Dead and Buried
by
Hunter and Lady-T
Disclaimer: We didn't do anything. Blameless we are, totally and utterly blameless. Honest.
Notes: LT is lazy and doesn't like thinking of plots. Hunter is lazy and doesn't like thinking of adjectives. Together things sometimes actually get done. Eventually. About 6 months late.
The yew tree looked to her like death, a smoky hulk on the distant, fogged meadow.
It called her name, the gallow-tree, ivy-trailed noose swinging limp and forlorn in the quiet dawn breeze. It was dark, like a black presence sucking away the light as it slowly spilled over the horizon, early morning sun casting slow and hazy across the dark sky.
It would rain later.
Behind her the crowd jeered, blazing torches casting red over their skin like fresh spilled blood.
A body to die, to join the white, spectral corpses already hanging from broken necks in the old boughs.
They hung like grisly fruits on the yew branch, bloated and ripe, old and withered, side by side as the mist became grey drizzle.
She could feel the cold, saturated air seep chill moisture through the white linen shift, sticking it to her skin in semi-translucent wrapping.
It was cold that morning, cold and damp and grey as they walked her to the tree and stood her on the barrel.
They tied her bare hands and feet, binding them tight as she looked across the crowd, seeing hatred in the eye of every woman and desire in the eye of every man. Hidden behind walls of anger, under the black and white of good Puritans...
She looked down at her wet, clinging, shift, the shape and colour of her naked body visible underneath.
"Little people..."
She sneered it under her breath as the crowd booed and spat.
A rancid egg hit her brow, thrown from the throng of spectators, viscous, evil-smelling yolk oozing down across one eye.
She hissed as the village laughed in unison, turning away her face as it slithered down her neck, cold and slimy on pale, white skin.
"You have been found guilty by this court. A witch in league with Satan himself!"
It was proclaimed for the whole town to hear, the boos and screams of hatred growing in pitch and fervour.
The minister, all in black, slapped hard on the cover of his Bible, raising his voice to God and his people.
"Found guilty!" he exclaimed again. "Guilty of bewitching this town's men! Of drawing them to you for your own depravity!"
She looked at them with cold, dark disgust, never flinching as they lowered the noose about her neck, the rough weave biting against her throat.
"Found guilty!" screamed the minister, building fever in the crowd, sweating and red despite the dawn cold.
"Guilty, evil witch, and sentenced to be strung up by your neck until you breathe no more! Until your heart beats with silence! Until your immortal soul is back with Beelzebub where it belongs!"
The crowd throbbed with simmered violence, murmuring their ascension to the minister's preaching.
"You have been looked upon and found wanting! Judged and found impure! May you burn in Hell eternal, for Heaven will never forgive you!"
She laughed then, slow and dark as the minister stopped silent, a greyish pallor creeping across his face.
His hands clenched into fists, shaking violently before growing suddenly weak, his Bible slipping out of curled fingers and onto the dew-soaked grass.
The crowd grew quiet as they watched him and heard her laughter, face growing white as he opened his mouth, a choked gargle bubbling up between blue-tinted lips.
Hush had fallen, every eye on him, every eye on her...
He shook for a terrible, eternal second before collapsing heavily upon the saturated earth, the woman throwing back her head, laughing at the slowly lighting sky.
Anger and hatred and new-found fear, they rushed and mixed in the crowd, a scream of vengeance driving them, and with an almighty surge of the living the barrel was pushed from beneath her feet.
The ivy-twined rope snapped taut, the figure bound and helpless as she came to an abrupt end.
A moment of suffocation before her neck broke with an audible crack, and then she hung limp...
It all fell so silent in the aftermath, the village forming a rough circle around her corpse, watching her swing limply from the yew tree, still the lingering bloom of life in her cheeks.
It would fade, and she would wither. New fruit to bloat and then rot on the boughs.
Slowly they drifted away, carrying the minister between them until once more it was just the yew tree, the hanging-tree and its idly swinging noose, dark in the meadow and heavy with produce.
~o~
Black clouds had been rolling over the horizon all day, boiling like dark, viscous soup against the backdrop of ancient trees.
Lightening crackled high in the atmosphere, illuminating the clouds as the first heavy drops of rain began to fall, splattering noisily against the forest floor.
Jean squinted up at the sky just visible between the tree branches and cursed. She was going to get soaked...
Large, angry droplets began to cascade in earnest from the unforgiving sky, a deep bass roll of thunder vibrating through her body as Jean picked up her pace and ran towards the distant edge of the forest.
The rain beat a staccato rhythm against the tree canopy above her, drops rattling past the broad leaves to splatter messily against her hair and shoulders as she ran beneath.
There was another bright flash of lightening, the percussive explosion of sound hot on its heels and Jean swore again, ducking through the muddy undergrowth towards the neatly trimmed mansion lawns.
Dirt and water had soaked her trousers almost up to the knees and she angrily pushed through another patch of bramble, taking a quick shortcut off the meandering path to reach the mansion faster.
The storm looked like it went on forever in the sky, dark and ominous and black, shimmering every now and then with its own internal, magical, light show.
She neared the edge of the woodland now, the trees thinning out until she could see the pale stone edifice of the mansion sitting like a beacon on the open expanse of verdant lawn.
A thick wall of rain cut across the grass, hammering the thin green fronds down into the mud, hazing the outline of the building beyond, but the lighted windows glowed welcomingly in the darkness and she breathed a sigh of relief.
She could see Scott leaning out on the porch, just his dark shape discernible through the rain, kicking his feet idly as he looked over the garden. His eyes were pinned to the forest edge, waiting for her, searching for her shape amongst the green and black undergrowth.
She took another long stride over a viscous patch of mud, pausing as she reached the very edge of the woodland to wave at him before building the nerve to step out into the sheer wall of cascading water that separated her from the house.
Her foot had barely begun to lift from the ground when the lightening struck.
It was an explosion of raw, ancient power, spearing to the heart of the old, twisted Yew tree that sat guard at the edge of the lawn.
Jean screamed as she was thrown backwards by the force of the blast, hurled like a rag into the corner, slithering through mud and rock and bramble before coming to a stop, her head smashing hard against the base of a tree.
The lightening had sizzled like hot fat, leaving a white streak across her vision before the world exploded into a kaleidoscope of pain. Her head throbbed with nauseating strength and it seemed to pulse right through her and out the other side.
Beside the lawn the ancient Yew creaked in agony, blowing apart in a cascade of splinters, boughs crumpling with the grind of tortured flesh as they smashed onto the earth, the tree split savagely down the centre. The white, naked wood seemed to gleam in the storm light, the edges of it smouldering despite the downpour.
Jean whimpered in pain and fear, clutching the throbbing, swollen lump on the back of her head as she clenched her eyes shut, tears escaping down her cheeks to mingle with the rainwater.
The unforgiving rain seemed to be pouring harder around her, soaking her to the bone but she barely noticed. The ache in her head was too great, as if someone was trying to open her up and force their hand inside.
"Jean?!"
She could hear Scott's frantic calling on the edge of her perception as he sprinted across the lawn, skirting carefully around the shattered tree branches that still smouldered on the grass.
He was unmindful of the drowning rain, searching desperately through the battered underbrush that seemed to try and choke and bind his feet, tangling in his clothes as he struggled to find her.
"Jean?"
From her place under the tree she whimpered and tried to sit up, swaying unsteadily against the sick dizziness in her head. Luminous spots danced beneath her eyelids, flickering in time to the thundering pulse of the storm as another crack of lightening illuminated the woodland like a photographer's flash bulb.
Scott caught the movement from the corner of his eye, his fiancé's body laying some twenty feet from where she had originally stood.
"Jean...? Oh, Jesus Christ, are you alright?"
He struggled through the tangled underbrush and slithered to his knees beside her in the mud, hugging her tightly as she nodded.
He pulled her back for a brief inspection of her wet, bedraggled form, her eyes still tightly shut forming a knot between her brows.
"You hurt?" he asked with concern, reaching out to touch her cheek.
She grimaced and tried to shake her head, thinking better of it as it sent another wave of nauseating pain behind her eyes.
"Just... hit my head," she ground out. "Really fucking hurts..."
Scott nodded and got to his feet, taking a quick look upwards into the descending storm, the rain plastering his hair to his scalp.
"I'll get you inside," he said, gently scooping her up in his arms as she winced and clutched tighter against the bruise on her head.
She whimpered, burying her cheek against the wet cotton of his shirt as he carried her through the cascading rain, back towards the mansion.
~o~
Are you SURE you're OK?" Scott asked for what seemed like the thousandth time that evening.
From her place on the couch Jean grimaced and shifted the ice-pack slightly against her bruised head.
"I'm fine, Scott. I swear," she grumbled. "I'm keeping watch on myself for signs of a concussion, no, I don't have any unexplained complications, I'm not about to keel over and die, and for God's sake will you stop asking me that?"
Logan smirked from behind his magazine, boots comfortably propped up on the coffee table.
"Get an attitude when you get hit on the head, don't you Jeannie?"
She cracked open one eye and glared at him.
Beside the window Gambit snickered, idly shuffling his playing cards as he watched the swirling weather outside.
"You can shut up too, swamp rat," she grumbled. "Meeting a tree head first is NOT funny..."
"Ahh, mon chere," he sighed. "Depends on who's watching, non?"
Jean rolled her eyes and went back to tending her bruised head.
In the hearth the red, dancing flames crackled noisily, filling the warm silence with the pops and snaps of an open fire. The room was lit with a warm glow from the flames as Remy had turned out the lights to better watch the lightening.
Outside had grown cold and dark as night descended, the thermometer on the porch dropping steadily as the rain began to merge with hail.
"Evil storm tonight," murmured Remy. "Shame 'bout the tree, too."
Scott nodded and pulled himself out of his armchair to pour a drink from the decanter on the sideboard.
"One of the Professor's favourites. He'll be upset when he gets home."
"Non, not because of that," said Remy. He caught Scott's confused look in the reflection on the window glass and he blushed slightly, shaking his head. "Jus superstition, dat's all. Forget I said it."
Scott shrugged.
"Like what? Lightening hitting your Yew tree spells doom and gloom for all eternity, that kind of thing?"
Remy laughed.
"Non, nothing quite so drastic... Just, in de olden days they'd hang witches from Yew trees. Trap their soul inside the wood. Let's jus' hope ours was not one of them, non? Could be all sorts of evil t'ings coming out tonight, now that their souls are free."
Logan snorted, exhaling a cloud of sweet-smelling cigar smoke.
"Cajun, you really are more superstitious than anyone I ever met."
Gambit shrugged.
"Jus' the way I am," he smiled. "Never want to miss an opportunity. Dark spooky mansion, the four of us alone in de middle of de storm... Remy t'ink it be the perfect night for a Freddy Kruger marathon..."
Jean groaned. "Thanks but no. I plan to enjoy the time we've got left before everyone else comes back. That doesn't include spending this week hiding behind the sofa with you."
Remy shrugged, sidling up next to her as he flashed his most winning smile.
"You sure? You, me, a sofa all to ourselves... sounds like a good idea to Remy..."
"You're a shameless pig."
"Fair 'nough."
Logan laughed and went back to his magazine.
Jean took the ice-pack off her head, gingerly feeling the bruise underneath.
"At least the swelling's gone down..." she sniffed.
The back of her head felt a little tender still, but the large lump had subsided. Maybe, she thought, she hadn't hit her head quite as hard as she'd first believed. It was one of those things that always felt a lot worse than it really was... like stubbing your toe on something really, really heavy.
The headache had eased quickly and now she sat up, dropping the ice pack onto the sofa cushion beside her, glad that at least moving around didn't result in nauseating dizziness any more.
"I think..." she said carefully, "I should go upstairs and take a shower..."
Scott had found her some dry clothes as soon as he got inside, but she still had traces of mud clinging to her skin. It was dry and flaky now, clumping her hair together in patches.
Scott nodded.
"I'll come with you. Leave these two to their horror movies."
Logan raised an eyebrow from somewhere behind his magazine.
"Early night, huh? Remember Summers... no strenuous activity for 24 hours. First rule of the concussed."
Scott rolled his eyes as he put an arm around Jean's shoulders, leading her upstairs.
~o~
Steam trailed out of the bathroom like a warm fog, settling over Jean as she lay on the bed.
She could hear the wet, sloshing sound of Scott in the shower, occasional snatches of half-remembered pop songs following the steam across the room as he sang to himself in the bathroom.
She felt... odd. Sleepy, kind of.
Maybe it was just because she was warm and clean from her bath, tucked up securely in bed while the storm raged outside.
She sighed and rolled onto her back. Saying she was sleepy wasn't quite right. She didn't quite know exactly what she felt. It was an indescribable sensation, nothing concrete, just an unarguable feeling of...
She scrunched up her nose, unable to come up with a suitable analogy.
It was like she wasn't quite all there. She felt incomplete, like someone had taken a part of her and stolen it away. An emotionless void seemed to be lurking inside, more than just apathy or exhaustion. It was strange and a little disconcerting.
She rubbed her eyes and focused on the ceiling, feeling stupid. Of course she was all here, she was just being melodramatic. She'd whacked her head on a tree, it was no wonder she didn't feel completely right.
She chastised herself for being paranoid, staring again at the white plaster above her as her eyes followed the path of a minute crack under the paint. No wonder horror movies are always played out in a storm... it sets minds to wandering.
Jean snuggled down into the sheets, feeling herself relax against the soft quilt. In the bathroom Scott still sang as he washed himself, the sound of him and the water and the storm mixing together above the bed as she lay there, watching them swirl together like bright colours as she felt herself drift...
Maybe it was the monotonous drumming of the rain but she felt suddenly exhausted. Like she was drifting to sleep as she lay there. Her mind seemed happy to wander on blankness as her eyelids drooped shut.
A clunk from the bathroom was followed by a curse as a dropped bottle of shampoo hit the side of the tub and it snapped her mind back to momentary wakefulness again. That was wrong, wasn't it? She didn't usually zone out like that... Was this one of the symptoms of a concussion?
She tried to remember but somehow couldn't quite seem to grasp the information she was looking for. She was... she was drifting...
She blinked stupidly, her mind sinking back to sleep as swiftly as it had jarred awake. It felt kind of nice... quiet, peaceful. Something she hadn't had in a long time. It was like the irritating background hum of other people had been removed and it was just her in her head for the first time in forever. Her and a tiny little voice whispering for her to sleep... just relax and let go...
Sleep, yes... that sounded good. Listen to the little voice as it soothes, the quiet, gentle whisper as it wraps a comfortable blanket around you...
A glow spilled through her. That felt nice too... warm and peaceful. She tried to think if that too was a sign of a concussion but she couldn't seem to remember any more and at that moment she didn't really care.
Sleep... gentle, warm sleep...
On the edge of her universe she could hear the faint metallic noise of the TV set downstairs, the squealing horror movie music echoing up the stairs above the noise of the shower and the howling rain battering at the window.
Remy was down there watching his movies. Logan was in his room.
Scott was in the shower...
Scott...
A picture of him came unbidden into her head, naked amongst the steam, oblivious to her out here, his eyes tight shut against the water as he sang tunelessly under the cascade, soap slathering across his naked skin.
Not right, not right...
Sleep, no don't sleep...
She suddenly felt so dizzy, like everything had started to sway in her vision, like she had been spinning around in circles...
Dizzy, dizzy, sick...
She twisted her head sideways against the pillow, trying to focus on the madly jumping bedside lamp, the room snapping in a sharp arc as she flailed to grab onto something that wasn't moving around.
The warm serenity vanished along with the voice, leaving a heaving tumult of faceless fears inside her skull. A swelling, broiling mass that echoed the raging gale outside. She gasped and writhed at the sudden shift, shivering as terrible cold overtook her, panicking as voices and feelings, and words that weren't hers were suddenly jammed into her head.
"Scott...?"
Her voice hardly seemed like her own, shaking, quiet and confused as she curled up on the sheets, clawing her fingers into the bedspread to stop the rolling motion.
"I... I don't feel so..."
Her breath hitched in her throat as a blinding pain seared through her head.
"Don't feel so good..."
Her words were just a whimper now. A shaking hand reached out to the bedside table but fell just short as her fingers curled up into a fist.
"I... I don't..."
She gasped then, her body going painfully rigid, her face a mask of exquisite pain, her eyes clenching tight shut as she fought against the burning in the back of her mind, choking harshly before collapsing against the bedspread, limp and weak. Rough, panted breaths heaving in her lungs as she rolled over onto her back again, swallowing nervously, focusing on her breathing to try and calm her raging heartbeat.
Breath in, breath out, breath in, then silence.
She jerked slightly then froze, eyes growing wide as her body refused to respond.
Sleep, insisted the voice again... long gone sleep...
No, no... not this... Fight, don't sleep... I can't breathe...
Her mind raged then faded, sight leaking away with the last breath that died on her lips as she grew totally still, totally silent.
Totally dead.
It seemed like an eternity. An eternity of waiting, an eternity of wanting, forever seeking the cold, beautiful rush of air in her lungs.
Dead but not, frozen but living...
There but gone.
Jean stared blindly at the ceiling, eyes wide and bulging, glassy and sightless, lungs frozen, unmoving for an eternity before she blinked, before she took a deep breath, before she levered herself upright as the lightening flickered at the window...
"I don't quite feel myself."
The voice was not her own.
Stretching tensed muscles, she looked at her hands in the warm glow of the bedroom lamp, clenching and unclenching the fingers like one would flex new gloves.
A deep growl of thunder rippled through the room from the world outside just as the electricity flickered, dipping for a short second before returning.
From the shower she could still hear Scott's tuneless singing and she softly eased herself off the bed.
She knew this place so well... go to the dresser, open one of the drawers.
She rooted through the contents carefully, pulling out the flat, thin, ornamental paperknife that she knew was kept in there. Scott used it for opening all his letters and the edge of it was dulled through continual use, the shining, polished blade glowing orange in the storm light.
She ran her thumb across the blade edge, turning it over and over in her long fingers as she looked across to the bathroom door.
Scott...
"Here today, gone today, hurry up and wait..."
Scott sang under his breath as he leaned his head forward under the hot cascade of water, massaging the soap out of his hair.
His eyes were tight shut against the hot water, his glasses on the ledge by the sink on the far wall.
"We fight it out, we work it out, give me some time to unwind..."
White bubbles slicked down over his shoulders, dripping into the tub and gathering around his feet as he rubbed his hands through his short hair, turning round to let the hot water sluice down his back.
"You put on quite a show, you know that?"
Jean's voice startled him as the bathroom door clicked shut.
He smirked, his eyes still closed as the water flowed down his body.
"You're a sneaky one. Enjoying the view over there...?" he asked.
"Oh, without a doubt."
He snorted in amusement. "You want to hand me my glasses so I can return the compliment?"
Jean shook her head. "Nope, I don't think I will."
He pouted. "Well that's not fair now... you could be completely naked for all I know and I wouldn't be able to enjoy the experience."
Jean's face split into a cunning smile as she took a step closer. "Well you'll definitely get an experience..."
Scott's laughter filled the humid air, his lips curling into an anticipatory smile as he heard her footsteps pad across the floor towards him.
"Is that so?"
Jean made a little snort of amusement. "Don't let me stop you. Please... return to your shower... I can wait."
Scott laughed again and turned around, reaching for the controls to shut off the water.
Her hand grasped at his arm and stopped him, those thin, elegant fingers sliding down his skin, making him stiffen in anticipation.
"Don't stop..."
She was purring right in his ear, he thought, her hand sliding round his shoulder and down across his chest, the spray from the shower soaking them both as she pressed herself close against his back.
He could feel her naked skin brushing past him as her fingers slowly explored the ridges of his chest.
"Let me look at you just the way you are..."
Scott swallowed, turning slowly to face her as her hands fell away.
She stepped back, watching the water caress his body, smiling in amusement at the beginnings of his erection.
"Well, look at you..." she murmured.
"I thought that's what you had been doing," he replied.
Jean smirked and stepped forward again, watching him shiver in anticipation.
"Turn around. I promise you it'll be good..."
He did as he was told, obeying her voice of honey and leather as he turned back into the spray, feeling the hot fingers of water beat against his skin.
She stepped close behind him, curling her arm around his chest, pulling his back tight against her as she rubbed his stomach in slow, soothing arcs.
"No touching..." she purred as he reached for her hand, licking slowly up the side of his neck before sinking her teeth into his shoulder.
He grunted and dropped his arms, though whether it was in pleasure or agreement he wasn't sure. Either way, her hand slid up to caress his chest, dragging a lazy thumb back and forth over a wet nipple.
"Good boy..." she crooned, pulling her fingers across the hard muscles of his pectorals to lightly pinch at the other nipple before easing her touches in a slow sweep down his body.
She stroked the baby-soft skin at the tops of his thighs before grasping a firm hold on the blood-heated flesh between his legs, pumping her hand slowly down his length.
He gasped, jerking against her as she licked her lips.
"I'm going to enjoy this so much..."
She was purring down his ear... stroking his hot flesh in her palm, jerking him off just the way he liked it. He was right on the edge of ecstasy when she brought the paperknife out from behind her back, sinking it up to the hilt in his stomach with one swift, fluid movement.
Eternity in a second... he froze in shock and pain, feeling nothing... feeling everything...
Her telekinesis slammed hard around his jaw, sealing it shut before he could scream. Locking across his face like a band of invisible steel, the veins in his neck bulged with strain, closing his eyes tight with a slight twitch of her powers.
The blade dragged slowly upwards towards his ribs, the dulled edge messily parting flesh, ripping like so much raw meat.
He flailed helplessly before she stilled him, binding limb by limb, strap by strap until he was frozen, his skin turning pale with the pressure of her telekinetic bonds.
Bands of pinched flesh around his arms and body turned white then darkened with bruises as she tightened her hold, his movements restricted to the point where he toppled backwards, landing half in and half out of the shower, the hot water sluicing his dark red blood down the drain.
He squirmed on the floor, jerking helplessly like a fly trapped in a spider web.
Disorientated, confused, in so much terrible, terrible pain... He was frantic beneath her, twitching and bucking, straining against the hold on his jaw as she sunk her fingertips into the edge of his wound.
She stretched open the cut to reveal the red and white gore underneath, his flesh tearing back under her hands like uncooked pork, the skin wrinkling as she pushed it away.
The body is full, she found, packed as tight as can be with everything needed for life, filled up with blood and fat and fluids. Hot and wet and sticky under her hands, familiar but alien both at once, the scientist left within her coolly naming every part, the rest of her just glorying in the familiar alien, new old feeling of blood on her hands, blood on her mind...
She settled on Scott's thighs, sitting on top of him comfortably, still wet from the shower, now soaked with blood. His head jerked back and forth as he hummed and huffed and desperately tried to scream in muffled, pathetic cries, his hands balled into fists against the floor as she held him down.
Dark, striped bruises pinched his skin tight beneath her unseen bonds but she barely even noticed them.
Blood, almost black in the dim light spilled over his hips as she widened the gaping hole in his stomach with the blunt, tearing edge of the paperknife, viscera exposed and pulsing, twitching in time with his racing, skipping heart.
"Shhhh..."
She calmed him like a fussy child, stroking his face and hair, leaving red, slippery streaks behind.
Liquid heat oozed from his body, slicking down his hips and stomach onto the bathroom rug beneath him, the smiling cartoon duckies vanishing in the swelling crimson lake.
A string of drool escaped down his cheek as he strained against his frozen jaws, his mouth frothing with spit foam as he struggled.
"So sweet..." his toes tightly curled as a telekinetic pressure began to build in his stomach.
He rolled his head back at the pain, the squeezing pressure pouring through his body in nauseating waves.
"So good, Scott, so good..."
Her voice sounded far away to him. In rapture. Each passing second making it more distant. Further and further away as he slipped, then fell, then nothing.
She felt him die, twitching her hips in bliss that bordered on orgasm as his last breath gurgled free, his struggling body falling limp and heavy to swim like a corpse in a crimson lake.
She licked her lips, curling her hands in front of her face as she watched his lifeblood slither down to her elbows.
"I want more."
She left him on the carpet, climbing into the still-running shower as she cleaned away the evidence from her hands and body, the swirling red gathering around her bare feet before vanishing forever down the drain.
A humming pulse still filled her, consuming with its power. It called to her like the storm.
She needed more, she had to have more, there had to be more...
Remy was watching his movies. Logan was in his room.
Logan.
Her soul lit up as she formed him in her mind, picturing every last detail, the gnawing ache in the pit of her stomach answering with a push of desire. Her lips parted as she launched into song under the hot water, picking up exactly where Scott had left off. "I'm never there, for you or me. Can't you read, the story of our lies... Death to me and life for you. Something isn't right..."
Her heart lifted with joy, a dark sweet smile splitting her face because this was going to be so. Fucking. Good...
~o~
The storm howled outside, battering the glass panes with angry fingers as the sleet and snow slithered endlessly through the night.
The wind-blown shadows of ice flurries danced against the glass as the bathroom door opened, sending a crack of light across the thick carpet followed by a wall of hot steam.
Logan padded across the floor to his bed leaving wet footprints in the pile of the carpet, one towel draped around his hips and another briskly rubbing his wet hair into damp spikes.
Illuminated only by the light spilling from the bathroom his skin shone in the half-dark, covered with tiny droplets of water that glittered like crystals with every movement.
His flesh was pink from the heat of the shower and he could feel a small growl build up inside him in answer to the sudden pick up in the storm's tempo, the frenetic cry of the wind suddenly beginning to scream.
He shook his head like a wet dog, getting the last few droplets of water from his hair before dumping the towel on the floor and plopping himself down onto the bed.
The temperature suddenly seemed to fall around him and Logan paused in his search for the TV remote, little goose bumps of ice suddenly running down his neck. The hairs across his body shivered and stood on end as his head turned slowly to face the source of the icy breeze.
"Jeannie?"
She smiled a slow, carnivorous grin from the doorway, a look that didn't quite reach her eyes.
"Logan."
Her voice purred like warm treacle dripping down his spine, following the cooling drops of water on skin still wet and flushed from the shower.
The cream silk of her robe seemed to glow, floating over her curves in a sensual caress, brushing skin and lingering. He couldn't help but stare at her, swallowing the sight of her body just right for tasting.
She raised her hand and from across the room he felt the irresistible pressure against his chest, pushing him back against the bed. He let the touch guide him down, a bemused smile on his face as he let his head fall softly onto the pillows.
Snakes of cloth seemed to swiftly ooze out of the sheets around him like tendrils of weed, creeping and binding, circling his shoulders and legs with a sibilant rustle as he shot her a confused glance.
"Not above using mind tricks, Jeannie?"
Jean curled her fingers. "Never."
She licked her lips and walked towards him, the pressure on his chest spreading slowly down his arms until it reached his wrists, dragging his hands up and out until he was stretched across the bed like a Christ-figure on his cross. The pressure eased to nothing as the sheets bound themselves around his wrists, serpentine cloth slithering where she wanted it. It formed out of the flat sheet, sliding and caressing across bare skin like melted chocolate, setting hard as concrete in velvet.
He pulled against the pressure on his limbs for a moment, fixing her with a dark look as she laughed.
"You won't get far." The words hung in the air for a second as she smirked. "And don't tell me you don't like it Logan, I can tell that you're lying."
She cast a meaningful look at his crotch and the start of the erection that was just beginning tent against the towel. Forming more in response to that fact that she was near him than anything else, but a part of him thought that he should take what he could get because the scent of her under cream silk was just too hard to ignore.
"What is it, Logan? The lack of control? Not having to be the one held responsible for your actions...? No guilt, no blame..."
She smiled slow and smooth as he narrowed his eyes at her. "Never figured you for the submissive type."
She gave the towel a sharp jerk, pulling it open to expose his naked body before she crooked a finger and the pressure momentarily returned. It rolled down him until his hips were held tight against the mattress. They were bound by a coil of fabric low against his stomach that wound around the top of each thigh in turn, weaving him firmly into the sheets as the tactile, fluid cloth set suddenly hard.
He grumbled low in his chest, ignoring the response of his body as she climbed onto the bed and swung one leg over his waist, straddling him with a thigh either side of his hips as her cream silk robe splayed out across his stomach.
Her hands plunged roughly into his hair, lifting his head from the pillows as she forced his lips open with her tongue, huffing with satisfaction as she felt him eventually return the kiss.
His tongue probed softly back inside her mouth, for the moment not questioning why she came to be here and just accepting that she was, licking against her lips as she began to pull away. He sighed raggedly as she slid down to nip him on the throat, her hands running along his cheeks and neck before gliding over his shoulders and down to caress his ribs as she sat up.
His chest heaved as she touched him, the pressure of the bonds still pushing against his limbs as she slowly circled his nipples with long, cool fingers.
He was stuck somewhere, trying to reconcile the idea of a hot shower and an early night becoming suddenly the most sordid of his fantasies. Her weight above him pressing down on his lap, her hands reaching slowly along his body...
He shuddered as her fingers fluttered against his stomach, finally forcing his mouth to work.
"Jeannie, just what do you think you're doing?"
He was trying to search her eyes in the gloom and she laughed dryly, her head turning as her back arched in a languid stretch.
"Why Logan," she sighed, eyes finally catching his in a flash of fire, "I thought you would have figured it out by now." She leaned over him, her tongue flicking out to lick his jaw as her breath hissed into his ear.
"I'm going to fuck you to death."
He felt himself shudder at the invitation and the soft, wet lick of her tongue, his body flooding with heated blood as she slowly ran her fingers through the trail of hair on his stomach.
She arched one impeccable eyebrow at his obvious arousal and he swallowed hard, trying to dislodge the lump that had suddenly formed in his throat.
"What about Scott?"
The question hung between them for a second before she replied.
"He's in no position to complain."
Her reply barely registered before she took his swelling penis in her hand, smiling at the resultant squirm, watching his neck arch as she pumped her fist slowly down his length. She tugged on him lightly then, the hitched breath at the spark of pain all the she needed to know. He screwed his eyes shut, overwhelmed by sensation, murmuring her name as her fingers pressed into his hard flesh.
Fantasy come to life, her hands on him, around him, better than his imagination could have ever dared to hope.
She blinded him with dreaming, fingers slipping just into the edges of his mind and smoothing away suspicion, glossing over whatever confusion she found until he no longer cared why she was there... He just gloried in the feel and the scent of her, the sex that was heavy in the air and had always been so long denied to him.
She curled her lip at the sound of his voice breathing her name and she chastised him with a rake of her fingernails down his abdomen, watching the muscles flutter beneath taut skin.
"No talking."
He hissed in pleasure, levering his eyes open to watch mesmerized as she pushed the robe down from her shoulders. The silk dropped away to reveal a naked body in the peak of physical condition, bare, rounded breasts topped with darkening nipples as she dropped the robe off the bed.
His breathing deepened in response, hands flexing against the binding sheets as she stroked him. God, all he wanted was to touch her...
He could feel the damp heat between her thighs pressing against his skin, the surge of thickened blood in his veins making him ache. She ran the tip of her index finger in circles just around the head of his erection, narrowing her eyes as he huffed and gasped, making little whimpers of need in the back of his throat.
"No," she murmured. "I never would have figured you for the submissive type at all. Shall we play a game, my Wolverine?"
He didn't reply, too far gone with the feel of her in his lap as she bent her head forward.
"I asked you a question. Shall we play a game?"
Her tongue flashed out to play back and forth over the top of one nipple and he moaned quietly in reply.
"I'll take that as a yes."
She fixed her mouth over the firm little nub of flesh, pressing her teeth into it and biting him slowly, pulling the nipple with her as she began to raise her head. It slipped from between her teeth as he grunted with the small flash of pain, the length of her rough, hot tongue smoothing over it before repeating the process with the other side.
He felt like he was riding a crest of ecstasy, the woman he had wanted for as long as anyone could remember, here and now pulling fantasies out of the furthest parts of his mind. Perfect in detail as she slowly raised herself above him, guiding his rock hard erection between her thighs.
So perfect, so fucking perfect as she sank down onto him, and maybe he should have suspected something but it all felt so good and any suspicion in his mind was long, long gone...
So hot and tight and wet as he stretched her open, filling the burning core inside her. So good and desperate as she gripped him within her channel, grinding down until he was as deep as he could get, and then she sat there, holding him still when all he wanted to do was thrust as hard as he possibly could...
He moaned, murmuring to God and her name in ecstatic agony, his head rolling from side to side as she sat on his hard swollen flesh, her hands raking up and down his chest.
And then she started to squeeze.
Squeezing his cock inside her body as something began to lightly squeeze against his windpipe, the pressure growing in his throat as she began to thrust against his hips.
He moaned stupidly, confused between the two sensations and unable to move, wheezing for air as her fingers circled his nipples, her hips rocking back and forth against his pelvis as she began to whisper her own pleasure.
She took one hand off his chest and moved it to her breast, playing with the darkening, swollen tip as she began to thrust harder, feeling him ride in and out of her body as his windpipe finally closed off completely.
He began to struggle then and she relished in it, his mouth flapping open uselessly as he fought to draw a breath, his eyes rolling back as she rode him hard and deep, pinching one of his flat little nipples tight between her finger and thumb.
So good, so bad... his lungs burned...
She thrust down hard, angling her hips to press him as far against the front wall of her channel as she could, dragging his body endlessly in and out until she could feel her orgasm close.
He could feel the weight of her on his hips, the tight, desperate pull of her core as she fucked him, but also the burning, the terrible pain in his chest as he battled to breathe, pulling him in two different directions at once. And then her words, barely just filtering through as he blindly struggled to draw air...
"Come for me, Logan... you can't breathe until you come for me..."
Oh God...
He closed his eyes and let it take him, the race for release... The sudden panic, burning in his chest like the heat around his cock, heart hammering a mile a minute as adrenaline filled his system.
He tried to focus, blind and desperate, searching for an orgasm that would release him from all his suffering, desperate to find it before he suffocated.
She kept riding him, feeling the pressure build inside herself as she squeezed, willing it to last until he was nearly there... nearly there...
His head swam, dizzy and disorientated, black spots in front of his eyes, every nerve ending passing raw electricity inside his body as she pumped hard and fast. Her body gripped him as she sank down again, impaling herself over and over until he couldn't tell one from the other, until it was all too much, until she was screaming as she came and pulling him deeper... All of it merged and formed into a furnace of blinding white fire, boiling in his stomach in a race for blessed release before erupting in a paralysing, spastic seizure, coming harder than he ever remembered as release exploded through him and sweet cold air finally filled his lungs in a desperate, choking battle. Unable to choose between screaming or gasping for air, his eyes rolled wildly as his fingers curled into tight fists, his hips still twitching against her hold on him as the last of his orgasm burned through him.
She felt him shake and quiver underneath her, gasping hard as she continued to milk his cock inside her sex, never letting up even as the dizziness started to clear from his eyes.
"Jeanie..."
He choked her name roughly before a coughing fit overtook him.
"What... what in the..."
She shushed him with a finger to his lips, a soothing brush against his cheek as he screwed his eyes closed.
"God..."
He coughed again and she smiled, curling her fingers once more above his chest, forming her hand into a fist over his breastbone.
Pain... it lanced through his body as something inside him started to squeeze, a wail of hurt escaping his lips.
His eyes snapped open as he started to struggle against his bonds seriously now, trying to throw her off, pulling against impossible restraint as crushing pressure filled his chest.
"Get off... Get off me!"
She laughed as he choked and thrashed, sealing off his windpipe again as her hand started to crush his heart.
His eyes rolled back in his head then, fingers and toes curling against the pain and pressure in his chest, the colour draining from his face as her other hand pressed down on his abdomen, digging telekinetic fingers into his liver.
He would have screamed if he could have, past the red and white pain and the scorching heat in his body. Past the insanity in her eyes and the claws escaping free from his hands that were useless to free himself with, pinioned as he was.
She saw the blue tinge of approaching death on his lips and she smiled, a dark blossom spreading out underneath his skin as he bled inside, still struggling with the last of his strength, thrashing against his restraints.
He was buried inside her even now and every desperate jerk of his body translated to another thrust for her, riding out his death throes as her mind kept him hard.
She bit her lip, feeling him buck and twist, rolling her hips as her hands tightened their grip on his crushed heart, leaving the pulped mess of his liver and plunging deep into a kidney...
He was slowing. He was dying, but she could draw this out, just enough, nearly there, nearly there, and...
"Holy fuckin' shit! What are you doin'?!"
She screamed as she came, her head snapping back as the body beneath her finally gave up the struggle, Remy at the doorway frozen in blank shock as she finally turned to look at him.
It sent shooting ice down his spine, the look in her eyes, the purest, black evil boring a hole right through him...
Oh God, Oh God... he could taste the panic in the air...
He reached for a card but she was too fast, stealing them out of his fingers with the barest flick of her power as she climbed off Logan's body.
She left him lying there, the serpentine sheets falling soft and lifeless over his skin as she released the grip on his throat. Close... so close...
Limp but not dead. She could feel his powers kicking in to fix the damage but she had time... time enough to deal with this. Hips swayed as she walked towards him with purpose, fast on her feet as she flicked the robe from the floor, wrapping it around herself without ever using her hands.
And then Remy felt it... the sharp impact that threw him back against the wall before she ever even touched him. The invisible grasp that picked him up and flung him like a rag doll from side to side down the corridor, beaten against each wall in turn until he could feel the blood in his mouth and the grind of broken bone in his chest.
He came to land with a thump, knocking over a small table and scattering the contents across the floor, blindly reaching for anything solid among the debris.
His hand wrapped around the broken piece of a glass paperweight, charging it desperately before she could steal it from him, throwing it with all the strength he could muster...
She snarled as the glowing pink glass arced across the hallway, headed right for her before her mind caught it, changing the direction and shooting it through the closest window like a bullet exploding from a gun.
The window shattered, letting in the storm as the percussive boom rattled through the building, a dark, angry look holding tight over her features as her mind dragged Remy from the floor, holding him high in the air as he coughed and spat blood.
She flung him backwards again, his body hitting the far wall and knocking free one of the swords that fanned out on display over the oak panels.
A last desperate attempt, he thought. A last chance. His last thought, his only thought before his fingers tightened around the hilt.
He struggled to find his feet, raising the weapon as he charged towards her, screaming in rage and pain and fear as he brought it down in a perfect arc, perfect to kill her, perfect to end this...
A perfect arc that never hit as he was lifted bodily from the floor and thrown backwards again, his spine to the wall and this time he didn't fall...
Silence...
He looked down at his chest, the bloodied sword blade poking through his ribs glittering oddly in the darkness, the pommel pressing against his spine as it held him suspended from the ground.
He let go of the sword he had been clutching so desperately before, letting it fall to the carpet with a dull thud as he reached out to touch the red covered blade through his chest.
His fingers tightened around it, breath rattling noisily in his lungs as his head lolled backwards.
"Oh... merde..."
His breath hitched as his eyes closed, whimpering before growing limp, suspended on the wall like a grisly painting as Jean snarled in satisfaction, watching his blood drip onto the carpet. She spun around then, stalking back to Logan's room, cream silk robe billowing around her as the storm flowed in through the broken window, snow and sleet clouding the hallway.
Walking through the storm, she appeared like a ghost. Pale white, almost translucent against the cold as she stopped and glowered, the bed lying empty in the centre of the room.
She closed her eyes, reaching out her mind to find him, the distinct feeling of his consciousness sparkling through her senses. Weak... he was weak. Near death but healing. He'd rolled himself off the bed and into the far corner and, through the bleak white storm, she could sense the uneven beat of his damaged heart leaking as much blood as it pumped. He was hurting and she fed off the knowing, the fact that she could bring him to his knees with only the touch of a thought.
She floated to the centre of the room, hovering just off the floor with the tall bay windows behind her, flexing her fingers as she watched him crouched in the corner like a beaten dog. Deep purple bruises covered his chest and back, bleeding inside still as he grit his teeth through the pain, skin covered in glistening sweat despite the freezing cold billowing through the hallway.
He growled softly as the lightening seared the sky once more, silhouetting her against the tall windows.
"Is that all you can manage, Logan?" She cocked her head to one side, smiling sarcastically at him.
His voice was rough when he spoke, ground out against the pain in his sides.
"I don't want to hurt you, Jeannie."
"That's your weakness."
She flicked her fingers out and he thumped back against the wall like he'd been punched, blood oozing down his cheek from the clawed fingernail marks that had appeared on his face. He snarled again, baring his teeth but she sneered at him contemptuously.
"I could rip you apart, you can't frighten me. I could peel the metal from your bones piece by piece and rip it out through your skin. I hold your life in the palm of my hand and all I have to do is squeeze."
As if to prove her point she clenched her fist, hearing him whimper in a shocked flash of hurt.
Logan grit his teeth, steadying his breath and leaning his head against the wall as he tried to swallow down the flaring red heat that seemed to swallow his body.
"That was just a taste. Do you want more?"
Jean watched him with curiosity, eyes glittering as he eventually seemed to find control of himself, painfully rising to his feet with what seemed like monumental effort, arms wrapped around his battered, naked body. His eyes were fixed on her as he stumbled, barely catching himself against the wall, leaning against it in the end for the support as his injured body screamed to be allowed to rest.
"I don't want to hurt you, Jeannie..."
He said it again and she laughed at him.
"You can't even touch me. Look at you, you can't even stand up!"
He growled. A dark, dangerous noise in his chest, his back hunching slightly as he battled the damage within his own body to make his legs move, to push away from that wall and take that first step towards her...
She had amusement on her lips, watching his body shake at the strain, each slow step seeming to take even longer than the last, his legs shaking with the effort not to fall as he closed the distance a fraction at a time.
"What are you trying to do? Fight me?"
He didn't reply, grunting slightly with the exertion as his heart strained to pump sluggish blood though crushed arteries. He was healing, but slowly... so damn slow...
"You're pathetic. Little, little man..."
Outside the storm screamed, shrieking winds battering the glass behind her floating body, Logan's low growl echoing the angry weather.
He took another dogged, shaky step and she curled her lip in disgust.
"Fine."
She raised her hands, curling her fists as the glass from the windows exploded inwards with her scream, shattering in a haze of razor sharp crystals and beaten, wet snow. Rain and wind and glass shot across the room with the low, percussive crack of the thunder, the empty windows letting the storm rage though them.
Lightening illuminated the wind-beaten crystal shards and he screamed... a thousand glass blades exploding into his naked flesh at once, the ice cold wind and force behind the impact hurling him back against the bed, his head cracking on the wall as he fell.
He barely even registered the sheets against his spine. All he could see was blood, oozing into his eyes and burning his skin. Every movement seemed to burrow the shards deeper inside his body, cutting him open from within. He couldn't move...
It hurt... hurt so much...
God... and then there she was, floating above him with her hair and naked skin almost glowing, that cream silk billowing in the wind, her laughing face watching his pain, reaching out to touch him with the softest sweep of her fingers across his face and...
Snikt.
It all dissolved into shock, like the lightening stole her smile, the claws in her stomach slowly moving up into her chest.
She looked like she wanted to scream, but she had nothing left to do it with. Breath gurgled in her lungs, blood on his hands as, for a second, her control began to falter. Her hand wavered as she sank down on top of him, fingers curling against the hurt as their blood merged, eyes clenching shut as she fought to stop the waver in her consciousness.
"No..."
Whispered into his skin, whimpered in pain as his claws slowly withdrew, bloodied wet hands holding her tightly against his chest as she shook...
"I... I didn't want to hurt you..."
He sounded broken, damaged as much inside as out, sinking his hands into her hair, cradling her head against his shoulder like he'd always wanted to do, glued together with boiling crimson...
She whined low in her throat, clinging tightly to his abused chest as the blackness crept forwards, tears escaping down her face as the two minds inhabiting her body slowly began to unravel.
Oh God... she was choking...
It hurt... it hurt too much and she sobbed hysterically in his arms as little by little the darkness came, quieting her, numbing her, and then finally, silently, killing her.
The storm outside raged, filling the broken windows with numbing, blank cold as Logan buried his face against the side of her head.
He cried, holding her tightly, pressing choked, desperate kisses against her ear, rocking slightly and whispering in his grief as the lifeless body in his arms gradually began to cool.
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