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Below the hum of electricity flowing through the walls and the steady breathing of sleeping students came a rattling of cabinets from the kitchen. The hall lit as somebody flicked a light switch, followed by the clamour of glasses on countertops and stifled laughter.
A slow sliding of metal on glass—a window opening. More quiet voices, shushing. The hiss of compressed air.
Rahne set her book down gently, straining her ears as she crouched down behind a couch and peered into the open kitchen doorway. Inside, confusingly, the back of somebody decked in red Kevlar. Two others across the counter, both around Rahne’s age, maybe a bit older.
More giggling. More air hissing—whipped cream, Rahne realised. She smelled something sweet that made her mouth water. Chocolate. Christ, how long had it been since she had chocolate?
The two companions went suddenly silent as Red raised a single finger in the air, signalling quiet. “There’s a mouse,” he said.
One of the two girls, with pink hair and a white jumper, covered her smile. Assuming a faux-stoic expression, she asked, “A mouse?”
“A mouse,” Red confided. “It’s skittering around and eating dust mites. I can hear it chewing away at pipes as we speak.”
The final kitchen dweller said, much louder in a tone of disbelief, “What in the world are you talking about?” Pink burst out giggling once more.
Red turned slowly on his heels so he was facing the doorway. Rahne ducked back after seeing a glimpse of shadowed skin under a pulled-up mask.
“Mouse,” Red declared. Something whizzed past Rahne’s face, small and silver. It hit the far wall with surprising force, wavering in place. A fork turned projectile, twines now jammed into the wallpaper. “Squeak, squeak,” Red sang. “Come out, come out, wherever you are.”
“What the hell, Wade?” the loud one deadpanned.
“Mouse,” he hissed. Rahne heard slow footsteps creaking over the wooden floors and she was met with two options: facing the kitchen dwellers or bolting. Common sense told her to back away slowly and retreat to her room. Dani would still be asleep—no harm, no foul. The saliva pooling on her tongue at the scent of sweets, though. That sense told her to sit and wait patiently to be discovered.
A shadow loomed over Rahne’s hiding place behind the couch, elongated horribly tall and spurring an unwelcome mental image of past looming figures. She held her breath.
The footsteps stopped a foot away from her huddled form. “Bullseye,” Red said. Unexpectedly, he held out a gloved hand. Rahne peered up at him. His mask had been pulled back down over his mouth; beady white eyes, black surrounding, and red all where else. “Hey, Mousey.” Rahne was hit with the throbbing sensation of trust in her chest. She had terrible survival instincts, but if the Wolf knew one thing, it was who was safe and who was not. Red had no intention of hurting her, and the Wolf knew this.
Whining the slightest embarrassing bit, Rahne reached up and took his hand. Pulled to her feet, she noticed that Red wasn’t quite as tall as the shadow had made him seem. Still, the eye sockets were uncanny against his broad face. “Hi,” he said pleasantly; adoringly. “I don’t recognise you.”
“That’s one of the new kids!” Pink supplied helpfully from where she stood, shovelling handfuls of popcorn into her mouth.
Red gasped dramatically. “Fresh meat! Spectacular.” He stuck out his barely-just-retracted hand. “The people call me Deadpool. Captain Deadpool.”
“No we don’t,” the loud one interrupted as Rahne shook his hand hesitantly.
Red groaned. “Word of advice, N-T-Whatever, don’t offer your opinion when it’s not asked for.”
Pink frowned. “That’s not nice.”
“I wasn’t talking to you, Yukio. Everybody knows you are perfect and could do no wrong. Your opinion is always welcome. Just not right now.” He turned back to Rahne. “What’s your name, Mousey?”
Rahne hesitated and thought back to what Roberto had said earlier that week about codenames. “Wolfsbane,” she said.
“That is so fucking cool,” Wade replied rather casually. “She—she? They?”
“She,” Rahne supplied.
“She gets to go by Wolfsbane but I don’t get to be Captain Deadpool? Is it because I’m Canadian?”
The loud one shook her head. “I have no idea what you’re talking about. Like, ever. Do you know that?”
“I do. You love me, though,” he said, pointing an accusatory finger.
She shrugged, smiling softly.
“Goddamn American war heroes. Anyway,” Red said, dragging out the syllables. “I am so glad we met because, may I just say, I absolutely love your hair. It is so adorable. You’ve got that whole elf-living-in-a-mushroom thing going on, and I am digging it.”
Rahne stared blankly back.
“See what you’ve done? You’ve scared her,” the loud one commented. “Apologise.”
“No, I’m not... I’m alright. You haven’t scared me,” Rahne said. She sounded awfully quiet and feeble compared to the other three naturally-commanding voices.
Red inhaled sharply and crooned like a proud mother over her baby. “You’re Scottish! Oh! I just love you more and more with every second that goes by, Mousey. Or, Wolfe. Nah, Mousey fits better. Can I call you Mousey?”
Rahne shrugged. “I don’t mind.”
“Fantastic. Well, Mousey, what are you doing up at—“ he checked his wrist for a watch that was not there. “Far past your bedtime?”
“I couldn’t sleep, so I was readin’ by the fire. Then the fire went out, and I couldn’t see the book, so I’ve been sitting here doing nothing for a while.” She did not know why she was suddenly sharing all this info with Red and his friends, but there she was.
Pink clapped her hands together a few times before strutting over to stand beside Red. “I’m Yukio. It’s a pleasure to meet you.”
“I’m Ellie,” the loud one called.
Red scoffed. “Well, now I’m just embarrassed. I didn’t know we were using our boring names.” He crossed his arms and it didn’t take much imagination to see his frown. “I’m Wade, then. Captain Wade Wilson.”
“Captain?” Rahne asked, wanting rather desperately to keep the conversation going. It had been an unseeingly long time since she talked about something other than Reyes. Plus, she really wanted somebody to offer her some chocolate.
“No,” Ellie said.
“Okay. Technically,” he started, “I was in the army. So screw you.”
“Doesn’t mean you were a captain.”
“Shut it. Fine. Fuck you. The name’s Wade—just Wade. Well, Wade Wilson. You get my point,” he rambled. “Yukio, Ellie, Wade.” He pointed respectively. “And Wolfsbane.” He set a hand on her shoulder. It was immensely comforting for reasons she didn’t really know, and didn’t really care to think about.
“Rahne. Wolfsbane’s a nickname my friends gave me. Rahne’s my actual name.”
He huffed. “Aw man, we’re not the first people you met here? Bor-ing. Who are your friends?”
Rahne thought for a moment. “Well, I guess they haven’t been bein’ very friend-like, lately. But there’s Illyana. She isn’t very nice, but she means well. And Roberto, who is very nice. And Sam, who is even nicer. And my girlfriend, Dani, who is just…” She inhaled deeply. “The best. Just, the absolute best.”
“Aww,” Wade crooned. “Adorable. They’re girlfriends, too!” He gestured excitedly between Yukio and Ellie.
Rahne hesitated, unsure if she was overstepping a boundary, but continued after a moment. “Do you have a partner?”
She heard his heartbeat pick up nervously. Boundary definitely overstepped.
“Nope,” he said. “I’m a free man.” It was an uncharacteristically short statement, and Rahne felt the strong urge to apologise, but was interrupted by Ellie:
“Well, you’ve got that weird codependent thing going on with that kid from Queens.”
“Don’t call them codependent,” Yukio whispered.
“They are, though.”
Yukio didn’t have a counterpoint, so she just shrugged.
Wade’s heart picked up again, for a different reason, Rahne figured. “He has a name. One that you know full well.”
“I have a name, but you still call me Ellie.”
“Negasonic Teenage Warhead is not a name.”
“Says Captain Deadpool.”
“At least mine’s easy to remember.”
“Bullshit. Nobody even knows what a ‘Deadpool’ is.”
“Guys!” Yukio interrupted. “There are people sleeping. Rahne, do you want to join us?”
Rahne smiled, fangs poking her bottom lip. “I’d love to. What are you making?”