Liquid Metal: An X-men & QuickSilver Novel

Chapter Thirteen: Man Down

Last Updated: Feb. 9th 2016

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I was dragged down with the weight of the person who was now using me as an aid.

'Focus' I told my self sternly. 'Get a freaking grip and help people' I had to manually pull the foggy veil from my brain and eyes, but upon doing so, I got a chance to look at the person beside me.

I had never seen Tori in such a vulnerable state before. She was on the ground on her side, breathing with tiny, shallow agonizing breaths. I could see the blood begin to pool in her hands.

"Shit" I hissed under my breath. I crashed to my knees and moved her hands away. She wasn't putting the right amount of pressure on the wound that was needed to lessen the bleeding. I knew she wasn't doing it because of the pain. I could feel the pain as soon as I touched her. It was as if someone had placed a single drop of molten steel just below the center of my rib cage and the liquid metal was now burning a tiny hole though my body.

"You're okay" I told her when I saw her eyes start to flutter. My voice tightened

It's fascinating just how thick blood feels when it coats your fingers. But if you think about it, I'd say it's good that you know what it is once you feel it.

My heart rate picked up instantly and so did my breathing. Hot tears clouded my vision but I wiped them away quickly with the back of my hand. I jerked down when I hear bullets and gunfire whizz by near me.

"No no no Tori, come on you have to get up" I said with panic, trying to keep her eyes open.

I had to double-take the person who had rushed past me. I shot my hand out grabbing their wrist. "Chris!" The mutant stopped in his tracks.

He looked down at me, seemingly surprised to see me there. "Josephine? What are you doing, we have to go!" He said, trying to get me to follow the masses by hoisting me up by my shoulders, but I struggled to push myself out of his grip.

"No!... Christopher Muse, you let me go right now!" I said loudly over the chaos of the place ripping myself harshly from him and I sank back down, placing a hand on Tori's abdomen to see if she had stopped breathing in the few seconds I had taken my attention from her.

He stopped for a moment to see what my fuss was all about.

"You gotta help her" I said looking up at him helplessly then back to Tori. I brushed her hair out of her eyes with my thumb.

You see, Christopher was one of those people I mentioned earlier that had taken up the mantle of being a leader. I knew he'd help, I knew he could heal; it was his mutation after all.

I watched him bend down and pick her up, I moved away so I wasn't blocking him. He turned to me. "Get out of here kid" He said, "I got her" I nodded and got up not caring that my hands were still covered in someone else's blood. I was out, pushing my way through the crowd again.

Looking around, I saw people being tackled to the ground with some kind of mutation suppressant and mild sedative shot into their bloodstream by the darts some of the men had.

Kid...

Peter! I look frantically over the tops of the heads in the crowd, which was rather difficult given I was a bit vertically challenged: at only 5' 5" a lot of the people here were taller than me.

The acrid smell of smoke hit my nose and throat with a stinging thickness and I nearly choked on the air around me. A pyrokenetic must have tried to used their mutation in some poorly executed last ditch effort to get away.