Gifted Read Online Free PDF Page A

thanks, I’m good,” said Kitty.
    Emma nodded, then continued her remarks to the class. “Now, this is a place of learning. Not just about your mutant gifts, but about the world. Respect for your teachers, mutant and human alike, will be expected of all of you. Control of your powers. The safety of those around you, is of paramount importance. Violence of
any
kind will not be tolerated.”

30  

THREE

    “BRING it on. Who wants a piece?”
    The bar was prime fight territory. It was small and squalid and filled with large men who had been drinking considerably and both smelled and looked like it. Country music filtered scratchily through the speakers, and no one ever really walked on the floor, which hadn’t been scrubbed in possibly forever, because the inch or so of caked dirt prevented their shoes from actually touching the ground. Rumor had it that a guy from the Board of Health had been by recently to check the place, but supposedly he had simply stroked out upon seeing it and never had the opportunity to file his report.
    The challenger at that particular moment was at least a head shorter than even the shortest of the behemoths chugging back beer. His black hair seemed to have a life of its own, as did his sideburns. His growling words betrayed hints of a Canadian accent.
    “Logan, knock it off,” said the bartender, a normally cheerful man named Clancy. “Come on…”
    “
You
come on,” Logan retorted. “I heard him,” and he pointed at 31 one of the largest men, a guy with a shaved and tattooed head, leaning against the pool table with a half-filled mug. “I heard what he said.”
    “Logan—”
    “I believe I heard him say,” Logan over-enunciated each word, “muttering under his breath—and these ears catch everything, trust me—that he’d never seen a sawed-off runt drink so much. Am I right?”
    The bruiser cleared his throat and said, a little nervously, “Yeah, I did say that—”
    “And that’s gonna cost y—”
    “But,” he added quickly, “I was talking about him.”
    He pointed, and Logan’s gaze flickered to a darkened corner of the bar. A little person, less than four feet tall, was sitting there with three empty mugs around him. He looked up with bleary eyes and, fixing them on the bruiser, said angrily, “My girlfriend dumped me. You got a problem with that, jerk?”
    “No, no, we’re cool,” said the bruiser hurriedly. “Just me muttering. Didn’t mean to broadcast it. Sorry, pal. How about I buy you a pint?”
    The little person considered it, then said, “Long as you don’t make jokes about half-pints.”
    At which point the bruiser, the little person, and several others in the bar laughed aloud, all of which seemed to defuse matters until Logan stepped to within an inch of the bruiser’s face and growled, “And you think that settles things?”
    The bruiser gulped slightly. Everyone stood utterly paralyzed. Working to keep his voice as flat and neutral as possible, he said, “If you want, I’ll buy you one, too.”
    Logan’s nostrils flared like an animal’s. “I smell fear coming off 32 you. In waves. You that scared of me, bub? How about your friends? They scared, too? Is that what it’s gonna take? Telling you what a bunch of total wimps you are, so that you’ll stand up for yourself?”
    The bruiser spoke barely above a whisper. “Seriously…the offer of a drink’s still open…”
    “No, it’s not.” Clancy’s voice cracked sharply across the bar that was otherwise silent save for Logan’s barely controlled fury. “He’s cut off. You’re cut off, Logan.”
    Slowly Logan’s furious gaze turned toward Clancy. Then he walked toward the bartender, one slow step at a time, like a gunslinger, until he was right in front of the bar. “What the hell are you talking about?”
    “Which word was unclear? ‘Cut’ or ‘off’?”
    “You can’t cut me off, Clancy.” There was no pleading in his voice. Logan was incapable of pleading. Instead