Mirror, Mirror

A/N Goddess Foxfeather, Queen of Mad Plotbunnies, BUSIEST WOMAN ALIVE ™, Prophetic Muse, Hamster Witch and Uberbeta… One day down and she’s still okay. *crosses fingers * InterNutter, TC, Maxwell Pink, Dracena, and Greywolf are loverly and wondermous for archiving/hosting. J ProPhile: So… yeah… Morgan: *gloke * Readers/Reviewers: Another few chapters and this is wrapped up with the usual threads to the next story so…wheeeeee, lol. Thank y’all so much for reading and reviewing as you can!

“*MUST* you?”

“Yeah… I think I must…” Logan slashed deeply at the thick, oaken door, his lips curling into an almost Seussian smile as the wood splintered and parted.

“I think it’s unlocked,” Mark called over the noise of the breaking door. “And that small window’s out anyway…” When it was obvious that Logan was too intent on destroying the door to pay him much mind, the librarian shrugged mostly to himself and stepped off the front porch, making his way quickly to the side of the house where he had seen the lack of window. Logan grunted loudly and Mark had a pretty good idea that the door was now no longer satisfying to shred, but he did not go back to check. The window was the easiest method of entry now, anyway. Not only would anyone in the house be distracted by Logan’s destruction to be minding the window much, it was open to a darkened room. Mark liked darkened rooms for being sneaky—it was much more effective than barging in through the main entrance, figurative guns blazing. He braced his hands on the edge of the windowsill, examining the space beyond the threshold for signs of life. Rather than being broken, it looked as if the window had simply been removed, no trace of broken glass or trauma to the frame evident. And the room itself seemed quiet, no sign of movement or even breath-sounds beyond the window frame. _Here goes nothing, as they say. If I die doing this, I hope they bury me with full honors. Or at least facing the proper direction. _ He hefted himself easily onto the sill, taking a deep breath before lowering himself into the room as soundlessly as possible. He could barely hear Logan’s booted footsteps in the hall at the front of the house and he knew the other man was trying to flush out anyone who might harbor ideas of harm or valor. “Right,” he breathed, rubbing his hands idly on the thick fabric of his trousers. “Not a problem at all.” The Boardinghouse was apparently empty, no sign of life to be heard, seen or smelled, aside from rodents and a former cockroach which was now dessicating in the corner, hopefully on to better things in it’s next incarnation.

“Nothing,” Logan’s voice carried back to him from somewhere in the hall. “You?”

“Nothing so far,” Mark allowed, still in his same spot. There was something amiss in the space, something that was sending tendrils of warning through his spine.

Logan filled the doorway, his body blocking the watery light from the hallway. “This ain’t right,” he opined, his claws sheathed. “Looks like no one’s been here for a while. I don’t even smell sweat…” He inhaled again, deeply, as if to punctuate his statement.

“Well, we’re not going to find anything by standing here.” Mark looked around almost idly, his eyes skimming over the exposed rafters overhead, trying to figure out just what was niggling at him as being an untruth.

“You go high, I go low,” Logan ordered almost without thinking. He headed down the hall without looking back to see if Mark had acquiesced. It was almost too empty, he thought, hating the cliché. There was not even a trace of recent occupation. The dust was undisturbed, the smell of old, dirty things was lacking. The kitchen, while messy, had yielded not even a piece of moldy cheese or stale bread crust. It was as if the entire place had been made to look like an abandoned house, like it was a stage set meant for consumption rather than verification. No warning sensors in his back brain were going off, though, no tiny tremors of awareness were signaling him that this was a trap. He had been tricked before, he admitted to himself, but not often. And by better than the Brotherhood. He reached the end of the hallway and paused, looking into the room on his right. It was the long-disused study, a thick coat of dust covering the dilapidated desk. A very faint trace of Mystique’s scent wafted from the termite-eaten wood, a sign of her existence mingled with decay. Some part of that, Logan thought, was metaphorical. On his left, the door stood closed, the knob gleaming bright, unlike the others in the Boardinghouse. “Right, he sighed. “Nothing weird about this, is there?” He glanced over his shoulder to see Mark easing towards the den area. He shrugged, reaching for the doorknob with a sense of irritated irony, stopping inches short of the mark when a tremendous clatter rose from the front of the house. “There it is,” he smiled, baring his teeth. “Fun to be had by all.”

Mark did not know who attacked him. They were larger than him, significantly so, and seemed to be breathing hard and loud, as if they were in discomfort. But they blindsided him, knocking him to the ground before he could unsheathe his blade. He hit the floor with a painful thud, the wind rushing from his lungs as dust filled his nostrils. “Gerroff me!” he grunted, trying to roll free of his assailant but failing miserably. He heard Logan’s footsteps racing towards them but his attacker was pressing down so forcefully, so steadily, on his back that Mark could not breathe and the world began to swim darkly around him. _My last words suck, _ he thought as he heard something pop in his shoulders. The huge weight moved from atop him and he had the impression of a bullet-like head and red metal before Logan’s slashing claws flew by his face and everything turned upside down.