Behaving Badly

This one is short. I thought it more effective this way instead of drawing out the suspense.

Rogue had seen her share of stupid rednecks. It was rare that a town in the south didn't boast at least a half of their population as such. Today she was on a mission. There was an anti-mutant protest happening in Alabama, and she'd wanted to attend. She was only observing today, not speaking out. She pushed her way through the crowd, keeping herself covered, and made her way to the edge where she could watch, unobstructed. There was nothing new here. The unintelligent masses weren't using any hard facts, they were just spouting off a poorly compiled list of different mutations and listing the worst case scenarios for what each of them could do.


The speaker, a fat, ruddy faced man in a suit, spewed his poison to a thirsty audience. Rogue was more irritated than anything else. These people weren't trying to make any political changes; they were just bored. The heat was getting to them and tempers were starting to flare. The leader just decided to direct their anger to a target. He spouted off scripture and played to the crowd. Rogue made her way back toward the street. She removed her gloves and began to tap people at random. Only a small touch, nothing to make them feel more than a little faint. In this heat, no one would think of a mutation as being the cause. She waited in the air-conditioned car that Xavier had rented for her and opened the glove compartment. She took out a small, zippered case that was slightly larger than a paperback. She checked the contents, twelve small vials, six green and six yellow. She sighed, only a dozen.


When the rally had ended, Rogue went to the first house on her mental list. She wasd thd that one of the people she'd touched had known where the speaker lived. She didn't think about his name. He wasn't human to her any more. She drew her tranquilizer gun from its holster on her hip and loaded a vial, a green one, into the chamber. They were each tipped with a tiny needle. She got out of the car and waited. She had endless patience if it meant she would be rewarded. Today she wasn't going anywhere till she got her reward. She crept around to the back of the house and peered in the window. She grimaced at the sight of the speaker's naked backside. He was getting ready to take a shower and was wrapping a towel around his midsection.


Rogue eased the window open and was relieved that it slid to the side with little noise. She took careful aim at the man's wide back and squeezed the trigger. He went down with little more than a grunt. Rogue was inside the bathroom in less than a minute. She touched his neck; his pulse was steady. She retrieved her dart and tucked it in a small container for dirty needles. Then she went back out the window and on to the next house. When she was finished, she returned to her car and drove to the airport, catching a redeye out of Birmingham and was back in New York by two AM. She only allowed herself to do a dozen per trip. It didn't seem like more than a drop in the bucket, but this trip made her total one hundred eighty.


One Hundred and Eighty people who spewed hate, as a hobby would be unable to bear any children for the next four years. Henry McCoy had developed the serum she used as a more long-term alternative to the Depo shot. Everyone in the mansion knew how to use a tranquilizer gun, the senior students and staff knew how to load the darts, and Rogue had just taken the science one step further. She called it ethnic cleansing. Hate begets hate? Well, these hate mongers wouldn't beget anything for a while. Maybe they'd have a change of heart by then.