Devourer of Sins

DEVOURER OF SINS CHAPTER TWENTY (NC-17)
Disclaimers Apply

A/N Goddess Foxfeather, Queen of Mad Plotbunnies, rocks. There. I said it. Ted agrees. InterNutter, TC and Maxwell Pink are forever enshrined in little plastic cases in my heart for archiving (eeesh...could I sound any more like a serial killer?). Readers/Reviewers: Thanks for the feedback! The platypi are falling back...I wonder what...oh. Oh, my! The Killer Kitties (tm) have unleashed their prototype, a killing robot, on the duck stronghold! Stay back-this could get messy if the ducks don't get away in time...Or if they don't find the "off" switch.



"Are you sure it's the same person, Jean?" The Professor's voice was low and intent, demanding honesty.
"No doubt...It was the man who told us he was Theo Simpson." Jean rubbed her hands on her pajama-clad legs, wiping away the clammy feeling that came from staring at Rogue's mental image of the dead man for so long. Shet dit dirty, oily, like she herself was rotting. She wanted a shower, hot cocoa and Scott. Not necessarily in that order.
Logan and the Professor exchanged glances, moisture from melted snow still dotting Logan's shoulders from his sojourn with the policemen. The Professor said, "Jean, there's something afoot that we need to get to the bottom of. Theo was murdered in recently in much the manner described by the police, also very similar to the corpse you said you saw in the temple."
The mansion was almost entirely silent, even to psychic ears, as dawn crept exceedingly slowly over the horizon, the night-dark sky turning the barest hint of purple. Finally, after what seemed like an eternity, Jean said, "Why were they killed?"
"It is actually interesting," Beast said from the vicinity of the window overlooking the expansive front lawn. "That is, if it did not involve the Professor's friend and so much...trauma...to you and the others." If he could blush, he would have at his verbal faux pas, but he soldiered on after the Professor gave him the barest nod. "I did some research last night after it was reported that Professor Simpson was killed in the same way you described the corpse in the chamber with you, and this most recent body adds to the mystery."
"Hold up a minute, Hank," Logan said, motioning for silence. "Give Half-Pint and the Elf a minute to get settled." As he spoke, the couple in question entered the room cautiously, Kitty walking somewhat stiffly and Kurt supporting her with one arm around her waist.
"Kurt, Kitty,' the Professor nodded. "I assume you're feeling better..." He did not miss the flare of Logan's nostrils and the narrowing of the foster father's eyes. _Much better, if Logan's radar is to be trusted. _ "Dr. McCoy was just about to inform us on some details pertaining to the murders."
"Murders?" Kitty breathed, feeling suddenly very ill. "What murders?"
"In addition to the mutilated corpse Jean was...enclosed with...at the temple, Professor Simpson was found murdered in Mexico City with the same type of wounds." Beast made a grimace of distaste.
Jean laid a hand on Kurt's arm, drawing his focus to her serious expression. "Rouge found a body tonight. Out in the thick of the woods on our side of the fence. Kurt, Kitty...It was the man who told us he was Professor Simpson."
Kitty's eyes widened. "Mictlantecuhtli1," she breathed. A strange, giddy sensation rose in her belly and she pressed her fingers to her stomach to suppress it.
"Was?" Kurt's brows drew together as he faced her, the rest of the room joining in his silent appraisal of Kitty's expression of confused joy.
She frowned then, not sure where the word had come from. "I...I don't know."
Kurt and Jean exchanged looks. The name rang in their ears, teasing recognition. Beast jotted the name phonetically on his legal pad, frowning as he did so. "Where did you hear that name?"
"In my head," Kitty murmured. "I've been hearing a lot of things in my head lately..."
The Professor frowned deeply. "Kitty, would you consent to another scan?"
"Yes, of course," she said, much to Kurt's relief. For a horrible second, he thought she was going to refuse and say she was just tired. She frowned again and said, "I didn't mean to interrupt, Dr McCoy. I'm sorry..."
"Quite alright," he murmured, very aware of Logan's presence suddenly near him, edging closer to Kitty in a show of paternal protectiveness. "I was just going to say that these murders are mimicking ancient sacrifice. The young boy was identified as having been killed in the style of a sacrifice to Tlaloc, the ancient rain god of the Aztecs. His preferred sacrifice was a young child who would cry profusely, so as to encourage rain to fall. The others seem to be in the style of something called a Danzante."
"Doesn't that mean dancer?" Jean asked, brows knitting in confusion.
"The name was applied to an ancient temple found by archaeologists many decades ago. It bore a relief around the outside of people that seemed to be dancing. It was only much later that the figures were identified as sacrifice victims, hands, feet and genitals removed and bodies contorted in pain." As Beast spoke, Logan looked faintly ill, crossins ars arms tightly over his chest in an attempt to close himself off from the words. "The name," Beast continued, "just stuck. It has been known as the Temple of the Danzantes2 for so long, no one wanted to change it."
"But we were at Templo de Muerte," Kurt said.
"Temple of the Dead." Jean's voice was thick with nausea.
Kitty stood suddenly, approaching the Professor with concern lighting her eyes. "I think the dead bodies are part of something big, Professor. That woman...the one who gave me this," her fingers drifted over her belly, "she just vanished. What if she's like Kurt and can teleport? What if she followed us?" She dared not voice her concern, _what if she's in us? _ , but she saw the Professor pick up on her train of thought.
"That's what we're trying to find out, Kitty. Why are these people dying? Why did what happen to you three in Mexico happen? Who are these people?" Logan laid a heavy hand on his foster daughter's shoulder. "Half-pint, these aren't easy questions to answer. Are you holdin' anything back? Is there something we need to know?"
Jean had joined the Professor in a covert scan of Kitty's thoughts and hoped his experience and advanced skill were making it easier for him to untangle the jumble inside Kitty's head. She winced as something, not Kitty but something inside her mind, lashed out with claws, cutting a tenuous silk cord of telepathy. Kurt steadied her when she did not know she had swayed and edged closer to his girlfriend. Kitty spoke so softly that it was easy to miss the maniac glee in her voice, "I can hear people whispering in the corridors, the mice in the attic stomping like elephants,3 I can smell skin, taste the air...God, Logan, how do you stand it?"
A subtle, unconscious spaced cleared around Kitty, no one quite sure of what to say. "Katzchen," Kurt finally said, sharper than he intended, "what are you talking about?"
"I've changed! Something happened to me in the temple, something after that woman cut me! The box...I couldn't leave the box alone and then it spilled. It got into me, Kurt...something is _in _ me now! Before, she just talked to me, she just stalked me...Now, she's in me!" Kitty rocked back and forth, clutching the Professor's knees like a child seeking comfort. "Help," she said quietly, not willing or able to look at any of the others in the room.
"Kitty, listen to me. This is very important. Do you feel someone in your head now? Are they with you as I speak to you?" Professor Xavier took up her hands and forced her to look him in the eye. "Talk to me, Kitty!"
Even as she shook her head in the negative, Jean denied her answer. "Something forced me out of her head a minute ago, Professor. Something angry..."
Kitty sobbed quietly, not sure if she should be upset about Jean's uninvited scan or not, rocking back into Kurt's arms before pressing her face against the Professor's knees again. "I can't feel it, but I don't think she's gone..."
"She?" Beast asked. "Are you sure it's a she?"
"It's a woman's voice when she talks to me..."
Kurt bit his lip. "Professor...I, um, I have to tell you something but it's very personal. It's about...um..." Kurt sighed. "Earlier, Kitty and I were...in bed...and after, I felt like someone was clawing at my brain. My head hurt so bad I thought I was going to faint. It didn't last long, but..."
Logan strove to ignore the fact Kurt just admitted having sex with Kitty, something that, despite his knowledge of the teenagers' relationship, he liked to pretend not not exist. "Elf, why do you think that has anything to do with Kitty's problem?"
Jean raised a brow. "Sometimes, after someone, er, finishes, they get headaches..."4
"Nein, not me..." He avoided looking at anyone, especially Kitty whose dark blush let him know she would gripe at him later for discussing personal matters with other people. "It was like someone was poking at my mind. It hurt, but not physically. It was...it's hard to explain."
"I think I understand," the Professor said, absently stroking Kitty's head. "This is more far reaching than I previously believed. We're going to need to discuss this at length." A look out the window showed him the brightening sky. "However, it is very late for you all, or very early. I suggest sleep, as much as possible, or at least rest. For now, we keep this between ourselves-no one outside those present at this very moment is to know about this. Agreed?"
"Why?" Kurt asked. "Wouldn't it be better if we let everyone know? I mean, more brains on the case, as it were?"
"No!" Kitty and Jean snapped as one. Jean, at Kitty's sheepish look, added, "Kitty is feeling very vulnerable right now. People won't always understand that what she's going through might be due to a psychic phenomenon and not...um, a more organic cause. Not even her closest friends can truly be trusted to understand her right now."
Kitty looked up at Kurt blearily. "I'm not crazy."
"No, Liebes," he said, taking her into a fierce embrace and drawing her to her feet. "You're very sane."

Drifting and turning like leaves on the breeze, consciousness twisted into being and then into solidity. Form and function became reality and Tlazolteotl walked the earth again. The scent of the girl was still fresh in her memory so she took the easiest form, at least until her strength returned, she told herself. It had been so long since she had felt cold that she stood, naked as the day she was created, and let the snow pile in a small drift around her feet, her hands outstretched and catching the flakes falling soundlessly from the winter-dark sky. She was free from the constraints placed on her by the powers of old, by those that created her, and she knew she could not let them rest. _Pretenders are claiming my throne. Pretenders must be fed to the gods, sate our lust for blood and make us whole and pure again. _ The words echoed in her mind like a litany, over and over until her ears rung with the music of hatred and death. Crunching softly through the icy precipitate, she made her way towards a large object she knew she should recognize but failed to, damning her weak state. It was cold to the touch, her new skin sticking to the surface and pulling away painfully as she silently cursed the object to the bowels of whatever level of the underworld spawned it. Clear glass was set into the upper portion of the object, ice layering it to create an opaque surface. Her reflection-not her own, she corrected, the other female's-stared back at her. _I look like a spirit, colorless and dead... _ Brown eyes stared back from a too-pale face, dark hair falling in snow-dotted strands around bare shoulders. _This will do for now...I need another form soon... _ Tlazolteotl could hear the girl, the one she know mimicked, crying in her head and instantly hated the part of herself that allowed her to take form from memory, hated the weaknesses it gave her. Tasting the air, she smiled. Blood was to be had this day and she wanted it _now. _
1 Aztec god of the dead. His name means Lord of the Land of the Dead and he carries a cup usually fashioned from the dome of a human skull. Human sacrifice was a major part of Aztec worship, almost all Gods requiring anywhere from one per year to constant, almost daily blood rites.
2 Temple of the Danzantes is located in Monte Alban in the state of Oaxaca in Mexico. Very important site, archaeologically speaking. It is a four-tiered pyramid in the step style (well, the remains of one) and is very significant of the Zapotec influence on the Aztec culture. Oddly enough, Oaxaca is known today for it's fabulous Dia de los muertes celebration that stems from Aztec and Mayan rites of old. Just in case you wanted to know.
3 Stolen and mutilated from Bram Stoker's Dracula when Lucy Westenra is telling the doctor of her strange illness.
4 Really. It has to do with blood pressure and flow. You can also experience temporary blindness. Cool.