Whispers of Shadows: A Mutant's Tale
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The door to the cellar clicked shut, muffling the Sunday rain and the rustle of city traffic outside the herbal medicine shop. The air in the basement was thick with the smell of dried roots and faint camphor, the kind of sharp scent that clung to everything. Laura let her senses stretch—every shadow, every creak of the old wood above—and let herself feel the exhaustion she’d been keeping at bay since the rescue. Gambit—Remy, but always Gambit in her mind—moved a little stiffly, favoring his right side. Smoke and bruises still clung to him despite the scrubbing she’d witnessed only hours before; his hands shook slightly as he settled onto the faded brown couch, rifling through the battered canvas backpack she’d shoved into his arms during the escape. It was her backpack, but for now, she let him investigate. Sometimes it helped to touch ordinary things after chaos.
The shopkeeper’s gaze still lingered in her mind: suspicious, wary. She understood. The world was rarely kind to mutants, and even less so when strangers arrived at your door after dark. Male strangers—her so-called brother, she’d lied, keeping her features flat, heart steady, voice cool and unyielding. She didn’t know if the woman was convinced or just desperate for fresh currency, but she agreed and ushered them into this hidden gloom beneath jars of goji berries and dried ginseng.
Laura kept to the bed—hard, narrow, with the kind of thin gray blanket that didn’t belong to anyone, and therefore belonged to everyone. She watched as Gambit muttered beneath his breath, his accent thicker when he was angry or wounded. Dangerous women, he said. She didn’t take it personally; she’d heard worse from better men, and she’d never asked for leadership—only necessity. Yet, a flicker of pride touched her as his tone shifted, a short-lived recognition of her pragmatic decision. Hideouts were as crucial as escape routes, and anonymity won more victories than brute force.
There was a clatter—the telltale squeak of Styrofoam as Gambit tore into the white boxes left on the small table. The aroma hit her like a punch: rice, soy sauce, the fatty, unmistakable smell of fried pork. Only one restaurant in this neighborhood wrapped the dumplings with a certain curl at the edge. She could see that curl here, in the top box, proof of safety in the details.
Her stomach cramped in on itself, a low gnawing pain that sharpened everything else. She wasted no time—her recovery factor pushed such needs aside when adrenaline rose, but now, in supposed safety, the hunger was a living thing. She devoured the meal with gusto, barely tasting each bite, instinctive and urgent, eating even faster than Gambit. Hunger was a luxury to indulge now, before the next emergency.
When he stood, his eyes flickered over to her—hollowed, grateful, but proud enough to keep his distance. He moved out of sight toward the tiny bathroom. The ancient pipes whined, and she heard the dull patter of water, washing away grime and—she hoped—some fear.
She stood, stretching until her spine clicked. Her claws, always close beneath her skin, tingled along her forearms—a constant readiness. She prowled quietly to the battered closet where someone had stashed old newspapers. Outdated news, but sometimes danger was written as clearly in the want ads as in the headlines. She sifted through them, feeling the rough newsprint beneath her fingers, piecing together recent crimes, possible watchmen, rival factions rising and falling just above their heads.
This was her element—not the confrontation or chaos, but these quiet moments of vigilance and planning. Her mind flickered back to the past hours—how she’d broken the binds holding Gambit, how she’d cut their way through back alleys smothered in neon and fear. How she always seemed most herself when the world mistook her for someone else. For a sister, instead of a weapon. For a nobody, instead of a danger.
In the end, hiding was only a brief illusion, a pause where instincts could be sharpened, wounds counted, alliances tested. Here in the chill, beneath the shop’s ancient floorboards, wrapped in strange herbs and old news, Laura allowed herself to rest—not because the chase was over, but because she’d learned (from Charles, from Logan, from herself) that to be a survivor was to master one’s vigilance and hunger both. The next move would come soon enough; for now, she would simply be—quiet, alert, the ghost in the shadows, repurposed as a sister and a hero, if only for tonight.
This story was generated by user ziggo.zane with assistance by one of OpenAI’s large-scale language-generation model; prompts used to help generate the story are shown below.
Images were generated with OpenAI's AI system, DALL·E 2, or uploaded by the user.
AI Prompts
Prompt: Write a long story about the mutant X-23, who brought her friend Gambit to a hideout in a herbal medicine shop. The mutant freed him from his kidnappers and had to ensure their safety. When the shop owner saw that the mutant had come with a man, she was not pleased. But the mutant lied that Gambit was her brother and needed rest because he was injured. The shop owner agreed and led them to a hideout in the basement under the shop. When they entered the basement, Gambit sat on a couch and looked through the things in her backpack. When he asked if she had checked his emails and if anyone had called, the mutant shook her head and sat on the bed. She listened as Gambit mumbled something under his breath that he would no longer take orders from dangerous women. After a moment, he praised her for finding them a hideout, to which the mutant shrugged. She watched as Gambit reached for the Styrofoam boxes of food that the shop owner had left for them. The mutant immediately felt hungry when Gambit opened the box and began to eat. She nodded slightly and reached for the second box and began to eat. She was so hungry that she ate the entire contents faster than he did. When the man went to take a shower, the mutant for reached a stack of newspapers from the closet. Describe everything in the form of a mutant's thoughts without dialogue
Response: The door to the cellar clicked shut, muffling the Sunday rain and the rustle of city traffic outside the herbal medicine shop. The air in the basement was thick with the smell of dried roots and faint camphor, the kind of sharp scent that clung to everything. Laura let her senses stretch—every shadow, every creak of the old wood above—and let herself feel the exhaustion she’d been keeping at bay since the rescue. Gambit—Remy, but always Gambit in her mind—moved a little stiffly, favoring his right side. Smoke and bruises still clung to him despite the scrubbing she’d witnessed only hours before; his hands shook slightly as he settled onto the faded brown couch, rifling through the battered canvas backpack she’d shoved into his arms during the escape. It was her backpack, but for now, she let him investigate. Sometimes it helped to touch ordinary things after chaos. The shopkeeper’s gaze still lingered in her mind: suspicious, wary. She understood. The world was rarely kind to mutants, and even less so when strangers arrived at your door after dark. Male strangers—her so-called brother, she’d lied, keeping her features flat, heart steady, voice cool and unyielding. She didn’t know if the woman was convinced or just desperate for fresh currency, but she agreed and ushered them into this hidden gloom beneath jars of goji berries and dried ginseng. Laura kept to the bed—hard, narrow, with the kind of thin gray blanket that didn’t belong to anyone, and therefore belonged to everyone. She watched as Gambit muttered beneath his breath, his accent thicker when he was angry or wounded. Dangerous women, he said. She didn’t take it personally; she’d heard worse from better men, and she’d never asked for leadership—only necessity. Yet, a flicker of pride touched her as his tone shifted, a short-lived recognition of her pragmatic decision. Hideouts were as crucial as escape routes, and anonymity won more victories than brute force. There was a clatter—the telltale squeak of Styrofoam as Gambit tore into the white boxes left on the small table. The aroma hit her like a punch: rice, soy sauce, the fatty, unmistakable smell of fried pork. Only one restaurant in this neighborhood wrapped the dumplings with a certain curl at the edge. She could see that curl here, in the top box, proof of safety in the details. Her stomach cramped in on itself, a low gnawing pain that sharpened everything else. She wasted no time—her recovery factor pushed such needs aside when adrenaline rose, but now, in supposed safety, the hunger was a living thing. She devoured the meal with gusto, barely tasting each bite, instinctive and urgent, eating even faster than Gambit. Hunger was a luxury to indulge now, before the next emergency. When he stood, his eyes flickered over to her—hollowed, grateful, but proud enough to keep his distance. He moved out of sight toward the tiny bathroom. The ancient pipes whined, and she heard the dull patter of water, washing away grime and—she hoped—some fear. She stood, stretching until her spine clicked. Her claws, always close beneath her skin, tingled along her forearms—a constant readiness. She prowled quietly to the battered closet where someone had stashed old newspapers. Outdated news, but sometimes danger was written as clearly in the want ads as in the headlines. She sifted through them, feeling the rough newsprint beneath her fingers, piecing together recent crimes, possible watchmen, rival factions rising and falling just above their heads. This was her element—not the confrontation or chaos, but these quiet moments of vigilance and planning. Her mind flickered back to the past hours—how she’d broken the binds holding Gambit, how she’d cut their way through back alleys smothered in neon and fear. How she always seemed most herself when the world mistook her for someone else. For a sister, instead of a weapon. For a nobody, instead of a danger. In the end, hiding was only a brief illusion, a pause where instincts could be sharpened, wounds counted, alliances tested. Here in the chill, beneath the shop’s ancient floorboards, wrapped in strange herbs and old news, Laura allowed herself to rest—not because the chase was over, but because she’d learned (from Charles, from Logan, from herself) that to be a survivor was to master one’s vigilance and hunger both. The next move would come soon enough; for now, she would simply be—quiet, alert, the ghost in the shadows, repurposed as a sister and a hero, if only for tonight.
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