"Get the hell away from me!" Isabel shouted, even as she stumbled back and struggled to keep her balance after being shoved back by a particularly strong gust of air. Her right arm was starting to slip into uselessness with all the sporadic movement that was happening and try as she might to keep both hands up, the injured arm was gradually drifting down toward her side.

It was difficult to keep an eye on all three of the men at once. The man with the sword was the one in particular that she wanted to be tracking at all times, but it was becoming increasingly difficult while she was being shouted at by someone she'd begrudgingly learned that she'd have to listen to.

"I wasn't doing a goddamn thing," She protested, leveling her glare at Zephyr. Something still wasn't right with his appearance. She knew the strange duo had to have something to do with it, just like they'd had a hand in the appearance of the collar around her neck. The problem with that was if the collar was solid and worked as it should, then false or not the young man reprimanding her would also be solid. He'd also be able to work the same way as the real Zephyr.

If Isabel couldn't best Zephyr while her abilities were fully in her control, then how could she possibly hope to do so with a collar around her neck?

Just as she didn't know the technicalities of the Aries' guy's mutation, she also didn't know the nuances of his partner's abilities. She didn't really have much of a clue as to what it was he was doing and aside from his fixation on fear, there wasn't much to go on. Was he getting into her head? Had they simply picked up on certain things from this file they kept talking about? Would knocking the guy out make the apparitions disappear or did they somehow depend on the person the ideas were leeched from? Too many questions again and no time to puzzle them out. The only way she could see it at the moment was she'd have to go through Zephyr to get to the other two. How she was going to do that was another matter entirely.

It didn't take long before she was knocked off of her feet in the sudden gale that was called up, gusts of air striking sharply like fists, whips, blades and with none of her usual protection available to her she was vulnerable to them all.

"This is bullshit! All bullshit! You've got nothing but tricks! Too much of a goddamn coward to put up a real fight, gotta hide behind something else and let someone else do it for you!" she yelled, whether or not she could even be heard over the sound of the wind roaring around them. She knew it wasn't really Zephyr. He never operated out in the open like this, would never make a scene about reprimanding her unless they were both tucked safely out of sight without the risk that someone would see or interrupt him. But at the same time it was difficult to stick to these convictions while she was being beaten black and blue and bloody with an all too familiar force.

There wasn't much she could do but cover her head and hope that one of the two strangers would fall for her baiting them. Then maybe she would get somewhere.

Aries watched as his companion sent his apparition to work, replacing his sword back into its sheath before folding his arms to let the spectacle before him play out. As much as he hated to let an opponent suffer to their end, he had to admit; Cancer had created a work of art this time. This Zephyr was well known to them, being one the targets two of his allies would be even now making their move on. But to see that Isabel feared him this much, to give Cancer the power to create such a powerful reproduction of him...it was unexpected. He hoped his allies would be able to take him down; they'd prepared for it but not everything was set in stone.

Cancer, meanwhile, was having the time of his life. With each passing moment, fake or not, his Zephyr clone was drawing her fear out, feeding him, making his power grow. For that's what his power was driven by; fear. The more a person feared something, the easier it was to draw the thing out into reality. The more a person feared something, the stronger he could make it. And the stronger someone feared something, the better the high he got for it. Not one of his comrades that Cancer was a warped individual...but they couldn't doubt his abilities.

Speaking of his creation, the Zephyr clone was doing a wonderful job of bringing the bone lady to her knees. She couldn't use her powers to defend herself, so the striking wind tore at her without mercy. But of course, Cancer was making sure to only give her superficial wounds, save for some slightly harder hits to her head and stomach with heavy blasts of wind. Finally, the wind died down at the clone stepped near her to answer her words.

"It's never your fault, is it? And yet, had you been a bit more restricted in your actions, then maybe people wouldn't have cause to want you dead. I'll admit, I've fancied the thought from time to time.

But I thought you could be useful. I thought you could be trained to be better, a real threat that could operate normally. I guess I'm nicer then I should be.

You think this is all a trick? Is all that pain your feeling a trick? The loss of your powers a trick? Everything happening here is real, Isabel. As will be the end result." Standing and walking away from her, the clone glanced at the two men before continuing on, merely saying/ "I'm done with her. Do what you want," before vanishing into the air and into the night. Cancer, gleaming, turned his attention back to Isabel, having dispelled the creation in lue of something he thought would be much better.

"Sticks and stones may break my bones, but your words will never hurt me. Call me what you want, Ms Duskmoor...I don't care. But now, perhaps you want to see what I'm really capable of? I'm nothing but tricks you say? Well then, let me show you the only one trick that matters now."

With a snap of his fingers, something in the air stirred. The lights around them flashed, fading in and out in response to something coming. All drawn on by her fear, of course, but then, whenever he summoned this particular being, it seemed to affect the environment itself. With a grin that would make the Devil envy, Cancer pointed behind Isabel to the creature that appeared.

It was big. At least eight feet tall and that was hunched over. It stalked from the shadows as if it had been there all along, its footsteps thudding against the earth. It was a monstrous creation; his Jackal. Had it been pure, in its own right, it would have been just that; a standing, muscled, animal beast, its snout lined with razor sharp fangs dripping to the earth beneath it. But like his power, it was created with the fear of its target, so this one had some...modifications. First off, one of its legs was metal, taking from a machine that Isabel would know all too well. One of its arms was like that too, half metal, half flesh. From its neck dangled a necklace of collars, exactly like the one that was wrapped around Isabel even now. And most terrifying of all was that it had Zeph's eyes, cold, dark and locked on Isabel.

Grinning, Cancer smiled as the beast stalked closer to Isabel, flanked by perfect copies of the machines that had manned the camps all those years ago. "Meet the face of your fears, Isabel. Meet...the Jackal."

Kneeling and hunched over on the ground, Isabel untangled her fingers from her hair and moved her hands to cover her ears as the assault died down and Zephyr stepped forward to berate her. She simply shook her head, momentarily unable to speak as she struggled to catch her breath after a particularly sharp strike had landed across her stomach.

She just had to keep telling herself that it was a trick, that it wasn't actually Zephyr that was throwing in the towel. There was no way he'd kick her to the curb after something like a brawl in the park. He'd be upset, but only briefly. A fight was nothing, especially if it didn't get into the news. Hell, she'd murdered him once and it hadn't done a damn thing to get rid of him. There was absolutely no way a silly scuffle would put him over the edge. There was no way she could push his buttons enough that he'd have her killed. He'd had enough chances to do it himself in the past, he wasn't going to change his mind at the drop of a hat.

But as much as this string of thoughts repeated in her mind, she couldn't help the creeping feeling of dread crawling up her spine. The feeling of disappointment settling in her stomach. As much as she disliked Zephyr and wished he'd leave her the hell alone, at the same time he was slowly becoming a sort of constant in her life, a twisted kind of normalcy and security in the routines he insisted on running her through every morning. For him to actually up and disappear, to decide that she wasn't worth wasting anymore time on would be just another addition to a long line of disappointments in Isabel's life. She might be upset at first, but she'd get over it quickly enough. And yet somehow the words still stung. The thought that he'd leave her in such a situation while so vulnerable frightened her.

The young man's figure had vanished by the time she lifted her head enough to take another look around. She also managed to note that Aries had sheathed his sword while her attention shifted to the paler of the two as he started another speech. Another introduction.

She heard the thing before she managed to turn and see it. The Jackal was big, but she was sure she'd fought bigger. The creature was unnerving, particularly while she was left without her abilities but with any luck she might actually manage to pry the collar off or maybe it would even end up damaged at some point in the fight and she'd be able to use her mutation again. With that prospect, the large being wasn't quite so intimidating, but when she caught sight of the creatures flanking it, she was undone. The sight of the Stalkers, the sole reason she wound up in the Camps at all, put her over the edge.

She struggled to her feet as quickly as she was able, every inch of her body protesting for the variety of new wounds she now had. She hardly felt any of them, though. Panic was quickly taking over, adrenaline numbing her pains and preparing her for her next course of actions.

She ran.

Even before Isabel's feet were beating the dirt in a hasty retreat, Cancer was laughing. Laughing a sick laugh that only the most twisted of people would ever unleash, all but dancing in place and weaving his hands through the air like a mad puppeteer, his power blooming. For even before Isabel had started to run, Cancer had felt it. Felt her fear spike at the sight of this monstrous contraptions of metal that the camps, a terrible fate for any mutant to have suffered, had used to keep their captives in line. The Stalkers.

Deadly, feared and all but lost to this day, they had been the nightmare that plagued many a mutant in the past. Isabel, it would seem, had been one of them; of course, they'd known that even before they'd approached her this night. They had been long lost, however...lost, save but in memories. And it was in those memories that Cancer had dug and uprooted them, created from the same fear that had created Zephyr. No...no more then that fear. For as much as Isabel feared the man of wind, she feared these things more.

Of course, he could not let her escape. No, he had to see her suffer more. See hope fade from her before they took her life. With that in mind, Cancer spun his power more and more...cackling and chanting all the while. "Run run, little butterfly. Soon soon, you will die. You think you can run to safety and hope; I'll soon show you a reason to mope!"

It happened quickly. One moment she had open ground to escape too. The next, there were walls. There were bars. All around them, the park seemed to be sprouting new additions, until every direction was now sealed off from escape.

Cancer had brought the camps back to life to trap Isabel.

He didn't stop there. Bars continued to burst from the ground, pushing her way to make her stop, forcing her in only one direction. To the Stalkers that had now caught up to her, flanking her to keep her from fleeing.

Then the Jackal struck. An iron-tight grip suddenly latched around Isabel's arm and with an inhuman howl, the Jackal slammed Isabel into the dirt..and then snapped her arm like a twig. Any cry she let out would be mingled with the other sick sound of the night; Cancer's hideous laughter as he stalked over to his creation and Isabel. "Are you afraid yet, my dear? Would you like to live, for this pain to end? I might consider showing mercy...if you beg me for it."

Only while locked in a collar would Isabel's own bones cause her pain. White hot agony raced through her arm, enough to make her dizzy as the bone splintered in the monster's grip, accompanied by another shock from the collar as her body tried to mend the injury. She feared she might lose her arm entirely if the beast holding it didn't release it's metal grip. She might lose more than that.

No matter where she looked from her position on the ground all she could see were cement walls topped with barbed wire and decorated with bars, all too familiar, too traumatizing. She could see the Stalkers circling, their clawed metal feet scratching against dirt and stone with a distinct, ominous sound. Their movements almost sounded like hissing. Or maybe the sound was coming from her.

Each intake of breath was pain. She could feel broken ribs, a fractured leg, a dislocated shoulder. Her head was swimming and she tasted blood. She could tell it wouldn't be long before she wasn't able to see straight, if at all. As it was, only concrete filled her vision and nightmares filled her head. She might have cried if she'd had the strength for it, but whatever strength she did have was better spent trying to get away from these monsters.

Her free hand fussed weakly at the iron fingers around her arm, covering the metal in streaks of dirt and blood. Her unfractured leg bent and pushed at the ground as she struggled to sit herself up or at least to move elsewhere. The adrenaline was starting to fade and each injury began to make itself fully known. She couldn't keep herself from voicing the agonies as she moved and twisted.

She heard the pale man approaching before she could put him in her sights. Shoes against cold dirt and a sickeningly gleeful voice. She bit her tongue and mustered a glare as her head fell back against the ground while she looked up at him. Afraid? She never admitted such things to anyone. She didn't admit, she didn't give up. Isabel was a survivor, she always managed to get out of the worst kind of scrapes and come back for more. She wasn't going to be bested by this freak.

In reply to his questions, she spit at him and offered a bloody grin.

Cancer reeled back in surprise when Isabel spat in his face, a hand going up to wipe at the bloody saliva that had been sprayed upon him. Behind him, Aries had to keep himself from laughing. Considering the amount of pain Isabel was surely in at this point and in the face of some of her worst nightmares, she was still defiant. One had to admire her for that. Of course, admiration wouldn't keep him from killing her, or letting Cancer do it. He should end it now though, let Cancer's sick games come to an end. But...they had to break her. Break her for the people watching.

Taking a handkerchief from his own pocket and wiping the blood away, Cancer's face went from shock and surprise to one of elation. Chuckling, Cancer glanced to his creation, giving it a slight nod. "Still so defiant...excellent! I wonder how long that will last."

Driven by an unspoken word, the Jackal suddenly shifted its grip, tossing her into the air for a moment before latching its metal claws around her throat, gripping just enough to hold her there. Then, lifting its other arm slowly, it lifted a single claw to her torso...and started pushing it through her flesh slowly. Slowly, ever so slowly, until it poked through the other side. Then it retracted just as slowly, letting the blood spurt from the injury.

The Jackal hissed in her face, taking in her pain and fear. Then, as if casting aside a plaything, the Jackal flung her into one of the Stalkers, which didn't even budge as he body bounced off its metal frame. She wasn't done long though; the Jackal picked her up once again and threw her again, this time into the trunk of a nearby tree. It was about to go after her once again...until Aries stood before it.

"Enough Cancer. We've made out point." Turning to Isabel, he drew his sword again. "Its time we ended her pitiful life. Have any last words, Isabel Duskmoor?"

Isabel might have laughed at the look on the pale stranger's face, but as breathing alone was becoming a chore, she probably couldn't have managed it even if she wanted to. It would have been cut short anyway. The man had barely recovered from the insult when she was subjected to the newest round of torment.

She'd been nearly gutted once in the past. Some X-Jerk had sliced right across her stomach in a fight on the Mansion grounds. Pluto had come to her rescue and let her slip into the Void until they were safely back at the Sanctuary. There wasn't anyone to step in a help her this time, though. She had no way of trying to stitch the wound herself, either. She couldn't even scream the pain was so severe.

It was a miracle her spine didn't snap the way she was being tossed around like an old ragdoll. She could certainly feel the rest of her body taking the full force of the landings, though. She couldn't keep track of how many fractures she had anymore, what was dislocated, what was torn and punctured. Every inch of her was screaming in agony. Everything was becoming one big blur of pain and torment.

When she seemed to finally come to rest in a tangle of roots, stones and dead leaves at the base of a tree, she didn't have any strength left to try and move herself. She heard the first stranger drawing his sword and managed to tilt her head in his direction, though focusing on him for more than a few seconds at a time seemed to be impossible.

The guy was barking up the wrong tree if he expected to get anything out of her. There was no way in hell she'd do anything like beg or apologize or whatever it was the guy was looking for. It was almost a shame she wasn't going to bleed out before the creep got the satisfaction of killing her.

"You c-... You c'n go... f-f*ck yerselves."

A small smile slid across Aries face as Isabel managed to spit out a final, defiant strong of words. Broken, battered, her life soon to end and yet she still acted as if she would return to make them pay. It was sad and at the same time, impressive. Aries only wished he'd been much more a challenge for her; Cancer had done most the work.

Speaking of his companion, there was one last thing he needed Cancer to do. Turning back to his ally, who was clearly not amused at having his prey taken from him, Aries jerked his head towards the fallen Isabel, then towards the monstrous creature known as the Jackal. "Pick her up for me; I want a clean shot for this."

Hissing at his comrade, Cancer was tempted to tell him to bugger off or let him finish her...but then he realized he could give her one final bit of pain before his companion finish her off. Smirking to himself, he tipped his head a little before nodding to the Jackal, muttering something under his breath to the creature. "But of course, dear comrade. Allow me to make it easy for you." With a roar, the Jackal surged forward, picking Isabel up, none too lightly and pinning her to the tree...its claws cutting wounds in her arms before lifting her over the open air before Aries.

Sending a glare his comrades way, Cancer merely shrugged in response. "He doesn't do gentle, I'm afraid. Now let's hurry this up; there's plenty more to do tonight if we finish early."

"We will be having a talk about this later. In the meantime...I think I'll bring your suffering to an end Isabel." With a single thrust, he pushed his blade through the center of her chest, sinking it in up to the hilt before pulling it out just as easily, the blood slowly trailing down her body. With a snort, the Jackal tossed her lightly to the ground at the base of the tree before fading away into the darkness, like everything else save for the collar. That would vanish as soon as they were gone. "May you rest in peace."

With that, both of them faded into the darkness, the only sign of their appearance the damaged grass of the park...and the broken body they had left behind.

The broken body that was still breathing.

The pair of strange men weren't very accomplished assassins. The one thing that needs to be done on a murder mission is to be sure that the person you're murdering actually winds up dead. For all the talking they did about killing Isabel, as thoroughly as they tormented and broke her, she still managed to survive. She'd have to remember to laugh at them later once she was sure that she'd be able to continue surviving.

She wasn't sure how much time had passed since the pair had disappeared, nor how long it had taken before she'd realized that the weight around her neck had vanished but once the realization dawned, she wearily set to work fixing what could be fixed. Mending her bones was the easiest task and while the broken skin and muscles around the former breaks still hurt, the pain was somewhat lessened.

The largest of her wounds were messily stitched shut, though she knew that the mending was mainly superficial and would only stop her from bleeding out for a little while. It did nothing to assuage the pain that consumed her.

It was a chore to pull her phone out of her back pocket once she realized it was mercifully still there. She knew there wasn't any way she was going to be able to get herself back to the Sanctuary without help, but even injured as she was it put a bad taste in her mouth to know that help was necessary.

The phone's screen was shattered, but other than that no major harm seemed to have been done to it in the fight. It was a struggle to pull up her contacts because of the cracks in the screen but she managed, filling the cracks with blood as she did so. She couldn't tell exactly where the blood had come from.

The speaker rang in her ear for what felt like and eternity before the call recipient's voicemail message began to play. A pang of panic caught hold of her again as the tone sounded, worry that she might not be found soon enough.

"You jackass. You would pick now t'not a-answer," she groaned into the phone, her eyes closing and her free hand curling into her tattered shirt in frustration, in pain, in fear. "'m at the park... I need you t'come and get me, okay? I n-... I need some help." She paused briefly as several loose stones shifted beneath her weight, sending a jolt of pain through her midsection. She had to recover and catch her breath before she could keep speaking. She had to keep herself from dissolving into tears so that she could be understood, though she couldn't keep the quaver completely out of her voice. "Please come find me, Zephyr. P-please..."

It had taken him under an hour to reach central park. More spirit than flesh he’d flown straight from the site of his own ‘death’ to the base of a blood stained tree. Duskmoors message had been fragmented, choked by fear and pain yet the crux of her words had been a clear cry for help.

Isabel never asked for help.

A multitude of scenarios had passed through the elementals mind as he’d raced through neon lit and smog filled skies. Thoughts of those suicidal enough to try and fight the homicidal soubrette, those who were actually capable of taking her down and finally those who were cruel or determined enough to try and break her.

All three lists were rather too long for his tastes, but then again enemies were part and parcel of the life Isabel had been living the past few years. The most likely candidates were the Russian or Italian mobs but he swiftly discarded the thought; he could deal with the ‘who’ after he found out precisely ‘what’ state Duskmoor was in.

Fortunately, whether by luck or sheer boneheaded stubbornness, Isabel’s potential demise proved as premature as his own when he found her barely conscious yet still breathing at the foot of a tree painted crimson from her torn and shredded flesh. Bone white stiches sealed the largest of the lacerations but even so the unnaturally pale tone of her skin betrayed just how much blood she’d lost.

She needed a healer, not a doctor; conventional medicine wouldn’t be fast enough. No, the girl needed mutant healing which meant one of two places. The first option was Sanctuary; the Order always had a handful of healers in residence, willingly or otherwise, to try and increase the life expectancy of its members. It was the ideal solution and the most predictable course of action.

Given that attempts had just been made on both their lives, Zephyr found he wasn’t overly fond of being predictable.

It's not paranoia if they're actually out to get you.

The second option then, was the ‘Xavier’s Sister School for Gifted Youngsters’, colloquially known as the ‘Mansion’. It acted as both school and boot camp for those who were more than human and acted as the base of operations for the vaunted X-men who generally opposed the Order whenever they could, out of principal if nothing else, though the Order wasn’t much better.

Under normal circumstances he wouldn’t have taken Isabel within 20 miles of the Mansion, she was too well known and being seen in her presence would only lead to inconvenient questions. Still, he had connections there; favours could be called on or made that would get him in the door if nothing else. And once inside they wouldn’t be able to refuse Duskmoor treatment without losing the moral high ground which they couldn’t afford, such was the price of their politics.

Mansion it was then.