0 comments/ 7010 views/ 0 favorites X-Men: Striking the Balance By: StonedAsia Disclaimer: Characters portrayed in the following are not mine and I did not create them. * Striking the Balance: (No Country For Old Men): The past: We were somewhere around Tindouf, on the edge of the desert when the drugs began to take hold. I was holed up in one of the Sahrawi tents overnight, suffering from burns and the delirium was upon me. I think it was a chemical explosion; our retreat from the Atlas Mountains a narrow escape and I myself the only casualty -- unexploded ordinance wedged in the Ziz riverbank going off with a bad fall. While we were only able to cross over the border into Trans-Algeria so far, it was enough to evade the New Canaanite landspeeders until our fuel depleted. It was the season of nuclear sandstorms and the whole of the Sahara was under a blanket rendering sensor-radar useless. Tetherblood was in control, leading us further from the Moroccan border and into the blindness of the wastes. It was harsh and unrelenting, the winds whipping my tagelmoust and delivering it into the clutches of the hurricane. We later emerged from the dunes scored and bloodshot, feet run red and ragged. The chase was over but I was feverish and unable to vomit, our water having run out a day before. Finding seclusion against boulders amongst the flats they kept me warm and hunkered down for the night. There were no settlements and we were going to die from exposure if not dehydration. I told them I was proud of them and that I would lead them into the River again if I had to. The dam was not only plunging Neo Sijilmasa into drought, but was a localised source of power for the North African Canaanite outposts. The whole of Morocco was in their chokehold. A chill soon developed and by dawn we had been drowned in fresh sandfall. Tetherblood sent out a flare. It was better to get captured than die. But the Kel Tamasheq found us; pastoralist Sahrawi wandering the desert from oasis to oasis. They took us in, bathed my skin and filled the wound with dried herbs and maggots. I slipped in and out of consciousness for three days, Boak never leaving my side. I had dreams of chaos and spires, rocky outcrops bursting like the Icelandic geysers and the spray coating me head to toe. I awoke periodically, the glare of the sun permeating a new tagelmoust hood. The earth shook, but I realised I was being carried, bound. My voice called out, I had no sense of direction, I was scared. 'Rest easy, Nate,' Tetherblood said 'we're on our way out of here.' The movement was jerky, my weight treated with care. A rocky surface, the wastes adjacent to the dunes. I tried to reach out with my telepathy, my performance clumsy at best in those days. Thoughts I couldn't interpret were intercepted. Closeness, unity. Formation. Friendship. I didn't want to relax but the fever came in fits. The scent of cloves and oil, the smell of lighted embers and the wisps of fire and smoke dancing to the sky. I slipped into dreams once more. The fever broke a day later; I stepped out of the tent into a small settlement. The rush of children spun me round and I saw the voices rioting at a fresh delivery of water. A lone dog, probably stolen from its mother months ago yipped by their feet, the men manoeuvring the nozzle from the back of a rusted landspeeder into cloudy jugs and bowls. They shouted excitedly, jostling with one another and letting a pool develop from spray. I could see it glistening in the sun, like a mainline pipe bursting and for one day all the world gathering at that one outlet to bask in the glory of Allah's fortune. Tetherblood greeted me, one of the English-speaking Sahwari by his side. 'This is al-Baqeq, an elder in the tribe. He's told us of the Iron ore expressway still operating in the Sahara. The trains come through every week delivering mined ore and supplies to the Dakar coast.' 'Does it stop here?' I asked. 'No. No stop at Tindouf.' The elder said. 'They're a camel-herding tribe, Nate. We maybe out one landspeeder and our air transport trashed but if we could catch that train on camelback we could shoot through the borders and past the Sahara to the coastal ports.' 'What about resistance,' I asked 'New Canaanite outposts?' 'Area controlled by Kel Tamasheq.' The man was smoking an old pipe. 'No fighting in Senegal.' 'Fine.' Then, to Tetherblood 'what's the window on this? I'm still not a hundred percent.' 'It passes through today, Nate. We can make it in five hours! The best thing is we've got lots of opportunity. The train is over two kilometres long.' I stared at the kids slipping in the mud, the dog wild. Upon a stony hill we stood, the sun high in the afternoon sky and the winds abated for the moment. Camels spat and scuffed, several members of the tribe present. They spoke in Berber to one another, smoking and clutching at their old bullet-rifles. The borders were zones of conflict amongst the tribes, years ago the Polisario taking control before Apocalypse bombed Niger and Mali and obliterated an insignificant populous. My mouth was sandy and dry, head dull and drowsy still. In the distance, surfacing through mirage and vapour a worm of steel and wheel ploughed its predestined trail. We heard the grind of axles. The roar of its horn. We mounted and I lowered my telescope. 'Are you ready?' I asked. The three of them nodded. The train was already through the membrane of mirage and speeding toward our interception point: the tracks a hundred and fifty meters directly ahead. Tetherblood thanked the Sahwari and I led the charge, the camel jerky but light-footed. Close to the chain of open-topped carriages and the screech of rails we galloped parallel, the worm at least twice as fast as us. I hadn't bargained on its locomotive inertia being so powerful. The winds picked up and flew down lee side, scattering loose gear and tossing our headscarves like leaves. Loose surface pebbles and desiccated roots made the camels falter and I heard Tetherblood shout above the roar: 'Nate we've got to ride faster! There's no way we'll get onboard otherwise!' And I wondered if the beasts had it left in them. We were added weight, racing against the chain looking for handholds. I heard a scream, and watched as Boak's mount buckled under the strain. It gave a horrible weak cry and he was knocked clean off. I didn't know whether we could keep going. What if the Sahwari had turned off leaving the camels and we would be stuck out in the desert again, abandoned to the winds of fate? I couldn't leave Boak. He was a relic from my guardian's time. He could take care of himself, off-line and hibernate until we found him again. Quickly, the camel dodged a boulder and I saw the three of us swerve in a line, Dawnsilk's camel with its mouth slack, saliva trails and beating manic animal eyes. The futility of it all. 'Nate! Boak's got a hold back there, but we'll all be stranded if we don't get on now!' Somehow the beast marshalled its strength and propelled me toward the flashing corrugated steel of the nearest carriage. A ladder found a way near me and I grabbed hold, the camel lagging and then free of my weight, the transfer breathless and all the blood rushing in my ears as I gazed at the others trying the same. Boak ran back to my point, his arms long enough to have saved him earlier and to help me up into the basin of the open-top. The wind buffeted me for a second before I set myself into the grain of the clumpy ore and lifted Dawnsilk up off her ladder. Tetherblood, still galloping but losing much ground was near but not near enough. I looked beyond at the endless stream of coaches, and saw in the distance atop that stony hill the muzzle flashes of celebration. 'Nate! Gimme a hand here!' Forget them that part is over, I launched myself over the space between carriages and into the pit of the next one, empty at the bow and a slope of fine dust at the aft. A thick, loud bong! rang out rattling the inside of my brain. I shook it off, Tetherblood was going to be out of range soon enough and his ride would tire in a matter of seconds. 'Come on Nate!' Dawnsilk screamed. I ran up the dust, sinking feet slowing me down but I had to get to the top to rescue my friend. Each step drew energy out and I felt sick with muscle ache when I finally reached the pinnacle and met the ferocious crosswind head-on. Tetherblood was mere metres away, grabbing for a handhold. I threw myself to the edge of the steel carriage and offered him my arm. He missed. He missed again. 'Come on!' I yelled. He grabbed hold! I yanked, my back bending unnaturally and he tightened about the bionics, gripping with both until he slid his feet off the camel's back. The beast groaned and was swallowed into the distance. Tetherblood sat exhausted on the ridge of the coach, having to shield his eyes from the dust and sand in the wind. Over my shoulder, Dawnsilk was jumping up and down. 'Made it!' I said. He grinned, red in the face. *** The present: Warpath crept along the side of the carriage, his strong hands able to support himself at right angles whilst keeping low. The wind sheer at this velocity would have blown him off, but he kept stable by wearing nothing but his batwing chaps and a grappling hook. Above him the night sky sparkled with absent pollution, him hurtling through somewhere along the Arizona basin. He took in a mouthful, cheeks billowing and ducking in to manoeuvre backwards along the carriage wall and away from the porthole until the wind turned to fight him from above. He turned to look behind, making sure no-one but Meltdown was there, a short blonde head poking out the skylight for a second and giving him the okay. Nodding, he plunged the grappling hook into the rounded camber of the train carapace, needling a tiny hole into which his fingers could squeeze. The metal was jagged, he bore the scraping. If he got thrown off he was hitting the pebbles and boulders at over three hundred and seventy miles per hour. He had challenged these daredevil stunts in the Yavapai County Bradshaw Mountains, always John and he leaping from crevice to crevice and jamming pegs into holes no bigger than a hairs width whilst upside down. That was why he was the perfect man for the job; the train rattling away on its sleepers faster than the TGV v150. Inside the runaway worm, Domino was held hostage, knife to the jugular. Her forehead was damp from beads of sweat. She was bound and gagged, thin plastic biting into her wrists like a torturous friendship bracelet. The train lurched one way, then the other, the tracks avoiding a hillock and Warpath clung on, slowing his progressive crawl. He flipped onto his back and dragged a blade up from his chaps. In his teeth and waiting for the train to stop its pitch, he ran through the details. 1) He could creep down to the control car's portholes and pop through, knife in hand, and up-against-the-wall the driver, slitting Domino's bonds and letting her kick some back; 2) He could go on his haunches and tin-open the ceiling -- assuming the knife wouldn't dull -- then tear apart the carriage, simultaneously pant-wetting the driver and giving him an aerial view of any combatants, with a head start in anticipatory disarmament and kill technique; 3) Tabitha could make her way through the doors, blasting them off one at a time and then right on the point popping the last one and then the ceiling and he could drop through and they could double-team everything and everyone; suddenly time to make a decision every second wasted maybe lifeblood down the sinkhole and Warpath got onto his belly and launched himself off the top of the carriage hitting the full brunt of the wind and smashing through the driver's windscreen, knife in hand and snarling like an animal, he shook off the shards of imbedded glass and took in the situation. The attacker was in the front car. He did have Domino with him. She was bound and unconscious. Meltdown was not here. The whole cab was in emergency light, slightly harder to define quick movements of which many were being made for even though Warpath had superior reflexes, Cable, the attack, had faster ones because he was familiar with the inside of the cab and could reach across to Domino and yank her head back and with a flick of his wrist spill the blood packet across her chest indicating a casualty before Meltdown burst into the room and then Warpath and Cable were grappling Jujutsu the hostage dead and Meltdown, surprised, shot in the belly with the driver's paintball gun who stood behind her. Warpath cursed and Cable suckerpunched him in the solar plexus putting the Apache on his rear. 'Stop the simulation!' He shouted, and the background, foreground, the very fibre of the air digitally dissolved into nothingness, desks, levers, light bulbs, doors and wreckage, glass shards and the little furry dice dispersing into ether and code. 'Stop the simulation.' He repeated, the two X-Forcers with their heads down. 'Why'd you hit me?' Warpath demanded. 'Because you're an idiot! You both screwed up and if that had been in the field your leader would have exsanguinated before you'd even got a damn bandage out.' He noted their dress. 'Either of you carrying any medical equipment?' Meltdown and Warpath looked at each other. 'Disgraceful. Absolutely pathetic. You always remember that your opponent knows his territory better than you do. No matter how well thought out your tactics are, always count on the unexpected. Count on him playing his hand as heatedly as you play yours. He's got everything to lose, just like you, he's reactionary, just like you, he's lethal, just like you. The only thing he doesn't do is lose like you.' 'Give it a rest!' Warpath shouted. 'We weren't prepared for you to just go ahead and kill Domino!' 'Why not? I could have killed her ten minutes before you came in through the window and you wouldn't know about it until you saw it. The reasons behind the situation are second to the situation itself. You anticipate that.' Domino spoke up. 'Can someone untie me?' 'Tabitha...' Cable massaged his temple with his metallic fingers. Warpath got up to go, taking the knife in his hand angrily. 'James -- come here.' Warpath stopped. 'What?' 'I saw you thinking it over on top of the carriage. Why didn't you think of what it was like inside the carriage? The reasons behind the situation are second to the situation itself. Your entry means that you are there, present, in the situation. Don't concern yourself with how you will get in there, because it only kicks off once you're in there. The situation takes priority. Use those instincts you have, those reflexes and make them count. You know what the right thing to do is, so do it. Make it second nature and act on it.' 'You make it sound easy Cable. It's not. Not when you're fighting someone like you.' 'Don't think of fighting me. Act like you're fighting yourself. If you were going to kill Dom, and I was attempting retrieval, you wouldn't think twice about cutting her throat. On that train, your entry was the catalyst. I reacted immediately. If it was the other way around, you would have reacted faster even than that. Treat the situation like you're the one reacting. I didn't think: "Hey, there's Domino, is she okay? -- where's Meltdown -- have I cut myself on the glass -- can I see properly? -- will I be fast enough? Oh, oh" No, I looked at the situation and acted on it. You do the same. You do the same or someone dies.' Warpath scowled in Cable's face. The two students left. Domino stood and threw off the bonds, examining her top. She stepped over to Cable and watched them go out of the danger room and into the mansion halls. '...You think I'm being too hard on them.' He said. 'I don't care. They need it.' 'I'm thinking: why'd'you have to coat me with this stuff?' She said pawing the red stickiness. 'And why you punched James in the gut back there.' 'Because he can't afford to botch a job like that in the field. That's how friends get killed.' 'You can't win them all, Nate. You know that.' 'Yes you can win them all; it just takes a lot of skill and using your damn brain.' He marched out and down the hall. 'Tell that to Grizzly and Dawnsilk and Kane and all the others then!' But she was alone. *** (Tentativism): The past: Dakar was a hive of multi-cultured freebooters and hustlers, rogues and traders, investors looking to buy into seclusion along the deserted flats of African anonymity and refugees looking to evacuate the nuclear hotzones. But when we reached the coastal town for a ride across the Atlantic I saw a man die. He was taken by street urchins and dragged into a mud hut on the fringes of town. We leapt to his aid, people seemingly oblivious to another man's struggle. Goliaths and runts circled us, we the strangers blown in from the dunes. I raised my weapon, motioning them to put down and leave; take the currency and not harm him. They didn't listen. We were too slow, our concentration, my concentration -- having faded along the journey that should have replenished it. They goaded us. We were exhausted and hot and thirsty. Our guns were coated in sand and iron grain, filthy and bent out of shape. We had barely survived the last several days. But the urchins held a knife to his throat -- I shall always remember the way the man's eyes twitched, like he had something in them that wouldn't go. They were panicky eyes, flitting from one side of the hut to the other, the low level sunlight barely shining through the clouds and masking our view of the situation. He shuddered in fear. Shaking, cold, unhappy. And all for what, a few coins from a weedy crate stacker on his break, whimpering in French to spare his life. The look on the knife-wielder's face told me otherwise. He was missing teeth, his tagelmoust faded and brown, facial hair scraggy and uneven. He was the filth of the gutter. All his companions shuffled noiselessly around us, the presence heart-speeding but completely silent. They crept like zombies awaiting a fallen corpse, each afraid of the first move because we held so tight to the iron and plastic in our hands. In those days I was paranoid about my telepathy, unsure of its capabilities especially under duress. I would have been able to tell, if I was confident enough, that the knife-wielder fully intended to kill his hostage and us as well, not because we were witnesses but simply because we might be carrying something of use. To feel so dehumanised amongst the roots of humanity when all the world burned around us was a disgusting truth. Dakar, the closeted remnant of a continent hardly dealt with, and here we were scrapping amongst ourselves. 'Drop it,' I said. 'Give us your money.' He croaked, a voice of decay and malnutrition. 'We're not carrying any, so drop your weapons and leave the man alone.' Tetherblood shouted. 'Nate, I think they won't hear.' 'I know Dawnie. But we got into this for a reason. We've got to see it through.' 'Give us your money.' And he drew a thin line with the tip over the man's windpipe. The man struggled but a desperate grip is enough of a grip to make you desperate. 'We kill him!' The urchin shouted. Then without warning they did, because at the end of the day it wasn't worth their time to bargain. They either got the money and got their food and drugs without a fight, or they didn't and stole the food and drugs in a fight anyway. In a fit the man crumpled, eyes bleating and hands grabbing at nothing, but then resigned himself and lay still and quiet. I shot the urchin clean through the forehead for that. The flesh cauterised on impact. We heard the sizzle of cooking meat. Tetherblood was stabbed in the kidneys. Dawnsilk blew apart his attacker, staining the walls. And in a frenzy of hunger, addiction and desperation the rest jumped us. Big goliaths, long gangly arms pincushioned from drug use. I saw my friend buried beneath a pile of them, a trickle of red oozing out from behind his chest plate ceramics. I was all rage and spit and I knocked them off, my telekinesis bubbling up to the surface like magma. They spilled onto their backs kicking in the air and screeching; speared pigs. The man had died despite my efforts. His poor destitute forlorn life over in seconds of action from a man not fit to lick his boots. I pitied the man. I pitied his innocence in all of this, yet I so wanted to hold onto that innocence in hope that I might forget the hardship of reality. But you can't do that. So I also pitied the thieves because the cosmic balance was not weighed properly. I unloaded from the plasma chamber until the scales tipped. X-Men: Striking the Balance 'T-Blood, man, are you okay?' 'Need some help here Nate. Blade went in straight. Not sure how clean it was. Urkk. I think I lost it somewhere over here.' His hands tapped the dusty floor. 'Street scum won't mess around again.' Dawnsilk said. 'How the captain?' I looked at the path we'd taken in the few pristine minutes of our route home. Bodies, a friend injured, an enemy wasted, a man I'd never met. Something worth risking your time for. 'Yeah... Not good Dawnie. Not good...' *** The present: Polished and sinuous, the Vauxhall Astra sat next to the kerb, July sun making the driver pant. Tabitha sat with the seat pulled back, hands on the wheel and eyes narrowing on the bend of the road. Next to her, Cable recited scripture from the Highway Code. He twisted in the seat, left leg raised and the right hovering over the space where the dual accelerator would have been. His focussed on her cheeks, reddening with each rebuke and the crunch of her eyebrows indicating a building tension. She used the same kind of anger to muster up the little glowing balls in the palm of her hands; plasma spheres of bio-chemicals that popped like a bubble-gum balloon. She was feeling the burn behind her eyes. Hearing the road riot act having stalled three times in the space of twenty metres. Seeing a film reel of her inaccuracies and fuck-ups play in the front of her mind, a boring theatre production of how not to drive a car starring Nick Nolte as the wooden instructor. 'Raise the clutch... s-l-o-w-l-y.' Cable said. She liked Nick Nolte (?). 'And foot off completely when you've moved about five metres.' Fast off the clutch or slow off the clutch. Which is it? 'Slowly, Boomer.' 'Yeah I know.' There was no breeze. The car was an oven, she tasted a tongue of sandpaper and stickiness, foul toothpaste turned into bile from exertion. Cotton. '...Boomer? Start the car.' She produced a mechanical yes. Hand to key -- she was going to turn the car on. The ignition key turned. The car came on. Success so far, she thought. 'Hang on,' he said 'what have you forgotten?' Was she sitting properly? Did she have the car in gear? So did the clutch need to be down? Had she got the windscreen wipers on? It was a lovely day outside. 'Um. What? I don't know. What? What?' Cable closed his eyes and reopened them. It was really grating after a while. Just a second of irritating behaviour clearly designed to belittle her. 'What's the first thing you do when you get in the car?' 'Close the door? Adjust the seat? What?' 'Yeah -- the door's closed, then what?' I wish he'd just say, she thought. Nick Nolte would open his mouth and then she could pop a ball of explosive plasma in it. Spit Nolte. Nick Molten. Mick Mack Mo. 'Put the clutch down?' She said. 'Put the clutch... no! What? No, you check that the gear stick is in neutral and the handbrake is firmly on.' 'Right. Fine.' She wiggled the gear stick left to right and gripped the handbrake and wobbled it. 'They're both on. Let's go, yeah?' Had she been eating a lot of sugar that morning? It might account for her irritability. Cable tried to get them to eat a balanced diet. No Joke-a-cola, no pop-tarts, no early-morning cappuccino laced with cream and a chocolate-shaving four-leafed clover or X-Force "X", no buttered buns with more than one raisin in the centre, no Chelsea anythings, no processed cheese or diary products that ran (except milk), nothing coated in yeast like marmite or twiglets, no tic-tacs, no gum, no chews, no bars, no hunks of nothing and definitely no shakes made from anything which sounded like a fruit but wasn't. 'In your own time.' Did she make a face? The engine purred into life with her right hand on the steering. Foot hovering somewhere near the bite. She shuffled right to left, six-point observation. Blind spot, nearside mirror, interior mirror, windshield, offside mirror, blind spot. Signalled left, last look over her left shoulder and go! The wheel rotated left. 'Push and pull Boomer it's not a jet...' The car inched forward. 'Look around you, don't assume everyone gives way.' Tabitha turned the wheel back to right. 'What are you doing?' 'What?! What?' 'Where are you going?' Cable asked, staring out the windows and all around. 'You want to pull out and drive forward, not park.' The car wavered on the spot. She put her foot on the gas and pressed. He dual controlled her. 'Take your foot off the accelerator.' 'My foot's not on the accelerator!' 'Take your foot off the accelerator, Boomer!' She looked down at her feet, gripping the wheel until her hands went white. She took off her foot and placed it next to the pedal muttering: goddamn it... 'I taught you to keep your eyes peeled -- this is no different. You cannot blindly charge out into the road and expect the traffic to part like Moses. Look all around not just straight ahead,' 'There's no other cars! We're a million miles from anyone!' 'Didn't you see James walking behind the car?' 'What? No I didn't see --' Shoving her head out the window she looked around for the big Indian. She leant back in, recomposing herself. 'Wherever he was he's gone now.' And she made a sheepish pout, the eyes stinging with saltwater. 'Sorry.' 'I'm sorry too. He was never there in the first place.' Incredulity plastered across her face. 'That's why you have to look around. All this space and some idiot walks out behind your boot. You get knocked by oncoming traffic and it's a little jolt, enough to dent both cars, but you're pushed back, you stall and then mash some poor bastard against another bonnet. It's all about control.' Yeah, it's all about control. Controlling the urge not to blow your head off Nick Nolte style. Pieces flying off into the great outdoors on such a lovely day and all this space and one mistake and you kill someone. 'We live in one another's pockets, literally. To do this,' he gestured 'you have to exercise absolute control. You have no space to do it your way because you and everybody else learn only one way. The way.' *** (The Listing Of Ships): 'What are we, Nate?' 'Excuse me?' 'What do I mean to you?' Domino straddled him, Cable lying on his back on the mattress. He looked up into her polarised eyes, short hair in a scruffy bed-head. Her expression was soft, questing. Lips were pursed, she wanted a response, both hands pressed at his breast. 'You mean to me... an end to loneliness. You mean the world to me Dom. Why are you even asking? Is it that profile from SHIELD? What they say about you and me?' She wasn't usually the type to be so sensitive toward this. 'It's just nice to know where a girl stands. Friend. Confidant. Sometime lover. What does that mean? How can I be a friend and a lover at the same time?' Seeing into his puzzled frown, she got a stab of doubt and ridicule, then tried to brush it off. 'Forget it,' she laughed, cracking a smile 'it's nothing. Just a joke. Heh.' He knew when she was serious though, and as unsettling in its own way as it was for Domino to present them with a question on their relationship, it did leave Cable pondering for a moment as to the what and why. Throughout his brief stint in the present, Nate had done a great many things with a great many people, but he didn't feel any connection was quite so potent as the one he shared with the lucky merc. Irene Merryweather. A name flashing bright and big in bold on his mind, a girl whose existence validated Cable's protective nature and undying devotion to his root objectives in this time zone. Sam Guthrie and Garrison Kane, people for whom Cable had found a way to replace the void in his part-heart for son Tyler. The rest of the X-Force kids and the ideals represented by Xavier and his foster parents Scott and Jean. The X-Man, another time-lost soul thrown in the deep end. Caliban, his simple friend whom Cable always had an eye out for. Domino. Domino. A mystery, but quite a reliable one. Things fell into place for the two of them. A woman who might rival Aliya for the dependency on love, sex and guns. All leather and sass, engine grease and grenade pins. She wasn't a replacement for his dead wife, she wasn't in addition to the wedding ring he kept in a box in his drawers, she was who she was. Friend. Confidant. Sometime lover. 'You've had love before.' He said. 'Yes.' 'So have I. We stick together because we work well together. Isn't that what you mean to me? You are someone I can depend on.' 'That's... not so great. I won't always be here.' 'No. Neither will I. What we do makes that a risk.' 'So where does that leave us? The uncertainty of our companionship. We could die any minute so why bother staying around one another because it'll just hurt.' She sat on the edge of the bed. 'That's a pain I'd gladly take Dom because it'd mean we had something precious together that we're both sad is gone. If we've both known what it's like to love and get broken-hearted then let's not call it that.' 'What would you call it?' She asked. 'Nothing. Being friends, confidants, sometimes lovers. Whatever.' 'Whatever?' She raised her eyebrow. 'You're gonna call it whatever?' 'What do you think its name should be?' 'It's like we're naming a baby.' She smirked. 'See you're not even bothered anymore.' 'I care! It does matter.' 'Why?' She fidgeted out of his sight and then got up to the window. Large droplets impacted on the double glazing. The view of Manhattan stretched out in a vast airy infinity, the clouds low and the birds high. 'It just does Nate. I want to feel loved. I miss Milo.' 'You are loved Dom. I know you cared for him, and nothing can bring that back but a person has to keep going. I'm not saying "move on" or replace him, I'm just saying that remember you've got a life to live.' 'And what if I said to you that that life doesn't involve you?' 'I'd want to know why...' 'Because I cannot be sure where we stand with each other.' 'Is it not enough that I do love you?' He asked. 'But do you actually love me, or is it just this conception of familiarity and support that masquerades as your real feelings?' 'Whatever the truth is, can't you say the same? If it bothers you so much why haven't you said anything about it before?' 'Things have changed. The anniversary dredged up the past. I'm facing it in a way I haven't before. Maybe I tried to run, I don't know.' She hugged herself over in the gloomy corner. He stood up and suddenly feeling the need for freedom and an umbrella rather than difficult emotions battering him, he grabbed the door handle. 'You're an independent woman Domino. I've always known that. If you want to run away from me, I shan't stop you. If you want to run toward me, so much the better, I'll be here for you.' The knob twisted and a gust from down the hall blew in, unsettling the hairs on the back of her neck. She watched him grab a jacket. 'I... need to know your answer.' 'You already do.' He said. *** On the streets at night the whores hustled and the hustlers whored. Bass boomed down from a windowsill stereo, Puerto Ricans crowding the stairs to their apartments. A grey cloud issued to the air, puffs in their mouths and wisps in the fingers. A ball hit the pavement and Domino knocked it back. The vendor on the corner in his little green shack that closed soon said hi how ya doing and listened to his wind-up radio. She browsed the remaining papers; something to read, get her mind off it. New York Times, Amsterdam News, the Daily, the Post, the Wall Street. The sweets and drinks, a cool-box of ice and an open lid, this that and the other crammed in with condensation. The comics at the back. Zeroes on Fire. The Indescribable Bulk. Fable. The rain had stopped. She could hear the crackle of the transistor radio. Thirteen dead, ritual homicides, police car exploded, pub-goers, bus stabbing, honour killing, father of three, feral youth, state of emergency, democrat exile, Paris riots, shaken baby. All too much. She buried her head and tossed some coins onto the papers, picking up random material and dragging her feet as she stepped into the city poison. War all the time. Shootings and lootings. Soldiers dead and partisans dead. Insurgents and refugees. Oil. The price of gas and electricity. The price of blood. Leaves skated on the puddles. She cast her gaze skyward, the looming black tower with a beacon of home inside. Low-power light bulbs. A fridge stocked. A hot water bottle. Cable. It wasn't too late to have a good night's sleep. She walked toward the doorman who lifted his cap. The blessing in disguise. 'How do you keep that room all year around, Miss, if'n ye don't mind me saying?' She half-opened the door, turned her head. 'I'm well connected.' She said. *** (The Birdcatcher's Oath): (Domino) I bang on the wall into the next cabin: 'turn your music down, man!' even though it's groovy and I do like house, but it must be two in the morning and Cable and the rest of us are on our way to Moscow. Out the window the shrubs and heath shoot by, our Nicolaevsky Express ploughing through the still and starry at 235km/h. Pressing my face to the window, the expanse of the lighted terra firma fades away into endless steppes. It is a beautiful but harsh realm. The temperature must be in the extremes. The roll of the cabin on the rickety wheels moves in time with the thump. The train lists, the thump keeps on firing. Like the Lars Von Trier track, the one from Dancer in the Dark with Bjork and that guy from Radiohead. The chugging of the train, my foot taps, and as I close my eyes on our trans-Russian adventure I remember: Andergraund, Belgrade, 1995. Nick Warren. The most intense experience I ever had on drugs. Some guy weaved through the crowd, smoke and mirrors all of it and handed me some pills. Security lax. I took them, alcohol was making my skin itch. All these young kids dancing like the end of the world, no-one sleeping outside, just underneath the Kalmegden Citadel. Restaurants orbited the plaza, chains of coloured bulbs linking every building all in one long neuron of energy; edgy for the night-craze. If the beat hit hard enough every one of those bulbs would shatter and all these diners, all the waiters the chefs the busboys the painters outside would cram into the club and pace and fret and wail to the piercing trance. I didn't know what the tunes were, but they flew by my head ten at a time, stirring all these feelings I never realised I had for everyone. These retro kids, laced with vodka and neon, sweat t-shirts and tits out, roll-ups and hands holding in a bestial-mad dark daisy-chain. I was juggling my body side to side, surrounded by people I never met before. Milo and I taking a break all of a sudden amid ridiculous scheduling. I didn't know what to say when he volunteered the trip. Take it, yup, go for it, swing out a little. When's the next time I'd relax? So bring over the drinks and lean over the counter to wait for them to serve you sos I can stare at your ass and the way those jeans fit your shape so perfectly. And then this guy like I said just came out of the crowd and he was covered in those tubes, one round his neck and at least three round each wrist and probably one on his cock too. Difficult to tell, y'know, they started with the dry ice flowing it over us as if we were crops being sprayed with insecticide. I remember they were playing Underworld then. The track that was in Trainspotting, but not the track that they used in the club when Karl Hyde goes mental shouting LAGER LAGER LAGER, MEGA MEGA WHITE THING -- which I heard was not about ecstasy although at the club with half of Way Out West pumping us higher and higher I sure wished it was. No, the track was the one off the album that the three of them remixed called Dark Train, at least twice the length of the original and then it was used in the bit when the baby crawls along the ceiling crawling along the ceiling crawls and crawls along the ceiling and then you get that Scottish guy what was he called and he's screaming and screaming and wetting his pants and his parents are knocking on the door but no-one lets them in and poor Ewan, he's screaming and screaming and the baby's crawling on the ceiling crawling crawling on the ceiling when Milo turns and grins and I think to myself maybe I should have kept one of these pills for him? I don't know. And a pause, and another hit of the snare and Nick Warren pulls some insane tune out of the archives and the crowd moves like a meadow in a fresh breeze, this distorted wave washing over everyone's hands as they're raised, and it circles around and around, the owners flashing the house lights up and down and Milo shoves the drink in my hand and I lean over into his ear: what's in it? Vodka and gin and martini and something else he says jesus that sounds potent what are you having? The same come on lets get in there. His dreadlocks waving, he moves like a blur flicking his pieces this way and that getting deeper in some acid beep klaxon shooting out -- someone touches my ass -- then squeezing in-between sweaty teenagers looking half my age: are you allowed in here? Yeah, course!? They look pissed, androgynous, hyper and sugar-crazed; I say: great! and give them a great big hug and a kiss on each cheek. Aw don't tell me you're jealous I shout into Milo's ear, no he says and puts one of those big black burly arms round my waist pulling me closer and there's a layer of drums on top of the bass, it's still got that four-four rhythm but now the crowd are getting more aggravated, I spill a little of my drink and scream out waaaay! Have you taken E? Milo shouts in my ear and I step on his toes the strobe pulsing and even when I close my eyes I can see it flashing about like fireflies in summer haze -- yes! Some guy was just giving them out, sorry I didn't get you one, but I didn't know whether you'd had it before or whatever I don't know, look c'mere yeah, let's kiss whoa! Where is he, he says, I want one! You've got your drink! Have mine! Have me, kiss me Milo! I love you! House lights come up and Milo's so sweet, we dance close, there's hardly any room and I feel the beating of my own heart echoing with each reverberation of the speakers, the thump goading my feet faster and faster and Milo's a bit sloppy with his tongue but I kind of like it; we had a lot to drink before we got here, three or four glasses of wine each, and I don't know whether he can handle his alcohol properly like me but I guess I'll find out. Nick Warren has got this proper deep acid track on now, and then one of the bouncers barrels through the crowd like a runaway train and gathers the dealer by the collar and they make off with him their tracks covered by spinning lights and oh damn I feel sorry for the guy but hey that's his problem not mine he should know better. 'Come on!' Milo shouts grabbing my hand. 'Where we going?' I smile. 'I need you so bad right now. I wanna fuck.' He says. 'Great!' I say. The tracks of the train rallying over and over again and again. Cable steps in, the slide door shutting. I'm underneath a plaid wrap. 'They still going on with that music? I just asked them to turn it down!' 'Nevermind Nate. Come on, sit with me a bit.' He eyeballs me. 'You're in an awfully good mood. What's wrong?' 'Nothing!' I laugh. Eventually the rhythm is going to get you. Who was that, Estefan? I pat the seat. 'Sit with me Nate.' The cubicle door flies open, the floor is so polished I think I can see the future. Wow! I shout would you look at that? And the guy inside who dries your hands is taking care of someone else, pampering his wrists: would you like aftershave -- his English sure is good -- how about a lolly? Some deodorant (I can't imagine what it smells like out there?) Cigarettes mostly, and the smell of dry ice. X-Men: Striking the Balance 'Come on,' Milo says, pushing me into the toilet where there's a shelf and a seat for girlfriends getting eaten out. Milo, what does dry ice smell of? But he's kissing me so sweetly, oh I love you baby you're so good to me. I stroke his face and his skin is so soft, he's got these deep knowing eyes, so clever and such a nice ass I swear I watch him when he works out and all that knotted tension in his lower back it all just dissipates when he comes in my mouth, this is so naughty, I shout! 'Oh, baby, you ain't seen nothing yet,' he whispers. I can't hear proper though because the bass really shakes the toilets like an earthquake, number 10 on the Richter and I can hear it suddenly, that faint guitar work getting louder and I'm sneaking out of my panties while his hands are floundering trying to rest the drinks on the ledge and be real quiet because we don't want to be found out because of course this is a solo sex toilet -- male and female separated -- but we want to be together and it's not solo sex right now although it is at this moment because I've got a finger past the elastic and oh my god it feels so good, the sweat and heat radiating out of my pussy like steam from a kettle, fuck, get your jacket off, get your jacket off and down on your knees! And with each thump of the bass in the adjacent cabin, Nate's got his fingers stroking harder and harder against my thighs and his head is going lower toward me -- I restrain myself one hand on the window making a big condensation imprint and the other tightening on his metal shoulder. I cannot wait for the moment. I cannot wait for the rush and the pull of the kinetics of the train to shunt him up into me. 'Put it in me, Nate...' I breathe. His hot exhalation hits my centre with precision, I'm wet with anticipation. Milo's fumbling around again, I put my fingers on his lips -- stop the shit, Milo and take care of me baby, me first dammit -- and he grins stupidly, my god I'd no idea I could be so selfish on E but then all that melts away as his face lowers to my cunt and licks at my red wet little hot clit. Pants round my ankles, I stifle a yell and see my legs spasm. He holds me down and his dreadlocks flop into my lap, and Nick Warren is spilling Offshore onto the crowd that tune was so amazing when it came out, just before the birth of dance which I hate so much it's such shit, and oh shit, that feels dirty... oh fuck, I swoon, keep up, don't stop Milo... But Nate feeds in a finger, I hold back a yelp, my legs spread like mountains of white about his head, and the couch that I'm sitting on is really actually quite uncomfortable and all the while this consistent thump right next to my ears and we can even hear the synths, his fingers tapping my vein, his tongue forking the apple and my folds parting to let him in further, quivering, my mouth open and eyes clenched just like my tummy and a yell out of my throat to combat the assholes next door. 'You like that? You like that?' 'Milo...! Milo...! Oh, I'm gonna come...!' Keep your voice down he hisses, and I feel his tongue riveting over my clit repeatedly, a nail-gun, a rail-gun, get wet like an angel, derailed, me bracing myself so delicately on the porcelain and imitation marble that glitters in the strong white light of the cubicle. 'Oh, oh, oh' sticking his fingers in, I'm so easy when I'm horny, oh god, I'm coming, and I feel the sudden stoppage of time, the sudden clarity, but the drug is acting in new and exciting ways and then it swirls my eyes and I see these little flowers opening their heads and out pops tiny little waterborne creatures, skating and surfing on the surface and all of it radiating and so piping hot and moist and oh jesus the clench in my belly and 'Nate! Nate! Holy fuck...! Ah...' and the snare rush is ending next door and my legs are clamping round his head, and then suddenly relax and loll. To one side, flicking my pants and trousers off, and Nate gets up wiping his mouth, that taste I know he'll kiss me with because I want him to and I'm the one that initiates it. 'You dirty bastard...' I say to him, grinning, and the train lists, knocking him to one side and into my reach and I'm fumbling with his buckle, I cannot wait to get his cock. He wiggles free of the jeans which go down to the floor joining mine, and I stare at his proud erection, wobbling hard and straight, desperate for me and my mouth and I keep him suspended raising an eyebrow, he's in for it, the beat getting louder and so I grip his shaft and pull and jerk and fucking tear him apart. He grits and bears it. I spit into my hand, lubing him up and fooling him until he's begging to be swallowed whole. Train wheels revolving. Menacing bass; time to take a dive Cable! I move forward and engulf him, sucking all the strength and pressure and strain onto my tongue. He tastes of iron and blood. I'll suck that out of him too. 'Use your teeth,' he whispers, the first signs of snowfall in the window. So on the updrag I close deftly around him, and lick the head -- he likes it a little rough -- and all I remember without giving up on the jerking is that he dances badly but fucks like a bull. I add a twist to each stroke. He's mine. 'Dom,' the knowing look 'finish me off...' I pump my head, bobbing up and down, pulling and twisting, hand at his balls grabbing and then not in time with the beat and he's almost there, his toes curling in the poor space of the cabin and I've almost got him, he tremors once, twice, three times, I squeeze the base of his shaft, pumping hard and I see the veins just in focus when I put my eyes together going up and down and he shouts and then the squirt hitting the back of my throat, swallowing and swallowing, the thick salt coating my tongue and I pull off and a few final jets hit my neck. 'Ah, fuck!' He says, the come running down my top. I whisk it off. I'm betting my luck will hold out. Stay hard, Nate. I love your come, but I love it even more in my cunt than in my belly. The look on his face is priceless, he's obsessed with my breasts -- good, he should be, I'm proud of them -- and while he's prone on his back I curl up to him, my lips nuzzling his ear lobe, and pulling him in for a salty kiss. I pass some of his taste back to him. He grins and strokes my tits, smoothing his release into my flesh. I whisper in his ear. 'Fuck me.' The mass of him rests on top of me, a welcome weight and in the bliss of the music thumping through the wall I open my legs, all a flutter and mentally the doctor is OUT. Instinct taking form. Instinct and nature pressing into the space inside. The thickness of him digging into me, I curl my legs about his ass, crossing the ankles, deep penetration and wet and slippery from his cuntlashing. I love fucking to music. I love the spacey effect, the miasma of emotion and the welling up of all this muscular tension until it bursts like a dam. 'Fuck me, Nate.' The train rattles on its wheels. He jabs up inside me, a kiss on my lips, hugging my arms and restricting my movements until I'm trapped; being fucked and manhandled and hard and thorough and really very deep and I become that slaughtered chick again in Belgrade in 1995, fucking in the toilets with her husband and screaming like a whore above Chicane and Humanoid and System F and Ferry Corsten and ATB and Robert Miles and all those other beautiful people. All the bass thump and Nate's powerful thrusts spearing into me, taking me higher and higher and I'm tingling all over, my mind attuned to the love of the universe, never losing stride and then -- ahaaahh -- this sudden splash of liquid at my anus, where his balls meet my pussy and what the hell? Have I come again, I don't know, my head is spinning the stress in my belly rioting like the kids back in the 90s all on Es and whiz and all those ridiculously named drinks that in European countries they give you about three fingers worth before any mixer and that's what Nate is doing, three fingers fooling with me, the clench and the tingle and wiggle and pump in and out and he's grunting, grunting Domino, Domino Nathan. The music and the thump. The train and its rails. The power line and the electricity. I feel the surge inside. Oh god, all the trembling travelling in alternating current up and down the length of my body, alighting the synapses and firing the neurons I feel so alive and I love what he's doing to me, I miss Milo so much but I love you too Nate, please, I want you to know how much you mean to me, I know I can be hard sometimes, I'm hard work and I know I can be mysterious and enigmatic and all that rubbish but a lot of the time I like to keep people at a distance but some people like you and Milo you break through and you bring the light in and shine it inside on all the dark places in the depths of my soul, and when you say that you love me and I know you do and please baby, please please please! Higher and higher and I don't know if I can stay conscious much longer, the synths next door so loud and happy and like an elevator that never gets to the floor you're going to because you don't know what floor you actually want it goes higher and higher, an elevator to the stars! and then he's pushing me further into the couch that we're on, I'm going to be bruised tomorrow, the plush of the material soft on my wet backside I watch his face, growling and groaning and with my name comes the completion of the act and the knowledge that I've had him and I wanted him so bad and he's still with me, thank you Nate, thank you for being there, you bring the light in, you bring light in, cool wind following, following after you, rising for you, your skin beautiful, everything comes natural, rocking rocking floating. *** (Cable) After the Morlock Ceremony of Light, when once a year they let the upworld ambience filter through the cracks of the pavement to illuminate the sewers, I came back to the sunken church. Crumbling gothic architecture and lack of light imbued the place of worship in permanent cold, no moss could take hold. The insects scurried but there was little to eat but one another. Did you know a cathedral is only a cathedral if there is a seat for a Bishop? A place where he can reside and preach. The chair itself is the symbol of teaching and authority, much like Xavier's wheelchair. It designates him as governor of his diocese. I had named this place a cathedral in the past, telling Storm that her ceremony would start here, but I was wrong. I didn't know that we had been standing in an abandoned building, foundations too dangerous for the council to demolish. Most of the neighbourhood had forgotten its existence; all but the Morlocks who came up from the subway lines and sewage ports to bask in spirituality none of them believed in but nonetheless respected. I came here before with Domino and Feral's sister Thornn. We used mirrors to reflect the shafts of light into the church and it was lit up with such magnificence you could forget for an instant that we were beneath smoggy Manhattan in the dust and stone and had been transported to this wonderful kaleidoscope world of colour. Pipes and steam became leaves, branches and waterfalls, the trickle of waste water a river of light; all reflections that were the Morlock's way of seeing beauty in an underground of darkness. A bird whistling startles me. I delve deeper into the darkness, telepathy reaching out. Maybe I'll get a signal off the creature, maybe not. I don't think I've tried before, but if it's successful then perhaps through the bird's eyes I might better navigate the pitch-black. I should have brought a flashlight. Tewit te woo. I sense no language from the animal, no discernable thought processes, as I pick over rubble and fallen masonry. I stumble into mud and am aware of the presence of water trickles, feeding spots of vegetation all alone down here. The place smells of damp. I get a chill because there is no wind. Footsteps I make don't echo. I must be in a very close space. The images I receive are panicked, my mind picking out the pertinent from the indistinguishable nonsense of birdbrain. It takes some getting used to, but the animal sees further in the lowlight than I do and it helps me find him, huddled in a ball on a stone ledge, limping. It's as if we are attuned via sonar. Him aware of my presence and me aware of the proximity of his, through my limited telepathy. I get the feeling the bird is a swallow? Swallows like to build nests up high, away from predators, so I'm guessing he fell from the nest or tried to evade a stalker on the way home and flew into the church. Getting in was hard enough for me, I don't expect the bird to survive without my help. But as I reach out my gloved hands he hobbles away -- I can hear his heart beating! -- and then at the edge he hops straight off and I know it would be cute to see him bounce because it's only a two foot drop but that's just cruel so I stretch out and quickly very quickly open my palm and there he falls in, our link so precise in the confined space I could find him blindfolded. He trembles in my hand. He is like a newborn: reluctant and terrified to do anything but lie in a heap but strangely curious as to what comes next. I feel his pulse radiating through to my core. Retracing my steps, I back peddle until I'm in the grey loneliness of the pews, gossamer-thin lines of dusk penetrating the slopes of roofing. Feathers black from dust and dirt, this fellow needs a bath. I wonder how long he has been down here alone. I wonder whether his family miss him. He's still got life left inside otherwise he wouldn't have called me. 'I'll get you out.' I tell him, making a loose fist and his beady black eyes and beak poking out between my thumb and forefinger. He trembles some more. My voice must be thunder. Carefully treading rubble and imprinting sole on mud clods I make my way up the church steps to where the lectern resides. The Morlocks had collapsed part of the west wall to allow passage in from the back alleys -- a contradiction of sorts because some were so adamant about their isolation -- but I don't complain, it makes an easy egress. Soon enough I feel a breeze on my face. The cobwebs blown off. The Swallow chirps. He must like the warmth of my hand. I go under the yellow tape and in an enclosed space, boarding and chalk to keep the neighbours away, I fling my hand out, loosing the bird. It is like sleight of hand, he disappears immediately, a solitary flap the only sign he was ever a part of me. I look to the stars. It's difficult to see much up there; pollution and nightlife make the skyline opaque. I wonder what I wanted to find down in the Morlock church. It's good the Swallow will get back home though; his loved ones will be waiting.