I2DT - Holding Patterns

[Narrator]

Since Ursus was wanted elsewhere, he'd been turned over to SHIELD for transport to goodness knows where. Blaze and Flare were put in holding cells under the point while someone tried to figure out what to do with them. Tereza's sister, Iron Soldier, and Trinity all seemed to have made a clean get-away.

[Laura Kinney]

A grinning X-23 walks down the corridor of the holding cells and stops in front of the two cells, looking back and forth between Blaze and Flare.

"You know, it's been a while since I had the pleasure of dealing with you guys."

[Narrator]

Flare stared at her, obviously slightly terrified.

Blaze just leaned back against the wall, "How long will the gloating last? I just want to know how long before I get to go back to staring at the ceiling."

[Laura Kinney]

"How about right now." she says and reaches over to turn off the communications with Blaze's cell.

"You with your friend on this? I can come back later if you'd rather spend some quality time by yourself. I could come check back in a couple days, maybe a week?"

[Narrator]

"Sister. She's my sister," Flare stammered out. "What do you want?"

[Laura Kinney]

"Whatever you got. Kidnapping's a couple of years, not too bad. But it gets worse when you push it up to human trafficking. Some of your friends bailed on you and I want to know where they might have gone. Safehouses, routes out of the country, future plans. I know at least a couple of your friends got away. You help us catch them, we'll see if we can shave a couple years off your inevitable sentence. You be extra helpful and maybe I'll even put in a good word for your sister."

[Narrator]

"I... I don't know. Trinity kept most of it in that head of hers. Bitshift handled getting us places to crash. Trinity will probably try to go back to Paris or maybe Amsterdam. I don't know if the deal with the Russian woman will hold since she didn't actually get what she came for, so Trinity's bound to be angry. That may mean she'll go to Greece." He glanced at his sister who seemed to be a little irritated at the amount of talking he was doing, even if she couldn't hear it. "I don't know much about the two Russians. Trinity kept that quiet. Had Bitshift route all the communications with them through his powers."

[Laura Kinney]

"You're not giving me a lot here, Flare. You guys got a plan to get into contact with each other if you get separated?"

[Narrator]

"We were supposed get to ground, make sure we were safe and clean, then Bitshift would e-mail us with a location to meet once he'd contacted Trinity. It was some seriously cloak and dagger shit. I think Trinity picked it up from an ex-girlfriend of hers, or at least that's what she said. Bitshift's does things with electronics, so he's likely hanging out on the internet somewhere. He seemed to know you guys were coming though, cause I saw him bug out just as the rumble got started."

[Laura Kinney]

"Just a little cog in the machine, eh? Well if you can get me access to your email so I can wait for Bitshift to make contact I'd consider that a show of good faith."

[Narrator]

"Sure... I can do that. Probably want to be careful where you access it from. You access it from the school, he'll know and it might spook him."

[Laura Kinney]

"You know, your sister could learn a thing or two from you about how to not dig yourself into a hole further. How did you end up in a terrorist cell anyway?"

[Narrator]

"The people in our town were messing with us for being mutants. Wouldn't sell us food. We couldn't get jobs to get money. Trinity and Ursus came along and got us out. Fed us, made sure we had the stuff we needed. We were grateful. No one else ever gave a shit."

[Laura Kinney]

"That'd ring a little truer if you actually got caught stealing food."

[Narrator]

"My sister's good at what she does. We're from France. You think I'd be around to talk to you if we had gotten caught stealing food there?"

[Laura Kinney]

"No but if you did I'd give you a slap on the wrist for it. Instead you got caught kidnapping someone and handing them over to be moved out of the country. Hard to see that as just trying to get by."

[Narrator]

Flare sighed, "You asked how we ended up with the Brotherhood. I told you. I'm sure we're not the first people you've run across who did something stupid out of gratitude to someone. I get it, we fucked up. We're going to jail. You've obviously already made up your mind on us. Get me something to write with and I'll give you the username and password for my e-mail."

[Laura Kinney]

She swipes something in front of the lock and part of the clear plexiglass slides to the side, letting her step into the cell. She hands Flare a piece of paper and a pen as she stands in the door.

"Let me make one thing perfectly clear. People like you are the reason why humans didn't want to deal with you. You can't act like a victim of persecution when you turn around and do exactly what they fear. And the sooner you realize that the better."

[Narrator]

He wrote some stuff down and handed it back to her. "What does it matter at this point? We're going to jail for a long time. My sister's seen me talking to you, so she's never going to speak to me again, even when we get out. Realizations are only for people who are going to get second chances." Even with her limited interpersonal skills, it was readily apparent he was giving up.

[Laura Kinney]

"You're an accomplice and you're cooperating. You'll do 2 to 5 years at most. If you can get this through your sister's skull the same is true for her."

[Narrator]

He glanced at Blaze who was studiously ignoring both of them at this point, "Yeah, she's not going to talk to me. Five years, cause you know they'll make an example of us since they won't be able to find Trinity. Then deportation back to France, assuming France will even take me back." He wasn't even looking at her. "You've got what you want and I've told you all I know. If Bitshift sends you something you don't understand, just come back and ask. It's not like I can ruin my non-existent future any more than I already have. Do me a favor though? Turn off the coms in here on your way out. I really don't want to hear Blaze chew me out."

[Laura Kinney]

X-23 shakes her head as she walks out of the cell and closes the door. She does turn off the com but then she just heads to Blaze's cell and opens the door.

"You got anything productive to say?"

[Narrator]

"Yeah, the X-Men busted up an opportunity to help more mutants. Trinity was getting us access to those gulags the Russians like to call 'schools'. If we'd made the trade, we would have gotten the access we needed to bust out a bunch of mutants. Now they're not going to get the help they needed, but as long as the X-Men get to be all high and mighty in their fucking university, the world will just dissolve into rainbows and unicorns won't it?"

[Laura Kinney]

"You know what's the problem with assholes like you? You buy into that whole schtick about the end justifying the means and cast yourself as the underdog hero."

[Narrator]

"You know what? We were. X-Corp likes to wring their hands about the plight of the mutant and oppression, but it's so much bullshit. X-Corp is doing *nothing* about the shit happening to mutants in France. Children are *starving* and they wag their finger at the French government. At least I'm aware that I'm using the ends to justify the means and I'm not using my fear of means to justify not actually reaching an end. What's your excuse for being a hypocrite?"

[Laura Kinney]

"I'm not the one turning on my own here. You know what happens when people stop giving a shit about the means?" she asks, taking another step into the cell and raising her fist. Two narrow blades snap out from between her fingers as she tightens her fist.

[Narrator]

Blaze actually looked mildly impressed, "Yeah, looks like some of the shit we heard coming out of Russia, only they're not quite so elaborate. I'd prove it, but I'm certain the Brits probably now have what few pictures we had. They'll probably sit on them and do precisely nothing with them. Sometimes you've just got to not give a shit about national sovereignty."

[Laura Kinney]

"You seem to have national sovereignty confused with people. Unless I got mixed up somewhere and you didn't actually try to sell a fellow mutant back to the place that's so terrible in the first place?"

[Narrator]

"I didn't like the idea, but Trinity said she had it all lined up and that she wasn't going back to the gulags," Blaze shrugged, "so I trusted my friend. You know, that person who got *me and my brother* out of a bad situation. The only thing that's going to keep me up at night is that we failed to help those people."

[Laura Kinney]

"Next time you try some dumb shit like that, maybe make sure your bait actually wants to be there."

[Narrator]

"As I'm sure you so graciously informed my brother to get him to rat on us, there won't be a next time. We're going to jail... blah blah blah."

[Laura Kinney]

"You know, I'm sure you don't give a shit about yourself, but if you keep this up you got a really got chance of draggin' him down with you, so congratulations on that." she says, her claws snapping back into her arm. "Especially when he's the one trying to remedy this fuck up and not let this ruin your entire lives."

[Narrator]

"He doesn't know shit. The only involvement he even had was when he tried to save me at the house. And in case you weren't aware, jail has a way of ruining your entire life, no matter how long your stay. So your belated concern for my welfare is noted, but unappreciated."

[Laura Kinney]

"Jail doesn't ruin your life. Being a whiny little bitch does. But what's worse is that your dead-set on bringing the only one who gives a shit about you down with you. Do what you want, I don't give a shit." With that she walks out and punches the button that closes the cell door, cracking the plastic in the process.

[Laura Kinney]

The next day...

Laura walks back down the corridor of cells. This time she's not wearing her uniform, nor her casual tanktop. She's got regular clothes on with an old army jacket and she's got a worn out traveling bag slung over her shoulder. She drops the bag with a dramatic thump in front of Blaze's cell before turning on the coms on both cells.

"Off the record." she says, jerking her thumb at one of the cameras, the usual blinking red light on it off. "You got anything useful to tell me about those camps, I'll personally wrestle X-Corp into giving you a minimal sentence."

[Narrator]

Flare looked at Blaze and Blaze shrugged before she spoke, "Define useful. Trinity said she thought there was one inside or under Stolobny Island outside Ostashkov, but we had no way to verify it beyond some strange work orders and shipments records that seemed a little out of place. The surface buildings are supposedly a monastery for the Russian Orthodox church. If so, they're monks with the strangest tastes I've ever known and they eat a *lot* of food."

[Laura Kinney]

She nods. "I can work with that. Do you know anything about the state of the borders? How easy is it to get in these days?"

[Narrator]

"For someone like you or me? Wouldn't be hard. There's plenty of open frontier to sneak in. If you're planning on going the more conventional route it wouldn't be too terribly difficult to get in as a tourist or find someone to smuggle you across if you'd rather not leave a paper trail."

[Laura Kinney]

Laura taps her thumbnail against her teeth as she's thinking. "I think I got an idea... Thanks for your help. For what it's worth, I think you were doing the right thing, just in the dumbest possible way." she says and heads out of the cell-block to do something really dumb herself.