This one goes on for a bit.
It’s one of those fictions that just keep on going with no real goal in sight. I get them a lot.
We’re in for the LONG haul.
Disclaimer: Marvel owns everything except this story and the original characters therein.
Flotsam
InterNutter
Every fibre of his being cried out for him to move. Well, except for the bits that were crying out in pain, but that was secondary. He was used to pain. What he wanted to know now was; if he moved, was he in for *more* pain?
He kept his body lax and his eyes closed, straining his other senses to find out as much as he could about his current predicament.
Firm bed. Clean sheets. A pillow that smelled only subtly of previous abuses, but mostly of being washed. Beyond that, there were smells of new plaster and paint… a cacophany of makeup… not just the powders and paints, but some of the more extensive treatments. Latex. Glue. Solvent.
An animal smell and a distant scurrying alerted him to the presence of a pet rodent. The animal in question was clean, but beyond that, he could tell little.
Noise filtered in, now. Someone’s TV… Survivor was on. A couple were arguing. A dog was barking. A baby started wailing. Someone, somewhere, was hammering on the radiator.
Closer to, someone was humming. Cooking, judging by the smells. The old style of cooking that didn’t pay very much heed to nutrition or low anything indices, but everything to quantity and taste.
Mortimer almost moaned out loud. Having to lie there, dying to move, hurting like nothing else, and smelling those smells was torture.
He risked opening his eye a crack.
It was one of those cheap flats with supremely low rent and walls so thin that wrapping paper looked like 8-ply in comparison. The normally dilapidated walls had been patched and repaired. Painted over. The whole place had been - fixed.
The hamster he’d heard earlier scurried through a neon tube… one of many that wound through the flat, between plaster hands and faces, bits of latex drying on string… and an exercise bike hooked up to a generator. Many candles indicated that this particular flat was one of the ones in a blackout zone.
The space normally dominated by a television was inhabited by a construction that, because it also contained a keyboard and mouse, had to be a computer. The rest of it was an aggregation of just about every entertainment unit that was ever made. Improvised milk-crate shelving contained the media archives that made Mort wonder exactly what sort of maniac had him in their clutches.
The maniac in question was by the kitchen. Or rather, the excuse for a kitchen that these cheap little flats always had. In this poky space, the tall and thin creature currently humming had created a modest feast.
They began to turn. Mort focussed on looking asleep.
“Good morning,” said the maniac. “Technically.”
What? But his pretense was perfect.
“I quite understand pretending to be asleep, you know. We hardly know each other. I might be some psychotically crazed lunatic for all you know. All I asked is that you keep in mind that I *did* haul you out of the Hudson, drag you up here, and take care of you right up to this moment. As an extra incentive, I do rather plan to look after you until you’re back on your feet.”
Mort opened his eyes and glared at his captor.
The sight of the person’s face was not exactly the most reassuring, but then, he’d been woken up by Sabretooth. A bad case of hives and some peeling skin was a minor disturbance.
“I made some soft food for you,” said the maniac. “It’ll be easier on your poor mouth. I made sure it’s comforting-warm so you won’t aggravate those burns.”
Mortimer tried to say, “What the bleedin’ blazes are you talkin' about?” but all that came out was, “Wh’t?” before the pain in his mouth and throat overwhelmed his desire to speak.
The loony helped him sit up, pressing a warm bowl into his hands. “You had third-degree burns *inside* your mouth… and around it, too. It's almost like you were struck by lightning, given the way some of your accessories welded to each other. Except I’ve never seen lightning do what it did to you.”
He *was* struck by lightning. He remembered, now. That weather-witch… she was responsible.
He should have died.
He should have drowned.
Except this peeling maniac had hauled him out of the water. “Why?" he rasped.
"I have a singular sympathy for life’s flotsam,” said Flaky. “I did try to take you to a hospital, but they all exercised their right to refuse treatment to mutants.”
Flaky was lucky the food was good. Otherwise he would have made a run for it. As it was, Mort stiffened.
“Relax. You and I, we’re in the same boat.” Flaky rolled up a sleeve, displaying that, underneath the flaps of skin, tiny scales in many shades of aqua were growing in. “Like I said. Life’s flotsam.”
Okay. So he was in the hands of a *mutant* maniac. Fine. He couldn't even tell Flaky’s gender. Working out whether or not they were on his side was going to take a bit longer.
~
A clock nearby chimed the hour, replete with a rendition of _Ach du Leiber Augustine_ in chintzy bells. He knew it. He recognized it… but the sound sounded… odd. As if he were hearing it with water in his ears. A similar thing had happened to his eyesight. It was as if he were looking through gauze.
Mort felt his face to be sure. No. No gauze. There was a faint coating of silverzine on some of the remaining burns, but no gauze.
Stupid bitch must’ve screwed up his senses when she hit him.
_Look at it this way, Muggins. At least you have a sense of taste, still._
_Yeah,_ said another inner self. _But how do we *know* that what we're eating is actually *good*?_
Mort looked at the creature occupying the one chair in the entire flat. Flaky was eating its own cooking with every sign of enjoyment. It was enough proof for him.
Hot - okay, comfortably warm - food in his stomach made him drowsy, but he sure as hell wasn’t going to go to sleep with the resident loony just a few feet away. Getting up wasn’t exactly an option, either. Waking up after a near death experience was exercise enough. Eating on his own seemed to have taxed his reserves.
Between one blink and the next, Flaky was kneeling next to him. "Finished?“
He made to stab it with his spoon.
"Now, *really*,” it chided. “Is that any way to behave? I haven’t hurt you at all.”
_Right, cocky… and for all I know you’re saving it up for later._
“It’s all right,” Flaky soothed. “It’s going to be okay. I have some silverzine for your burns and a saltwater rinse for your poor mouth, and then I’d like to tuck you back in. You’re obviously tired.”
Mort made the mistake of blinking again. His spoon was gone and so was the last remnants of his food.
Flaky was daubing silverzine on his face with a surprisingly soft touch. It was almost a loving caress… were it not for the patient, businesslike expression on the mutant’s face.
Close to, beyond the haze of his vision flaw, Flaky looked positively effeminate.
“There,” Flaky cooed. “Ready to rinse, now?” It offered a glass of warm water that smelled of salt.
There was a bucket nearby. Conveniently nearby.
Mort swigged, swished and gargled the revolting stuff, spitting accurately into the obvious receptacle. Ha. He hadn’t lost *that* ability. He grinned.
“A spittoon expert, I see,” Flaky smiled. It wiggled like a female when it walked, but that was no true indicator. He knew from experience that some people were permanently in-between classical gender roles.
Mort blinked again, and Flaky was tucking him in, making sure he was both comfortable and warm. Topping up the IV he hadn’t even noticed until Flaky touched it, and checking the catheter bag.
_Waitafuckinminute…_
Mort realized with some alarm that he was next to naked in the home of a complete stranger.
Flaky blushed. There were some interesting colours under the looser parts of its hives. “I know. Hideously forward of me, but… well… you were unconscious and you needed help. With everything. Um. I promise I’ll restore your dignity, self-reliance and decency once you have the strength for it… but in the meantime, alas, needs must.”
Mort blinked. When he opened his eyes again, it was dark. Save for a single candle - one of those ones in a glass pot - left burning by the window.
_Hello… Flaky’s keeping vigil for someone…_
He could, with a little effort, make out a shape underneath a coverlet in the next room. If there was any better time for sneaking through this loony mutant’s stuff, he didn’t know when it was.
That is, until he tried to get up.
Mort lay back in the second-hand pillow and watched the sparkles fade from his vision. Okay. Now he knew better, and he knew that Flaky meant it when it said he had to get his strength back.
The better time for espionage was next week, sometime.
In the meanwhile, he needed his rest.
~
His fogged senses alerted him to someone moving around. Once again, his instincts - honed through pain - made him feign sleep and take in whatever cues were available.
It was the furtive noise of someone trying to be quiet and busy at the same time. Mort opened his eyes a flicker. That tall figure in the fog-shrouded dark was none other than Flaky, his loony host.
He drifted back into sleep.
At least until the singing started.
It was still quiet, the tremulous warbling of someone singing just loud enough for music to come out.
“Good morning starshine…”
Mort checked, moving just enough to be able to see his captor.
Okay. Flaky liked dancing naked in the dawn’s early light. Its one concession to the coming winter was that it - no, *she* - danced behind the safety of the glass doors that lead to the pocket balcony.
Flaky was most definitely female.
And younger than she acted.
The joints were a dead give-away. She’d yet to grow into them, so they stood out against the rest of her.
Amazing to think that Flaky had yet to reach her full height.
Mort rolled over and evened his breathing before Flaky finished her early morning peep show. If he was lucky, he’d fall back into slumberland and Flaky would never be any the wiser.
“I know you’re awake,” said Flaky. The soft noises of a robe being put on barely filtered through Mort’s foggy senses. “All I want to know is whether you saw anything, and if it was accident or design.”
Mort opened his eyes. Damnit. How the flying fuck did she *do* that? Was she some kind of–
“I’m not a telepath,” she said, despite evidence to the contrary. "I’ve spent a large number of hours watching you sleep. You mutter.“
News to *him*. Besides, how could he mutter anything with his throat the way it felt.
"Well, it’s more of a whisper, at the moment,” Flaky qualified. “When you’re pretending to be asleep, your lips stop moving. Don’t get me wrong, anyone else would be marvellously fooled. I just -uh- pick up on the details.”
Okay, so he was in the hands of a highly-observant, nudist, mutant, loony samaritain-wannabe. Flaky was packing on the adjectives, and he'd only known her a day.
Mort made an effort, propping himself up on one arm. Mutant healing factors were all very well, but pain was pain the world over. After the flashes subsided and he had his breath back, he rasped, “Acc’d'nt.”
It hurt a little less, this time. Thank whatever God was around that took pity on him.
Flaky was bustling around the kitchen, putting this and that together. "Ah. So I can trust that it won’t happen tomorrow by design?“
Mort managed a nod, still trying to figure out how to sit up without too much strain. He wanted to say, _I’m not in the habit of perving on underage girls, love,_ but his injured throat would barely let two words out without threatening a coughing fit or worse.
Flaky paused in her bustling to bring over a white tablet, a marker and a duster. "Here. This should help save your vocal chords.” A few long strides and she was back in the kitchen. “Terribly sorry, but I kept getting distracted, earlier. My mind’s all over the place at the best of times.”
The scent of cooking cinnamon assaulted him, making him spend a great effort not to drool on his writing.
First things first. _Who ARE you?_
“Sara Louise Adrien, swimming in come-uppance,” she said. “I got thrown out of my last school, so Mother had enough of me and the rash…” she rubbed her arm over her sleeve. “It lead to an unpleasant discovery. I’m sure you can guess what *that* was.”
An active X-gene, for sure. He hadn’t needed any medical tests. A kid with green skin and webbed hands and feet was either a mutant or a freak. Either way, his real parents hadn’t exactly cared, and fobbed him off to the nearest hell-hole orphanage they could find.
“So, of course, Mother disowned me,” Sara continued. “She refused to let me back in the home until I stopped, and I quote, ‘all this mutant nonsense’… and now I’m legally emancipated, taking correspondence school, and trying to make ends meet. Precisely what I deserve, as Mother would say.”
He wrote, _Name’s Mortimer,_ and after a pause, added, _Toynbee._
“Well, Mortimer Toynbee, I’m pleased to make your acquaintance,” she smiled, warm and genuine. “Do you prefer Mort?”
He nodded, eager. Far too eager. The last time he felt like this… he’d been saved by his mentor, Magneto. And it all ended in flotsam. He had to stop himself feeling *glad* to receive a smile.
But right now, it was too much work.
“Mort,” she said, making him feel warm and welcome. “Would you like to make an attempt on the waffles, or would you prefer to surrender at scrambled eggs?”
_Never surrender!_ he wrote. He could chew and, if necessary, use his slime to make sure things eased down. It eliminated taste, for the most part, but considering some of his 'meals’, that was a mercy.
“Gung ho,” Sara chirped. “I must be doing something right. For a change.”
He watched her bend over her implements. _She’s underage. Don’t even think about it,_ he reminded himself. Hell, the last time he’d been with a woman, Magneto had paid exorbitantly for her time.
It just re-enforced the message that nobody would volunteer.
And yet…
This woman - this *girl* - had no fear in her eyes when she looked at him. No disgust. She’d seen him naked - the catheter bag was a clear indicator - and she still kept him in her home.
_She’s still a loony,_ he argued. _For all I know she thinks I’m from mars._
Waffles with a side of scrambled eggs arrived on a plastic tray. Sara took hers and the one chair to the computer to work one-handed on something mysterious as the other one fed her.
Ambidexterous, and completely unaware.
The hamster ran through the tubes to a platform by the monitor.
“No, Chuckie. The vet said you’re not allowed sweet treats. Have a bran thingie.” Long fingers pushed a brownish oblong into the hamster's presence.
Chuckie sniffed it, nibbled, and decided it was good enough to carry away.
Sara chuckled. “Oh *dear*… more hate mail from the anti-mutant faction. And I quote, 'God luvs me coz I haet muteez adn God haets U’… charmant… I feel a Strong Bad moment coming on.” Click. "Deleted!“
Her whole voice had changed with the last word.
What the flying *fuck*?
Sara noticed his confusion. "You don’t look like you spend a lot of time online. Strong Bad’s this character from an ongoing flashtoon site.” As she spoke, she brought up a window. “He answers email from mostly real people.”
Mort watched the animation with growing perplexity… and then amusement. Finally, he laughed until his throat complained and almost made him choke.
Sara was there in an instant, offering the saltwater gargle. She showed real concern. Real worry.
Loony or not, she *cared*.
He reached out, impulsively, to touch her cheek. The parts where her skin was still alive were warm and smooth. Even the dry, dead skin covering the scales was not an unwelcome sensation.
“Mort?” she said.
She didn’t resist when he pulled her closer. Didn’t flinch when he kissed her brow.
He wanted her lips… craved them… but she was underage. Off limits.
When he let her go, she sat dumbfounded on the floor, touching the memory of that kiss.
“What was that for?” she asked.
_You cared,_ he wrote.
~