Experiment... /Why/

Summary:
February 24, 2015: Fantomex is on the hunt for other living weapons and finds one.

Mutant Town

A part of the town of New York… For mutants.


Characters

NPCs

  • <Name of NPC or "None">
  • <Use same pattern for all npcs>

Mood Music:
[*<http://insert.video.or.music.link.here>]


Getting out of the hideout was no issue. Not being a prisoner made it a walk out occurence, but if the case was even harder, X would still be where she is now.

Temperatures do not bother her, and dropped in in a crate with nothing other then her attire she is left with little option then to show it, but thankfully Mutant Town is not the place she would get second looks, unless of course you are the cause of several going to the hospital and a couple near deaths. Only a few involved personally, but images went viral, as well as video clips of the feral little beast that came unleashed on the strip.

Back, but this time her pace is far slower, her head downcast as mossy gaze focuses on the ground and fleetingly to those around her, some quickly crossing the road and causing honking and screeching brakes to avoid her like a plague. Heavily laden boots of metal and straps encase her feet, strapping up to the base of sinewed calves, the stretch of fitting leather encasing legs and entwining in a belt like looping of an X shaped draping over hips to leave slivers of skin peeked beneath like a single wrap of laces. Abdomen is bare, the top a simple leather bra like encasing, strapped over her shoulders, melding with the fall of long black hair. There is no reaction from the small figure weaving her way through the bodies and making them scatter without even /trying/.

Shoulders slumped slightly like she would shrink into invisibility if she could.
Magneto gave Laura three days in the abandoned apartment. As he promised, he sent food. The third day, he send a false ID card, a smartphone and some cash. Apparently he had to go out of New York, so he gave her the resources to hide in the crowd and a few friendly contacts. Since them, besides a few emails through unternet servers, nothing. He is still investigating, and now tracking down the origin of the videos, as they were too convenient, too laced of anti-mutant propaganda.

But not just anti-mutant racists study those videos. A few years ago another living weapon escaped a high-tech lab, this one in London. And Fantomex is quite interested in meeting his fellow experiments, the good and the bad. So E.V.A. scours the nets for scraps of information, and Fantomex breaks into corporate and government databanks frequently. He also stole much information from the World computers, and he was aware of the Facility experiments. Just not where they were taking place.

E.V.A. has a file on X-23. Not Laura Kinney, just X-23. It is outdated, perhaps. But good enough the facial-recognition subroutines (or is just memory? Hard to say with a technoganic being) flagged the video when it hit the nets.

Good enough to get Fantomex back to Mutant Town. Of course, Laura went with Magneto, so she could be anywhere in the world. But Magneto has been seen several times in Mutant Town, and so Fantomex has been searching.

/Tell me none of your longings, I don't need them or you. And leave me none of your wisdom, I don't need your lies or your truths../

The money is thrust in one of her pockets, the cell phone and evident lump in the back pocket of leather pants, she is doing nothing to hide away what she carries in evidence, but then again she is doing little to hide. She gets what she gets, and sometimes she deserves it. No effort on her part is made to make contacts or allies… Friends. A foreign thing to the girl because they come and go as much as she has, and right now nightmares plague her in sleep or awake, her misdeeds handled others and she willingly accepts the blame…

As well as the shun.

Walking up to a store, the display of alternative looking attire drawing her attention long enough to have her lingering before the wire crossed window, but as she heads for the door the shop-keeper flips the sign to closed before she can even touch the handle. No look, no expression of emotion - shoulders hunch and she moves on, eventually she will be able to use at least one of the resources.

And there she is… just walking. The young woman's body language screams of regret, bleakness and angst. Fantomex was not sure what to expect of the young clone assassin. But definitely it wasn't… that.
Leaving the invisible flying saucer floating over the streets, Fantomex hops down to the closest rooftop and then to the street, using a light post to slow down his fall. Some mutants actually saw the elusive illusionist, but in mutant town displays of superhuman agility are not that uncommon. He catches up with Laura just as the shop owner… behaves like a jerk with her. New Yorkers. He pushes the door open. "Bonjour… that wasn't polite, monsieur. But today is your lucky day. I will give you a thousand dollars if you keep the place open half an hour longer." He also invites Laura in with a gesture.

X was already moving on, just past the front door when Fantomex lands. She sensed his rapid approach before he appeared, but the way it seems to flicker in and out made her visibly tense, the visible musculature beneath the lace and strap of fingerless gloves that wind up past biceps shows her readiness, having already acknowledged inwardly someone may want to have a go at her… But what happens makes her look back around her bare shoulder and blink slowly.

Where she expected a hand of hatred one of kindness extended, making her head tilt in wonder, that spiderwebbing of black spilling downward and splaying out in the light winter breeze. Her hand rose and captured those strands, tucking them behind her ear so as not to inhibit her vision that is more telling of the trut then the senses he seems to elude.

Fantomex gets a speculative scan of her eyes, from head….to toe….and back, resting on masked visage. For a moment it looked like she would keep walking away, deny him that expensive gesture. She did not.

Turning to face him and the door of the now held open shop she heads in, pausing just in front of Fantomex and without looking at him flares her nostrils to permit other senses to take him in fully now. "Thanks." Though as she pushes past the shop keeper puts himself behind the counter, expectantly watching Fantomex. "Don't know if 1000 is worth my life, but it'll feed my family." Hand extended he waits. Pay now, anything can happen after this moment of stupidity.

"I'll keep you safe, monsieur. You can trust me, I am French," states Fantomex with no little irony and much fake-French accent. He leaves a 10 bills on the counter and looks back at Laura. Who is he? For a few seconds the mind refuses to notice the details, but as Laura focuses, she can see the masked man, dressed in black and white and armed with twin heavy handguns. Unusual, even for Mutant Town.

He studies her back. Closer than from a rooftop this time. "How should I call you, mademoiselle?" He asks, after a few seconds.

The man behind the counter gives Fantomex an incriminating look that does not ease back at his declaration of nationality. "Huh. That doesn't make me feel any better, in fact, worse." But that does not stop him from taking the money and stuffing it in his pocket. Money talks bullshit walks. "You got 30 minutes with your little…" The man gestures towards X as she is slowly sliding through a rack of coats.

The remark from the man does not even get a reaction from X, no look up, no tension, it is like his words or him are a non-entity. She's simply accepting.

When Fantomex addresses her she stops her small slide of hangers, metal squaling across metal in slide to rest that dark green gaze upon him. "Why?" That one word asked at a snap, did he intent to be charitable further and offer her a new face to go with the false identification Magneto gave her? Offer to whisk her away on a white horse that matches his debonair attire? Either way that question is borne on the look of suspicion.
Fantomex tsks at the shop owner and proceeds to ignore him, making sure also he doesn't pay attention to what Laura and him say. "Because I don't like to address people by a number and a letter. For instance, I am Jean-Phillip nowadays, and not C-C-7."

As a measure of precaution, he is some distance from her claws when he says that. "Have you seen anything you like?" He adds, nonchalantly.

/I've been better when the sky was red, and a face like yours couldn't make me scared./

As Fantomex speaks to her she leans over, a slight motion, one that can almost be passed off as a gesture of peeking more on the rack, what cannot be ignored is the notable primal animalistic sniffs before she turns away and moves to another rack upon his inquiry on likes. A jacket her hand has remained on left behind. "Nothing. You shouldn't have spent your money."

In saying as much she sends a shriveling glare towards the shop-keep that likely would have made him piss himself if he was not busy counting his money with a shit-eating grin on his face. More to make X feel that twinge of guilt and the hunch of her shoulders draws tighter, muscles along bare shoulder blades knotting until she exhales.

Whoo-sahh.

Fantomex did not cause this, she did, and he is being suspiciously nice… Though it is not so suspicious anymore when he states his -real- name. Letters and numbers. Now he becomes the very focus of those eyes borne of overgrowth. For a moment there is a sadness, a flicker of excitedness, and then..

If he does not move she is upon him, keeping a rack between the visual of them and the shopkeeper, those dual blades drawn out upon the pinkening streaks of blood. "Who are you?" She says between ground teeth, a low growl coming forth. "Who sent you?"
"I sent myself," he states. And… he is no longer where he was just three seconds ago. He has no scent. He is, again, outside her reach. "I escaped five years ago," he adds. "Do not worry about our greedy friend, he can't hear us. He can't really pay attention to you or me. I am… misdirecting him."

And he is back to where he was supposed to be, his palms extended to Laura in a conciliatory gesture. "I am also Fantomex. I earned the name and the role before I… left. You knew you weren't the only one, right? They have been doing this… to people like us, since the Cold War. Even before."

When he appears back near her, even palms out X steps to the side, not out of his reach per se, but enough to remove herself from it quickly if she has to. Leaning in again her head tilts, a near bird like gesture, her fingertips flexing in a ripple to draw in to a fist, shaking in her obvious indecision just before the fists release as the blades draw in. She's listening.

"I do not find myself as special enough to be the one and only." X mutters, her hand reaching for the rack and touching back down on that jacket, finally pulling it free to slide it off its hanger and put it on. Leather, a simple bikers jacket that buckles at the waist, bearing zipper-sealed pockets though the back laces up with red leather ties like a corset. It hung off her, made for someone with more height, but as slender, so at least when she pulls it closed it is fitted nicely save where the waist should be at the middle on her it is at her hips, the sleeves a few inches longer. Holding her covered hands up she shrugs and settles for it despite looking like a kid trying to wear her big brothers jacket.

"Laura." Finally it seems like she recalls what she is called by those who seek to flatter her with endearment, so far - Fantomex has not needed her name to try and do so. "X-23." Looking down at the final name her hair spills free of its tuck beneath the collar of the jacket, her hand coming up to push it back once again, only flicking her gaze towards him and then away. "Why?"

"Because real names are for real people. Codes and numbers are suitable for dolls and machines only," states the white-clad man. "Laura is a good name, you look like a Laura."

So she found a jacket she likes? Two sizes too large.

But she should be wearing a coat in New York's evil winter weather. It strikes Fantomex Laura is carrying within her enough angst to want to be cold, and probably she needs to be watched for bits of self-destructive behavior. Not his business, but…

He rummages through the stands and finds a couple things, approaching the brunette girl cautiously. First one is a scarf with a plaid pattern of dark green and black. He places it over her neck, letting the sides hang to the waist. The second is a beret, bright red, he puts it on her head and hrms in approval.

X's mother tried to give her the first term of endearment she ever had, books, toys, a name that seems to get the approval of this total stranger even. She did as she was told, like a machine driven doll and killed her.

There is no bottom to the depth of those eyes and movements, truly undefinable unless you know what you are looking for, or looking at. "How do you look like a … anything..?" That mossy gaze follows him as he peruses the racks, backing into the rack as he approaches and bundles her up, to her the equivalent to the little brother in Christmas Story. For a moment X stands there her fingers finally moving to the ends of the scarf, lifting it to look at and letting it drop, the beret reached up and touched, tipped forward a bit to cast a shadow over those eyes.

"This will not make me blend well." She states matter of factly, she'd literally be a sore thumb, but she does not take it off, she stands there in the oversized coat, long dangling scarf and beret, curiosity now coming from those animalistic eyes, peering up at Fantomex, but not belying the fact that if he moved too fast, she would be gone or leaping for vital points.

"That is not a simple question and it would require to explain much about names and how I see the world," comments Fantomex, turning to pay at the desk. "You will blend much better than walking around the streets, in winter, wearing a leather bra, oui? Do you want to blend?"

"You see the world… But hide from it." Laura states again with a sniff, not one that comes off condescending, at least not meant to, but he is letting him know… She sees him, even if he comes to her senses like a flickering image on a skipping DVD.

Blending. She never found an importance in it, if she wanted to hide she very well could, it is what she is. She never cared, or at least showed it openly. A rise and fall of shoulders and the coat sags off one, tugged back up while she moves to intercept Fantomex before he pays, pulling the tags off the items and putting the money Magneto gave her down with the tags. More then enough to cover. These things mean nothing to X and it shows. "You have done enough." She states as she turns and heads out the door.

"Oh no, mademoiselle, I not hiding from the world, just from the Weapon Plus projects," there is also that little problem with him being a famous thief wanted in many countries. But Fantomex would prefer to be famous than to blend, regardless.

Laura can pay for her clothes, even if he is not sure if some money (which he stole a few hours ago, anyway) means having done any enough. He just wanted to know her, and still wants to tell her a few things. So he follows her out.

/Must be nice./ A thought, nothing stated but when he mentioned the program she stopped with ine hand holding the door open, that welcome bell chiming and silencing in the stillness, not a tell of the tension that sang up her spine. Not looking back she lets the door close after her departure of the threshold, walking down the street now with her hands thrust in her pockets she hears the bell chime once again, alerting her to his following, making her dip into an alleyway and disappear into the shadows.

If he follows her he will catch up by only ascending, coming to the rooftops of Mutant Town where the pipes billow out smoke into the cold air, the heated apartments below nestling the others within safe and sound unknowing of the meeting above, or the beings and their capabilities and uses, X holding the beret in her hands now, studying it. "What do you /want/?" She does not have to look up to know he is there, the wind carrying more then a freeze as it kisses along tormented features - the question holding far more meaning then simplicity.
Fantomex follows Laura. Silent as a ghost, and no scent. If she is not looking at him, it is as if he is not there. "I am trying to track other survivors of the programs. People that broke free to some degree or that would oppose the existence of further development. You were created by a splinter branch trying to replicate the Weapon Ten success. But the main branch, they moved on, and Weapon Sixteen might be about to be deployed."

X freezes. If it was a hunt this would be the bad sign before the predator burst forth. Not even a breath, just the snap upward of those piercing green eyes, narrowed to keen slits that bore their own deadly razored edges. The hat is crumpling in her grip, her fingers at some point concaving in upon the fabric, wrenching it and seams begin to pop in the strain.

There is not much she can say, so much goin though her mind as an exhale has her unwinding her grip upon the hat and putting it back on her head, straightening it; that ripped seam showing when her head lowers just a bit, enough to bring the brim of the hat over her gaze, that hair unfurling from tucked places beneath heavy laden fabric and knotted within the lashing scarf. "We shouldn't live."
"We not?" Replies Fantomex. Suddenly, he has lost his accent. "We are not what they wanted; and we can choose to be what want to be." He leans against an air exhaust, looking rather relaxed. But this, like so much in him, is an illusion. "But to be truly free, we are going to need to stop them for good." Unhidden by the mask, his eyes are pale blue. But they don't look particularly cold. "Living, really living, is not easy, but maybe you should give it a try, it is not so bad once you get it going."

The loss of his accent does not surprise her, or at least it does not appear to, though she starts slowly backing away, backing towards the ledge of the building with her head dropping lower, hair veiling further so he cannot see within that darkness cast to gauge reaction. Is that what he wanted from her? Reaction, information, revelation? Nothing? She found the latter hard to believe.

"I tried. Each time…" Her voice catches and fades as she swallows and pauses just at the ledge of the roof, the heels of her boots hanging over it, her balance eased, not even wavering or /trying/. "I failed."

Without another word she simply falls backward off the roof, disappearing from the lofty height to descend…

No sound of impact, nothing. X is gone.

"Let me help you," wait… that is not what he wanted to say. He wanted allies, not responsibilities. Fantomex sighs, smacking himself with a hand. Looking over the edge of the building. No one, but she has enhanced senses, maybe she is listening. "It is worth it, Laura. It has been five years for me. And even though I am on the run, and so I am not truly free. I managed to find ways to enjoy my life." Pause, "hey, look in the left pocket of the jacket. You can contact me." He left his card.


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