Sabretooth glared towards Kurt when he compared him to being a human. The quick save of replacing the noun with ‘mutant’ didn’t take the sting of the insult away. “Shut it, elf!” Kurt’s last sentence struck a nerve within Creed. He tensed again, and as vexed as he was, the feral was unable to silence the German accented words from echoing and repeating in his head.
Just because someone has whatever unpleasant to look at as his face doesn’t mean they don’t want to live… Doesn’t mean they don’t want to live… Doesn’t mean they don’t want to live… Want to live…
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For the second time, Victor’s subconscious forced him to revisit his childhood, and re-live it from the first person perspective. He sat on the floor inside of a cold basement cellar, alone and in the dark, with his neck bound by a chain linked leash bolted to the wall. Like a slave. Like a dog.
He looked at his hands – specifically his bloody fingertips. The bleeding had stopped by now, and the claws that were once there showed signs of returning. His stomach growled, and the young boy wondered if he’d be fortunate enough to receive another serving of trash and table scraps from his soft spoken, God fearing mother.
Then, he heard the thud of heavy footsteps. By now, young Victor knew what was approaching. The door opened then slammed shut seconds later, and the footsteps grew louder as the source of them descended down the small flight of stairs inside of the cellar. Victor shut his eyes to feign he were asleep. He heard the clattering of metal tools slide across a wooden table – the child realized he was reaching for those wretched pliers again. The boy hoped that his facade would work. But it never swayed his father in the past.
And it didn’t sway him now.
Calloused hands slapped his face, which made the young mutant go wide eyed with shock. They grabbed him by the cheek, and fingers pried his mouth open. Victor tried to wrestle away, and hit the back of his head against the wall.
“You might be growin’ more of those demon teeth, but I swear on my life, you’ll be saved if I pull enough of ‘em out! Devil, you are a LIAR! My son may not be worth a damn, but I won't let you have him without a fight!”
Victor made a plea in vain. “But I didn’t do anything! Please, won’t you believe me?!” Unfortunately, all that came out of the child’s mouth was an untranslatable flurry of gargled, stifled grunts.
“Oh, Heavenly Father! I demand you look after my boy’s accursed soul, even if I must kill ‘em to extinguish Satan’s presence!” Victor’s father proclaimed. He tightened his grip on the boy’s jaw, lifted the pliers to his son’s mouth and reached for yet another fang. “In Jesus’ name… Ame--”
His father failed to finish the prayer. The bloodcurdling scream of his child made it too cumbersome to concentrate…
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Creed sharpened his gaze towards the night crawler, and spoke to him sternly, as if he was issuing a direct order. “Turn this fuckin’ contraption off, an’ get this collar off my neck. NOW!”