“I don’t think I’ve ever seen anything so beautiful,” Jimmy’s voice was quiet and breathless, as though afraid to scare the creatures on the island.
Kitty nodded, also transfixed by the elegant equines. “I was never one of those girls who loved horses and ponies, but I understand what my classmates were going on about now.”
“The two of you don’t have to be so quiet.” In comparison, Jamie’s normal tone of voice was as loud as a foghorn. “The island’s more than a kilometer away; they can’t hear you.” The two former X-Men just turned around to glare at him. He sighed, “Look, if the two of you are done ogling, mind lending your ears to the mission briefing now?”
Jimmy gave him a theatrical sniff. “You have absolutely no poetry in your soul, man.”
Dryly, the older man shot back. “I like race cars, not horses. Wagner, come over here and pay attention.” The German dutifully wandered back to the shoreline. “Alright, the mission today is pretty simple. We’re here to collect unicorn horns-” He was cut off by two horrified gasps from the teens.
“You can’t be serious!” “We’re going to have to kill those beautiful animals?”
Jamie raised his voice. “No! Now would you please keep your outbursts to the very end?” He waited until the younger two had nodded. “We’re not going to kill the unicorns. First, they’re Threatened. There probably aren’t any wild unicorns left, they’ll all locked away in sanctuaries and zoos by governments. The British government is trying to increase the population, killing them would be counter-productive. Second, they’re more related to deer than horses, so the horns are shed every year after the fawns are born.” He waved his hand over at the island, where there were indeed smaller equines gamboling among the herd. “However, freshly shed horns have more marrow, which is what distillers use to make poison antidotes. So it’s better if the horns are collected while still loosely attached. A quick tap at the base right now and they’ll come off with no harm to the unicorn.”
Kurt interjected at that point. “Poison antidotes? What type of poison?”
The leader of Excalibur shrugged. “I’m not a doctor, so as far as I know, anything. I do know that the Crown keeps a supply on hand to use on people who’ve been exposed to nerve gas. They don’t dip into the stockpile for anything less serious than that.
“Anyway, collecting the horns is usually the job of the caretakers but unfortunately this year, they’re low on staff members with the appropriate qualifications. So they were hoping we’d lend some of our members to pick up the slack.”
After a brief pause, Jimmy asked the obvious question. “What type of qualifications?”
“Wait, what?” Kitty screwed up her face in confusion. “Are you telling me that unicorns can actually sense that?”
“Normally my motto is don’t believe everything you read, but yes, that’s a real thing.”
“If that’s the case, why are most of the caretakers disqualified? Shouldn’t they all be virgins?”
“It’s apparently very short range. You don’t need to be a virgin to fill a trough with hay or muck out a stall or even drive a trailer with a unicorn in it. But all the vets have to be virgins and any handlers as well. As of last week, there were three virgin staff members available.”
“So what happened to them?” asked Jimmy.
“The senior vet is on vacation in the Bahamas and she won’t be back for another week. The intern ‘celebrated’ her birthday,” Jamie did the air quotes thing just to really pound the idea in. “This weekend with her boyfriend. And John, the guy who let us into the compound-”
“-broke his leg,” finished Kurt, clearly remembering the heavy cast the junior vet had been wearing. “So why just us and not-”
“No students!” Jamie’s jaw clenched a little. “They may be rare creatures with amazing stem cells but the bloody things kick like mules when not handled correctly. I’m not risking any of the students on this mission.”
Kurt sighed. “I was going to ask why not the other teachers but I am guessing none of them are qualified either?” The older man actually blushed a little but nodded anyway.
“Okay, uh, I think we have a problem then,” Jimmy raised one claw to attract everyone’s attention. “Neither Kitty nor I are virgins.”
Jamie gaped for a second before snapping his jaw shut. “You’re not? But you’re both only 19!”
“19 with two boyfriends already!”
“And one sucky telepath!”
“I will do it!” Kurt cut off all the wrangling before it got any louder. “Or at least assuming I still qualify.”
“The internationally reviled assassin is a virgin while the two teenage geniuses are not. What is the world coming to?” The captain shook his head. “Are you absolutely sure?”
The indigo man hesitated. “The most I have had is a handjob. Do I still qualify?”
“Yes, that’s fine. Blowjobs and handjobs don’t count, although flang does. There needs to be actual penetration to disqualify you.”
The other two members of Excalibur exchanged awkward glances. “Ah, I guess we’ll go wait for you in the cafeteria then?”
Kurt lightly thumped the still goggle-eyed Jamie on the back. “This is probably for the best, Captain. Kitty and Jimmy are both city kids, they would not have any idea how to handle a unicorn.”
