The next couple of days The House kids were busy scouting for a new place to fight and polishing the betting formulas, in addition to enforcing the “shut the fuck up” rule. They had to put the kibosh on quick to keep word from getting around and spoiling the fun. Wolverine had to corner that dumbass Bishop at school after 3rd period because he’d heard the guy jawing with some friends about a fight he’d been in that weekend. Surprised he’d shoot off his mouth after getting whooped up on. He came way too damn close to the truth for Wolverine’s comfort, so he communication the message in the form of 27 inches of razor sharp bone dancing in front of Bishop’s eyes to leave the advertising to the experts. That almost earned him a week’s detention from Darkholme, until Bishop said he’d just asked to see the claws. The principal gave them both appraising, and suspicious, looks before sending them on their way. Whew.
The House enforced the rules seriously, as they related to each person personally. Each teen who’d showed up the week before could not invite anyone to come to this week’s battle themself. Instead they had to give the name of the person they wanted in to The House and two members would look over the potential fighter first. Had to know who could keep their mouths shut and bring some money to the table. If the prospect checked out then Rogue or Wolverine would issue the invite, without exactly spelling out to the lucky guy or gal what they’d be in for if they did show up. And the importance of the sponsor taking responsibility for they kids who got invited was hammered home. No one wanted to get bounced because they trusted the wrong person, so selection was finicky and demanding.
For the following weekend an additional handful of teens would be joining Mutant Underground, and The House was kicking around the idea of setting up the matches themselves, which would allow them to set up odds in advance and also ensure paired up some interesting combinations.
“Seriously, two chicks whaling on each other is hot!” Pyro insisted. “Guys will throw money around just to see if they lose their shirts!” The other boys nodded vigorously.
Rogue eyed them with an amused expression on her face. “So predictable,” she sighed and scribbled the idea down in her notebook as they sat around the picnic table at lunch, when Rogue had driven to the school to meet up. “So you wouldn’t mind if I paired up Boom Boom and Jubilee?” she asked Pyro.
“Hell no, I don’t mind,” the flamethrower grinned. He’d noticed the Asian’s girl’s slick moves the week before and felt her appreciate eye on him a few times. He would definitely put money down her, hell burn it to ash and rub it all over her, anytime.
“Me and that Deadpool loon,” Wolverine noted, tapping his finger on her notes. He was more than ready to dust his knuckles and if that Wilson guy was begging for a taste he’d give it to him.
Silver grinned. “Man, that is going to be a hard one to call.” He rubbed his hands together in apparent delight, like could already feel the greenbacks in his fingers.
Wolverine bristled at the implication. “What you don’t think I can take him?” he growled around his cigarette. Maybe he should fight Silver instead, teach him a lesson.
“Hey hey hey,” the white haired speed demon soothed, “no offense, but he’s a healer too. No clue who would come out on top.” He shrugged.
“Really? But he’s got scars on his face.” He patted his own visage jokingly. “Me? Can’t hurt anything this fine.” A round of laughs circled the table, except for Pyro whose face creased.
“I guess it’s different than yours, I’ve seen him heal from some crazy shit. His chest is all sorts of fucked up.” Pyro pulled a face at the grotesque memory. “Last year he chopped off two fingers of his fingers on a dare. Fucking did it too! Then stuck them back on. The guy is seriously bent,” he warned.
“Lemme see his stats,” Wolverine snapped and Avalanche laid a creased sheet of paper in his hands. “Hmmm, regenerative healing factor, enhanced strength and reflexes, martial artist, expert…marksman?” He raised an eyebrow. “Guns?”
Pyro smiled uneasily at Wolverine. “Uh yeh, kinda why he’s at BH in the first place. Only reason he didn’t get a felony conviction for possession of an unregistered gun was his age. He’d converted it to fully automatic too. And he’s got these swords that-“
“Swords, eh?” Wolverine’s brow furrowed. Without thinking about it the claws slid slowly free and slipped past his face as he rubbed his chin thoughtfully.
“Oh no you don’t!” Rogue snapped. “There is no way!” She grabbed Wolverine’s hand and squeezed it tightly, mindful of the blades.
“And why not?” he demanded. No matter how fucking cool she was, the Wolverine would not let his woman (heh heh, he liked thinking of her as HIS) tell him what to do. Ok, maybe she could boss him a bit when they were alone, but not in front of the guys.
“Because A) I think spilling gallons of blood would freak everyone out and that would be the end of Underground.” Ok, she had a point, this wasn’t supposed to be a gore fest or sanctioned attempted murder, just some rough-and-tumble-fun. “And B) I would not be able to handle seeing your guts hanging out.” Wolverine flushed pleasantly at the earnest look on her face coupled with the passionate flash in her eye. A potent combination.
“AAAAAAWWWWWWWW!” the guys jeered. “Oh, isn’t that sweeeeeet?!” Lanche teased while Silver started to sing, “Wolvie and Roguey sitting in a tree, K-I-S-S-I-N-G!”
“Oh shut up!” Rogue snapped, but she was inwardly pleased at the nod her boyfriend gave to her plea, which he quickly covered with a scowl as he jumped on the picnic table and grabbed the shirt collars of their taunting friends. Lunch devolved into a wrestling match that left the boys dusty and sweaty and Bezerker hanging from a tree by the waistband of his destroyed boxer shorts. Rogue watched indulgently from the sidelines, like a mother hen overseeing her wayward, rather clumsy, and sometimes stupid chicks.
Days and evenings ran together in a blur of boring school except for the Lit class and spending a little time each evening with Rogue. The library was a good place to curl around each other on a sofa in the back of the stacks and alternate between silly conversations and the occasional kiss and studying. Well, Rogue studied her coursework and Wolverine studied her. When she batted his hands away for the tenth time one evening and told him to go do something else to occupy his time or she was going to fall her calculus test he took the hint and headed for Angel’s office.
Wingman had the keys to the woodshop, which he tossed to Wolverine with a smile and said he was glad the boy was doing something ELSE with his hands. The smartass comment received a dirty look that only made him laugh as Wolverine slammed the door behind him. The teen spent the rest of the evening planning some timber into sweeping curves he knew would fit perfectly with the little project that had bloomed in his head.
All in all things were flowing along smoothly, with just the right amount of discord to keep him on his toes. A run-in with the Blob kid after school that resulted in a big-kid sized dent in the side of a school bus before Wolverine jumped on the back of Rogue’s bike and she raced them away. Darkholme swooped down just after their escape and gave Tubbo Saturday detention. Good times.
A meeting with Xavier on Wednesday after dinner to discuss his piss poor grades so far, except for his English class. The Professor managed to extract a half-hearted grunt of agreement from Wolverine that he would try harder, which the telepath didn’t believe for a moment. So he smoothed over the tense atmosphere with some platitudes about how many mutants at the Institute seemed to enjoy the vocational classes offered here more than the college prep work at Westchester High. He offered to let Wolverine sign up for any other classes he might wish to take at the Institute if he liked, and hinted that the place could use someone with the advance auto repair skills. There were quite a few cars in the garage for the staff and grounds crew that needed upkeep and other work.
“Yeh? How much?” Wolverine asked.
“Pardon?” Xavier asked, his smooth face belying none of the enjoyment he felt at the spike in the boy’s interest.
“How much you gonna pay me to work on your cars? I ain’t doing it for free.” Wolverine needed some extra money. Right now The House had to front most of their winning from the previous week for this week’s bets, just to cover them at the start of the night. They wouldn’t be able to start keeping their profits until after the next fight when they had reserves on hand. Wolverine made sure to keep his thoughts far away from all that in the presence of the Professor.
“Ah, well, you see we already provide you with room and board and-“ Xavier started to explain.
“Look, lots of other kids got money from their families or jobs or whatever. I came here with just my clothes and some books, and I’d like to have a little spending cash.” Wolverine buried the thought of that little trip to Adam and Eve’s deep in the back of his head and just let an idea of Rogue and something really sissy, like flowers, float to the top of his mind. Aha, Xavier caught that one. Good.
The bald man’s eyes sparked with understanding. Hmm, Wolverine and Rogue. Interesting. Xavier decided to reserve judgment on the potential pairing, the girl was already isolated enough because of her mutation. It would not do to make her feel even more of an outsider by interfering in any relationships she may form with other students. He did approve of the surprisingly gentle emotions Wolverine projected along with the girl’s face, which was unexpected but welcome considering the boy had arrived pulsing with negativity and latent hostility.
“Alright, Wolverine, I’ll make you a deal. If you can fix the groundskeeper’s truck, then we’ll talk about a fair wage for future work. No idea what the devil is wrong with it, but it’s driving Mr. Banks crazy.” The boy nodded in agreement and left the office. Xavier steepled his fingers under his chin, dwelling on the young feral. The boy had depths not yet tapped, only hinted at.
The following day at school Wolverine occupied himself with doodling through most of his classes a list of things that could be making the truck act so wonky. He’d taken it for a spin around the Institute grounds before lockdown the previous night and it was clear it was jacked up in several ways. He’d scope out the garage and see what tools and parts they had on hand, then make a list of what he’d need. Xavier was apparently Daddy Warbucks, so Wolverine figured the old man could spring for it.
After school he disappeared in the garage and started to tear apart the engine, spreading the parts around on a drop cloth. Only when he was unceremoniously yanked from under the chassis by a pair of hands on his trolley did he realize how much time had passed. He also realized he was looking up at that fucking jerkoff Cyke and his bitch faced cheerleader girlfriend. Great. He thought he’d gotten rid of these two.
“I know what you’re doing, Wolverine,” Cyke announced as he vainly attempted to loom menacingly over the smaller teen.
The boy didn’t even bother to stand, just sat up on the trolley and wiped his greasy hands across his shirt. “Fixing the engine, genius,” he sneered. He really had better things to do than deal with these assholes. He rolled his eyes and attempted to push himself back under the truck.
Cyke’s foot on the trolley kept him in place, “Not that, dickface.” He gave a nasty grin that made Wolverine want to bitchslap it right off his face.
“Mutant Underground?” Jean said haughtily as she sketched air quotes.
Wolverine snarled at the girl. He could not believe he ever thought she was hot, what a fucking bitch!
“Telepath,” the redhead said brightly as she tapped on finger to her temple. Crap, it was so simple none of them had thought of it. Wolverine didn’t need to be psychic to know these two were positively rolling in glee at pinning him with his dirty little secret.
“Xavier’s going to kick you out of here so hard your ass will bounce,” Cyke taunted.
“You and your little goth slut are both going to-“ Jean gasped. The two boys turned their heads to look at her just in time to watch her crumple to the ground on top of the engine’s grimy.
Rogue stood in her place, tugging on one glove and giving Cyke a tight, hard look that thrilled the darker teen to the core. “You’re late for dinner, sugar,” she said to Wolverine, her eyes never leaving the football hero’s distressed face.
“Thanks, darlin’,” he moved to her side to put an arm around her waist, “Just have to clean up the trash.” It was his turn to give Cyke the shank eye. The bigger teen positively quailed under their combined glares, and he stammered out threats until he found himself floating upside down in midair and his shirt flopped up over his face.
Wolverine turned to look at his woman, amused to see a huge grin play across her face as she turned her hand in front of her and the jock rotated again in the air, this time on his back with his head arched back to look at them upside down.
“Now what we have here,” Rogue drawled in that husky voice that zapped at Wolverine’s spine, “is an opportunity for you, Summers. You have two choices. You can decide not to tell Xavier EVER and I’ll let you and her” she prodded Jean rather roughly with her booted foot, and the redhead’s temple banged into a dirty alternator, “go. No harm, no foul. Orrrrrrrr,” she dragged out the word as Wolverine unsheathed his claws, drawing the eyes hidden behind the red shades to them, “Orrrrr I can drain you too and my man here can slice both your clothes off and leave you two in a compromising position on the garage floor where Angel will find you in 10 minutes.”
Cyke gave a strangled moan that mingled with an unimaginative string of curses. “Tick tock.” Rogue tapped an imaginary watch on her arm. “And I’ll know if you’re telling the truth, Quarterback,” she said sharply as she tapped her own temple in mockery of Jean. “Telepath.”
Hopelessly cornered and once again upside down, the blood rushing to his head and turning his face as red as his sunglasses, the jock knew when he was beat. “Fine, I won’t tell Xavier!” he spat. “But this isn’t over Wolverine!” Rogue rolled her eyes at the cliché.
“Fine, show up for Underground this weekend and we’ll settle this shit, Boy Scout,” Wolverine leaned down and snarled viciously in the jock’s face, making sure to spray him with spittle as he growled loudly. “Bring your money.” With that parting shot, Wolverine sheathed his claws and turned to Rogue. “C’mon babe, I’m starving.” She giggled and leaned into his shoulder as she released Summers to collapse on the floor in an ungainly heap.
Just as they opened the door to go into the house, Summer muttered under his breath, “Cunt.”
Wolverine paused, pulled away from Rogue, and said, “Hold on a sec.” Before she could say anything there was a crunching sound and Cyke landed on his ass, his glasses shattered and his hands over his eyes. Wolverine returned to Rogue and grabbed her hand, tugging her into the hallway as he kicked the door behind him.
“My knight in faded denim,” Rogue laughed uproariously and pretended to swoon.
“Damn right, darlin’,” the boy grinned as he bowed over her hand and pressed a swift kiss to her glove. Then he wrapped her arm around his and they strutted down the corridor to the cafeteria.
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