Author Notes: To Beth, Ally, and Ann, who all expressed reservations and interest, and everyone who asked me where on earth the sequel to Hope was.

*****

She had to almost believe it was a gift from God. Direct, made to order, how-on-earth-could-even-good-luck-account-for-*this* kind of gift. No other explanation.

Thank God.

"You don't wanna do this." Please do this. "Just walk away." Come on, sugar, pick up that bottle. Good girl.. "I don't want trouble." You know you want it. So do I. Do it, sugar. Do it for me.

Marie wanted trouble. She wanted to *wallow* in it, and the adrenaline was already spiking in her veins, everything flipping into slow motion, black-and-white, crystal clear and perfect in the zone. Flexing her gloved hands, she shifted on the barstool while the man beside her--an idiot born if there ever was one--cringed away as if her skin burned. Ironic, because he didn't know it did. Satisfying, because he understood, even if he had no idea why.

Thin, nervous, drank his beer like habit, not pleasure. Smoked the way women in Marie's mind had once given head. He probably didn't see women fight too often, even in crappy little hick-bars like this, stuck in Redneck Central, surrounded by silent white and trees half-bent under the weight of the snow pulling them down, a shack of a bar where the music was always classic country and Willie Nelson crooned in the background, the beat moving in the blood of her body. She forced herself not to grin--no reason to scare the chick away. No reason at all. This was good, this was life, this was breathing--that was a frightened bartender going for the phone. Fuck.

Shit, how much showed on her face?

Luckily, the woman facing her was a slightly-drunk, normal-psycho barfly with pretensions of ownership of the male Marie had specifically singled out to hit on. The sort for whom thinking was a long and difficult process rarely attempted, since hangovers and intoxication tended to blend together into one long, mind-numbing existence. Not bad as lives went. Marie might have envied her.

That just made it easier. Just made it better. She had something Marie wanted and that could be enough.

Marie slid slowly off the barstool, sawdust powdering over her feet, trying to look just a little vulnerable--thank goodness she'd worn flat boots and not the heels, thank goodness her hair was in an oh-so-innocent, if-you-fuck-me-you-can-see-what-it-looks-like-down chignon. She knew the image she presented to the interested spectators and had a brief moment of worry that some idiot might so lose his common sense as to intervene and try to protect her or some crap.

She tended to have that effect on men. Damn.

Swing bottle--oh good, back off a little, look frightened. You have no idea, chickadee, no idea at all. That's it--I look helpless, I look frightened and young and fragile. I'm just a kid, right? Stupid little kid, no idea what I'm getting into, right? A little closer--do it for me, baby. Do it for me.

Marie snapped out with one hand, a quick punch to the eye that staggered the larger woman back two stumbling steps. So far so good. Too drunk to get all the pain. Make it last. Make it good. Marie backed off a step, watching the woman right herself, blinking a little in surprise--she hadn't come close to using her full strength. Not yet.

Another flash of the bottle and Marie dodged, feeling jagged edges scrape along the bare expanse of her upper arm, drawing a fine line of pure red just above the edge of her gloves. Pain, quick and hot and bright, fascinating and she wanted to study it, but danced back, pulling herself on the balls of her feet and settling herself into a routine that was blessedly familiar. The bottle a third time and Marie grabbed the woman's wrist, twisting briefly--enough to hurt, not to break, or all the fun would be over. With a choked cry, the woman dropped it and Marie brought her boot down hard, shattering the glass before dodging back again and waiting, hearing in the distance the tinkle of settling glass beneath wood shavings and sticking to spilled beer and years of vomit ingrained into the concrete floor.

Come on, come on, come on, I need this--

With angry screech, the woman threw herself forward bodily and Marie laughed, couldn't help it any more than she could help the sheer pleasure that raced through her veins, the heat that spiraled up from her stomach and flooded her body. Mind instantly moving into the here-and-now, no consequences, no future, no past--the woman almost forgotten, no more than a body that was there for her to lose herself in, and it was good, even as Marie landed on her back with a meaty hand scrambling for her throat, bring her knee up sharply and hearing the sound of air rushing from the woman's mouth--rolling them both over and pinning heavy arms to the floor with her knees, and letting go completely. Drowning in the smell of whiskey and beer and the smoke of a thousand cigarettes. Close enough to see the rotting edges of her teeth and the fetid blow of her breath with the first punch that blacked one puffy eye.

A handful of dark hair around her fist, staring into the swollen, blood-shot brown eyes that could have belonged to a woman she'd never met, never would meet. Dragged her up until those eyes couldn't look anywhere else, until they met her own, until she *knew* the woman saw nothing but her, knew nothing but her, was bathed in her body and soul. So she'd *know* who was doing this to her, know what she'd done to Marie, how she'd hurt her. How she--

"I'll never like you, you bitch." And a punch with her entire body behind it, full of hate and revenge and such pleasure--there was nothing like it. Nothing even close.

That was the best part.

It was a full minute, before she hopped lightly to her feet, the woman's head hitting the floor with the hollow sound of a rotten melon--a full minute, before she realized she wasn't alone--a full minute, before she looked down, haze receding, at the unconscious woman between her feet and recognized the fact that her target was six hundred and eighteen miles away.

A full minute before she noted the bar was silent. The rush was gone, it was cold, and that woman, *that* woman, wasn't the one she wanted.

Startled people, used to violence at the drop of a hat, but maybe not used to handling a girl who'd trained under the very best, who could kill anyone and anything in under eight seconds if she wanted to--who just didn't look like exactly what she was. They watched her, wary, unsure, at the blood fanned across her shirt and gloves, the blood trickling from her nose that she licked instinctively as it rippled down to her lips.

Stared at them when her tongue darted out to lick the woman's blood from the tip of her finger, fascinated eyes fixed on her.

They didn't need to know she was a mutant to know what she was, what she'd made herself, what she was letting herself become. Reveled in it for a moment, taking it in, their fear, their horror, their sick disgust--she wasn't a mutant or anything but a woman who looked like she was willing to wreck everything in sight, a woman who just didn't give a damn anymore--

--and they would be right.

That was the second best part, definitely. Definitely.

"Anyone else?"

Maybe they could hear it in her voice--she knew they could see it on her face, as she spread her sticky, gloved hands, expectant. Nothing, not even breath to break their silence, and she stepped away, almost disappointed, dropping a wad of bills on the bar before finishing her drink with a swallow and strolling to the door.

That they parted for her was no surprise at all. That was good too.

The End