Clint, Cal, and Pam - Backdated to 6/25
Jun. 25th, 2018 04:00 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
ax_fatale posting in ![[community profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/community.png){kind=small}
ax_mainA late night kitchen raid goes wrong, blood is spilled, and Cal and Clint take off.
Disclaimer: Violence. Lots and lots of violence.
Clint wasn't really sure how he felt about Pam. She was definitely a little weird, but then they all were. The part that unnerved him was the part he'd seen in the holo room, where she'd been dismembering zombies with Billy. Maybe it was because she did it so gleefully, whereas Clint still got a little sick to his stomach thinking about all of the holos he'd 'killed'.
Still, he'd wanted to try and spend some time with her (and she was one of the only teleporters at the school), so he'd invited her to have a late night feast of cold sandwiches and warmed up spaghetti in the abandoned cafeteria. After all, he'd always learned that diplomacy was better with food.
"Nice to know I'm not the only one who likes this place better when it's not full of people," Pam said as she eyed what she assumed were the products of a late-night leftover raid on Clint's part and slipped into a seat. "I mean, the food's great? But you realize just how many people are here when they're all right here." And yeah. She wasn't really a fan of that. Especially since she was pretty sure that a decent number of them were inTJ's camp about her having planted a knife in Jeanne's shoulder. Or her being Brotherhood. Whichever, there was glaring. She wasnt a fan of that, either.
He pushed a couple of the platters and bowls toward her, then shoved a big forkful of spaghetti onto his plate. "Yeah, I usually either eat here after everyone's gone, or take it all back to my room for Caleb. It's just too many eyes, right? And they're all on you. And, you know, me."
"Yeah, exactly. Last thing I need is one more trigger to turn invisible. Fuck that." She picked a sandwich up from the tray and took a bite. "Caleb ok?" With classes out for the summer, she hadn't really seen him around much.
Oh yeah, that's right. Pam and Caleb knew each other. Which was... weird? "He's strong. Stronger than I thought, turns out," Clint admitted as he dug a fork into the mound of noodles. "He told me he was at a place with you and Alex. And another girl?"
"Nott," Pam confirmed with a nod. "I mean, there were other kids there too, then? But they sorta came and...well, went." She grimaced and reached over to help herself to the bowl of spagetti. "Honestly, we figured he was dead. No one ever mentioned other places."
"Makes us even. I thought Cal was dead," Clint admitted.
"Weird when they show back up, hey?" Pam grimaced. "I mean, good, definitely. But still. Really fucking weird."
"More good than weird," he hummed thoughtfully. Then he paused. "What do you think of all of them? All of us?"
"That we're all seriously fucked up?" she half-joked, then shook her head. "I don't know. When we heard about Tommy, it was like, 'Fuck, it's not just us - we need to talk to this guy, make sure he's okay. And I guess...I still kinda feel like that? Except you guys all came in your own groups already. You've got people watching your backs. I'm not sure you even want that, or if you just want to try and forget it all." She smirked, a little. "Plus, I got the impression from Caleb that the first thing people did on arrival was warn all of you about the Big Bad Brotherhood. So there's that." She twirled spaghetti around her fork. "Turn it around. What do you think?"
Clint frowned slightly, chewing his way through a meatball before responding, "I didn't know they were making kids fight other mutants. Or, you know, holos of them. I knew that Cal had it bad, and I knew what they did to me, but I'm- I was always asking for it. I didn't know it was that bad for everyone. I don't know how to, you know, deal with it. Other peoples shit."
Pam frowned. "You can't. I mean, people can really only deal with their own shit. Or not deal with it. You can't do it for them." She set her fork down and made a face. "Anyway, the holos weren't so bad, mostly. I mean, stabbing Billy didn't mean shit to me until after I actually met Billy; it was just another combat sim against a kick-ass opponent, with the usual penalties at the end if I lost, or didn't last long enough. Not a whole lot different than fighting - I don't know, Army assholes or whoever was protecting the target of the day. The only ones that sucked were the ones with people I actually knew." She looked back up at Clint with interest. "What'd they have you fighting?"
"Eh," Clint rubbed at the back of his neck. "Less fighting, more assassinating. Uh. I mean, they were all like, politicians and stuff. Powerful people."
"Wow. You were special." Pam smirked, then shrugged. "I did some of those. More business type than political, though. Infiltrate, get in close, do the job and get out again. I'd've loved to have gone to that big party thing just to see if the sims measured up."
Cal had just walked the pup, and he would've taken her with him to see Clint, but she seemed too tired to go play with Lucky. So he left her curled up on his bed, and, after one last pet on her head, located Clint's psi imprint in the cafeteria and teleported by its door, just inside the large room. He'd noticed he had company, of course, so he was unsurprised to see Pam. "Hey," he greeted them as he walked over. "Enough spaghetti for a third stomach?"
Pam had felt a familiar - and yet not quite familiar - pull from behind her, and had started to spin in her chair even as Cal began speaking. "That was one of my portals," she accused, her eyes narrowing, not even realizing that her hand had automatically settled around the handle of her fork as it would have around the hilt of her knife.
Clint looked up, brightening slightly at the arrival of Cal. "All you can eat." He hopped up off the table. "Lemme grab you a plate."
Usually, Clint's reaction to Cal's arrival was something Cal liked to focus on. If someone else was happy to see him, then maybe he wasn't as bad as he thought. It was the same way he felt about Frumpkin, or about either pup, letting him pet them. The fact that it was Clint only made it better, because that reaction was a mirror of Cal's, and he couldn't put words on how it felt to not be alone in that.
But right then, his focus had sharpened on Pam, Pam who looked ready to stab him with that fork. Cal's steps slowed, and he stopped a few feet from the table, his shoulders tense, wishing he had a weapon of his own on him.
He didn't want to use the telepathy on her. He only wanted it to keep people out.
"Yeah," he answered, sounding a lot more nonchalant than he felt. Should he be sounding her out? He could do it without her noticing, he was sure, but he didn't want to. He didn't want to panic, either. He didn't want Sandra's voice whispering in his mind, he didn't want to feel this way. "I told you I'd mimicked you."
"You didn't say you were keeping it all." The way he sounded so calm and rational about it wasn't in his favor - she didn't trust people who wanted to reason with her. She'd heard enough of the "calm the crazy girl down" tone at the Facility to know it was bullshit, and normally meant someone was buying time and trying to find an opening. Her grip tightened around her fork, and she reached for the knife with her other hand as she slid out of her chair and stood up. "What else did you take?"
Pausing halfway to the kitchen, Clint looked back at them and cursed inwardly. He zeroed in on the sharp tools in Pam's hands and felt the muscles in his shoulders tense. Taking a few steps back toward Pam, he raised his hands. "It's not like he stole it."
"What he said," Cal confirmed, raising his hands slightly. Empty hands, not hiding anything. He didn't want this. Please, fuck, he didn't want this. "I don't take from people, I mimic."
"Fine. Stop mimicking me, then," Fatale demanded, watching his hands carefully. The last time she'd talked to Cal, he'd been using what had looked an awful lot like Billy's knives. She wasn't in any hurry to find herself impaled by them.
"Why the hell should he do that? It's not like it hurts you," Clint pointed out.
Later, Cal would feel grateful that Clint got it, without him needing to explain, when Cal wasn't sure that he got it himself. For now, he was still too tense, too wary, too close to that place he didn't want to go. Sandra's voice was already there, pointing out how vulnerable he would be to Pam if he dropped her mutations. "I'm not taking anything from you. And I don't want to stop."
Fatale's eyes narrowed, and she glanced over at Clint - no immediate threat, there, though it occurred to her that she didn't know what is mutation was, and should have made an effort to find out - before turning her attention back to Cal. Who was a threat, even without her abilities. With them? She wasn't sure she could take him, but she wasn't going to go down without a fight, either.
"I don't really give a fuck what you want," she countered, her voice low. She set the fork down on the table, and switched her knife to her right hand, where she began weaving it through her fingers to get a better feel for its balance. She wished, now, that she'd brought one of her own along, but this would do if she needed it. "They're my powers, not yours. You didn't pay for them. I did."
"Fuck that, you don't know what I paid for," Cal retorted, anger rising in his chest, to solidify into something he could use. He wished Clint wasn't here, much as he was thankful that he was. He wasn't used to giving a shit about someone, when it came down to fighting someone.
"Really? Don't care. You were supposed to be my fucking replacement. And I'm not being replaced." With that said - and it would've had to have been said sooner or later, so maybe it was better to just get it out there now - Fatale disappeared. With Jeanne's advise in mind, she didn't immediately teleport behind him - he'd be expecting that. Instead, she slipped off her shoes and began weaving her way away from them as silently as she could manage, her eyes locked on Cal.
"Shit," Clint breathed out quietly. His hand palmed a knife from the table (a butter knife, but still) and he shifted his gaze around the room, suddenly wishing he had his sight back. "I don't suppose we could go back to talking about this or anything?"
She was moving away, Cal could tell, focusing on her psi imprint. But what did that mean, when she could teleport by him in an instant. "Don't make me fight you," he said, his tone a little too level, his words at odds with the hot knives that appeared in his hands. You know where she is, came the whisper, right by his ear, you could end this fight before it even starts. But he ignored the voice, for now.
And Clint was a liability, but she would know that, if Cal told him to go.
"Says the guy with Billy's knives in his hand." Right. He didn't want a fucking fight. She ignored Clint's question and continued to circle. "Besides, if you weren't looking for a fight, why would you want my fucking powers? That's what they're for." Invisibility, teleportation, hand-eye coordination. She was a fucking assassin, just like he was. He was just better - no. He maybe had more powers, but she had the training.
And only one fucking knife, whereas his were unlimited.
"I'm not using them against you," Cal retorted. For now. Like he wasn't using Billy's knives against her, and he forced himself to vanish the ones in his hand. (It wasn't as if he couldn't recall them with a thought.) He wanted to keep facing her as she moved, but resisted the urge. Better if she didn't know that he could track her, if she was going to make a move. Maybe he could trick her into making a move that didn't involve teleporting; those were easier to predict.
"Yet." It was just a matter of time, after all, even if he did let go of Billy's knives. She'd fought with Billy in the Danger Room - she knew just how fast he could get them back, which put her at a disadvantage if she didn't strike first. She considered, briefly, throwing the knife - but it was the only one she had, and a quick glance confirmed that the other had disappeared from the table.
No one was looking for a fight. Riiiight.
Fatale set her jaw, opened a portal, and dove through - and came up stabbing at Cal's throwing arm. A strong offense was pretty much the only chance she had.
It all happened so fast. The argument, the weapons, the nerves and tension. Before Clint knew it, he saw a portal open up, and everything went to hell. It didn't matter whether the argument was valid or not, or whether they were all students, or even all refugees from those labs. Almost instantly, all that mattered was that Cal was being attacked, and Clint only had one real choice; the only one he would ever have in that kind of situation - protect Cal.
The butter knife in Clint's hand was shit for throwing, so he grabbed a fork without thinking and whipped it toward the portal's opening. Normally, he'd have unerring accuracy with that kind of thing, but against an invisible opponent, the only thing he could count on was his hearing aids and his intuition.
Cal had used Billy's knives in sims enough that he knew how to fight with them. He knew that most of the time, the ones in his hands weren't the most efficient. When the portal opened, he should have just manifested the knives so they would fly in and meet Pam as she stepped through. In a sim, he would have, and that would have been the end of the fight, or close enough. The first decisive move to lock in a checkmate.
The air shimmered with the hint of knives for a split second, too quick for anyone to notice, but he managed to stop himself at the last moment. Not a sim, and he didn't want to kill her. Fuck, he didn't even want to hurt her, no matter what the urge in his elevated pulse said, what the voice whispered in his ear. That had lost him precious time, however, and when he shifted to avoid the coming attack, it was too late. The knife bit into his arm, pain duller than you would expect from something sharp, and training took over. One of Billy's knives flashed into his good hand, and he slashed towards where he knew she was.
She felt her knife connect, but before she could dance out of the way, something sharp struck her in the shoulder. She let out a soft hiss of pain, knowing it was a mistake even as she did, because a split second later one of Billy's knives sliced across her stomach. Not deep, but sharp enough to sting, deep enough to draw blood.
Yeah. So much for anyone there not having wanted a fight.
Ignoring the pain, Fatale tightened her grip on the knife and slashed - then opened a portal behind her and fell backwards through it, rolling to her feet when she emerged on the other side, several yards away.
Cal was bleeding, and based on the hiss Clint had heard, Pam was probably injured too. If he let it keep going, things were just going to escalate. "Okay, Jesus," he called to the room at large. "Cutting each other up isn't going to change the whole powers situation. And as much as I like both of you, Pam, if you're going after Cal, I've got his back, every time. You really wanna go after two of us?"
Cal walked away from Clint as he talked; separate targets was better. If she came for Clint, it would give Cal an opening. If she came for Cal, then at least she wouldn't be coming for Clint. Win-win. The wound in his arm pulsed with pain, dull, throbbing, but adrenaline was making up for it, for now, and he only glanced at it to assess the damage before looking back in the direction her portal had dropped her. "You got first blood. Take the win."
Don't make us into what they wanted, but there was an edge of warning to his voice now that hadn't been there before. It wasn't just don't make me do this anymore, it was also, because I will do it, and you don't know how well they trained me.
Not well enough, because he still didn't want to take her out with a psi attack. The old man had been clear enough what Cal could and couldn't use his mutation for, and like fuck he was going to let her jeopardize that for him. He didn't owe her anything, no matter what she seemed to think.
"This is a win?" Fatale scoffed. She was bleeding, definitely - not badly, not enough to matter, but there was definitely blood. She ignored it, for now, and while she kept her eyes on Cal, it was Clint she answered. "I didn't want to go after either of you. But as dangerous as everyone says I am? He's more. I know how he was trained, and I know he's killed me before, and there's no fucking good reason to have my powers if he's not planning to do it again. That's what they're for. I'm not going to sit back and let him do it."
For fuck's sake, assassins. Clint wanted to smack his face. The thing was, he couldn't even deny the logic. If they were still in the labs (and half the time, he woke up thinking they were), he'd totally get it. But they weren't, and he wasn't going to let anyone take Cal's powers away. Or, you know, hurt him otherwise.
"This isn't a win. This is a 'no, seriously, it's not going to happen so forget about it,'" he told her. "If Cal wanted to kill you, don't you think he would have tried it already?"
"I would've done it already," Cal muttered, before he could help himself. With the array of mutations at his disposal, she wouldn't have stood a chance, and he would not even have needed hers, specifically. "But I don't. Want to. I don't want to kill anyone, or you'd already be dead."
He was going to ignore the fact that part of him actually really wanted to, right now. She was a danger; she wanted to take him out. But it wasn't a part of him he wanted to listen to, not now, not ever. Not ever again.
"I'm not that easy a target," Fatale muttered. Still, she had to admit they had a point. Maybe. He'd have tried, at least.
"You've never seen me and targets," Clint pointed out, but lowered the butter-knife in his hand. "So can we chill out about this? Cal's keeping whatever powers he wants to keep."
Cal didn't feel ready to chill out at all. His heart was still thudding in his ribcage, and his arm was feeling more painful by the second. He was a little too aware of his blood dripping on the floor, but he didn't want to show Pam how badly she'd injured him, in case this wasn't over. In case seeing a weakness made her pounce.
Then again, if they were going to fight, he'd rather they stopped fucking talking about it, but he resisted the urge to call another knife to his good hand, just in case. Because all in all, he'd really rather they didn't fight. So he clenched his jaw, and waited to see what she would say to Clint.
"No, I'm not chilling out," Fatale shot back. "They're my powers, and I'm not ok with him copying them, just because he wants to. Fuck that." Why should he get that kind of advantage?
"Well then," Clint said, chill, and slow. "You're gonna have to go through both of us. Cause Cal's keeping the powers."
That said it all, didn't it? Fatale's lips pursed with resolve, and she nodded. The gloves were off, then. She couldn't back down, wouldn't - and neither, apparently, would they. Without a word, she opened a portal and stepped through so quickly it was barely perceptible. Another opened atop a table that was no closer than she'd been, before, but which offered the perfect vantage point. With one fluid motion, she threw, aiming straight for Cal's throat.
A lot of thoughts and emotions went through Cal as he tried to move in time, a hot knife appearing in mid air and trying - failing - to glance off of the one she'd thrown. Too slow, too late, too unprepared. The knife sank into his throat, (too weak,) and for a few seconds, he didn't feel anything (too naive). He should've known better. He should've taken her out.
Blood bubbled up in his throat as he tried to call out to, "Cli...", and the pain slammed into him, as if reality had only just decided to reassert itself. His knees buckled and he dropped on the floor. Clint. He had to make sure Pam didn't go after him. Too late for Cal, but not for Clint. Cal focused on her psi imprint as he coughed up blood, put a hand to his neck. Keep the blood loss to a minimum, buy yourself a few seconds. The psi blast took Pam out like a light, and he felt her slip into unconsciousness more than he heard the thud of her body hitting the table.
There. Clint would be okay.
Clint, meanwhile, had realized at the last moment that he had said the wrong thing to Pam. He saw her throw the knife, and he had his own arm halfway up when he watched her drop to the table. It was only then that he registered the sounds trying to come from Cal's throat, and he turned, eyes widening in shock.
"No!" he yelped, dropping the knife in his hand as he dove onto his knees beside Cal, an arm moving to support him, the other hand plastering over Cal's as they tried to stem the bleeding. And, god, it was going everywhere. "Fuck. Fuck. You idiot. Asshole. You are not dying." Not like this. How many times had he seen Cal close to death? How many times had he been brought back? He couldn't die here.
Asshole. Dying. One word he expected from Clint, the other, not so much. Cal felt oddly detached from all of it, and panicked at the same time. He wanted to reassure Clint (it's okay, it's for the best), and he wanted to fight against it. His bloody hand stopped trying to stench the flow, leaving that task to Clint, and he gripped his shoulder instead. It was stupid, feeling like if he was going to die, it might as well be with Clint by his side. It was stupid, and part of him refused for it to happen.
He reached for Clint's mutation, because it was habit, and it shoved Pam's hand/eye coordination out of the way, the one he valued least, both consciously and subconsciously. It's okay, he stopped trying to tell Clint out loud, using the old man's telepathy instead. And then it really was okay, and instead of in pain, and dying, Cal looked surprised. The injury on his arm was knitting itself up, and he brought his free hand up to the knife protruding from his throat, and pulled it out before Clint could react. An arc of blood followed it, but the wound closed itself up immediately. Cal turned his head to the side to cough out the blood that had flowed into his throat, and couldn't figure out how to feel.
Clint just stared. Poised, where he was, to shove his hand back onto the spouting blood, mouth open to curse Cal to eternity, he just...stared. Cal had healed. Cal had fucking healed. He wanted to both laugh, and cry, but he just stared, unable to really breathe correctly.
Cal coughed and spat out blood for a few long seconds, then rolled back onto his back. Caught Clint's gaze, and... had no idea what to say. "That was you," he finally blurted out, after a moment longer. He wanted to throw his arms around Clint, but instead, he sat up and looked Pam's way. "Is she...?" She felt like she was out, yes.
Still not sure what the hell was going on, Clint followed his gaze toward Pam and pushed up, wiping his bloody hands on his shirt as he moved to her side to check her pulse - just in case. "She's okay," he reported quietly, then looked back over at Cal. "Are you-?"
"I'm fine," Cal answered, never mind that he wasn't, that his hands were shaking, that he couldn't even remember what 'fine' felt like. Even before this, but even less so now. He sat up, and tried not to pay too much attention to the amount of blood (his blood) everywhere. His legs felt shaky, but he pushed up to his feet as he sent a telepathic message to the old man. He felt like puking. He didn't want to. Fatale's hurt. She needs medical attention. Cafeteria. On the heels of that message, he sent the same one to McCoy. He couldn't put anything more than that into the message. He didn't want to puke. He didn't know what to say, or do. He only knew he couldn't stay here. "I need to get out of here."
"Tell me where you wanna go," Clint told him, already moving to carefully help Cal to his feet. He'd call Xavier in a bit, if Cal hadn't already pulled a telepathic bit.
It barely even registered that Clint was helping him up - that Clint was touching him - which said a lot about how much Cal implicitly trusted the other boy, given his current state. "I don't know," he answered, frowning, still looking at Pam's unconscious body on the table, and trying not to think of the blood coating his clothes. He wasn't going to puke.
"Can you teleport?" Clint asked, realizing that he needed to get Cal away from the school ASAP. Not so much because of the trouble they'd be in (and there would be trouble), but because Cal needed to get some fresh air, away from anything and everything that reminded him of the labs.
Cal frowned - that was what had started this whole mess; it was the only thing to do, right then - and tore his gaze from Pam, to look at Clint. "Yeah," he confirmed, after a beat, and opened a portal beside them, needing to get away. It didn't matter where. He stepped through into a dark street, then looked back at Clint, only then realizing that maybe he wasn't coming.
But Clint didn't hesitate, stepping through after him and holding out an arm in question. If Cal didn't want to lean on him, that was fine, he got it, but the guy had just lost a lot of blood, and Clint knew from experience that his power (his old fucking power - and he'd get to that soon) didn't exactly replenish lost blood that fast.
The portal collapse behind Clint, and instead of paying attention to wherever he'd taken them, Cal looked at the offered arm with incomprehension. It wasn't that he didn't feel weak - he did, jelly-legged, wobbly-kneed, and still nauseated - it was that it didn't occur to him that Clint might be offering that sort of help. Instead, he thought that he was offering a hug. The thought was so ridiculous that Cal nearly laughed, but then he just stepped into Clint and wrapped his arms around him, not giving a thought to the blood all over him. Fuck. Fuckfuckfuckfuckfuck. He didn't want to break down, and all he could do was hold on to Clint, and try to hold the tears - the sobs - the breakdown - at bay.
"Thank you," he managed, in a tight whisper, after a long moment.
Oh. Uh. Oh. Armful of Cal. Clint wrapped an arm around him, then, fuck it, the other one too, and held him, trying not to make it weird. It was still kind of weird, what with, you know, stoic-get-off-me-mimic bawling in his arms, but Clint wasn't about to let him go, not until Cal was good and ready. Not until he'd gotten it all out.
Clint still had a lot of questions. Mostly about how Cal had healed himself, and, you know, also where the fuck where they? But those could wait. He held the bro, let him cry it out, and stared in confusion at the darkened neighborhood around them. The place had definitely seen better days, and it looked like a few lots had just been abandoned, but at least that left them in relative peace. Better than back at the school.
When Cal finally came up for air, and thanked him of all fucking things, Clint wasn't exactly sure how to answer. Sure thing, Buddy, just didn't seem right. So Clint just huffed a sound, and told him, "'Course."
That finally made Cal laugh, although 'laugh' was a generous term for the broken sound that made it past his lips, trying to pass for a laugh. Yeah. Of course. Nothing was - nothing was of course. Cal let go of Clint and stepped away, wiping at his face as if erasing the tear tracks would erase the fact that he had cried at all. The laughter had died down as soon as it was there, and he looked around, then got a little too quiet. Fuck. Was that...? "Fuck."
"What?" Clint turned, tensing at the off-chance that they'd been followed.
It took Cal a long few seconds, and a gulp before he managed to say, "I used to live here." He was staring at a clearly abandoned, partially burned down house, and it didn't feel as if his heart was ever going to beat evenly again.
Shit. Clint should've known that something like this would happen when Cal was so fucked up. He huffed out a breath, then stepped up next to Cal. "You okay?"
Was he okay? Cal wasn't sure what okay meant anymore. "I'm alive," he answered, after a moment, looking away from the burned down shell of a house, and at Clint by his side. He wanted to thank him, again, but the words wouldn't get past his throat again. "I didn't mean to take us so far."
So far. So...shit Clint thought again. California. That's where Cal had grown up. He looked back up at the house and whistled. "Well. We're here. And you need to get off your feet. We should find somewhere to squat for the night until you get your energy back."
"I... don't know where," Cal replied, shaking his head. He couldn't think, and Clint was right - he needed to get off his feet. The sooner the better. His throat was aching again, with the lump stuck in it.
Clint nodded. "Okay. You stay here, I'll scout out a place that's, you know, not your old house." Because like Cal needed that shit. "I'll be back in a few minutes."
"Hey." Cal reached out to grab Clint's arm before he could move away, and swallowed back the panic trying to rise inside him. Idiot. You can stay on your own for a few minutes. What are you, four? "Be careful," he said, his voice a little rough, and let go of Clint.
Especially if he was going to scout out some half burned down places. Cal didn't know what he would do if something happened to Clint, never mind if something happened to him here and now.
Clint paused and looked back at him, and he couldn't help himself. He gave a wink. "Hey don't worry. I got this." Then he disappeared into the dark.
Don't worry. Yeah. Easy. Cal watched him go, then found a side of curb to park his ass on before his legs dropped out from under him. Slowly, the ache in his throat receded, but the nausea was still alive and kicking, only reinforced by the amount of blood he realized was on him. With shaking hands, he pulled his t-shirt off, and used the less bloodied parts of it to wipe the slowly drying blood off his neck. Fuck.
He wasn't going to start crying again. He didn't want to think about how close he'd come. About how stupid he'd been to hold back. He should have known better. He fucking did know better. But he hadn't wanted to - fuck. Fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck. He wanted to scream his throat raw, but... not a good idea.
Ten minutes later, Clint appeared at the edge of the light from a streetlamp, crouching down beside Cal with a slight nod. "I got something. Just. Don't ask any questions, okay?"
Cal pushed up to his feet slowly, carefully, not entirely sure that his legs would hold him up. "Tomorrow," he told Clint. "I'll ask tomorrow."
"Sure, sure," Clint told him as he reached out to help Cal to his feet, then shouldered him down the street to a darkened house. One lone light lit a window. The truth was, he'd just found the first place that had mail piled up in their box and no cars in car port, and decided to take advantage of whoever's vacation might be happening. One broken window wasn't a big deal, right? At least they didn't have a security system. Helping Cal to the front door, he let them in and nodded down the hall. "Shower's that way, if you wanna get cleaned up."
Bloodied shirt hanging out of the back pocket of his jeans, Cal went with Clint, trying not to tense up from the extended contact. But he would rather lean on Clint than fall on his ass, and much as he wanted to push him away, and not let anybody close, not even him - part of Cal also welcomed it. Having Clint there, solid, steady, and touching someone, being touched, even if the contact was completely utilitarian. Cal would just be adding that to the long list of things he felt conflicted about, these days.
"Thanks," he told Clint quietly when he indicated the bathroom, and he ignored the pictures of a smiling family on the walls as he pushed away from his friend and made his way towards the open door of the bathroom.
He avoided looking at his reflection in the mirror and set the tap going, in the hope of mostly covering the sounds of his puking. It took him about ten minutes to get that out of his system and clean up as well as he could over the sink. He felt an instinctive reluctance to undress any further and use the fire. Five more minutes were spent trying to get the blood out of his t-shirt, before he gave up, the red gone pink, but still all too obvious. At least he didn't have any blood left on himself, he figured, finally examining himself in the mirror. He avoided meeting his own gaze, and then wrung as much water as he could from his t-shirt, slinging the wet garment over his shoulder as he went back out, looking for Clint.
Clint's shirt was slightly less bloodied, so he'd left it on for the moment, but he had washed his arms and face in the kitchen sink, and looked a little cleaner. He'd started a fire in the fireplace, and had raided the kitchen for food the owners likely wouldn't miss. Granted, he couldn't cook for the life of him, so the food he'd set out consisted of grilled cheese sandwiches and some canned soup.
He'd carefully ignored any sounds he'd heard coming from the bathroom, which was easy once he took his hearing aids out. When Cal came out, he was obliviously chowing down on a stack of grilled cheese, flipping through the owners' REI catalog.
Cal watched him for a second, and then stepped over to the fire and threw his bloodied t-shirt in. It was ruined, anyway, and even if it hadn't been, he didn't want to wear it again. He watched the flames lap at it and take hold, watched it burn for a few more seconds, trying to make up his mind. Heading upstairs to find something to wear - it hadn't hit him before, but he felt half-naked now, in a way being shirtless had never felt, before - or giving in to the rumble in his stomach at the smell of the food. He felt a little steadier, enough that his brain wasn't completely offline anymore, but food would help cement that.
So he turned back to Clint and walked over, rubbing at his shoulder with his opposite hand, and took a seat beside him, trying to find something to say, because it felt like he should say something. Maybe his brain wasn't back online after all.
Blinking and looking up when Cal joined him, Clint slipped his hearing aids back on. Slow, one at a time, before finally looking over at his friend. Grabbing a throw blanket from off the couch, he tossed it into Cal's lap. "There's food. If you want it. If not, I can dump it in a plastic container thing." No need to waste good food.
Cal blinked when Clint reached for his hearing aids; his brain really wasn't back online, since he hadn't noticed them on the table. He grabbed the blanket and wrapped it over his shoulders, then reached for a sandwich. He didn't feel like eating, but his body needed the food. "Thanks," he said, again. He sounded like a broken record.
"You know, I've gotta ask. Did you keep my healing all that time?" Clint asked finally, glancing over at his friend. "Did you hide it?"
Cal frowned, his brain needing a few seconds to catch up with what Clint was asking. "No," he said, once he understood it at last. He finished the sandwich, not sure he could keep on eating when they got further into this conversation. He wiped his palms together, then folded his hands in his lap.
"After they moved me to that other place. They put me on a collar. To suppress what I could do. I couldn't have kept anything if I'd wanted to." And fuck, he'd wanted to. He'd wanted to keep it all, and blow holes in that place a lot earlier than he had, in the end. Especially in the early days after being led to believe that Clint was dead. Cal raised his hand to touch the place where the knife had been, but redirected his hand to rub at his jaw instead, gaze cutting away from Clint before coming back to him. "I mimicked you tonight. I didn't - think, I just..."
"Took what's not there," Clint pointed out, frowning deeply.
"I don't take," Cal repeated words he'd said earlier today, his throat tight. Focus on the now. His hands had curled into fists in his lap, and he forced himself to unclench them. "If I can do it, then it's not gone."
Clint started to say, you know what I mean, but stopped when Cal emphasized that last bit. And then he frowned. "I mean, I can heal a little faster than what's normal, but nothing like I used to. Nothing like what you did tonight."
"But it used to be like that," Cal said out loud, even though they both knew it. He didn't know they'd done to Clint exactly, and right now, given how shaky he felt, he did not feel like using his remaining knowledge in genetics to try and formulate hypotheses. He wasn't sure he would have wanted to on a good day. "I don't know. I can only tell you - your sight's gone, but not that." Or I'd be dead.
Hearing it - hearing that simple phrase, your sight's gone, was like a punch to the gut. Clint held on to that for a moment, swallowing down the pain, and the anger, and the grief for something he'd taken for granted. He breathed through it, then focused on the other part. His healing wasn't gone. Maybe he couldn't access it, but it was somewhere inside him, and it had helped Cal. He swallowed hard, then rubbed at the back of his neck. "You should keep it. Just in case."
Cal watched him go through that pain, and was aware of just what it was. He remembered, when he'd found out what they had done to him. What he couldn't mimic anymore. He didn't reach out to Clint, though, because he remembered that he hadn't wanted Clint to reach out to him. He remembered... He pushed the memories aside when Clint spoke up. Cal's lips quirked into something only vaguely resembling amusement. "In case."
Maybe something could be done for Clint, if he wanted. But Cal knew he'd personally rather stay the way he was than let himself be poked and prodded by doctors again. What was the use in pointing it out, when Clint had probably already thought of that?
Clint managed to give his friend an amused side-glance at that. "Well, someone did just try to kill you."
Actual amusement was still a way away from Cal, and he only just managed to give Clint another twist of his lips. "I hadn't noticed." He looked away, and tugged the blanket a little more securely on his shoulders. "What if she tries again, Clint."
"Then this time you're protected," Clint decided quietly. With his healing, Cal should be able to counter whatever Pam tried to throw at him, and that was a huge fucking relief. "And if she keeps trying, then we find something to hold over her head."
Cal's fingers tightened on the edges of the blanket, and he was silent for a moment, before admitting, "That's not... She doesn't have any healing." He wasn't worried about what she might do. He was worried about what he might.
Oh. Clint glanced down. He should have picked up on that. Cal was afraid of himself. He didn't answer right away, actually putting some thought into it, and not just blowing Cal's concerns off. Pam didn't have healing, true. She had a lot of other scary shit, and aim to rival to his own, but if Cal hurt her, she wouldn't be picking herself up off the floor like he had. He could just assure Cal that he wouldn't hurt Pam like that, but Clint wasn't sure of that, either. Not after what they'd been through. He'd held himself together back there, but that wasn't a given for the next time they met.
Finally, he shook his head. "If she tries it again, then it's not your fault. She knows what you're capable of. She knows the danger. It would be a stupid move on her part, and I don't think she's that stupid."
"Did you think she'd try to actually kill me tonight?" Cal asked, very levelly. Too levelly. That kind of evenness to his voice spoke to how tight a grip he was keeping on himself. But there was also mercilessness to his question, one way or the other. Either Clint hadn't expected things to escalate that much either, and his assurances about how he perceived her meant little, or Clint had, and Cal was even more fucking stupid than he already figured.
He kept thinking, I should've known, but even now, he kept refusing to expect the worst from any of the other former lab rats.
Pam, though. He expected the worst from her and then some, now.
Clint made a face. "No," he admitted softly. "No, I didn't think she'd do that. I would have been quicker to take her out if I had."
"Me, too," Cal confirmed after a moment's silence.
And just like that, he had to get up, had to put some distance between himself and Clint. He took the time to say, "I'm gonna go find something to wear," and then he stood, dropped the blanket back on the couch, and stepped away like he didn't want to portal upstairs right this second if it gave him room to breathe. He turned for the stairs instead, focusing on his breathing, making sure he didn't walk too fast. Nothing to see here.
Disclaimer: Violence. Lots and lots of violence.
Clint wasn't really sure how he felt about Pam. She was definitely a little weird, but then they all were. The part that unnerved him was the part he'd seen in the holo room, where she'd been dismembering zombies with Billy. Maybe it was because she did it so gleefully, whereas Clint still got a little sick to his stomach thinking about all of the holos he'd 'killed'.
Still, he'd wanted to try and spend some time with her (and she was one of the only teleporters at the school), so he'd invited her to have a late night feast of cold sandwiches and warmed up spaghetti in the abandoned cafeteria. After all, he'd always learned that diplomacy was better with food.
"Nice to know I'm not the only one who likes this place better when it's not full of people," Pam said as she eyed what she assumed were the products of a late-night leftover raid on Clint's part and slipped into a seat. "I mean, the food's great? But you realize just how many people are here when they're all right here." And yeah. She wasn't really a fan of that. Especially since she was pretty sure that a decent number of them were inTJ's camp about her having planted a knife in Jeanne's shoulder. Or her being Brotherhood. Whichever, there was glaring. She wasnt a fan of that, either.
He pushed a couple of the platters and bowls toward her, then shoved a big forkful of spaghetti onto his plate. "Yeah, I usually either eat here after everyone's gone, or take it all back to my room for Caleb. It's just too many eyes, right? And they're all on you. And, you know, me."
"Yeah, exactly. Last thing I need is one more trigger to turn invisible. Fuck that." She picked a sandwich up from the tray and took a bite. "Caleb ok?" With classes out for the summer, she hadn't really seen him around much.
Oh yeah, that's right. Pam and Caleb knew each other. Which was... weird? "He's strong. Stronger than I thought, turns out," Clint admitted as he dug a fork into the mound of noodles. "He told me he was at a place with you and Alex. And another girl?"
"Nott," Pam confirmed with a nod. "I mean, there were other kids there too, then? But they sorta came and...well, went." She grimaced and reached over to help herself to the bowl of spagetti. "Honestly, we figured he was dead. No one ever mentioned other places."
"Makes us even. I thought Cal was dead," Clint admitted.
"Weird when they show back up, hey?" Pam grimaced. "I mean, good, definitely. But still. Really fucking weird."
"More good than weird," he hummed thoughtfully. Then he paused. "What do you think of all of them? All of us?"
"That we're all seriously fucked up?" she half-joked, then shook her head. "I don't know. When we heard about Tommy, it was like, 'Fuck, it's not just us - we need to talk to this guy, make sure he's okay. And I guess...I still kinda feel like that? Except you guys all came in your own groups already. You've got people watching your backs. I'm not sure you even want that, or if you just want to try and forget it all." She smirked, a little. "Plus, I got the impression from Caleb that the first thing people did on arrival was warn all of you about the Big Bad Brotherhood. So there's that." She twirled spaghetti around her fork. "Turn it around. What do you think?"
Clint frowned slightly, chewing his way through a meatball before responding, "I didn't know they were making kids fight other mutants. Or, you know, holos of them. I knew that Cal had it bad, and I knew what they did to me, but I'm- I was always asking for it. I didn't know it was that bad for everyone. I don't know how to, you know, deal with it. Other peoples shit."
Pam frowned. "You can't. I mean, people can really only deal with their own shit. Or not deal with it. You can't do it for them." She set her fork down and made a face. "Anyway, the holos weren't so bad, mostly. I mean, stabbing Billy didn't mean shit to me until after I actually met Billy; it was just another combat sim against a kick-ass opponent, with the usual penalties at the end if I lost, or didn't last long enough. Not a whole lot different than fighting - I don't know, Army assholes or whoever was protecting the target of the day. The only ones that sucked were the ones with people I actually knew." She looked back up at Clint with interest. "What'd they have you fighting?"
"Eh," Clint rubbed at the back of his neck. "Less fighting, more assassinating. Uh. I mean, they were all like, politicians and stuff. Powerful people."
"Wow. You were special." Pam smirked, then shrugged. "I did some of those. More business type than political, though. Infiltrate, get in close, do the job and get out again. I'd've loved to have gone to that big party thing just to see if the sims measured up."
Cal had just walked the pup, and he would've taken her with him to see Clint, but she seemed too tired to go play with Lucky. So he left her curled up on his bed, and, after one last pet on her head, located Clint's psi imprint in the cafeteria and teleported by its door, just inside the large room. He'd noticed he had company, of course, so he was unsurprised to see Pam. "Hey," he greeted them as he walked over. "Enough spaghetti for a third stomach?"
Pam had felt a familiar - and yet not quite familiar - pull from behind her, and had started to spin in her chair even as Cal began speaking. "That was one of my portals," she accused, her eyes narrowing, not even realizing that her hand had automatically settled around the handle of her fork as it would have around the hilt of her knife.
Clint looked up, brightening slightly at the arrival of Cal. "All you can eat." He hopped up off the table. "Lemme grab you a plate."
Usually, Clint's reaction to Cal's arrival was something Cal liked to focus on. If someone else was happy to see him, then maybe he wasn't as bad as he thought. It was the same way he felt about Frumpkin, or about either pup, letting him pet them. The fact that it was Clint only made it better, because that reaction was a mirror of Cal's, and he couldn't put words on how it felt to not be alone in that.
But right then, his focus had sharpened on Pam, Pam who looked ready to stab him with that fork. Cal's steps slowed, and he stopped a few feet from the table, his shoulders tense, wishing he had a weapon of his own on him.
He didn't want to use the telepathy on her. He only wanted it to keep people out.
"Yeah," he answered, sounding a lot more nonchalant than he felt. Should he be sounding her out? He could do it without her noticing, he was sure, but he didn't want to. He didn't want to panic, either. He didn't want Sandra's voice whispering in his mind, he didn't want to feel this way. "I told you I'd mimicked you."
"You didn't say you were keeping it all." The way he sounded so calm and rational about it wasn't in his favor - she didn't trust people who wanted to reason with her. She'd heard enough of the "calm the crazy girl down" tone at the Facility to know it was bullshit, and normally meant someone was buying time and trying to find an opening. Her grip tightened around her fork, and she reached for the knife with her other hand as she slid out of her chair and stood up. "What else did you take?"
Pausing halfway to the kitchen, Clint looked back at them and cursed inwardly. He zeroed in on the sharp tools in Pam's hands and felt the muscles in his shoulders tense. Taking a few steps back toward Pam, he raised his hands. "It's not like he stole it."
"What he said," Cal confirmed, raising his hands slightly. Empty hands, not hiding anything. He didn't want this. Please, fuck, he didn't want this. "I don't take from people, I mimic."
"Fine. Stop mimicking me, then," Fatale demanded, watching his hands carefully. The last time she'd talked to Cal, he'd been using what had looked an awful lot like Billy's knives. She wasn't in any hurry to find herself impaled by them.
"Why the hell should he do that? It's not like it hurts you," Clint pointed out.
Later, Cal would feel grateful that Clint got it, without him needing to explain, when Cal wasn't sure that he got it himself. For now, he was still too tense, too wary, too close to that place he didn't want to go. Sandra's voice was already there, pointing out how vulnerable he would be to Pam if he dropped her mutations. "I'm not taking anything from you. And I don't want to stop."
Fatale's eyes narrowed, and she glanced over at Clint - no immediate threat, there, though it occurred to her that she didn't know what is mutation was, and should have made an effort to find out - before turning her attention back to Cal. Who was a threat, even without her abilities. With them? She wasn't sure she could take him, but she wasn't going to go down without a fight, either.
"I don't really give a fuck what you want," she countered, her voice low. She set the fork down on the table, and switched her knife to her right hand, where she began weaving it through her fingers to get a better feel for its balance. She wished, now, that she'd brought one of her own along, but this would do if she needed it. "They're my powers, not yours. You didn't pay for them. I did."
"Fuck that, you don't know what I paid for," Cal retorted, anger rising in his chest, to solidify into something he could use. He wished Clint wasn't here, much as he was thankful that he was. He wasn't used to giving a shit about someone, when it came down to fighting someone.
"Really? Don't care. You were supposed to be my fucking replacement. And I'm not being replaced." With that said - and it would've had to have been said sooner or later, so maybe it was better to just get it out there now - Fatale disappeared. With Jeanne's advise in mind, she didn't immediately teleport behind him - he'd be expecting that. Instead, she slipped off her shoes and began weaving her way away from them as silently as she could manage, her eyes locked on Cal.
"Shit," Clint breathed out quietly. His hand palmed a knife from the table (a butter knife, but still) and he shifted his gaze around the room, suddenly wishing he had his sight back. "I don't suppose we could go back to talking about this or anything?"
She was moving away, Cal could tell, focusing on her psi imprint. But what did that mean, when she could teleport by him in an instant. "Don't make me fight you," he said, his tone a little too level, his words at odds with the hot knives that appeared in his hands. You know where she is, came the whisper, right by his ear, you could end this fight before it even starts. But he ignored the voice, for now.
And Clint was a liability, but she would know that, if Cal told him to go.
"Says the guy with Billy's knives in his hand." Right. He didn't want a fucking fight. She ignored Clint's question and continued to circle. "Besides, if you weren't looking for a fight, why would you want my fucking powers? That's what they're for." Invisibility, teleportation, hand-eye coordination. She was a fucking assassin, just like he was. He was just better - no. He maybe had more powers, but she had the training.
And only one fucking knife, whereas his were unlimited.
"I'm not using them against you," Cal retorted. For now. Like he wasn't using Billy's knives against her, and he forced himself to vanish the ones in his hand. (It wasn't as if he couldn't recall them with a thought.) He wanted to keep facing her as she moved, but resisted the urge. Better if she didn't know that he could track her, if she was going to make a move. Maybe he could trick her into making a move that didn't involve teleporting; those were easier to predict.
"Yet." It was just a matter of time, after all, even if he did let go of Billy's knives. She'd fought with Billy in the Danger Room - she knew just how fast he could get them back, which put her at a disadvantage if she didn't strike first. She considered, briefly, throwing the knife - but it was the only one she had, and a quick glance confirmed that the other had disappeared from the table.
No one was looking for a fight. Riiiight.
Fatale set her jaw, opened a portal, and dove through - and came up stabbing at Cal's throwing arm. A strong offense was pretty much the only chance she had.
It all happened so fast. The argument, the weapons, the nerves and tension. Before Clint knew it, he saw a portal open up, and everything went to hell. It didn't matter whether the argument was valid or not, or whether they were all students, or even all refugees from those labs. Almost instantly, all that mattered was that Cal was being attacked, and Clint only had one real choice; the only one he would ever have in that kind of situation - protect Cal.
The butter knife in Clint's hand was shit for throwing, so he grabbed a fork without thinking and whipped it toward the portal's opening. Normally, he'd have unerring accuracy with that kind of thing, but against an invisible opponent, the only thing he could count on was his hearing aids and his intuition.
Cal had used Billy's knives in sims enough that he knew how to fight with them. He knew that most of the time, the ones in his hands weren't the most efficient. When the portal opened, he should have just manifested the knives so they would fly in and meet Pam as she stepped through. In a sim, he would have, and that would have been the end of the fight, or close enough. The first decisive move to lock in a checkmate.
The air shimmered with the hint of knives for a split second, too quick for anyone to notice, but he managed to stop himself at the last moment. Not a sim, and he didn't want to kill her. Fuck, he didn't even want to hurt her, no matter what the urge in his elevated pulse said, what the voice whispered in his ear. That had lost him precious time, however, and when he shifted to avoid the coming attack, it was too late. The knife bit into his arm, pain duller than you would expect from something sharp, and training took over. One of Billy's knives flashed into his good hand, and he slashed towards where he knew she was.
She felt her knife connect, but before she could dance out of the way, something sharp struck her in the shoulder. She let out a soft hiss of pain, knowing it was a mistake even as she did, because a split second later one of Billy's knives sliced across her stomach. Not deep, but sharp enough to sting, deep enough to draw blood.
Yeah. So much for anyone there not having wanted a fight.
Ignoring the pain, Fatale tightened her grip on the knife and slashed - then opened a portal behind her and fell backwards through it, rolling to her feet when she emerged on the other side, several yards away.
Cal was bleeding, and based on the hiss Clint had heard, Pam was probably injured too. If he let it keep going, things were just going to escalate. "Okay, Jesus," he called to the room at large. "Cutting each other up isn't going to change the whole powers situation. And as much as I like both of you, Pam, if you're going after Cal, I've got his back, every time. You really wanna go after two of us?"
Cal walked away from Clint as he talked; separate targets was better. If she came for Clint, it would give Cal an opening. If she came for Cal, then at least she wouldn't be coming for Clint. Win-win. The wound in his arm pulsed with pain, dull, throbbing, but adrenaline was making up for it, for now, and he only glanced at it to assess the damage before looking back in the direction her portal had dropped her. "You got first blood. Take the win."
Don't make us into what they wanted, but there was an edge of warning to his voice now that hadn't been there before. It wasn't just don't make me do this anymore, it was also, because I will do it, and you don't know how well they trained me.
Not well enough, because he still didn't want to take her out with a psi attack. The old man had been clear enough what Cal could and couldn't use his mutation for, and like fuck he was going to let her jeopardize that for him. He didn't owe her anything, no matter what she seemed to think.
"This is a win?" Fatale scoffed. She was bleeding, definitely - not badly, not enough to matter, but there was definitely blood. She ignored it, for now, and while she kept her eyes on Cal, it was Clint she answered. "I didn't want to go after either of you. But as dangerous as everyone says I am? He's more. I know how he was trained, and I know he's killed me before, and there's no fucking good reason to have my powers if he's not planning to do it again. That's what they're for. I'm not going to sit back and let him do it."
For fuck's sake, assassins. Clint wanted to smack his face. The thing was, he couldn't even deny the logic. If they were still in the labs (and half the time, he woke up thinking they were), he'd totally get it. But they weren't, and he wasn't going to let anyone take Cal's powers away. Or, you know, hurt him otherwise.
"This isn't a win. This is a 'no, seriously, it's not going to happen so forget about it,'" he told her. "If Cal wanted to kill you, don't you think he would have tried it already?"
"I would've done it already," Cal muttered, before he could help himself. With the array of mutations at his disposal, she wouldn't have stood a chance, and he would not even have needed hers, specifically. "But I don't. Want to. I don't want to kill anyone, or you'd already be dead."
He was going to ignore the fact that part of him actually really wanted to, right now. She was a danger; she wanted to take him out. But it wasn't a part of him he wanted to listen to, not now, not ever. Not ever again.
"I'm not that easy a target," Fatale muttered. Still, she had to admit they had a point. Maybe. He'd have tried, at least.
"You've never seen me and targets," Clint pointed out, but lowered the butter-knife in his hand. "So can we chill out about this? Cal's keeping whatever powers he wants to keep."
Cal didn't feel ready to chill out at all. His heart was still thudding in his ribcage, and his arm was feeling more painful by the second. He was a little too aware of his blood dripping on the floor, but he didn't want to show Pam how badly she'd injured him, in case this wasn't over. In case seeing a weakness made her pounce.
Then again, if they were going to fight, he'd rather they stopped fucking talking about it, but he resisted the urge to call another knife to his good hand, just in case. Because all in all, he'd really rather they didn't fight. So he clenched his jaw, and waited to see what she would say to Clint.
"No, I'm not chilling out," Fatale shot back. "They're my powers, and I'm not ok with him copying them, just because he wants to. Fuck that." Why should he get that kind of advantage?
"Well then," Clint said, chill, and slow. "You're gonna have to go through both of us. Cause Cal's keeping the powers."
That said it all, didn't it? Fatale's lips pursed with resolve, and she nodded. The gloves were off, then. She couldn't back down, wouldn't - and neither, apparently, would they. Without a word, she opened a portal and stepped through so quickly it was barely perceptible. Another opened atop a table that was no closer than she'd been, before, but which offered the perfect vantage point. With one fluid motion, she threw, aiming straight for Cal's throat.
A lot of thoughts and emotions went through Cal as he tried to move in time, a hot knife appearing in mid air and trying - failing - to glance off of the one she'd thrown. Too slow, too late, too unprepared. The knife sank into his throat, (too weak,) and for a few seconds, he didn't feel anything (too naive). He should've known better. He should've taken her out.
Blood bubbled up in his throat as he tried to call out to, "Cli...", and the pain slammed into him, as if reality had only just decided to reassert itself. His knees buckled and he dropped on the floor. Clint. He had to make sure Pam didn't go after him. Too late for Cal, but not for Clint. Cal focused on her psi imprint as he coughed up blood, put a hand to his neck. Keep the blood loss to a minimum, buy yourself a few seconds. The psi blast took Pam out like a light, and he felt her slip into unconsciousness more than he heard the thud of her body hitting the table.
There. Clint would be okay.
Clint, meanwhile, had realized at the last moment that he had said the wrong thing to Pam. He saw her throw the knife, and he had his own arm halfway up when he watched her drop to the table. It was only then that he registered the sounds trying to come from Cal's throat, and he turned, eyes widening in shock.
"No!" he yelped, dropping the knife in his hand as he dove onto his knees beside Cal, an arm moving to support him, the other hand plastering over Cal's as they tried to stem the bleeding. And, god, it was going everywhere. "Fuck. Fuck. You idiot. Asshole. You are not dying." Not like this. How many times had he seen Cal close to death? How many times had he been brought back? He couldn't die here.
Asshole. Dying. One word he expected from Clint, the other, not so much. Cal felt oddly detached from all of it, and panicked at the same time. He wanted to reassure Clint (it's okay, it's for the best), and he wanted to fight against it. His bloody hand stopped trying to stench the flow, leaving that task to Clint, and he gripped his shoulder instead. It was stupid, feeling like if he was going to die, it might as well be with Clint by his side. It was stupid, and part of him refused for it to happen.
He reached for Clint's mutation, because it was habit, and it shoved Pam's hand/eye coordination out of the way, the one he valued least, both consciously and subconsciously. It's okay, he stopped trying to tell Clint out loud, using the old man's telepathy instead. And then it really was okay, and instead of in pain, and dying, Cal looked surprised. The injury on his arm was knitting itself up, and he brought his free hand up to the knife protruding from his throat, and pulled it out before Clint could react. An arc of blood followed it, but the wound closed itself up immediately. Cal turned his head to the side to cough out the blood that had flowed into his throat, and couldn't figure out how to feel.
Clint just stared. Poised, where he was, to shove his hand back onto the spouting blood, mouth open to curse Cal to eternity, he just...stared. Cal had healed. Cal had fucking healed. He wanted to both laugh, and cry, but he just stared, unable to really breathe correctly.
Cal coughed and spat out blood for a few long seconds, then rolled back onto his back. Caught Clint's gaze, and... had no idea what to say. "That was you," he finally blurted out, after a moment longer. He wanted to throw his arms around Clint, but instead, he sat up and looked Pam's way. "Is she...?" She felt like she was out, yes.
Still not sure what the hell was going on, Clint followed his gaze toward Pam and pushed up, wiping his bloody hands on his shirt as he moved to her side to check her pulse - just in case. "She's okay," he reported quietly, then looked back over at Cal. "Are you-?"
"I'm fine," Cal answered, never mind that he wasn't, that his hands were shaking, that he couldn't even remember what 'fine' felt like. Even before this, but even less so now. He sat up, and tried not to pay too much attention to the amount of blood (his blood) everywhere. His legs felt shaky, but he pushed up to his feet as he sent a telepathic message to the old man. He felt like puking. He didn't want to. Fatale's hurt. She needs medical attention. Cafeteria. On the heels of that message, he sent the same one to McCoy. He couldn't put anything more than that into the message. He didn't want to puke. He didn't know what to say, or do. He only knew he couldn't stay here. "I need to get out of here."
"Tell me where you wanna go," Clint told him, already moving to carefully help Cal to his feet. He'd call Xavier in a bit, if Cal hadn't already pulled a telepathic bit.
It barely even registered that Clint was helping him up - that Clint was touching him - which said a lot about how much Cal implicitly trusted the other boy, given his current state. "I don't know," he answered, frowning, still looking at Pam's unconscious body on the table, and trying not to think of the blood coating his clothes. He wasn't going to puke.
"Can you teleport?" Clint asked, realizing that he needed to get Cal away from the school ASAP. Not so much because of the trouble they'd be in (and there would be trouble), but because Cal needed to get some fresh air, away from anything and everything that reminded him of the labs.
Cal frowned - that was what had started this whole mess; it was the only thing to do, right then - and tore his gaze from Pam, to look at Clint. "Yeah," he confirmed, after a beat, and opened a portal beside them, needing to get away. It didn't matter where. He stepped through into a dark street, then looked back at Clint, only then realizing that maybe he wasn't coming.
But Clint didn't hesitate, stepping through after him and holding out an arm in question. If Cal didn't want to lean on him, that was fine, he got it, but the guy had just lost a lot of blood, and Clint knew from experience that his power (his old fucking power - and he'd get to that soon) didn't exactly replenish lost blood that fast.
The portal collapse behind Clint, and instead of paying attention to wherever he'd taken them, Cal looked at the offered arm with incomprehension. It wasn't that he didn't feel weak - he did, jelly-legged, wobbly-kneed, and still nauseated - it was that it didn't occur to him that Clint might be offering that sort of help. Instead, he thought that he was offering a hug. The thought was so ridiculous that Cal nearly laughed, but then he just stepped into Clint and wrapped his arms around him, not giving a thought to the blood all over him. Fuck. Fuckfuckfuckfuckfuck. He didn't want to break down, and all he could do was hold on to Clint, and try to hold the tears - the sobs - the breakdown - at bay.
"Thank you," he managed, in a tight whisper, after a long moment.
Oh. Uh. Oh. Armful of Cal. Clint wrapped an arm around him, then, fuck it, the other one too, and held him, trying not to make it weird. It was still kind of weird, what with, you know, stoic-get-off-me-mimic bawling in his arms, but Clint wasn't about to let him go, not until Cal was good and ready. Not until he'd gotten it all out.
Clint still had a lot of questions. Mostly about how Cal had healed himself, and, you know, also where the fuck where they? But those could wait. He held the bro, let him cry it out, and stared in confusion at the darkened neighborhood around them. The place had definitely seen better days, and it looked like a few lots had just been abandoned, but at least that left them in relative peace. Better than back at the school.
When Cal finally came up for air, and thanked him of all fucking things, Clint wasn't exactly sure how to answer. Sure thing, Buddy, just didn't seem right. So Clint just huffed a sound, and told him, "'Course."
That finally made Cal laugh, although 'laugh' was a generous term for the broken sound that made it past his lips, trying to pass for a laugh. Yeah. Of course. Nothing was - nothing was of course. Cal let go of Clint and stepped away, wiping at his face as if erasing the tear tracks would erase the fact that he had cried at all. The laughter had died down as soon as it was there, and he looked around, then got a little too quiet. Fuck. Was that...? "Fuck."
"What?" Clint turned, tensing at the off-chance that they'd been followed.
It took Cal a long few seconds, and a gulp before he managed to say, "I used to live here." He was staring at a clearly abandoned, partially burned down house, and it didn't feel as if his heart was ever going to beat evenly again.
Shit. Clint should've known that something like this would happen when Cal was so fucked up. He huffed out a breath, then stepped up next to Cal. "You okay?"
Was he okay? Cal wasn't sure what okay meant anymore. "I'm alive," he answered, after a moment, looking away from the burned down shell of a house, and at Clint by his side. He wanted to thank him, again, but the words wouldn't get past his throat again. "I didn't mean to take us so far."
So far. So...shit Clint thought again. California. That's where Cal had grown up. He looked back up at the house and whistled. "Well. We're here. And you need to get off your feet. We should find somewhere to squat for the night until you get your energy back."
"I... don't know where," Cal replied, shaking his head. He couldn't think, and Clint was right - he needed to get off his feet. The sooner the better. His throat was aching again, with the lump stuck in it.
Clint nodded. "Okay. You stay here, I'll scout out a place that's, you know, not your old house." Because like Cal needed that shit. "I'll be back in a few minutes."
"Hey." Cal reached out to grab Clint's arm before he could move away, and swallowed back the panic trying to rise inside him. Idiot. You can stay on your own for a few minutes. What are you, four? "Be careful," he said, his voice a little rough, and let go of Clint.
Especially if he was going to scout out some half burned down places. Cal didn't know what he would do if something happened to Clint, never mind if something happened to him here and now.
Clint paused and looked back at him, and he couldn't help himself. He gave a wink. "Hey don't worry. I got this." Then he disappeared into the dark.
Don't worry. Yeah. Easy. Cal watched him go, then found a side of curb to park his ass on before his legs dropped out from under him. Slowly, the ache in his throat receded, but the nausea was still alive and kicking, only reinforced by the amount of blood he realized was on him. With shaking hands, he pulled his t-shirt off, and used the less bloodied parts of it to wipe the slowly drying blood off his neck. Fuck.
He wasn't going to start crying again. He didn't want to think about how close he'd come. About how stupid he'd been to hold back. He should have known better. He fucking did know better. But he hadn't wanted to - fuck. Fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck. He wanted to scream his throat raw, but... not a good idea.
Ten minutes later, Clint appeared at the edge of the light from a streetlamp, crouching down beside Cal with a slight nod. "I got something. Just. Don't ask any questions, okay?"
Cal pushed up to his feet slowly, carefully, not entirely sure that his legs would hold him up. "Tomorrow," he told Clint. "I'll ask tomorrow."
"Sure, sure," Clint told him as he reached out to help Cal to his feet, then shouldered him down the street to a darkened house. One lone light lit a window. The truth was, he'd just found the first place that had mail piled up in their box and no cars in car port, and decided to take advantage of whoever's vacation might be happening. One broken window wasn't a big deal, right? At least they didn't have a security system. Helping Cal to the front door, he let them in and nodded down the hall. "Shower's that way, if you wanna get cleaned up."
Bloodied shirt hanging out of the back pocket of his jeans, Cal went with Clint, trying not to tense up from the extended contact. But he would rather lean on Clint than fall on his ass, and much as he wanted to push him away, and not let anybody close, not even him - part of Cal also welcomed it. Having Clint there, solid, steady, and touching someone, being touched, even if the contact was completely utilitarian. Cal would just be adding that to the long list of things he felt conflicted about, these days.
"Thanks," he told Clint quietly when he indicated the bathroom, and he ignored the pictures of a smiling family on the walls as he pushed away from his friend and made his way towards the open door of the bathroom.
He avoided looking at his reflection in the mirror and set the tap going, in the hope of mostly covering the sounds of his puking. It took him about ten minutes to get that out of his system and clean up as well as he could over the sink. He felt an instinctive reluctance to undress any further and use the fire. Five more minutes were spent trying to get the blood out of his t-shirt, before he gave up, the red gone pink, but still all too obvious. At least he didn't have any blood left on himself, he figured, finally examining himself in the mirror. He avoided meeting his own gaze, and then wrung as much water as he could from his t-shirt, slinging the wet garment over his shoulder as he went back out, looking for Clint.
Clint's shirt was slightly less bloodied, so he'd left it on for the moment, but he had washed his arms and face in the kitchen sink, and looked a little cleaner. He'd started a fire in the fireplace, and had raided the kitchen for food the owners likely wouldn't miss. Granted, he couldn't cook for the life of him, so the food he'd set out consisted of grilled cheese sandwiches and some canned soup.
He'd carefully ignored any sounds he'd heard coming from the bathroom, which was easy once he took his hearing aids out. When Cal came out, he was obliviously chowing down on a stack of grilled cheese, flipping through the owners' REI catalog.
Cal watched him for a second, and then stepped over to the fire and threw his bloodied t-shirt in. It was ruined, anyway, and even if it hadn't been, he didn't want to wear it again. He watched the flames lap at it and take hold, watched it burn for a few more seconds, trying to make up his mind. Heading upstairs to find something to wear - it hadn't hit him before, but he felt half-naked now, in a way being shirtless had never felt, before - or giving in to the rumble in his stomach at the smell of the food. He felt a little steadier, enough that his brain wasn't completely offline anymore, but food would help cement that.
So he turned back to Clint and walked over, rubbing at his shoulder with his opposite hand, and took a seat beside him, trying to find something to say, because it felt like he should say something. Maybe his brain wasn't back online after all.
Blinking and looking up when Cal joined him, Clint slipped his hearing aids back on. Slow, one at a time, before finally looking over at his friend. Grabbing a throw blanket from off the couch, he tossed it into Cal's lap. "There's food. If you want it. If not, I can dump it in a plastic container thing." No need to waste good food.
Cal blinked when Clint reached for his hearing aids; his brain really wasn't back online, since he hadn't noticed them on the table. He grabbed the blanket and wrapped it over his shoulders, then reached for a sandwich. He didn't feel like eating, but his body needed the food. "Thanks," he said, again. He sounded like a broken record.
"You know, I've gotta ask. Did you keep my healing all that time?" Clint asked finally, glancing over at his friend. "Did you hide it?"
Cal frowned, his brain needing a few seconds to catch up with what Clint was asking. "No," he said, once he understood it at last. He finished the sandwich, not sure he could keep on eating when they got further into this conversation. He wiped his palms together, then folded his hands in his lap.
"After they moved me to that other place. They put me on a collar. To suppress what I could do. I couldn't have kept anything if I'd wanted to." And fuck, he'd wanted to. He'd wanted to keep it all, and blow holes in that place a lot earlier than he had, in the end. Especially in the early days after being led to believe that Clint was dead. Cal raised his hand to touch the place where the knife had been, but redirected his hand to rub at his jaw instead, gaze cutting away from Clint before coming back to him. "I mimicked you tonight. I didn't - think, I just..."
"Took what's not there," Clint pointed out, frowning deeply.
"I don't take," Cal repeated words he'd said earlier today, his throat tight. Focus on the now. His hands had curled into fists in his lap, and he forced himself to unclench them. "If I can do it, then it's not gone."
Clint started to say, you know what I mean, but stopped when Cal emphasized that last bit. And then he frowned. "I mean, I can heal a little faster than what's normal, but nothing like I used to. Nothing like what you did tonight."
"But it used to be like that," Cal said out loud, even though they both knew it. He didn't know they'd done to Clint exactly, and right now, given how shaky he felt, he did not feel like using his remaining knowledge in genetics to try and formulate hypotheses. He wasn't sure he would have wanted to on a good day. "I don't know. I can only tell you - your sight's gone, but not that." Or I'd be dead.
Hearing it - hearing that simple phrase, your sight's gone, was like a punch to the gut. Clint held on to that for a moment, swallowing down the pain, and the anger, and the grief for something he'd taken for granted. He breathed through it, then focused on the other part. His healing wasn't gone. Maybe he couldn't access it, but it was somewhere inside him, and it had helped Cal. He swallowed hard, then rubbed at the back of his neck. "You should keep it. Just in case."
Cal watched him go through that pain, and was aware of just what it was. He remembered, when he'd found out what they had done to him. What he couldn't mimic anymore. He didn't reach out to Clint, though, because he remembered that he hadn't wanted Clint to reach out to him. He remembered... He pushed the memories aside when Clint spoke up. Cal's lips quirked into something only vaguely resembling amusement. "In case."
Maybe something could be done for Clint, if he wanted. But Cal knew he'd personally rather stay the way he was than let himself be poked and prodded by doctors again. What was the use in pointing it out, when Clint had probably already thought of that?
Clint managed to give his friend an amused side-glance at that. "Well, someone did just try to kill you."
Actual amusement was still a way away from Cal, and he only just managed to give Clint another twist of his lips. "I hadn't noticed." He looked away, and tugged the blanket a little more securely on his shoulders. "What if she tries again, Clint."
"Then this time you're protected," Clint decided quietly. With his healing, Cal should be able to counter whatever Pam tried to throw at him, and that was a huge fucking relief. "And if she keeps trying, then we find something to hold over her head."
Cal's fingers tightened on the edges of the blanket, and he was silent for a moment, before admitting, "That's not... She doesn't have any healing." He wasn't worried about what she might do. He was worried about what he might.
Oh. Clint glanced down. He should have picked up on that. Cal was afraid of himself. He didn't answer right away, actually putting some thought into it, and not just blowing Cal's concerns off. Pam didn't have healing, true. She had a lot of other scary shit, and aim to rival to his own, but if Cal hurt her, she wouldn't be picking herself up off the floor like he had. He could just assure Cal that he wouldn't hurt Pam like that, but Clint wasn't sure of that, either. Not after what they'd been through. He'd held himself together back there, but that wasn't a given for the next time they met.
Finally, he shook his head. "If she tries it again, then it's not your fault. She knows what you're capable of. She knows the danger. It would be a stupid move on her part, and I don't think she's that stupid."
"Did you think she'd try to actually kill me tonight?" Cal asked, very levelly. Too levelly. That kind of evenness to his voice spoke to how tight a grip he was keeping on himself. But there was also mercilessness to his question, one way or the other. Either Clint hadn't expected things to escalate that much either, and his assurances about how he perceived her meant little, or Clint had, and Cal was even more fucking stupid than he already figured.
He kept thinking, I should've known, but even now, he kept refusing to expect the worst from any of the other former lab rats.
Pam, though. He expected the worst from her and then some, now.
Clint made a face. "No," he admitted softly. "No, I didn't think she'd do that. I would have been quicker to take her out if I had."
"Me, too," Cal confirmed after a moment's silence.
And just like that, he had to get up, had to put some distance between himself and Clint. He took the time to say, "I'm gonna go find something to wear," and then he stood, dropped the blanket back on the couch, and stepped away like he didn't want to portal upstairs right this second if it gave him room to breathe. He turned for the stairs instead, focusing on his breathing, making sure he didn't walk too fast. Nothing to see here.
