The XXX-Gene Ch. 56 (Marvel) (Patreon)

A/N: Luck will only take you so far.

-x-X-x-

Well, that escalated quickly. Though Natasha didn’t need to worry about Thaddeus stepping in and making a fool of himself. Even if that had been his first inclination, which it wasn’t, Emma was in his head already, telling him not to make a move.

Stay back. I don’t know how Pierce survived or what he might be capable of, but even if you can defeat him, Shaw won’t look any more favorably upon you for it.

Yeah, Thaddeus had figured as much. That’s why he stays put, even as Cessily roils against his skin underneath his pristine white suit. Even as Shaw releases Emma’s arm from his, stepping forward to face Donald Pierce in the middle of the room, Thaddeus stays put. Emma, for her part, moves over to the side, close to him and Natasha but not directly next to them.

Everyone else stays quiet and still, Pierce’s mercenaries keeping them all cowed with the promise of interlocking fire from their dangerous-looking rifles. There’s a long, pregnant pause before Shaw lets out a dark chuckle.

“Shall we then? I’ll even give you the first move, Pierce. Show me this ‘exalted science’ of yours.”

Sebastian Shaw’s overwhelming confidence cuts through the tension hanging over the party, and even gets a few titters from the watching crowd. This in turn only serves to infuriate Donald Pierce more as the former, or perhaps current White King stomps forward, his angry steps leaving cracks in the floor with each move he makes.

“You’re going to regret that, Shaw.”

Honestly, Thaddeus was just wondering how this had happened. Emma had been so sure that Pierce was dead…

Well yes. Shaw did tear off his arms and legs. Usually, being reduced to a torso is also enough to reduce someone to a corpse. But I suppose someone must have saved him and… repaired him.

Thaddeus frowns at Emma’s telepathic words, his eyes roaming up and down Pierce’s body. Right, it’s not just the hands then. Its both arms and both legs. The mutant-hating man is effectively a cyborg at this point. But then, Thaddeus probably should have been able to guess that from whatever was going on in Donald Pierce’s head that was keeping him from probing his mind.

Actually, it reminded Thaddeus of something. It felt almost… familiar in a way.

Before he can really ponder that familiarity further however, Pierce has finished closing the distance between him and Shaw and winds up the bloody fist he’d used to crush the skull of the doorman. For a second, it makes for an interesting tableau.

On the one side, a man dressed all in white with a face of pure rage and a gleaming metal fist covered in blood pulled back. On the other side, a man dressed in black, standing with his arms literally clasped behind his back and a smirk on his face as he makes no move to defend himself.

Thaddeus half-expects Shaw to dodge or something as Pierce throws his fist forward with a shouted roar. But… no. Shaw takes it right on the chin, his entire body turning to the side from the force of the blow. Thaddeus thinks he sees a faint glow as well as far from being downed, Sebastian Shaw stays standing.

Silence reigns over the ballroom for a long moment as everyone, including Pierce, watches Shaw slowly straighten up, no worse for wear with that smirk still on his face.

“Is that all you’ve got?”

Pierce blinks and then gets even angrier, letting out an animalistic rage-filled cry as he brings both his metal fists down upon Shaw, again and again. Thaddeus watches on, a little stupefied. He’d been expecting more. He’d been expecting a battle of titans, of equals and peers. He hadn’t been expecting… this. Oh sure, it’s not all punches. Some of Pierce’s blows are electrified, some of them seem to almost glow with radioactive energy. He’s pulling out all the stops. Only…

Isn’t he playing right into Shaw’s hands? Isn’t he giving his enemy everything he needs to destroy him? What was Pierce doing? Why was he giving Shaw so much kinetic energy? Was he stupid?

He doesn’t know.

Thaddeus blinks, and glances over in Emma’s direction. She’s watching the fight with a blank expression, even as she explains things to him.

Donald Pierce knows that we’re mutants. He even managed to uncover my status as a telepath. But Shaw’s own mutation is a closely guarded secret. And Pierce has never been one for patience. He made his move without fully understanding what he was up against, and Shaw tore him to pieces for it. Now… he’s done the exact same thing, all over again.

Oh. Well that changed things didn’t it? That recontextualized this entire encounter. As Donald lays into Shaw with all of his artificial might, truly testing his ‘exalted’ science against Shaw’s ‘filthy mutation’, it becomes abundantly clear, at least to Thaddeus, that this entire situation is already a foregone conclusion.

Really, it’s only a matter of waiting for Shaw to get bored at this point-

SMACK!

A ripple of shock runs through the ballroom as Shaw finally acts, his hand coming up at lightning speed and catching Pierce’s next fist in its palm. The blond man, so caught up in the moment, is already swinging with his other fist before he even registers that fact.

SMACK!

And so the second fist gets caught in Shaw’s other palm, leaving Pierce’s hands trapped in the Black King’s grasp. The self-proclaimed White King’s eyes widen in outrage, even as Shaw’s expression transforms into a grinning sneer.

“My turn.”

The screeching of metal being rent asunder fills the ballroom and many of the party’s guests flinch away and wince in pain from the noise. Pierce, meanwhile, can only howl in outrage and agony as Shaw crushes his metal fists into unused scrap metal… and then RIPS Pierce’s artificial arms clean off of his body before kicking him backwards.

The armless White King falls to his back, the sparking servos at his shoulders wiggling and writhing uselessly as Shaw holds his removed limbs to the side for a moment before dropping them contemptuously to the ground to begin striding forward.

For the first time since his arrival, Thaddeus sees fear flash across Donald Pierce’s face. But the man doesn’t seem like the type to despair. Instead, that fear is almost immediately replaced with more anger, the blond’s rage rising to fresh new heights as his face purples dramatically.

“That’s more than enough out of you, Pierce.”

Get ready.

Thaddeus is honestly already tensing up, but Emma’s warning helps him realize what he’s anticipating, just before it happens.

As Shaw arrives over the downed form of Donald Pierce, he lifts his foot up, and it’s obvious he’s about to end things. But then, if it’s obvious to them, it’s equally obvious to Pierce. But the White King isn’t the type to beg for his life. Especially not from a ‘filthy’ mutant’. Instead…

“KILL THEM! KILL THEM AL-URK!”

There’s a rather disgusting squelching noise as Shaw brings his foot down through Pierce’s chest, shattering his ribcage, bursting his lungs, and quite literally smashing his heart into a paste judging by the positioning. But… Pierce’s last orders are spoken all the same. And his masked mercenaries are apparently the type to follow said orders even after their boss’ demise.

As rifles are raised with military precision and fingers hit triggers, Cessily bursts out from under Thaddeus’ suit, covering him from head to toe in his armor’. Thaddeus, meanwhile, immediately stops holding back his true size, growing even as he moves to try and position himself as best as possible between the mercenaries and Natasha and Emma.

Natasha is closer to him of course, so it’s easier to shield her with his body. Fortunately, Emma has a diamond form that she’s already switched into just as the bullets start flying.

What follows is rather hectic as people, likely very important people, die. After all, this was a Hellfire Gala, a meeting of the rich and the elite to discuss things like policymaking and how to better enrich themselves at the expense of everyone else.

The attendance for the evening is made up of businessmen, politicians, movie stars, athletes. The rich and the powerful of society.

And most of them are NOT bulletproof. Even as Thaddeus, Natasha, Emma, and Shaw all exist as a sort of island of impenetrability in the center of the party, the rest of the partygoers are not so lucky. Some have a mutation that allows them to either weather or escape the storm, but just as many are normal rich people unlucky enough to get caught in the crossfire.

As bodies hit the floor, Thaddeus watches Shaw for a moment… and realizes the Black King isn’t going to do anything. As the man pulls his foot out of Pierce’s chest and takes a step back, he observes the ensuing carnage with a look of detached amusement on his face. After all, it’s not like he has anything to worry about. The bullets that do hit him seem to bounce right off; their kinetic energy absorbed by his mutation just like Pierce’s punches.

Shaw is in no danger from Pierce’s mercenaries here and apparently he’s willing to let just about everyone in here die because of his and Pierce’s spat, it would seem. Probably some bullshit about ‘survival of the fittest’ or something, and about how any of those too weak to survive this attack have no place in his ‘inner circle’.

… Well fuck that. Maybe Thaddeus would get further in life if he had the same mentality as Shaw. Maybe he’d be better off if he could just ignore the wanton slaughter of others taking place right in front of his eyes. Hell, he’d probably fly under the radar a lot longer if he just took Natasha and ran for cover.

Fuck. That.

Natasha isn’t some damsel in distress who needs to be taken anywhere anyways. The former Black Widow has already made for cover on her own when Thaddeus checks up on her, and once she’s no longer in harm’s way… he acts.

His first leap takes him into the enemy firing line. His first swipe draws the mercenaries’ attention like nothing else. But it doesn’t matter. Cessily barely even feels the bullets. Emma was right. Pierce hadn’t understood what he was getting into here, not even slightly. If he had, he would have equipped his men with better ammunition. But they’d overestimated him. They’d all given Donald Pierce a bit too much credit.

Together, Thaddeus and Cessily cut through the mercenaries like a scythe through wheat. Bodies are slammed into walls and thrown across the ballroom as Thaddeus goes on a semi-controlled rampage through their ranks. In short order, the mercenaries break. Their posthumous loyalty to their Master only extends so far and soon enough, those who can still stand on their own two feet are beating a hasty retreat back through the main entrance they’d come in through.

The entire time this is happening, Thaddeus feels Shaw’s eyes on him. He has the Black King’s undivided attention now that he’s chosen to act. For better or worse.

Probably for the worse actually, and in more ways than one. Because when the last of the mercenaries has retreated, the fighting finally over, and Thaddeus turns his head in Shaw’s direction… he quickly notices something that the Black King has not yet realized.

Donald Pierce’s body is missing. There’s no way he survived that chest stomp. His heart would have been completely pulverized by that blow. And yet… the self-proclaimed White King’s corpse is gone, only a bloody stain left in its wake.

When Shaw notices that Thaddeus’ attention is not entirely on him, the man turns and pauses, staring down at the empty spot where he’d left his opponent’s body. For the first time all evening, Thaddeus sees anger flash across the Black King’s face, his jaw clenching in concealed rage and his hands twitching like they want to curl into fists.

He has much better control than his counterpart did though. As silence falls and the surviving party goers of the shot-up Hellfire Gala slowly creep out from their hiding places with wide eyes and shell-shocked expressions, Shaw puts on a wide grin and spreads his arms.

“Well now… what a show. Never a dull moment in the Hellfire Club, is there?”

He does a slow turn for a moment, and Thaddeus imagines he’s currently taking stock of who lived and died under that veneer of satisfaction and amusement. As this happens, Natasha makes her way back to Thaddeus’ side, attempting to salvage her cover. She hadn’t fought in the battle, but she had moved with an agility and grace that didn’t quite befit a College RA. Still, everyone else had had more important things to worry about.

Finally, Shaw’s eyes fall upon Thaddeus… and Natasha. The Black King’s gaze glitters with greed as he takes a step forward… and almost slips in Pierce’s blood. Thaddeus stiffens as Shaw catches himself and then takes another step forward. Shit.

Thaddeus is not ignorant to how much weight his luck powers have been pulling tonight. Even Natasha had noticed something strange about just how many men had been diverted from approaching them and trying to steal her away from him. Frankly, Thaddeus still didn’t know whether Donald Pierce’s entrance right as Shaw was making his way over to him and Natasha had been an extension of his Luck with a Capital L or not.

But… Luck could only take you so far. It could only hold back someone who was truly determined to make trouble for so long.

As Shaw arrives right in front of him, he looks up at Thaddeus with a raised eyebrow. Accepting the silent command for what it is, Thaddeus signals for Cessily to back off, even as he shrinks himself back down to his ‘normal’ size. Folding herself back beneath his White Suit, Thaddeus inclines his head respectfully in Shaw’s direction.

“Black King.”

“Mister Cummings… our newest White Pawn.”

In a rational world, one might expect Shaw to be about to congratulate Thaddeus on a battle well fought, or to talk him up to everyone else for being the only one to actually show some guts and fight back. Something like that. But Thaddeus knew better. The stumble combined with the way Shaw had been approaching him before Pierce’s arrival made it clear that in some way, the Black King had it out for him. It was just a matter of waiting for the other shoe to drop.

“Introduce your date to me, Mister Cummings.”

Careful not to clench his jaw too much, Thaddeus looks over at his date. Was this what Shaw was planning? To expose Natasha’s identity to both him and everyone else? Was that what his Luck was trying to prevent?

“… This is Natalie Rushman, sir. We both go to Empire State University.”

Turning his intense focus over to Natasha, Shaw smiles as she offers out her hand and he takes it, placing an uncharacteristically gentle kiss on her knuckles.

“Charmed, Ms. Rushman.”

Then, he turns back and that shoe Thaddeus had been waiting for finally drops.

“Lend me your date for the evening, Mister Cummings. She looks absolutely ravishing in black, and a woman of such beauty deserves to be hanging off of the arm of the Black King. Wouldn’t you agree?”

Thaddeus’ eyes widen as Shaw finally makes his play. To be fair, it was the exact same thing Thaddeus suspects most of those other men from earlier had had in mind. He just hadn’t expected Shaw to be so… base and callous about things, he supposed.

But he should have. The man is a Brute with a capital B, no matter how nicely he tries to dress it up. Donald Pierce’s heart blood still drips off of Shaw’s left shoe in fact, and the only reason the man isn’t bloodier is because the arms he ripped off just a little while ago were mechanical and not organic.

Of course, Thaddeus knows that Shaw isn’t actually just peeling Natasha off of him out of lust, or even as a power play. He wants her because he recognized her as a Black Widow. By taking her, he would be able to let her know more privately that he knew who and what she was, and from there he would no doubt pressgang her into his service.

It wasn’t a complete disaster. Natasha working for Shaw while Shaw thought Thaddeus didn’t know she was a Black Widow would actually give Thaddeus a woman on the inside, of sorts. But… it also wasn’t ideal. Natasha already had enough people she had to answer to. She had more than enough on her plate without playing escort and private assassin to the Hellfire Club’s Black King.

And more than all of that… Thaddeus simply didn’t want to. He had his pride as a man, after all. Could he really let this stand? Could he really let this happen?

Not that he had much of a choice. Shaw wasn’t going to take ‘no’ for an answer. It was either let him have Natasha… or pick a fight with the Black King right here, right now.

I’ll back you Thaddeus, whatever play you want to make.

Thaddeus doesn’t outwardly react to Emma’s support, but it’s a near thing. A few seconds have passed since Shaw made his demand and the silence is starting to get awkward. One way or another, Thaddeus needs to make a decision. Just a matter of making a decision he can live with… or maybe live THROUGH.