2:32 AM.
Two people lay on the bed — Marcus flat on his back, Marie curled against him, her head on his chest, one leg thrown over his, her hand resting on his stomach.
His eyes opened.
For a moment he just stared at the ceiling.
Then he went to rub his eyes and sit up, but a weight on his chest stopped him.
He lifted his head slightly to check what it was.
“…”
Marie, sprawled over him like he was some kind of teddy bear.
[Ding]
[+100 Merit Points rewarded for making Marie (Rogue) feel safe.]
Are you for real, System?
He waited a few minutes before giving up on the idea of moving.
The gloves were doing their job — keeping her skin off his — but caution still felt necessary.
Against his chest, Marie stirred.
She rubbed her eyes, pushed herself up slightly, and glanced toward the window.
Still dark outside.
Her gaze drifted to the clock.
2:33 AM.
“It’s not even morning yet,” she muttered, then noticed her own position — leg over his, hand still resting on his stomach.
Her eyes jumped to his face, checking if he was awake or asleep.
The moment they met his — and she caught that awkward half-smile — the situation got infinitely worse.
She wanted to find a hole somewhere and disappear into it.
It took her a second to process before she scrambled off him.
“…Sorry…” she mumbled, voice so low he barely caught it, her face already buried in the pillow.
Marcus just shook his head with a sigh and slowly sat up, stretching out his muscles.
“It’s alright,” he said, still half-groggy.
“Just your teenage hormones acting up. Happens to everyone your age, nothing to be—”
He stopped mid-sentence.
Wait.
Did I just tell her she’s horny?
The pillow muffled a strangled noise from Marie’s direction — somewhere between a groan and a scream.
“Oh my god.” She groaned into the pillow.
“Oh my god, why would you say that.”
“That’s not — I meant it in a normal way,” Marcus said quickly, already backpedaling.
“Like, a scientific way. Biologically. It’s a biological thing that—”
“Stop talking,” she said, still face-down in the pillow.
“Please. For the love of god, stop talking.”
“Right.” He cleared his throat, rubbing the back of his neck.
“Yeah. Okay. Not helping.”
He stood up, deciding the smartest move at this point was to just walk it off, and headed toward the window to check the street below, mostly as an excuse to give her a minute to recover in peace.
He pulled the curtain back an inch.
Two black vans sat parked directly across the street, engines off, headlights dark.
No plates visible from this angle.
“Marie.” His voice dropped, all traces of the earlier awkwardness gone.
“Get up. Now.”
She lifted her head from the pillow, still red-faced.
“What? Why—”
The door exploded inward.
Wood splintered across the room as three, maybe four shapes flooded through the doorway, black tactical gear soaking up what little light there was, rifles up, red laser dots slicing through the dark and landing across Marcus’s chest.
“HANDS UP! GET YOUR HANDS UP, NOW!”
Marcus’s hands shot up, palms open, fingers spread.
“Okay— okay, hands up, see? Nobody’s doing anything, just— please don’t shoot, alright?”
Window’s ten feet away.
If I run for it—
No. Bad idea.
They’d put three rounds in my back before I got my hand on the latch.
Guns beat legs every time.
He kept his hands raised, kept his voice as calm and non-threatening as he could manage with four rifles trained on his center mass.
“I’m not resisting. I’m not doing anything. Just — everyone stay calm, okay?”
“ON YOUR KNEES!”
He dropped, slow and deliberate, no sudden movements, hands still laced above his head.
Somewhere behind him, he could hear Marie’s breathing gone ragged and fast, the blanket rustling as she pressed herself back against the headboard.
Zero powers.
Zero weapons.
Zero way this ends well if I do anything except exactly what they say.
“Stay still, Marie,” he said, low, not moving his head.
“Just do what they tell you.”
Boots crossed the carpet fast.
A hand slammed down on his shoulder, shoving him flat onto his stomach, a knee driving into his back hard enough to knock the air out of him.
Plastic zip-ties cinched tight around his wrists a second later.
…
Inside the Kidnappers’ Car
Marcus sat silently in the back seat of the SUV, hands tied behind his back, trying to see something — anything — through the window beside him.
He was in the rear passenger side.
This car had no way to open the doors from the inside back here, and the driver’s section was completely sealed off from the rear.
It looked like some heavily modified vehicle built specifically for exactly this — kidnapping people.
The windows were so thick and tinted that breaking them wasn’t even worth considering, and he couldn’t make out anything outside.
[Ding]
[New Quest Available]
[Quest Objective: Save Marie (Rogue) from the Frost International thugs.]
[Reward: To be determined.] This chapter was copied from g.com without permission.
He glanced at the notification.
Bro…
I can’t even save myself right now.
How exactly am I supposed to save her?
The only thing that came to mind — something that might actually give him a shot at surviving this — was the store refresh.
Wait.
Marcus’s eyes narrowed slightly, replaying the quest text in his head.
Frost International.
Not S.H.I.E.L.D.
Not the X-Men.
Not even some random black-ops mutant-hunting outfit.
Emma Frost’s company.
That didn’t track.
If Xavier’s people had picked up Marie’s signature on Cerebro, sure — fine, that made sense, that was the whole reason he’d blown sixty points on a dampening pendant in the first place.
Even a government registration unit sweeping the city for unregistered mutants after some anonymous tip, that tracked too.
But a private tech and defense contractor?
Sending a small army in tactical gear to raid a cash-only motel at two in the morning?
Why would a corporation want her?
He turned it over, trying to make the pieces fit.
Frost was busy playing nice with Senator Stern, chasing some defense deal, competing with Stark for government contracts.
What did a scared runaway girl with a skin-draining touch have to do with any of that?
Unless it’s not about the registration angle at all.
A power like hers — absorb someone’s memories, their strength, their abilities, just by touching skin….
In the right hands, pointed at the right target, it was a weapon.
Or worse, a research asset.
Something you could study, replicate, maybe even weaponize on a larger scale if you had the labs and the money for it.
And Emma Frost had both.
Hey, System.
How much time until the store refreshes?
The blue screen dismissed itself, and a new one appeared in front of him.
[34:07]
Wow.
Marcus almost laughed, if the situation weren’t so far past funny.
Thirty-four minutes.
Might as well be a lifetime, the way things were going.
It was a gamble either way.
No telling what would even show up in the shop when it refreshed — could be something that actually mattered, could be another round of gloves and burner phones while he sat here zip-tied in the back of a kidnapper’s SUV with nothing to show for it.
He glanced at the balance sitting quietly in the corner of his vision.
[Current Balance: 150 Merit Points]
Guess I just sit here and hope for the best.