Hotel Brasil, eighteen hours ago;:
Kiden rushes up the crowded hotel stairway to find the room she is seeking. She is followed closely by Cameron who calls her name and doesn’t bother apologizing to the unfortunate working girls she bumps into in during her mad dash to follow Kiden. The girl enters to find a horrific scene. Cameron arrives two seconds behind her and immediately goes to the aid of the injured man. After assessing his condition, she informs Kiden that he is dead.
Outside the open door of the hotel room, the working girl that Cameron ran into is making a cell phone call to her Daddy. She identifies herself as Tanya to him and informs him that he has trouble he needs to take care of. He asks what in the world she is talking about. Tanya tells him that the trouble involves one of his girls, the creepy one. Tanya also informs him that this creepy girl is leaving with two other “bizzos”.
Daddy gives her instructions to follow the trio to wherever they are going and to call him when they get there. Tanya promises she will do as he says.
Cameron and Kiden take X-23 back to Cameron’s apartment and assure her she will be safe there. On the way, Kiden tries to explain how she knew where to go. Tanya follows close at their heels and makes a phone call to Daddy and tells him the address of where the trio have gone.
Cameron’s Apartment, now:
Cameron and Kiden are in the middle of trying to get X-23 settled in when Kiden has another vision of her father sitting on the couch next to X-23. She tells the others what she sees but none of them can share her vision. Cameron keeps asking her if she is ok. Kiden’s father tells her to “get out” and fades from her sight despite the fact that she desperately begs him to stay. Kiden collapses in a heap of tears on the couch right where her father’s lap should have been but he is no longer there.
Front Door, Cameron’s Apartment, Now:
Several young men, dressed in suits and ties appear and call the trio out. Daddy kicks the door down and tells the others to feel free and fire. The men burst into the apartment in a barrage of automatic gunfire.
As the men are breaking down the front door, the trio are making their quick escape out the back via the fire escape. Kiden is the first to reach street level and she shouts encouragement to Cameron who hesitates but changes her mind as the gunfire explodes into her former residence. X-23 is nearly to street level when her claws pop out. She is startled and lets go of the fire escape and drops the last five feet to street level. Kiden immediately notices and her eyes bug out as she covers her mouth in shock.
At street level, the trio hears Daddy order a cease-fire. As he looks around the apartment he sees that no one is there. He grabs Tanya by the face and lets her know is displeased that he has been given false information. He accuses her of telling the girls he was coming so they could escape his wrath.
Two hours later in a nearby alleyway:
Cameron realizes that the guy after X-23 was in reality her pimp. She wonders out loud how she got mixed up in this when all she wanted to do was teach high school. She asks Kiden what they are going to do now. After all, her home has just been shot up and they have nowhere else to go. Kiden’s only reply is to grab her head in anguish and plead with her deceased father to help them out of this mess.
The Bronx, NYC, 7:24 a.m.:
Tatiana is on her way to school when she sees a small brown and white dog get hit by a car. She goes to the aid of the injured animal and discovers its right hind leg is broken and it is losing a lot of blood fast. The car that accidentally hit the dog stops and a frustrated man emerges to talk to her. He claims he did not mean to hit the dog. She obtains a tie from him and immediately stops the bleeding. The dog licks her as if it knows she is helping it. The bystander who loaned her the tie asks her if there is anything else she needs. She asks him for a ride to the nearby free animal clinic where she volunteers. He agrees and gets a towel out of the trunk to wrap the injured animal in. Tatiana assures her injured friend that he will be just fine.
Meanwhile in another alleyway Kiden digs through a dumpster in search of anything she can find. She emerges with a burger that has one bite missing from it and proclaims to her friends that breakfast is now served. X-23 and Cameron look on in absolute shock. Cameron asks her if she is joking around. Kiden tells her that it is not her fault that Cameron fled her apartment without money, credit cards, or ID but adds sarcastically that she will continue looking to find something more to “her majesty’s liking”. As Kiden continues her search she suddenly finds herself kneeling in the dumpster over her father. He tells her “This is what I want you to do”.
Bronx vocational high school:
Tatiana arrives late for her class and finds the teacher telling them where to turn in the textbook as she walks in. She apologizes to Ms. Parker for being late but her teacher tells her to just take a seat. Chester, a boy in her class, asks her what happened but she tells him not to start with her this morning. He replies by calling her frigid.
Suddenly, a noticeably bad smell permeates the classroom and the teenagers start commenting on it. However, Tatiana suddenly begins to hear multiple voices inside her head. She hears one of the girls thinking she is too weird to be invited to a party. Other voices agree that she is totally weird. She finds herself overcome with nausea and falls from her desk as she starts to vomit. One student calls for someone to get the nurse. Chester comments that she is swimming in her own vomit.
Ms. Parker attempts to settle the students down and turns to ask Tatiana just what she thinks she is doing. As the teacher turns, everyone notices exactly what is wrong with Tatiana. Tatiana has now taken on the appearance of a brown and white K-9 and begins to howl.
Subway Train, same morning:
The trio have made their way onto an above ground train car. Cameron is telling Kiden that this is crazy. Kiden points out doing what her father says to do did not seem crazy when it came to leaving the apartment by the fire escape route. Cameron has no reply to that and silence falls over the trio.
Outside the Bronx Vocational High School:
A student is talking to a security guard. She is telling him that tonight her mom has a narcotics anonymous meeting when she is interrupted by a large brown and white K-9 shaped creature breaking through the window they had been standing in front of. The creature runs off down the street with torn clothes clinging to its body. The security guard and the student are sitting on the ground in shock. He tells her that she has homework she should do and she readily agrees with him.
The creature is soon followed by a mob of angry students from the vocational school. They are running after it, shaking their fists in the air and calling it a mutant. It is very clear that they are angry, disgusted and intent on causing harm to the creature they are in pursuit of.
As the creature runs down the crowded New York Street it attracts the attention of a mutant hating gang equipped with baseball bats.
Subway Train, same morning:
Kiden sees a street sign that says Gun Hill Road and the trio exit their ride at her insistence. They just stand there looking around. Cameron asks her if she is sure this is it. Kiden tells her to give it a few minutes and something will happed to indicate which direction they should go in.
A half-human/ half-k-9 creature runs upright down the same side of the street with the mob in hot pursuit. The pursuers shove the trio to the ground. Cameron grabs Kiden and tells her to get up. Kiden states that this is what her father wanted them to see and she takes off in pursuit of the angry mob.
Eventually the creature transformation begins to wear off leaving Tatiana on her own to deal with the angry mob. She chooses an alleyway to run down but soon discovers it’s a dead end with a black feline that is not happy to see her. She turns to leave the way she came but angry men with baseball bats block the route. They yell and shout that she is a mutant and needs to be dealt with. She tells them she is no mutant but that she is just like them.
Kiden takes a short cut through a warehouse and as she arrives on the scene the angry mob is now running for its life. As the crowd disperses Kiden is left to face a large black feline creature that clearly intends to do her harm. Cameron states that she has a bad feeling about this and Kiden agrees. However X-23 steps in front of both of them and approaches the violent creature. The two mutants stare each other eye to eye. Something in the feline creature recognizes a fellow predator, maybe even a fellow friend. X-23 extends her hand and the feline creature sheathes its claws and places a paw in her hand. The two move toward each other and as they hug the feline creature starts to cry all to human tears and says “What have I done?”. X-23 turns the creature around and leads it toward Kiden and Cameron and out of the alley. Away from the small dead body of the slain feline in the alley.
