Part 3 (1/2)
SECURITY TOOK ROGUE AWAY. SCOTT WATCHED, UN- able to do a thing to stop them. He and Kurt tried; they went to the supervising nurse, who happened to be Nurse Penn, to argue on her behalf. All they got for their trouble was a strange look and a simple, ”I know what happened, I saw it all.”
Scott was not comforted.
”Now what?” Kurt asked. ”What will they do to her?”
Penn shrugged. ”Jane will be locked up until the administrator has time to review the case. If they find she murdered that kid with deliberate intent, she'll probably be s.h.i.+pped off to the psychiatric ward of the state prison facility. Even if she's not found guilty, she'll probably be sent there. That woman is too dangerous for this place. Something you know all about, huh, Renny?”
Penn did not wait for an answer. He left them, walking quickly after the small group hauling away Rogue. The men who had started the fight lay on the ground in a drugged heap. A security guard prodded their ribs with his nightstick.
Scott and Kurt followed Nurse Penn. He never turned around to see if anyone watched him, which was good, because Scott did not want to explain why he and Renny, two of the most unlikely people to be interested in Jane's welfare, seemed so concerned.
He was glad Rogue did not fight them, and watched her straight back, her careful easy walk. They took her to the third floor, to a nurses' station where the woman at the desk looked at Rogue without much surprise. Scott and Kurt hung back in the stairwell, trying to listen as the hospital employees argued about where to put her. The station nurse wanted Rogue locked up in her own room, but the security guardsa”and Penna”thought there was too much furniture, too many resources to make a weapon, especially in her ”current state.”
The current state being that of a murderer. Never mind that she had acted to defend their colleague. Never mind that she was not fighting them now, but instead waited, unemotional and calm. A good act; Scott could not imagine what Rogue was feeling at the moment.
The security guards won the argument. The desk nurse said something m.u.f.fled, and then Scott heard keys, the rattle of a door. Velcro ripping.
”Let's go,” Scott said to Kurt. ”At least we know where she is now.”
”Temporarily. I do not trust that she will be there for long.”
”Then we need to find everyone fast and get the h.e.l.l out of here.” Once they escaped this place it was only a short run to the Blackbird, which they had left close by in a local park. Calling the Mansion from the jet would hopefully convince the people back home that they were not mere impostors.
a.s.suming, of course, that the jet was still there. If someone had their bodies, they also had access. The Blackbird opened its doors on spoken command of certain pa.s.swords, or if the internal sensors confirmed the physical ident.i.ty of a permitted flyer. The idea of strangers in his jet made Scott sick. He did not want to think about it.
He and Kurt walked downstairs and sat at a table in the far comer of the recreation room, where they watched nurses continue to soothe the patients, who stared wide- eyed and groaning at the corpse still lying on the ground. Scott wanted to groan, too, but for a different reason.
”What did you discover about Maguire?” he asked Kurt.
”Not much. I found his office, but it was locked and I had nothing to open it with. The nurses, though, were quite helpful. According to them I have been in treatment with the doctor for quite some time, and am, er, less crazy now. Even, perhaps, functional. Though I cannot be all that functional, or else Rogue's former inhabitant would not be able to beat me so thoroughly.”
”Former inhabitant,” Scott mused. ”So you think we're alone in these bodies?”
”What?”
”It's possible the original owners are still here inside us, suppressed by our own minds.”
”I would rather not consider that,” Kurt said. ”I prefer to be solely responsible for my actions, rather than take the risk that there might be someone else with me, directing what I do.”
”I did say suppressed.”
”And I say that everything rises to the surface eventually.”
He could not argue with that, nor did he want to. He, too, preferred the idea of being this body's sole occupant, but that raised the uncomfortable possibility that someone might be inhabiting his body, as well. A stranger, gazing out from his eyes, using his powers.
He mentioned this to Kurt, who turned so very solemn that Scott wished he had said nothing at all.
”I have thought of this,” Kurt confessed, rubbing his chin against his clasped hands. ”And I find that it disturbs me greatly. Strangersa”especially the strangers we now reside ina”using our powers and living our lives? I cannot imagine the trouble.”
”I can,” Scott said, ”and it scares the h.e.l.l out of me. Everything Professor Xavier built and that we supported could end in an instant given the wrong act, especially one that is done in our name.”
”Ah, but we are jumping to conclusions. Without more information, we cannot know if this was an accident or deliberate, Maguire or someone else, if the switch was localized to us, or widespread. We are trying to walk on clouds right now, mein freund, and nothing good ever comes of that.”
”Pessimist.”
Kurt smiled. ”Come, let us go and see if we can learn something new about this place.”
So they walked, peering out windows where they saw barbed wire and chain-link fences; sliding doors with security checks and metal detectors; more nurses' stations surrounded in gla.s.s, where the walls were soft blue and cream.
The nurses and security guards put their backs to the walls when they pa.s.sed; they did it subtly, without overt gestures of fear, but Scott felt it. Even little Mindy, who seemed to have a reputation of good behavior, fell under the same hospital safety procedure.
Don't turn your back, don't let down your guard.
They found the window where the patients got their meds, and some of those men and women were already lined up, waiting: trembling, shaking, muttering obscenities under their breath while rubbing their arms so hard, so fast, skin turned red. When the nurse at the window appeared with plastic cups of medicine and water, the entire line pressed forward, hungry.
Scott and Kurt walked away, fast, before anyone noticed them just standing there and forced something down their throats. Their fears were not unfounded; they pa.s.sed men tied down in wheelchairs, struggling as nurses roughly pushed pills into their mouths.
”They do not separate the s.e.xes here,” Kurt pointed out. ”I find that odd, and I must admit, dangerous.”
”Maybe they only mix during the day. Or perhaps the patients don't have a record for s.e.xual violence. That, or the men have been chemically castrated.”
”Scott.”
”Oh, um. Sorry.”
Kurt coughed, glancing down at himself. ”And Jeff? You said you were going to check on him. I forgot to ask you.”
”There were too many people around his room for me to break in. I looked through the window, though. He's still unconscious.” ”Still?”
”I was in there last night. I picked the lock on my door and took a look around. Our Jeff, whoever he is, got in a fight with the nurses.”
”Could it be Logan?”
”Maybe.” Hopefully not Jean. He was not sure he could handle his wife looking like a man. A chemically castrated man, at that. Logan, on the other hand ...
”You're smiling,” Kurt said. ”Care to share?”
”Not particularly,” Scott said. ”Take me to Maguire's office.”
Kurt led Scott down narrow halls into the most distant part of the first-floor wing. They pa.s.sed only one nurse, and she had a familiar face.
”Well, isn't this cute.” Nurse Palmer placed her back against the wall. ”What are the two of you doing down here?”
”Going to see if the doctor is back,” Kurt said, while Scott stared at the floor, demure as a little doll. ”We miss him.”
”He's not there, honey,” she said.
”We miss him,” Kurt said, with a wonderful whine in his voice that made him sound like a twelve-year-old boy. ”Can we at least go wait by his door?”