Chapter 27 -Interlude-

-Somewhere in the dense woods of Canada-

Rustling sounds can be heard as two figures are making their way through the woods. One figure is cutting through the branches with razor sharp claws.

"Come on, Jimmy, when are we going to stop this and go back?" Victor asked as he followed James through the dense woods. His clothes were damaged and muddy.

"You can go anytime you want. I never asked you to come with me. And stop calling me that!" James said as he angrily swiped at a branch, destroying it violently.

"So, what's the plan here? Do we just kill them or what?" Victor said as he completely ignored James' comments. This only further annoyed James.

"No, we're just scouting," James answered.

"Why the hell do we care anyways? It's not like it'll blow up on our faces," Victor said with an annoyed tone.

"Word is that this guy is experimenting on mutants. We have to check it out," James said as he crouched down to look at the ground. He softly touched ground and looked at the surrounding area for clues.

"Okay…can't we just give a tip to Lydia or that team with the x jumpsuits," Victor chucked at the end, remembering the flight suits the young x-men were wearing. As he said that he walked past James and ruined whatever clues were around James. James' nose twitched in anger but released a deep breath and inhaled nice and slowly. He finds himself doing this a lot in order to not let his anger come out.

"Hey…" James said as he picked up a faint unique smell.

"You smell that?" James asked. Victor stopped and looked back at James. He tried to pick up the scent James was referring to but had no luck. He walked closer to James and suddenly he picked up a faint smell.

"Smells like medication? Drugs?" Victor asked.

"Yeah," James agreed. He sniffed the air around him and found a trail.

"This way," James said. James was wearing jean pants and a white short sleeve shirt with a red long sleeve shirt on top.

They made their way through the woods and reached a section where the trees started to become less dense. They walked slowly until they could see a tall metal fence.

"So now what?" Victor asked.

"Sneak inside and get them out," James replied. Victor seemed annoyed.

"This is stupid Jimmy. We shouldn't be doing this. We have bigger fish to fry," Victor voiced his annoyance.

"If you have a problem with what I do then you can leave anytime you want," James replied in a low angry voice.

"Lydia wouldn't-" Victor tried to say before James interrupted him.

"Don't bring her into this!" James shouted angrily. Victor slightly raised his hands.

"Okay okay, you don't have to be so touchy about it," Victor said. A red dot appeared on his shirt and then several other red dots were covering his entire body.

"Ah shi-" Victor tried to say before a hail of bullets came. Several of the bullets hit causing Victor to stagger backwards before moving for cover. James was also hit but not as much as Victor. He was closer to the trees to take cover from the bullets.

"Well Jimmy? You got us into this mess. Get us out," Victor said as he crossed his arms and leaned against the tree. He paid no attention to the bullets that were constantly firing towards their direction, some tearing bark off the trees as they hit.

James looked angrily at Victor again but this time he let that anger flow throughout his body. He extended his claws out and screamed as he charged towards the metal fence. Victor sighed and groaned as he looked at the sky.

"Wish you were here sis," Victor whispered. He looked back down and took off chasing after James.

After several minutes, smoke and small craters could be seen as Victor and James finished off the last remaining soldier. Victor cracked his neck as several bullets dropped off his body in different locations. James pulled his claw off a soldier who gargled blood as it came out of his mouth. James looked around and saw a building they haven't touched yet. He walked towards it and found it locked. He forced the door open by kicking it.

"Over here!" James said.

"This feels weird, why haven't we seen any prisoners?" Victor said as he kept looking around. James remained silent as he was also thinking the same thing.

They searched around and found stairs leading down. They descended down and caught a whiff of something familiar.

"Jimmy…" Victor said.

"I know…" James responded. The smell of death was incredibly strong. A smell they were all too familiar with. They descended further down and opened the double doors.

They could see cells that contained a dark looking ash. James went to one of the close by cells and Victor continued ahead to inspect the other cells. James knelt and touched the ash. He took a whiff of it and realized it closely resembled like a human scent. He looked at the inside of the cell and started to inspect it.

"It looks like a grenade went off in here," James said as he inspected the walls of the cell. From his experience with war, he could tell when a grenade was used.

As Victor heard James, Victor stopped at a cell and remained silent. He swallowed hard from what he was looking at. The left-over smell was overwhelming. He turned his head to the side to avoid looking anymore. His plan was to spare James from looking but it failed when James was next to him.

"Hey, did you hear me?" asked James as he was approaching Victor. He found it strange that his talkative brother would not answer. He saw Victor look to the side and he immediately knew something was wrong in that cell.

When James saw the contents inside the cell, his anger rose. James stared at the remains of children. There were some bones that escaped whatever explosive was used here. The bones were tiny. The surroundings seem to quiet down to pay respect. A ringing sound came next as James toned everything out. He remained motionless as he stared at the remains.

"Come on, let's go," Victor said as he elbowed James to bring him back to reality. Victor now showed a face of determination. This became very personal now.

They continued down the corridor to find very similar cells with remains in them. The smell was harsh on their noses.

"I don't get it. Why do this?" Victor asked as he couldn't bear the smell anymore and activated his facemask from the suit. It only covered his lower face since he didn't want to fully activate his suit.

"I don't know," answered James as he activated his lower mask as well. It has been a while since the last time he activated his suit. It mainly reminded them of Lydia, so he reframed from using it.

"How much information did you gather on this guy?" asked Victor. He was hoping James did more digging before jumping in to be the hero.

"Just what I heard. This guy has been kidnapping people and experimenting on them. He usually targets mutants," James answered. Victor shook his head slightly. He was hoping for too much for his brother to use his head instead of jumping right in to save the day.

They reached another set of double doors that was locked when they attempted to open. James spartan kicked the doors and the flew apart. Victor just scoffed at him trying to show off. They continued ahead and found this area to be a lab with offices. Victor took off to one side while James went to the other. They had a natural way of operating and knew what each other would do.

Victor looked at some of the desks to find anything relevant. The papers contained equations and reports. He recognized some of the information listed but he couldn't see anything worth noting.

James had the same in his search. He started to open drawers and for some that were locked, he just swiped it with his claws to open them. There was nothing worth inside the drawers for him to get Victors attention.

They continued to search until they covered the entire room. Victor looked a door that he had missed before. He used his shoulder to force the door to open. Inside, it looked like an ordinary office. There was a computer that looked like it had been wiped clean. Victor continued to look through the drawers but found nothing important. He looked under the desk and found a suspicious looking imperfection. He touched the area and applied pressure. The area under the desk sunk in like a button and the large painting on the wall clicked open. Victor turned around to see what the sound was.

"James!" Victor said loudly to get his brothers attention.

Victor opened the painting wider to see a vault behind. He extended his nails and punctured vault. He continued to do this until he could rip the small door open. Inside it contained one folder and some other objects.

"Anything?" James asked as he came inside the office.

"James…" Victor said in a low voice. Victor recognized one of the objects inside the small vault. He picked it with his nails and showed his brother the small pin.

"Hydra…" James said with a frown. He knew this was becoming increasingly worse. Victor handed the pin over to James as he inspected it.

Victor looked inside the vault and grabbed the folder. The papers revealed portfolios of people with an x marked across their picture. Victor knew they were deceased. It was hard for him to continue to look at this. There were various pictures of kids and teenagers. Some of the pictures contained their body cut open. As much as he hated to continue, Victor read the files.

"It looks like they were trying to understand the mutations within everyone," Victor said as he handed the folder over to James. He knew he shouldn't, but James had to see the contents.

James grabbed the folder and opened it. His eyes widen slightly on the pictures he was looking at. His surprise was quickly replaced with anger and confusion.

"This doesn't make any sense," asked James. The person that went missing was only a few days ago. James furrowed his eyebrows trying to understand everything.

"They must have left and only had the soldiers patrol to make it seem like it was active," Victor concluded from all he has seen so far. It made sense to James as he nodded.

Suddenly, both felt a strange sensation. Their instincts were screaming to leave. They heard stomps coming behind the exit corridor and walked slowly to see who it was. They were several feet away from the double doors and stopped when the stomps became louder and louder.

The doors were torn off and landed on the floor. A monstrous large wolf walked from the darkness. It stood 5 feet tall on its four legs. It had black hair with disfigurations all throughout its body. It had been heavily experimented on. Green saliva escaped its mouth as its growled at Victor and James. It sniffed the air and locked in on James. Its eyes were dark red and veins were surrounding them.

"A wolf?" Victor asked confused.

"No, look at it. Not anymore," James said as he inspected its features.

"They experimented on animals too?" Victor asked. Before James could say something, the wolf created a loud screech with its voice. It was aimed at James and he had no time to react. James was sent flying into the wall and several concrete materials collapsed on top of him. Victor took a stance and ran towards the wolf with his nails extended.

The wolf barely spared a glance at Victor and once he was near, slightly tilted its head and a telekinetic force sent Victor flying to the side of the wall hitting several pillars along the way. James had pushed and clawed the debris off him and charged at the wolf. He screamed as he charged and extended his claws out to strike at the wolf. The wolf growled and let James get closer. The wolf bit into James' shoulder as James punctured its belly with both of his claws. The wolf seemed to be not bothered from the pain and continued to bite at James. Seeing that his attack didn't work, James continued to puncture the wolf in different spots. The pain from the bites slowed him down as he noticed that the green saliva seemed to burn his flesh.

The wolf took this chance to bite into his arm and swung vigorously left and right. James was sent flying into the side wall close to Victor. James screamed as the green saliva continued to burn. It appeared like it was burning faster than he could heal. Victor looked at him and back at the wolf. The wolf seemed to only be targeting James.

"What the hell did you do to piss this thing off Jimmy?" asked Victor. He didn't want to take any more chances and activated his suit. It had been a while since he had fully equipped it. It still looked brand new as the nanites kept everything clean.

"Astrid?" said Victor. He enabled the helmets noise cancellation to prevent James from hearing him. He knew he would be upset with Victor if he heard him, but this needed outside help.

"Victor?" Astrid replied.

"Okay, no time to explain. Connect to my suit, this thing seems to be after James. The green stuff isn't letting him heal," Victor quickly explained. A quick flicker in his HUD and Astrid had successfully connected.

"Scanning," Astrid said.

"Throw this at it and escape with James," Astrid quickly said. In Victors right hand a grenade looking device formed from the nanites. Victor wanted to ask what it was but quickly did as Astrid told him.

The ball landed near the wolf and Victor noticed that James' suit had activated. Victor grabbed James and activated his thrusters to fly upwards. He crashed into the ceiling but broke through. He continued to increase the power to continue upwards. A loud explosion could be heard but Victor focused on getting out. He quickly reached the top and continued to fly into the sky. He looks down to see that the base had sunk inwards.

"Astrid, what type of grenade was that?" Victor asked as he saw the devastation one little ball could do.

"A new grenade. Land quickly," Astrid said. Victor did as she ordered and landed in a clear field.

"Lay him down," Astrid said. Victor slowly put James down and waited for Astrid. He was about to ask what to do next when James' suit automatically deactivated and the nanites went to the locations of the green saliva. James was still somewhat conscious, but the pain was making him not pay attention to what was going on.

"The nanites will eat the poison and allow me to analyze what that thing was," Astrid explained.

"Thank you," Victor said genuinely.

"Awww, you're very welcome. Since when did you become so soft?" Astrid asked.

"I guess I picked it up," Victor chuckled.

"How's sis?" Victor asked.

"She's doing well. Currently, she's off world traveling the universe," Astrid said.

"I'm not surprised," Victor said laughing.

"What happened here?" Astrid asked.

"James had some intel that there was this guy kidnapping mutants. We thought it was just some sicko, but it turns out the Hydra is behind this. They killed several children and teenagers," Victor said the last part softly. Astrid was quiet for a moment before speaking again.

"Can I review your feed?" she asked.

"Sure?" Victor responded not sure what she meant.

"I see…" Astrid said after a few seconds of silence.

"Wait, you're able to view what we saw? I thought we had to have our suits activated," Victor said.

"No, but I only reviewed the last few moments. I respect your privacy," she said.

"He should be okay now," Astrid said again. Victor looked at James and saw the green saliva gone. James' wounds were now starting to close up.

"This was a very targeted attack," Astrid commented.

"What do you mean?" Victor asked.

"The creature seemed to sniff the air and lock onto James. Almost like it was hunting him. That green saliva is specifically designed against healing mutations. The creature is probably the result of experimentation and mixed with other mutations. It was able to use telekinesis to slam you into the wall," Astrid explained.

"Yeah, it probably had other mutations," Victor said.

"You did the right thing in calling me," Astrid said in a low voice.

"Thanks…" Victor responded in a low voice as well. Victor decided to end the conversation there and deactivated his suit.

He walked over to James and looked at how he was peacefully sleeping. Victor got closer to him and smiled.

"WAKE…" Victor said loudly as he slapped him across the face with his right hand. The sound of metal could be heard as Victor's bones hit James' cheekbones.

"…UP!" Victor said loudly again as he backhand slapped James. Another metal sound was heard.