and opens the door. Walking inside, it's a quaint little home, if a bit on the plain side. A shaggy little blond boy of maybe 8 years is sat cross-legged on the couch tapping away with a controller in his hand. And I think he's playing—

*[ROUND COMPLETE. LIVES ADDED. WEAPON DROP.]* Halo ODST firefight, Lost Platoon. That takes me back.

"Henry!" Rachael calls over the video game.

"Mom!" Henry cries, running up to Rachael and hugging her. His small frame barely coming up to her waist. 

"Ooh! Hello Pumpkin. I missed you. Did you have fun?" She says, caressing the top of his head.

"Yeah. But I get lonely." He replies, still not having noticed me.

"I'm sorry pumpkin. Hey, I brought someone to meet you." She pushes him off of her and he finally notices me. I show my face and give a slight smile.

"Hello, you can call me Tyler." I stretch my hand out for a handshake.

"Hello, my name's Henry." He reciprocates my handshake.

"You have good taste in video games."

"Thanks, do you want to play a round with me? I have two controllers, but mom usually doesn't have time to play with me."

"Sorry Henry, we don't have a lot of time, but I'd love to play a few rounds as soon as we can." 

"Tyler is going to take us to—" Rachael starts, but looks at me since she has no idea where we're going.

"Hopefully a new home. We need to pack your stuff. A few sets of clothes and whatever you can't buy or replace. We need to leave as soon as possible." I answer.

"Can I take my  Xbox?" Henry asks.

"Sure." I answer and he immediately bounds away. 

"You look younger than what I expected from under the mask. And you seem good with kids." Rachael says to me.

"He seems really innocent…" Unlike his mom.

"That's probably because his dad hardly came here. He lived and breathed his work, so he slept at the facility. Our marriage...was very strained and growing up like this has kept Henry pure, so I'm thankful but I also feel like I have up all of his moments to babysitters."

"You'll have plenty of time with him in the future. I think I'll have you work your debt to society off, but you'll essentially be working from home. It'll be a transition but I'm sure both you and him will like it. I think you better get started. Try to bring as little as possible."

"Okay." She answers, heading to her room to get started packing.

I sit down, cross my arms, and rest my eyes for a few minutes until they are ready with two large suitcases. I lead them out of the house and over to the Blackbird.

"Wow!!! This plane is so cool!!! Why is it on the road though?" Henry exclaims.

"You like it? The plane can land anywhere there's a flat, straight stretch of land. Head inside and buckle up, but try not to disturb the mean woman or the sleeping girl." I say, sending him bouncing inside.

I strap in the bags so they don't bounce around. Then I check up on the passengers to make sure they're all right. Mercury seems to be coming together more, but still not showing any signs of waking up. Her hair was turning a blood red orange and her body was getting defined enough that I could see her lady bits starting to appear, so I covered her box up with a soft blanket. I walk into the cockpit to see Wolverine brooding.

"Cortana. Have you identified where the girls are?" I ask.

"They made it all the way to upstate New York using buses and hitchhiking. They disappeared around a small farming town, but the lack of cameras in the area prevents me from knowing exactly where. Hopefully you can use your sense of smell to pick up on something." Cortana replies.

"Let's go there then." I strap myself in and Cortana lifts the plane off the ground. 

I simply closed my eyes and tried to calm my nerves during the flight, occasionally listening to Henry and Rachael's banter. My knowledge of comics is starting to seem less and less useful. That's made clear with Mercury's presence at the facility and X-23's unknown location. The timelines for different groups like the X-Men and the Avengers is completely changed. The only thing I do know is the events of different Marvel characters are vaguely similar from universe to universe. And following that logic...I really hope X-23 is fine.

Once we reach the general area where X-23 and everyone else was last seen, we land on a rural road running in between 2 fields. There's 5 places that I think we should check out to see if we can catch a trail of X-23. Me and Logan unbuckle ourselves and open the cargo doors.

"Stay here, we'll be back as soon as we can." I tell Rachael and Henry.

Me and Logan step out and run over to the nearest house. It has a barn next to kt. Inside is just a bunch of pigs and sheep. No whiff of X-23. Listening inside the house, is just a middle aged married couple bickering about ordinary things. We move on to the next place which is a small little shack in the woods. No Trespassing signs are plastered everywhere. It's completely abandoned, no luck here either. Then we move on to the next place which is a pretty large farmhouse with a lot of land but no barn. The corn is out of control and clearly hasn't been well taken care of. Me and Logan crouch and hide in the tall corn.

We get closer to the house and I can see two guys out on the balcony, looking out into the fields. They clearly can't see us, but if they bothered to make this look like a real farm, they might be able to see us here. I hear laughter from a group of guys playing poker inside. I can't hear the exact conversation, but I pick up the occasional loud word. Clients, Girls, Bitches, Mutant Scum. Collars. Contract. Horse. Train. Death. My face turns sour but I bring it back.

"Logan, this is the place. I can hear some guys talking about mutant girls from inside the house." I whisper to Logan.

"Do they have them in there with them?" He whispers back.

"I can't make it out, but I think it's best if we assume that. A slow attack could make them hostages if they have the girls. I think it's best if we go all out from the start. I'll take the right side, you take the left side."

"Ready, Go!" He unsheathes his claws and speeds to the guy on the left. 

I sprint towards the guy on the right. I move so fast that he doesn't even react until my fist is a foot from his face. *SMASH* his body busts through the house walls, leaving an opening for me on the inside. The place reeks of smoke, alcohol, and...sex. 5 guys around a poker table in the dining room across from me reach for their funds when they see me. But Wolverine busts through the front door and immediately starts ripping them to shreds. I follow X-23's scent towards a basement door and I can hear several heartbeats beyond it, and that it's. Man with a firearm pointed at the door.

I open the door— *BANG**TING**BANG**TING**BANG**TING**— 3 bullets bounce of my armor. A black man in a pimp suit and a goatee stands on the other side of the gun that shot at me. He looks like leader material, so I lightly throw his head against the wall and knock him out before cuffing him. I walk down the rest of the stairs and EVERYTHING hits me.

The sight and smell alone makes me want to throw up. 4 girls and 1 middle aged woman are chained to a bare concrete wall. Completely naked save for the chains, cuffs massive collars on their necks and the bruises that color them in shades of purple and green. The walls and floor are riddled in claw marks, blotches of blood, pools of dried piss and vomit. All of them are knocked out or very delirious. A few syringe needles are on the ground. 

This is what became of the girls. I...I can't even imagine the suffering. I want to lash out, to destroy something,  someone, but I can't. This isn't about me.

I sucked up every ounce of courage I had and walked towards the smallest of the girls, a little girl of 4 feet and 6 inches.l, and started checking up on the condition of her body and consciousness. She had black hair, green eyes, and two large scars running from the forehead, over her eyes, and down to her chin. I absorbed her chains and the collar on her neck that looked like some sort of advanced shock collar. Then I moved on to the next one, similar black hair, green eyes, but slightly taller and large stretch marks on her cheeks and forehead like cat whiskers, almost as if her head grew too fast. I freed her and moved on to the next one. She was about the same height as the last one, but her hair was white and she had pink eyes. Her face was very jagged and had bone spurs like scales covered with her facial skin. Freeing her, I moved onto the next one. She was just over 5 feet. Black hair and green eyes like the rest. If I were to guess, this is X-23. Freeing her, I moved onto the 30-ish year old woman. 5 feet. Again, black hair, green eyes. She seemed conscious since she giggled when I looked into her eyes, but she didn't say anything else and she was clearly out of it. She was cold to touch just like the rest. She should be Sarah Kinney, X-23's mother.

Logan comes down the stairs and freezes when he sees the scene. 

"Did you clear the rest of the place?" I ask him.

"...y…" He stutters but doesn't complete a word.

"Then go look for a large horse barn or something outside. Go on. Go." I wave him out but he's still frozen.

"LOGAN! Look at me!" I bark, earning his shaking attention.

"Go look for a horse bath." I tell him, sending him dashing up the stairs. Presumably to occupy his mind.

I grab one girl at a time in a princess carry and bring them to the master bathroom and place them into the large bath tub. Despite their small sizes, I can only fit 3 in the bathtub. Then Logan comes in with two horse baths and places them on the floor, already rinsed out. I place the remaining 2 girls into the tubs and start running hot water in the bathtub. I use my powers to fill up the other two baths manually. 

Logan sits on the ground quietly and watches me as I check the girls for wounds. I'm checking X-23's  wrists when her eyes flare open and she jumps up, putting her hands around my neck, attempting to strangle me.

"Hello, my name's Tyler."

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