Warning: Contains violence, death, and bad language.

"Ugh." Marie opened her eyes and sat up, making a face. God, she'd give almost anything for a pillow and a toothbrush right about now. Her head ached, her mouth felt like something had crawled into it and died, and she was incredibly thirsty. And Annie was talking.

"-Nope, no idea where we are. Really. I promise, if I knew where this place is, I'd tell you," she was saying, with the exaggeratedly patient tone she used on people she thought were very stupid. "And Kyle doesn't know where we are either, do you, Kyle?"

"No," Kyle said. Kyle did not sound patient. Kyle sounded pissed.

"But... why are we here?" It was a male voice, a deep baritone, but still young-sounding. And panicked-sounding, too. New one, obviously.

"Well, if you mean, why are WE here, instead of someone else... no idea. Because we're mutants, probably." Marie looked over in time to see Annie shrug. Clarice, by the look of it, was still asleep... she never woke up when Annie talked. Marie figured she was so used to it that it didn't even register anymore.

"And if you mean 'what for'... testing. Scientific tests. Like on monkeys and rabbits and stuff." That was Kyle's rather raspy voice.

There was a rather pitiful noise from the unidentified newcomer, and Annie turned her head to look at Kyle. "You couldn't have broken it to him gently?" she asked mildly.

"You think I shoulda waited until they came and dragged him away?" Kyle said over the panicked hyperventilating noises from the next cell.

"Well, no... Hey, Marie, you're awake?" She looked around and smiled brightly. "Hi!"

"Hi," Marie said a bit gluggily. Her throat was sticky and in desperate need of water.

Annie pointed to the wall of their cell, where a little spout was sticking out. "Push the button underneath and water comes out." She held out a small, battered looking plastic cup. "Kyle loaned us their cup."

"Thanks." Marie gave Kyle a grateful look... he really did look a lot like a younger, skinnier version of Sabretooth. His hands had that same shape, too... long in the palm, with blunt fingers that folded tightly together to look almost pawlike.

He grinned toothily at her, and she noticed Jonny's head resting on his lap. They seemed to be friends... how long had they been here, to get so close? And testing? He'd said something about it the night before, but she'd been so tired... "'s not so bad," he said reassuringly, accurately reading the look on her face. "You get used to it."

Scientific testing.

She'd get used to it.

The faint remnants of Magneto's personality, in the back of her mind, were having violent hysterics. So were the much stronger remainders of Logan's personality. And there was a faint, angry buzz right at the very back that was probably all that remained of Annie. The Magneto-voice wanted to escape, and then kill everybody. The Logan-voice wanted to kill everybody, and then escape. The Annie-buzz, from what she could tell, just wanted to hit all the things and all the people in the entire complex (except fellow prisoners) until they stopped moving and making interesting sounds.

Marie went to get a drink of water.

When she'd drowned the babbling voices - along with her tonsils - she shuffled over to the bars and sat beside Annie. "Where's the new guy?"

Annie pointed. "You can see if you squash up to the bars a bit."

Marie squashed. Marie looked. An area at the back of her brain that had nothing to do with other people's memories, worry about their extremely dubious future, or anything else remotely connected with reality, went 'ooh!'.

The guy in the next cell was absolutely *gorgeous*. Wavy black hair, even features, muscles everywhere... yes, okay, he was currently panicking, and that doesn't look good on anyone, but *still*... She sighed a little. "Hi."

He looked up, blinking, and Marie was momentarily distracted by thick eyelashes and big, expressive brown eyes. "Hi," he said in a rather small voice. She felt a pang of sympathy. Oh, sure, he was at least her own age... much older than any of the others, except maybe Kyle... but he obviously had never, ever had anything even slightly weird happen to him. The poor guy was clearly scared witless.

"Where are you from?" she asked softly.

"Vancouver," he said, looking down at his hands. "Most recently, I mean. I was born in Denver."

She nodded sympathetically. "Annie and Clarice and I got nabbed from 'round Westchester. We go to a kind of boarding school there," she said. "I don't know about Jonny and Kyle..."

"I'm Canadian too," Kyle contributed. "Jonny's English."

"Really?" Annie brighted. "My Dad's from Canada too. Maybe we're related, and that's why we look alike." She tucked her knees up under her chin. "I'll ask him when he comes and gets us."

Everyone looked at her.

She blinked. "What? He's going to come and get us. He gets really pissed off when people pinch his stuff. And Clarice and me are his stuff. So he's gonna come and get us and... you know... kill everybody. Like he does."

Marie brightened a little. Creed probably WOULD come after 'his stuff'. And Logan would come and get her. Of course he would. He'd promised to take care of her and, by and large, was doing a pretty good job. After all, if he wouldn't let her get cheated at cards, he definitely wouldn't let her get experimented on. "That's true."

Annie nodded. "And Mr Logan will come and get Marie, too. And we'll get them to take you guys back with us. So there we are." She settled on her tailbone and wrapped her hands around her feet. "We'll just wait until they get here."

Nobody noticed the way the new prisoner's head popped up at the name 'Logan'.

* * *

They'd left the Jeep behind long ago... well hidden, of course... and were slipping through the forest so silently that even the birds hardly noticed them.

The unplanned, automatic partnership they'd fallen into during the trip was even more in evidence now, almost uncanny... and yet, also oddly familiar. There was no need to plan, or discuss, they simply were, and what they were worked perfectly. It was comforting, that feeling of knowing without thinking where the other was, what he was doing, and letting your actions and his flow together.

Within hours, they'd stopped talking. By the next day, they barely even needed to think. Some wellspring of instinct was doing its work, and while the men might never really get along, the two predators joined seamlessly in the pattern of the hunt.

They followed the scent of hot metal for over a day before they found the hidden road... just a tiny dirt track, barely wide enough for one vehicle. And the way things were, to their eyes, the road was merely a trail, a trail to be followed, and they followed it. Sometimes one to each side, sometimes on the same side, slipping through the trees soundlessly as they pursued their quarry. At infrequent intervals, when some unwary creature crossed their paths, they would leave the great hunt for a smaller one, then they would feed, and rest a little, until the impetus picked them up again and drove them on. They were hunting. They would not stop until they had found their quarry.

Once or twice a thought would surface. For a moment, the strangeness of their deep, if temporary, rapport would come into their minds for a moment... and then it departed, unheeded and unremembered. There was only the hunt, and the other who also hunted, and the quarry at the end of the hunt. That was All There Was, all that had ever been, and in that period of eternal now there was a kind of peace.

Neither of them felt, or even looked particularly human anymore. The beast within had become the beast without, and there was a tiny edge of surprise, at first, that instead of the ravening, bloodthirsty thing they'd both expected, the Beast Within was simply a predator, which hunted and tracked efficiently, but with no malice. They would find the quarry, because the quarry had taken their cubs. They would kill it, in case it took the cubs again. But they didn't hate it, or want to hurt it before it died. It was just something that had to be gotten rid of.

They would find the cubs, and take them back to... no, not back. That den was no longer safe. They would need a new den to hide the cubs in. But that could be decided after the cubs had been found.

When, on the third day, they found the complex, they sat for twenty minutes staring at the wall before enough of their humanity resurfaced to remember how doors worked.

* * *

Days had passed.

It wasn't possible to tell how many, since the lights were constant and none of them had particularly good time-senses. Annie guessed two. Marie had guessed four or five. A thin, stooped old man in a janitor's uniform had come to clean up the vomit from Geordi's cell, and at irregular intervals had brought them food.

That was to say, a dish of tasteless mush and a couple of flat, waferlike things had been provided to each of them. Clarice was beginning to understand why Jonny and Kyle were both so skinny. She'd actually felt reasonably full afterwards, because she was very small and never ate much anyway, but Annie and Kyle had both inhaled theirs in about two seconds flat. Apparently their nausea had faded.

Annie's stomach rumbled, and she sighed pitifully, poking at the latest tray - which, to be fair, HAD been significantly more meager than usual. "I'm starving," she moaned. "That was hardly even a SNACK."

"I keep telling you that you eat too much," Marie said a bit grumpily.

"I do not. I need fuel for the machine." She patted her stomach, and Clarice giggled. Tone, phrase, and tummy-pat were all copied exactly from Jubilee.

"Hey..." That was Jonny. He had a nice smile, the couple of times she'd seen it, but mostly he looked sad and a little afraid. Clarice guessed that more than a few bad things had happened to him lately. "Ladies? Uhm... if it's not rude... what mutant powers've you got?"

"I've got a healing factor," Annie said absently, as she hunted for stray crumbs on her tray. "And I can shapeshift, too."

"I..." Marie looked down at her bare hands, and stuffed them into her pockets. "When I touch someone skin-to-skin, I... kinda suck out their energy. And their powers. And their memories, too."

The new prisoner... he said his name was Geordi, something that had inexplicably made Marie and Jonny snicker for over an hour... flinched visibly, and Marie looked unhappier than ever. Kyle and Jonny, though, looked kind of interested. "Really?" Jonny asked thoughtfully. "That could be pretty handy sometimes."

"It's not," Marie said briefly, and she looked so sad that Clarice crawled over to her to give her a hug. Marie smiled a bit, and hugged back carefully.

"Wot about you, Clarice?" Jonny looked at her. "What can you do?"

Everyone looked at her.

Clarice flinched a little, and slid around behind Marie a little. "I'm not sure," she whispered. "I only ever did it once, and I was really scared, so I don't remember much. There was just a big light."

Kyle looked a bit sceptical, but Annie nodded. "That happens," she agreed. "Mr Summers says that unless something really bad happens, that kinda shocks your powers open, most mutants don't get any real powers until they're about me and Jonny's age. And if you're malnourished or something, it can take much longer."

"Really?" Geordi shuffled closer to the bars, looking interested for the first time. "I was... twelve, I think, the first time something big happened. Is a healing factor when everything just sort of... heals right away?"

"Uh-huh." Annie nodded. "You too?"

"Uh-huh." He scowled, kicking at the bars. "And some weird stuff with my bones and stuff."

Annie leaned up against the bars and squinted at him. "Hey, open your mouth for a second..." He obliged, and all three of the girls could see the same pronounced canines that Annie, Sabretooth, and Wolverine all had in common. Kyle presumably did too, but since nearly every tooth in his mouth appeared to be canines, it was hard to tell. Annie nodded, and showed him her own teeth. "Feral-type mutation," she explained knowlegably. "Like me and my Dad and Kyle and Mr Logan and Rahne at school. There's more around, too." This time she did spot the frown at the name 'Logan', and blinked. "Do you know any?" she asked cautiously. Better not to let him know she'd seen.

"One," he said shortly. "We met a while back."

Ah. Mr Logan had probably been horribly rude to him or something. Possibly hit on his mother. Annie nodded, dismissing it from her mind. "Well, I'm getting bored," she said cheerfully. "Let's bust out."

"I thought we were going to wait for your dad to come and get us," Jonny said, blinking a bit.

"We are. Just not in here. 'Cause I'm hungry and I wanna go get some food." Annie pointed one clawed hand at the bars.

Absolutely nothing happened.

She sighed mournfully. "That stuff they shot us with... it deadens mutant powers, right?"

"Yup." Kyle nodded.

"Drat." Annie sighed. "Now we're going to have to wait for a guard to come, so we can overpower him."

Kyle shook his head. "They always come in threes or fours," he said resignedly.

Annie brighted. "Oh, good." She smiled a fanged smile. "A challenge."

* * *

"'s small," Logan whispered almost soundlessly as they crouched in the brush not five metres away from the wall of the compound.

Creed nodded, still getting the hang of talking again. He'd never been much of a one for it. "Most underground," he whispered back. Annie had talked a lot about the two 'Facilities' she'd been in before she'd escaped, and apparently they were usually mostly underground. And any dangerous prisoners were kept on the bottom levels, so that if worst came to worst and they escaped, the whole level could simply be flooded first with gas, then with water, and sealed off permanently.

Logan nodded, obviously understanding that. "Perimeter alarms?" he suggested.

Creed nodded. "Lotsa alarms," he agreed. "Sneak or bull?" Sneaking in took a lot longer, and it was boring, but it lowered the chances of getting the cubs' throats slit. Just bulling their way through, though, was not only faster, it was a lot more destructive, and Creed was in the mood for some serious destruction.

Logan thought about it for a minute. "Try sneaking first," he suggested. "When we set off an alarm, we can start breaking stuff."

Wow. That was a great plan. Hardly any of the guys he'd worked up with before had come up with fun, easy plans like that. Creed nodded enthusiastically. "That works," he agreed.

"Right."

They both stared at the solitary guard for a long moment.

"I'll charge him from in front. You run behind him and rip out his hamstring."

"Right."

The Beast Within wasn't giving up control as fast as perhaps it could.

* * *

The other boy... Geordi, Kyle remembered, although it was hard to fit a name to someone he couldn't see... made a soft noise of nervousness. "I can hear someone coming."

Kyle tipped his head a bit, turning it from side to side to find the sound and get a direction. Across from him, he could see the kid Annie doing the same thing. "Guards," he said briefly. He knew that tramp-tramp of heavy boots very well, and he was less worried - he was almost used to them - than interested by the fact that Geordi had heard them even before Kyle himself. Sharp teeth, good ears, an oddness of bone and muscle... obviously a mutation whose time had come.

Annie cracked her knuckles, a startlingly unpleasant smile on her cherubic face. "Oh, good. I'm getting really bored in here."

The other girls gave her an alarmed look, and both retreated to the far corner of the cell.

Kyle blinked. She could hardly be all THAT dangerous, could she? She was only, what, twelve? "Three," he said, sticking with the solid information his ears were giving him. "Big."

Annie's nasty smile widened. Marie and Clarice huddled further into their corner. "Yay."

Kyle sat back on his tailbone, and watched the guards as they came around the corner and tramped down the narrow hall to the cells. Jonny whimpered, shifting a little closer, and Kyle rested a reassuring hand on his knee. "They won't try anything," he promised in a whisper.

Annie seemed to hear him, giving him and Jonny a sharp look that shifted quickly into grim understanding. He saw her fists bunch. "Hey! You!" she snapped, marching up the bars. "Who the hell are you, and what are we doing here?"

"We're the guys who put you in there," said the biggest one, leering at her. Kyle felt Jonny tense beside him. Shit. This had to be the trio that had... shit. "And you're doing whatever the hell we tell you to do, girl."

"Oh. Well, that explains it, then." The sarcasm could have cut glass. "And what exactly were you planning to tell us to do? No, wait, I think I can guess."

"Good." The man grinned, unlocking the door. "Now, you just get back there in the corner with your friends." Kyle could see what he suspected Annie couldn't - that the two behind the front-man had guns in their hands, and cuffs hanging from their belts. Damn, damn, damn.... Annie might intend to put up a fight, but if the other two were threatened...

Annie backed up obediently, and all three of them slid into the cell, raising their guns. "All right, now hold out your-"

Annie looked between the bulky bodies, and let a trace of fear show in her eyes. "Jeez, how many of you guys ARE there?"

Kyle blinked. How she'd known this was an unofficial 'visit', he didn't know. Maybe that was standard in these places. But it worked as nothing else would have, all three of the men slewing around to see who was coming to spoil... or steal... their fun time. They weren't expecting any trouble - these three were NOT among those who'd had run-ins with Kyle, or they'd have known better.

They did, to their credit, only look away for a split second.

Before they could look back, a wet snapping sound echoed a bit in the small cell as the spokesman for the small group found his chin grabbed and jerked impossibly around by small, calloused hands. Before he'd finished flopping limply to the ground, one of those hands had fisted up and smashed with lethal force into the second man's throat. It made a dull, meaty sound as it connected.

If Annie's arms had been longer, the third man would have gone down without more than a surprised squeak, but they weren't, and he was far enough away that he managed one wild shot before she slammed into him with enough force to smash the back of his skull against the cell wall.

Marie, huddled protectively over Clarice, screamed.

So did Jonny, a little, and Kyle was pretty sure Geordi had too, but Marie's was definitely less of a 'loud noise, eee!' scream and more of the 'I'm hit!' variety.

Annie caught it too, and dropped the third man's body, moving blurringly fast to Marie's side. She took the girl's arm, and then relaxed a bit. "It's just a graze," she said soothingly. "I know it hurts like hell, but it's not bad."

"Ow... uh..." Marie sniffled. "Really hurts..."

Kyle could smell the blood. No matter what Annie said, that was more than just a graze - but if she didn't want Clarice and the weak-stomached Geordi to know about it, he could see the sense in that. He could hear Geordi vomiting again as it was. "The guards are wearing t-shirts under the jumpsuits," he reported from memory. "Bandages."

"Good idea." Claws were handy for ripping cloth into neat strips, and she peeled off the fabric from the nearest body with calm indifference. Jonny was looking nervous about that. Geordi was still retching helplessly. Kyle was of a mind to think Annie had been entirely too nice, and killed them much too fast. "Marie? You're going to have to... how can I put this... push the coverall down so I can get at your arm. I don't want to rip the sleeve off if I can help it."

"Ok-kay," Marie snuffled, obviously trying hard not to cry. "But don't none of you guys peek!"

"We won't," Kyle agreed, smiling a bit. He looked down at Jonny instead. The younger boy was squashing himself so tightly against Kyle's side that he was practically sticking his head into Kyle's armpit - which smelled bad enough that he had to be seriously upset. "You okay?"

"Yes. No. I don't know. I was... scared," Jonny whispered, knowing that Kyle would hear no matter how softly he spoke. "And I'm *glad* they're dead! I *wanted* them to be dead! But..."

"But Annie's pretty lethal," Kyle agreed in a soft murmur. "So'm I, you know."

"Yeah. Never seen you do it, though." Jonny shook his head, straightening up a bit. "I'm fine. Really. Just... surprised me."

Kyle nodded, risking a quick peek. Annie was zipping up Marie's coverall, one of the sleeves stained with blood and with a bit of white t-shirt peeping out through a hole in the grey fabric. "Done?"

"Yup. Let's get outta here." Annie looked off to his left, and grimaced. "Whenever you're done puking, Geordi..."

"You... you *killed* them!" the disembodied voice choked weakly.

Annie looked down at the bodies around her feet, and blinked. "Yeah? So?"

"SO?! You KILLED them!!!"

Annie looked surprised. "Of course I killed them. Do you WANT to stay here and be experimented on? I don't, but if you do, I don't HAVE to unlock that door."

Kyle grinned at the startled noise that followed THAT little statement. "WE want out," he said mildly, pointing at the door. Annie nodded, and went to dig out the keys from under that first body. It would be a very good idea if they were all somewhere else when someone came looking for the trio... or looking to see where the gunshot had come from.

As it happened, nobody had heard the gunshot, because on the first level, a guard with his own rifle's barrel embedded in his shoulder had managed to hit an alarm before he bled out. Where the intruders were, nobody knew, but the focus was on the upper levels. Level seventeen, with only a few cells and a couple of drugged teenagers, wasn't going to attract anyone's attention for a good long while.

(End part seven)