Gehenna: Part One

by Luba Kmetyk

Part 1

*ring* Kitty squirmed around, waiting for someone to pick up. *ring* She'd started losing track of what day it was -- much less the time of day -- locked away with Pete, but she'd found it dark outside, a few hours after midnight according to a clock in one store's window. *ring* That meant it should be late evening in Westchester. *ring* After finding the phones in two nearby callboxes vandalized and useless, she'd phased into a closed greengrocer's to 'borrow' their office phone. *ring* At least she could still remember her calling card number and the mansion's number... *ring* ...no matter how exhausted she was...

"Hello, ya've reached the Xavier Institute for Higher Learnin'. How may Ah direct yer call?"

"Hello -- Sam, is that you?" She fought to keep her voice calm, to sound like her usual self. "It's Kitty."

"Hey, gal, it's been a while. How are ya? An' yer James Bond fella, an' Rahne an' everybody on Muir? Say, can Ah say hello ta Rahne when yer done?"

"Umm... I'm fine, Sam." But, given their current situation, she couldn't bring herself to utter the same polite platitude about her former-spy lover, although she fervently hoped the mutant rocketeer wouldn't pick up on that omission. "And everybody up at Muir's fine, at least they were when we left a while ago. Pete and I are spending some time in London, that's actually where I'm calling from. Listen, you know I'd love to chat, but I'm kinda rushed right now. The reason I called is, I really need to talk to Logan. Is he around?"

"Sure, Ah'll go get him fer ya."

"Thanks, Sam. I appreciate that. And we'll talk some another time, ok?" Guthrie might not realize it, but she was promising herself -- as much as her old friend -- that things would get back to normal eventually, and there'd be time once again for all those little social pleasantries she'd taken so for granted up until now.

* * * * * * * * * * *

She felt like she'd been waiting forever, but it actually was only a moment or two before the silence was finally broken by the welcome sound of Wolverine's familiar growl. "Hey, pun'kin. What's happening? The kid still treating ya right? Sammy said y're callin' from London?"

"Logan, can you do me a favor?"

He could hear the strained note in her voice, a barely-suppressed tremor that the less sensitive Guthrie hadn't noticed, and changed his tone immediately. "Sure, kid, anything. Watcha need?"

"Err... Can you go someplace, and call me back? I mean..."

Her voice trailed away, leaving it to him to fill in the blanks. She didn't want anybody at the mansion listening in on an extension... and that's just what Storm would do, if she knew Kitty was on the phone with what sounded like a problem. "Sure, kid. Just gimme some time, and a number where I can getcha."

She recited a long string of digits, and then repeated them for confirmation. "That don't sound like your cell phone. Hotel room?" But the exchange wasn't right for the St. Martin, where they usually stayed in London.

"I'll tell you later, ok? I don't have my cell phone with me, but I'll wait right here, until you call me back, and I promise, I'll tell you everything, just not now, ok?"

* * * * * * * * * * *

"Ok, Kitty, I'm down at Harry's in his back office, all nice and private." The barkeeper himself would be busy serving out front for hours yet. "What's wrong? Are you ok? Something wrong with the kid? Or is it something he did? I swear, Kit, if that bum's hurt ya..." Wisdom might be a friend, an old acquaintance in the small covert ops world whom the experienced Canadian had come to like and trust, but it was Kitty who held that very special place in his heart.

"Logan, really, it's nothing like that. I mean, yes, there's something wrong with Pete--"

"He hurt?" The gravelly voice sharpened.

"No, he's fine. I mean, he's not fine, but he isn't hurt, it's not that. It's just... Logan, he's hurting, and I don't know what to do. I don't know how to help him. He says he doesn't need my help, but he does... but I don't know how, I don't know what to do..."

Logan heard the rising note of hysteria in her voice, as she relaxed what had obviously been a somewhat tenuous control held too long, and interrupted in a firm tone. "Kitty, c'mon now, darlin', cut that out. Take a deep breath -- 'member all them lessons we had us? Calm down, breathe, center... and tell me what the hell's going down that's got you so freaked."

"I don't know where to start." But her tone was more confused than frantic now, and he knew this talk was helping whatever was wrong.

"Start at the beginning, and go to the end... then stop." He sighed in some relief at her shaky laugh, even if he hadn't gotten the Lewis Carroll quote quite right, and settled himself to listen.

* * * * * * * * * * *

"I guess it started a little over a week ago. We had a radio call come into Muir, that a government chopper was flying over. When it landed, this tall, distinguished-looking guy -- Brigadier Ferguson, he said his name was -- got off, and wanted to talk to Pete. He said he needed Pete to do a mission for the government, just like he used to."

"He show any identification? Any proof he was legit?" Maybe -- no, certainly -- Excalibur had considerably better relations with the British and Continental governments and general populace than the X-Men did in the States, but that acceptance in turn tended to make the European team more trusting than perhaps they should be.

"Oh, Pete knew him, that wasn't a problem. Pete told me later this Ferguson was in charge of a small, special anti-terrorist task-force that reported directly to the PM. They've had a really good rep for many years and no political agenda, they just stayed in place and kept doing their job no matter which party was on top."

"Ok, just checking. And yeah, I think I heard o' this guy and his group, now that ya mention it. Got an ex-IRA enforcer workin' for him -- I guess he believes in the 'set a thief ta catch a thief' approach." Not a mutant, to the best of Logan's limited knowledge, but a skilled and experienced operator, an indivisible tangle of good and bad fitting no simple, easy definition or stereotype, as so many in that field were, as Logan and Wisdom themselves were -- a top IRA enforcer who'd switched to mercenary work when his sacred Cause had been worn thin by too many innocents killed in random bombings, he'd finally been captured doing a charity flight into Bosnia with a load of children's medicine and co-opted by his old adversaries to fight for a worthier cause -- not too different from Wisdom's checkered career... or his own. "So, go on... he said he wanted the kid ta do a mission? Why not send his own guy?"

"Is that the Dillon he mentioned? He said he would normally send one of his own people, except apparently this Dillon is out of it, with a broken leg... You know, I never got a chance to ask Pete if the guy might be related to his friend Trevor..." Logan cleared his throat, and Kitty took the hint. "Anyway, the brigadier -- he said they'd learned about a hidden research facility in Bengamisa, just outside Kisagani in Zaire, that had made considerable progress genetically engineer a robust form of Ebola virus that could spread through the air. Moira got all fussed hearing that -- she said even regular Ebola is horrible stuff, everybody who gets it dies in a few days... There's no cure or even any real treatment for it, she said, not a hint of one. And the only reason it hasn't turned into a total medical catastrophe yet is it's hard to pass around except through blood and fluids -- like AIDS, I guess."

"Yeah, I saw a guy come down with it in Africa, once. Moira's right, it's some *really* bad shit." Sent in to rescue a young doctor being held hostage, a missionary who was the only son of an important Quebecois government minister, the small strike force had no idea how one of their members had gotten infected. But a week or two later, a formerly strong, stoic man been puking up his insides in endless torrents of black blood as the virus ate away at all his vital organs, and begging and pleading anyone near him to kill him and put him out of his misery -- and, for once without a single wisecrack, Wade Wilson had broken into the isolation ward late one night and done precisely that.

"Ok, so this Brigadier Ferguson said this group was trying to develop this stuff, and a local guy who was one of their human guinea pigs escaped and got back to his village, where he told his story to one of the volunteer doctors before dying, and the doctor reported it to his people at WHO, who passed it along." She chuckled mirthlessly. "You know, I thought Alistaire had gotten his new agency up and going awful quickly, but it turns out that's the World Health Organization, not our old friends the Weird Happenings Organization."

Her less-than-infinitely-patient captive audience forced himself to ignore her rambling -- but not cut it off -- realizing she needed to gradually work herself around to discussing whatever she'd called about. "So why's it a Brit problem, anyway? Seems like this Ferguson would just call up the Christians in Action and dump it in their laps." Not that the CIA boys wouldn't manage to screw it up somehow, but that was a different problem.

Kitty couldn't read minds, of course, but she'd known Logan and his quite biased opinions for a long time. "Because of exactly what you're thinking -- he didn't trust anyone else to be sure to do the job right. Besides, the group behind this apparently blames Great Britain for all of Africa's current problems -- they claim the British Empire destroyed all the indigenous cultures and introduced corruption and all the other evils of modern civilization, so the betting was running high they'd likely love to dump some of their bug on London to pay back the evil colonials."

"Yeah, right, darlin'... like Africa never had any problems before the great white bwanas showed up," Logan snorted.

"I'm just answering your question, Logan. I didn't say I agreed."

"Yeah, sorry, pun'kin." Making a mental note to himself that Kitty hadn't relaxed enough yet to regain her usual impish sense of humor, he shifted his weight and recrossed his legs as he prompted gently, "Ok, so it's a Brit problem on accountta this Ferguson character wants to win brownie points for his own people, and 'cause this buncha crazies were gonna target the limeys as well as the yanks like usual. So, lemme guess -- he wanted Pete ta take out the joint, right?"

"Yeah, exactly. He said they could send in an SAS team for a full assault, but that would create all kinds of diplomatic and PR problems. There really wasn't any concrete evidence to take to the international community, and the brigadier said that the local authorities couldn't be trusted not to help them get away and finish up their research somewhere else, that they'd probably been paid off plenty to warn them of danger and otherwise just ignore them. He said his deputy had checked all the various agencies' records, and Mr. Pitman in MI5 and Mr. Doyle in MI6 and Mr. Jardine had all confirmed that Pete had the best 'wreck-and-roll' record of any agent they had, so they wanted him to go in and destroy the research complex and everyone in it. Kurt went totally ballistic when he heard that--"

"What was the elf doing there? Sounds like this weren't none o' his business." Not to mention being something the always determinedly idealistic Nightcrawler would not handle well at all, even if he had been making noises recently about the team needing to be more proactive.

"Kurt got all snippy when the brigadier wanted to talk to Pete privately; he said anything to do with a member of the team was team business. I guess the brigadier figured there wasn't much chance Kurt or the others would spill the beans to the press or anything, because he didn't argue the point too long."

"So the elf got an earful of things he'd rather not know, huh? And got upset by getting his nose rubbed in the real world?" Logan had fond memories of endless hours of ethical debates with Wagner when the two of them had first joined the X-Men in which they'd argued about whether one could ever be justified in killing, neither ever converting the other to his own point of view. But the Black Air agent was uncomfortable enough with some of his own past deeds that he'd take Nightcrawler's strictures against any such actions personally rather than hypothetically.

"Oh, Logan, it was just awful. Kurt got all sanctimonious about Excalibur not being under government orders and how X-Men never kill, Douglock started sprouting statistics of estimated bystander fatalities based upon the extent of incidental property damage during various past missions, then Brian started lecturing Kurt on the need to maintain good relations with our local government and populace -- unlike the X-Men, he made a real big point of that to Kurt -- and Peter started pontificating about duty to the state and duly appointed authority, and Pete told them all to bugger off, and nobody was asking their opinion or for the team to get involved anyway. And Kurt told him, if he went, he wouldn't be welcome back."

"And Moira didn't have nothing ta say about that?" Logan would have bet the acerbic Scotswoman would have rather pointedly reminded Wagner Excalibur were only her guests on Muir -- and he could remember at least *one* occasion when Moira had been quite willing to shoot to kill.

"Moira wasn't there by then, she'd mumbled something about viral surface proteins and tailored antibodies and left while the rest of us were still talking... and I really don't know if she did get some idea for her research during the brigadier's visit or if it was just a good excuse for her to get away from the rest of us for a bit. It was Rahne who reminded Kurt that he didn't have any right to throw people off her mother's property, that the Kinross holdings didn't belong to the team just because the X-Men had killed Moira's son. *Then* Peter stormed off in a sulk, Rahne went running after him apologizing, Douglock went after her asking why, Meggan got so upset by all the fighting that she ran out crying, Brian followed her, and Amanda started reading Kurt the riot act for being a first-class jerk."

[next part]

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