Wolvie Fanfiction: The Meaning of Pain

ChaoticPsylocke said:
well i have this bookmarked, but havent had the time to start reading just yet! im sooo busy with stupid school, in fact i should be studying NOW.....but im very excited to start reading!

happy birthday!
Click to expand...

Thanks. I totally understand what you mean about school. I took a day off for my birthday, and I swear that I fell three days behind somehow. Goodness.

Thanks for dropping by!

:D
 
Shorter chapter, but I'm kinda running out of chapters I have done, so I'm trying to stretch these out until summer break. :D Enjoy!

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Chapter 30: Strangers

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I can handle flesh wounds.

Things, people—they heal. If not, they die. Beast could go either way, but there’s nothin’ I can do about that now. Rogue, though . . . she’s somethin’ else.

Damn. Promised to look after the kid, even if she does her damnedest to make that as hard as possible.

Damn her. She should’ve known I’d’a been all right, instead of runnin’ out like that. Worse Marvel-lady could’a done was kill me, and that wouldn’t have lasted.

Don’t know what to do about this.

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It took him a long time to wash all the blood off of him. Seemed like it spiraled down the gleaming sink for hours, swirling from his fingers, his hands, his arms—most of it not his own.

He never realized how healing could bring up as much blood as killing, if not more.

He still reeked of blood, and his hair and face were sticky from his own, but there was nothing to do about it now. He dried his hands off on the last clean linen and chucked it onto the blood-stained mound on the floor and turned, looking at Rogue.

She hadn’t moved—hadn’t changed. Her breathing was steady, her pulse slow but healthy. If he didn’t know better he would have thought she was sleeping.

But this wasn’t how it was supposed to be. The kid’s power absorbed power, memories . . . whatever. It wasn’t supposed to take her out for the count.

Damn it.

Logan pulled a chair over, sitting down next to her and dry-washing his face. He stared at her, listening to Beast’s ragged breathing, and her steady heartbeat.

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Don’t know what she was thinking. Probably wasn’t. Stupid kid shoulda known better than anyone that I could take a beating and still get up from it. That’s what my mutant powers do—I keep going, no matter what. I survive.

But Rogue’s powers messed her up this time—screwed her over like none of us expected. But who’s t’say how it’s supposed to work? It ain’t like there’re rules to our powers. It sure to hell ain’t somethin’ any of us signed up for.

Damn mutant powers are anything but predictable. Some’re simpler than others—like my healing, and claws. It ain’t like I one day am gonna start spittin’ ice like Fro-Boy, or shootin’ beams outta my eyes. I just live, and kill. Some are more complicated, though.

Who knows where Rogue’s powers begin and end? It ain’t like she goes around touching people experimentin’, either. Outta everyone, her power’s unknown.

What the hell just happened out there?

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Logan was still sitting there, his face in his hands, when he heard movement behind him. He’d locked the door and there wasn’t the bamf or the stink of the elf, and couldn’t smell anyone else in the room, so that left one person.

Logan swiveled on the stool (Who in the world had thought of a swivel-stool with wheels and adjustable height?). Beast was squinting blurrily up at him out of one eye—the other one was swollen black and blue and probably wouldn’t be opening for a few days.

"Beast. How're ya feelin'?"

"Been better," Beast replied weakly. With half his face swollen he sounded like a drunk man. He looked down, taking notice of his bandages. "I . . . suppose I have . . . you to thank for this?"

“Thank the American citizens you’ve worked so hard to help.”

“Ah.” Beast shifted, but immediately stopped, cringing at the pain. He let out a long careful breath. “Would you mind . . . fetching me a good dose of morphine?”

Logan stared at him for a second. Oh. Painkillers.

He hadn’t even thought of them.

“The refrigerator . . . on the right. That’s it.”

Logan just handed Hank the small bottle, letting the blue mutant inject himself with the drug.

“Thanks,” he sighed, relaxing back into the bed.

“Yer not out of the woods yet, Beast.”

“Close . . . ‘nough,” Hank mumbled, closing his eyes. As Logan watched he fell right back to sleep.

Drugs knocked the big guy out like a two by four never could.

Lucky bastard.

Logan sat back down, putting his arms on the side of Rogue’s bed and letting his head thud softly on top of them. He stared at the floor—at some darkening bloodspots that had flecked onto the tiles.

Damn, he was tired. Healing had pulled enough out of him after the Scarlet Witch’s beating. Felt like he could sleep for a week.

No time to rest. He had to get up—find Storm. Call Fury again, for all the good it’d do. He could start tracking down the Scarlet Witch, but—damn. The kids.

He couldn’t just up and leave. Hank still needed attention, not to mention Rogue . . . and after the kids found out about this mess they’d likely flip. It’d be like Stryker all over again.

Storm, Beast, and Rogue in one blow. Damn.

He lifted his head, dry-washing his face before staring at Rogue.

Without a telepath, how in the world was he supposed to even know what was wrong?

He brushed her hair from her face, careful not to make contact with her skin.

“Come on, Rogue. I got enough to worry about righ’ now without you pullin’ a stunt like this . . . .”

To his surprise, Rogue actually stirred. He pulled back his hand as her eyes fluttered open.

“Darlin’? How're ya feelin’?”

She looked at him, blinked slowly, and sat up. She looked around the lab, her brow furrowed and her expression puzzled. She rubbed her head, grimacing.

"All right, short-stuff," she said, sounding a bit shaken. "What—what in the hell happened and where the hell are we?”

No southern accent. If anything, it sounded east-coast.

This wasn't Rogue talking.

He stood, immediately bristling. "Who are you?" he snarled.

Rogue's expression slammed down, turning guarded. She looked ready for a retort, but suddenly her expression froze, then changed. Her eyes widened, and her face drained of blood.

"L-logan?" she whispered, staring at him.

Her face spazzed—fear, confusion, anger running over her face. She reached up, tracing her own features, blood draining from her face.

"What have you done to me!?" she screamed, then grabbed her head and doubled over. "No! No! Get outta mah head!"

And suddenly, she lifted right off the bed.

Flying, dammit.

If you could call it that.

She shrieked, shooting forward so fast that Logan couldn’t even think about grabbing her before she slammed head-first into the wall, leaving a sizable dent. Logan leaped forward, grabbing her safely by her covered arms. She was stiff as a board, curled up, her hands over her head. He pulled one away, afraid of finding blood dripping down her face. A hit against the wall like that would’ve knocked him reeling.

Not even a bruise. He didn’t know whether to be grateful of that or not.

"Darlin', listen to me.” Rogue's eyes were shut tight, her teeth gritted as she fought an internal battle. He didn’t even know if she could hear him. "You've gotta fight her!"

"Ah can't," Rogue sobbed, tears running down her face. "Ah . . . she's angry, Logan. What did ah—what did ah do? No! Leave me alone!"

Her eyes shot open, and her bare hands grabbed Logan's jacket. "Logan, help me!" the eastern-coast accent pleaded.

Okay, maybe for once fighting wasn’t the best way. The kid was starting to lift up again—he was barely holding her to the ground with his full weight, and he didn’t want her taking off right through the ceiling.

“Okay, okay. Listen to me. Listen to me, Rogue.”

Get her calm.

Her eyes stayed on his face as if he were a lifeline.

“I—I’m not—”

“Just listen to me, okay. It’s all right, kid. It’ll be all right.” Her breathing was slowing; she was relaxing. He eased off her arms a hair as she settled back into the ground.

“Where are we?”

“Med lab.”

“Wh-what happened?” her voice was tight—strained.

Still not Rogue. He could almost smell a difference, as impossible as that sounded. It was still her, but there was something else, something he couldn’t put a finger on.

But who the hell was this Ms. Marvel character?

No time to ask. She thought he knew her, and he wasn’t about to tell her otherwise. She already reeked of near-panic. Sweat dripped down her face.

“Listen—” Not ‘Listen, kid.’ The Marvel-chick had been a full-grown woman. “What do you remember?”

She nodded, closing her eyes briefly. “Yeah, yeah. I—” Her brow furrowed, and when her eyes opened she wasn’t seeing him. “Oh, God. No—ah didn’t—I . . . Logan, ah . . . somethin’s wrong . . . .”

She was getting upset again. Damn, of course she was, but he couldn’t let her. He put his hand on her shoulder—both to ground her to something outside whatever was going on inside her head and to keep her from taking off the ground again, if he could.

“Okay, okay. Stay calm. We’re gonna figure this out, al’righ’?”

“Fine. Get off me.” She pushed him off her, moving his weight with ease. She stood, putting a hand to her head and grabbing the bed to steady herself. “God. Keep your day job, Wolverine. You’re about as reassuring as the Hulk.” She paused, her voice softening to a whisper. “What the hell’s wrong with me?”

Logan straightened. His muscles were tensed for a fight, but he didn’t know what to do. He couldn’t fight this—couldn’t fight without hurting Rogue, and it wouldn’t do a thing to help.

“The mutants!” she looked at him, her stare suddenly sharp. “Why did you—” She jerked to a stop, her eyes whipping around to where Beast lay. She turned vaguely green, a hand flying to her mouth.

“Oh God,” she swore. “Hank.”

He caught her arm before her knees gave out. “Kid?”
 
She looked at him, her eyes wide. “She’s not letting go, Logan. It’s never been like this—never . . . .” She gritted her teeth. Her grip turned painful on Logan’s arm. She shut her eyes, her eyes twitching behind the lids.

After a long moment her grip relaxed, and she let out a long breath.

She opened horrified eyes to look at him.

“She’s inside me, fightin’ to get out. Ah don’t—I don’t . . . .” She looked around the room, her eyes confused. “Where’s Tony?”

BAMF!

Logan didn’t glance back at Kurt as he teleported into the lab.

“Mein gott,” Nightcrawler said, staring at Hank.

"Elf," Logan said, not even sparing a glance away from Rogue, who had sat on the edge of the cot and was bent over, her head in her hands like it was fit to explode. "The door's locked."

"Of course, that does not stop me, mein freunde.”

"I thought it would at least make a point," Logan said. "I guess I was wrong."

Nightcrawler took a step forward. “Kitty told me what happened. Is . . . is he going to be all right?”

“Beast?” Logan glanced at him. “Dunno. Guess we’ll see.”

“Rogue?”

Logan glanced at her. The kid didn’t seem to hear them—her eyes still shut, hunched over on the table as she fought some internal struggle.

“We’ll talk outside,” Logan said.

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Got Rogue some drugs to knock her out. I’m glad it worked—with the Marvel chick’s invulnerability or whatever the hell, I wasn’t sure it would. Hope she’ll sleep until I get some of this crap figured out.

Told the elf the whole thing ‘n sent him out to talk to the kids. He’s been tryin’ to keep ‘em calm for the last couple hours. Don’t think Kitty said anythin’, but it ain’t like the kids can’t watch the news, and the fact that Ororo and Rogue’re both AWOL from classes ain’t something that can be easily overlooked.

Kids’ll be worried. Took months after Stryker’s attack to get the kids to stop jumpin’ at every shadow. This ain’t gonna help.

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Wolverine was hunting.

He’d been on the trail—smelled them miles off. Didn’t matter how far. Didn’t matter since when, or from where.

He couldn’t have said, even if he was in the mind to care.

Man.

He moved almost silently, blending in shadow after shadow even as he ran, leaping over trees and tearing through foliage unhindered with a slash of his claws.

Smelled guns.

Prey.

Head was reeling—vision spotted, ears roaring. Weak. Tired. Blood on his hands made him hungry. Didn’t matter.

Didn’t know how many there were. Didn’t care. One or one million—their scent turned his blood to fire.

Kill.

He was close. Scent like spikes up his nose, spikes in his ears, in his skin—cutting him. He’d sneak around, cut them off. Keep them from bolting, running, escaping . . . .

No more.

They were murmuring—talking. Voices, with words too far away from his mind to understand.

Close now.

Slowly. Silent. Stalk, blending into the shadows.

Head spinning, senses reeling. Black and white spots dancing across his vision, breath choking him.

Fury.

He bristled as he saw the man—dressed in furs, carrying a pack on his back. He held a long gun in his hand.

“—hurt . . . bad. Hit . . . head fallin’, can’t even—”

Wolverine froze stand-still, his blood turning from fire to ice in a second, and tempering to steel. He blinked, recognition returning to his eyes.

Man. Gun.

Kid.

They’d got the kid. Standing next to the man with the gun, sweating . . . rubbing his throat gingerly, stinking of fear.

Wolverine didn’t hesitate.

He lunged. Wolverine hit the kid, bowling him over and knocking him to the ground. Gambit shouted, but Wolverine was already moving. The man had raised his gun, but Wolverine shredded the end and grabbed the butt of it, ripping it from the man’s grip and striking him down as a scream shattered the air.

“James!”

Wolverine drove his claws downwards, and a shot gun rang through the air.

It close-range, and the shot hit him right in the forehead like a four-ton boulder, blinding him with blood and the impact. He almost felt his brain slosh in his skull.

The man scrambled away, missing his claws by inches as Wolverine whipped around towards the one who’d shot him, his snarls lost in the screaming and the kid’s shouting as he lunged again—

The man grabbed his shoulder and slammed his fist into his jaw.

Wolverine’s head snapped back, but the man cried out, grabbing his hand.

BAM! BAM!

Two more shots slammed into his torso, throwing off his balance. He staggered, falling to the ground.

No!

Not enough. Had to keep standing, had to keep fighting. He’d fought through worse—but he was weak from before. No time to heal up, no time to recover. Red filling his vision, but not rage this time. Blood, draining away from him. Draining to white with his vision as he looked up—looking at his attacker at the first time as his vision reeled.

A light-haired, pale, and terrified yet determined looking woman, holding a smoking gun up to her shoulder.

BAM!

Wolverine’s eyes rolled up into his skull and he slumped to the ground.

He went still, his face half-blown away and the three shotgun hits to his chest gaping blood and gleaming metal ribs. Gambit scrambled towards him, gripping his shoulder and shaking him.

“Wolverine! Mon dieu, Wolvie! Wolvie!”

Wolverine’s head lolled unresponsively.

The man stood up behind Gambit, and the woman stepped forward, shaking, but refusing to lower the gun.

She needn’t have worried. Wolverine would be fighting no longer.

TBC . . .
 
I think I need to read through this whole thing again, I am starting to lose track of when is when... :p


In 616, Carol Danvers knew Logan from previous missions. Are you going to have them as strangers here? Even in the comics Logan was conflicted because he knew both of Rogue's "personalities" when this overlap occurred, he was the best to help her with it because he knew both parties and how to reason with them.
 
I know. I've had to reread it several times myself just to remember what things I decided to put in the final draft and what I cut. Sorry; like I said at the beginning, I never imagined this would explode into such a massive project.

That said, the next chapter should be up in a few minutes.

:)
 
Again, a shorter chapter, but I'm planning on posting another one within a week, so hopefully it'll be enough to hold you over.

Sorry again about the gaps between posting, guys. These last weeks of the semester are always death.

Enjoy,

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Chapter 31: Transitions


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Logan stepped out of the elevator and stood in the empty hall. A death pall had fallen over the school—the same silence that had fallen after Scott had disappeared, and after the professor and Jean’d died.

Beast would live. It’d take time, but he’d heal. Storm wasn’t dead—she couldn’t be—but he would have to leave to find her, and he couldn’t leave now.

And Rogue? Damn, she worried him the most.

This wasn’t his goal—he didn’t know anything about running a school.

BAMF!

Logan didn’t even miss a step as Kurt appeared, hanging from the light fixture, then dropped down at his side.

“They’re in the game room,” Nightcrawler said. “Everyone is there.”

“Good,” Logan said, striding forward. He didn’t notice that with every other step he left a bloodied boot mark on the carpet. Those wounds had already healed, for the most part, and were already forgotten.

He pushed the door open into the game room and stood there, staring down at all the wide-eyed students gathered around. They were crammed on every surface, many sitting close for comfort. Pixie, a pink-haired, glossamer-winged mutant, was even hovering in the corner of the room, her wings giving off a faint buzzing sound.

All of them watching, waiting. The room stank of worry, fear, tension. Eyes reflected back worry, but worse than that . . . trust.

God. When’d they get to be so many? Had so many joined since the professor’d died?

Kylee jumped off Kitty’s lap and ran over to grab his leg, clinging to him. “Where’s Stormy?” she asked.

Logan put a hand on her head, matching gazes as the room fell silent, watching him. “Dunno, darlin’.”

“What about Dr. McCoy?” Bobby called out.

That seemed to open the floodgates—questions drowned out any chance of picking one out from another—let alone bother to answer them. The noise pressed on him, the heat of the room making his own drying blood beneath his scorched and torn uniform grow sticky once again with sweat. The stink of fear and tears made the air catch in his throat as the kids pressed forward, demanding answers.

God, he didn’t want to be here. He never asked for this.

Logan sighed. He ignored the shouts, his hand going for a cigar from his pocket. But—oh, yeah. Damn leather suits didn’t have room for cigars. So he let his arms fall to his side, waiting without a word until the kids finally got the hint and shut up. The fact that his hair was half-plastered to his head with blood and filth and his shirt had been all but burned right off probably helped it happen a little faster than usual.

Silence. Finally.

“Okay, listen up,” Logan said, his voice conversational level, but in the absolute silence of the room his voice was clear. “’Crawler told you what happened, now I’m gonna tell you what’s gonna happen.”

“You ain’t getting’ sent home. With what’s goin’ down out there right now that’d be the worst thing we could do. So we’re gonna sit tight, stay calm, and keep doin’ what we’re doin’—classes, exercises, missions, the whole mess.”

There was a stir. People whispering questions, wondering, but not brave enough to speak out.

“What about teachers?”

“We’re looking for temporary teachers, but we’ll have them covered. You be where you’re supposed to be when you’re supposed to, and we’ll go from there.”

“What about Ms. Monroe?” Pixie asked softly.

Logan clenched his fists, and the front row of kids sitting on the floor in front of him leaned back, eyeing him nervously. “We’re working on that,” he said.

He caught Kitty’s eye. Her hair was still damp from the rain, and her face splattered with mud. She swallowed, giving a brave attempt at a smile.

Good girl.

Logan nodded to the room, reaching down and picking up Kylee and handing her back to Kitty before turning from the room.

He had work to do.

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Rrrring. Rrrrrrrrrri—

“Papa Pizza’s Delivery Service.”

Damn, Logan really wanted to kill something. He’d gone back to the MedLab both to escape the worried kids and to check on Beast and Rogue again. Nothing had changed, but it wasn’t like he was the type to expect miracles.

He wasn’t feeling the most patient at the moment.

“Get me Fury.”

“Uh . . . .” Same stupid clown.

“Now, kid.”

“Yeah—one second.”

Logan pulled out a cigar out of his leather jacket that he’d donned. It was bloodstained—couldn’t remember from what—and a bit charred, but he didn’t care. He put it in his mouth and was about to light up when he glanced back over at Hank the sleeping Rogue and changed his mind.

“This is Agent Carter.”

“Get me Fury.”

“Wolverine.” The way the lady said it was dry, almost amused—yet ungiving as Fury’s. “Of course you’d be making trouble as soon as you come back onto the map.”

“Listen, lady—”

“It’s Agent Carter, Wolverine, and you aren’t going to get anything by bullying me. There’s a reason Fury told me to take your call.”

“All right, Carter. I wanna talk to the Scarlet Witch.”

“Not happening. The Scarlet Witch is a member of the Avengers, and her safety is SHIELD’s concern.”

“***** ain’t cooperatin’, ‘s that it?”

“You put her brother in the hospital and very well could have killed him. Wanda Maximoff is not the most forgiving of people, even on a good day.”

“The kid broke a couple ribs. Get over it,” Logan snapped.

“We’re working with her.”

“Screw you,” Logan said.

“We also have all our agents and carriers on alert for your mutant friend.”

“Storm.”

“Storm.” Her scorn was evident. “The point, Wolverine, is that she’s alive. The Scarlet Witch did not lie about that. This is our area, and we’ll call you when we find something.”

Logan grunted.

“You’re in deep enough **** right now as it is. If I had my way, Fury’d let you get what’s coming. Keep low until this blows over.”

“Yeah, whatever.”

He hung up.

Like he would sit around doing nothing and let them do all the work. He only had their word that they were looking, or that she was alive at all. And Logan trusted SHIELD as far as he could throw a helicarrier.

But he could stay low. Low enough that they wouldn’t see him coming until it was too late.

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It was weird waking up again.

He woke up slowly, which was strange in and of itself. Couldn’t ever remember waking up slowly. It was always fast—hot, quickened with fear, panic, or startled awake by some sound.

He felt funny. Warm, for one—almost too warm, but not feverish. Ground was too soft, air too dry.

He twitched his arms, but he was too heavy, too tired. Couldn’t seem to move.

His head shook slightly, his eyes pressing shut as he gave a soft groan.

He tried to roll over onto his side—but something got in his way. Something holding him down . . . on his wrists . . . .

NO!

His eyes shot open and he jerked upwards—or tried. Ropes were bound around his arms, around his chest, holding him down, stifling him.

“Wolvie! Calm down, mon ami!”

It was the kid, scrambling out of a sleeping bag on the floor.

Wolverine struggled against the ropes, but they were too tight to slip from.

SNIKT!

Gambit jumped at the sound, throwing up his hands. “Now, Wolvie—put da claws away. ‘S’al’righ’, petit—”

Wolverine twisted his wrist. It took some squirming, but his right claw caught an edge. He sliced through the ropes as if they weren’t there, bolting upright and crouching on the bed, looking around the room wildly.

People. People. People. The stink was everywhere—on the floor, in the musty air—on him. God, they’d brought him here; they’d touched him. Where was he?

“—were havin’ dose bad dreams a’yours. Even cut youself, n’ almost Mac. Not like dey’d hold ya down if ya woke up anyway. So put dem claws away, homme—”

Kid! The kid had done it—given him to them . . . .!

The door cracked open.

“Remy?”

Wolverine was across the room in half a second, grabbing the door and catching the wrist of the woman on the other side. She gave a choked scream as she was whipped unexpectedly into the room and thrown to the ground.

“No!”

“Wolverine!” Gambit bolted towards him, grabbing his arm to hold him back. Wolverine snarled, whipping his elbow back and into the kid’s face. The lady screamed as the kid flew back, blood pouring from his nose as he slammed into a dresser. He slumped face-first onto the floor, limp.

Wolverine hadn’t looked away from the one on the floor. The one that’d shot him—he remembered. He’d been weak. Still was. The world was blurred and unfocused around him, but they hadn’t drugged him enough. He was going to kill them all, get away again. They’d never have him again, never catch him.

She was gasping, dragging herself backwards on the floor, her eyes wide—she stank of terror.

But over that . . . she reeked of chemicals. Cleanliness so sharp that it burned his nose, burned his eyes. Could almost feel it eating into him, eating into his brain. Like medicine and pain.

She smelled like his blood.

“Wolverine? M-my name is Heather. Please—I only want to help—” Her back ran into the wall and her voice jolted—she had no where else to back up to. “You—you came out of the woods and frightened us. We aren’t the ones that are after you. Remy told us everything—”

Wolverine took a step forward. His claws gleamed before him, his fists trembling.

He wanted out. He wanted silence—no, it was too quiet in here, too close. The walls were closing in around him, the stink made him want to choke. He was gasping for air; he couldn’t breathe—couldn’t breathe!

“C-can’t you understand what I’m saying? I’m not going to hurt you—oh God.”

She cut off, staring up at him. He’d come close, and her eyes were fixed on his claws, the trickles of blood down his fists that had dripped down before his healing factor had healed the cuts.

She spoke again—her voice soft, trembling. “Is that—is that what they did to you?”

Wolverine paused, following her gaze. In the presence of the cabin’s room—made homey by the rug and the homemade quilt over the bed—the long blades looked almost absurd. Sharp cold against the warmth, reflecting days of snow and frost and black nights frozen to break. Too clean—too inhuman for humanity.

The silence was close, complete—

“I’m sorry,” the woman whispered, not moving.

Wolverine glanced down at her. He had pulled back without realizing—straightening as he stared at the metal claws sprouting from his fists. He unclenched his fingers, flesh by metal, his lungs rising into his throat.

Not withdrawing them, he lowered his hands, turning his attention back to the woman—that’s what she was, a woman. He’d never seen one so close, never smelled one so close.

Unarmed. He’d have smelled the gun oil.

“We—James and I brought you back here. I fixed you up all I could—James went for help, but we’re so far out, and the weather—”

That explained the fading scent of his blood on her. Beneath that and the disinfectant was the scent of the soap she used, the scent of lavender, and then just her.

The rising stink of fresh blood caught his attention and he glanced back to the kid, then blinked.

The kid lay on the floor, unmoving. Blood dripped from his forehead into his hairline.

SNAKT.

He withdrew his claws, moving to the kid’s side and carefully reaching for his pulse. The lady made to move, but Wolverine turned sharply at the sound and growled at her, making her go still. As he turned his attention back to Gambit he settled back against the wall, watching him and holding her wrist where he’d grabbed her.

Kid’s heartbeat was steady. A quick check showed he was breathing well, and his eyes weren’t dilated—no concussion. Wolverine’s elbow had hit him full in the forehead above his right eye—leaving a quickly-appearing goose-egg that was oozing blood. The nose shot had been more glancing—it wasn’t broken, and the blood would be easy to clean up. He’d be all right, besides a nasty bruise and a good headache.

Damn it.

He could feel the lady’s eyes on him the whole while—following him as he checked the kid before helping him lie more comfortably on the floor.

He’d be fine. Wake up in forty-five minutes, maybe less.

Damn. Wish he hadn’t hit him quite so hard—wasn’t thinking clearly. Kid needed to be able to run—run away from here.

They had to go. Had to get out of here. It was getting hard to breathe again. The place stank to hell.

“I—I have ice and water I can fetch. It’d keep the swelling down,” the lady spoke from against the wall. Wolverine glanced back at her. The sharp stink of fear over her was fading—and over it, determination. She didn’t move, her eyes didn’t move from his—a challenge.

It was almost funny.

Wolverine didn’t look away either. Lady could be going to get reinforcements—call someone. Could be getting a weapon.

But she didn’t smell like she was lying.

Wolverine nodded slowly. She nodded back, licking her lips as she rose slowly—each motion careful, watching his reaction. He didn’t move, not taking his eyes off her as she backed out of the room—her hand reaching blindly for the doorknob—and disappeared into the hall.


TBC . . . .
 
Howdy! Sory I've been so long in reviewing this. I'm back to work now and I don't have the time like I had before.

I liked this chapter a lot. I like Logan in a leadership role at the school. He was great with the kids and I liked his speech.

Was nice to see Gambit again too, can't wait to read more. :D
 
Thanks for reading, everyone! Sorry for the long wait (finals were killer!).


Enjoy!



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Chapter 32: Confrontations

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Heather’s hands were shaking as she grabbed clean rags and put a large bowl in the sink to fill with warm water. But her expression was set, and she didn’t hesitate to grab the now-filled bowl and head right back into the room.

She stepped in and immediately shivered; the room had gone cold. Her eyes went to the dented dresser, and then rose to find Remy on the bed, the top quilt pulled roughly over him.

Wolverine had pulled back the curtains and now stood next to the opened window, untouched by the cold despite the fact that all he wore were some of James’ pajama pants, which dragged a good six inches on the floor. Freezing rain was pelting the sill and reflecting thin moisture into the room. It beaded on the hair on Wolverine’s bare chest as he watched her, his shoulders slightly hunched in the shadowed corner of the room—the wildness in his eyes replaced by wariness as he watched her closely.

Heather shivered with the cold, her breath visible as she moved forward. Steam snaked up from the bowl of water.

She stepped to the bed slowly, each step accompanied with a glance to the man in the corner to see if he’d moved. She reached the bed and put the bowl down on the desk beside it. She reached towards the boy, glancing again towards Wolverine. The pattering of the rain roared beside the silence of the room.

He didn’t move.

She let out a long breath, turning her attention to Remy.

“Ouch,” she said, tilting Gambit’s chin and grimacing at the blood. She took a cloth, carefully wiping away the blood as she opened his eye to check for concussion. She wrung out the cloth and continued cleaning the cut. “You . . . you need to be more careful. He was just trying to help,” Heather said, her words gaining confidence as she spoke. “We both are. I didn’t mean to hurt you, you know.” She glanced up at Wolverine. Dark eyes stared back, wild and unwavering. “I—I am sorry for that. But Remy explained everything.” Her eyes flitted to him again, and then back down. “He admires you a lot, whoever you are. He said you saved his life.”

The blood was already stopping. Either it wasn’t as bad as it had looked, or maybe this boy had some of the same thing going on as Wolverine. Heather reached for her medical bag that she’d left by the bed earlier, pulling out a bottle of hydrogen peroxide. “James and I . . . we’ve known each other since college. We came out here to take a break—crazy, I know. It’s still winter up here in the mountains, but we just had to get away from people—” She opened the bottle, disinfecting a needle as she leaned towards the boy.

A grip like iron caught her wrist.

She jumped, automatically flinching away, but her arm didn’t even waver in the man’s grip.

God, she hadn’t even heard him move—hadn’t seen the dark movement until it was too late. She, James and the boy had had to carry him here, and it had been more than a small struggle. It didn’t seem possible that someone so heavy could move without a sound.

She looked up at him. His eyes were narrow, and after a moment he shook his head. The motion was a bit halted—unnatural, like the body language was as unfamiliar as a foreign language.

His grip was painful on her wrist. His hand was almost uncannily warm, wet as it was from freezing rain. The drops were still cold.

“It’s all right,” Heather said. “I’m a nurse.” His expression didn’t change—unreadable as stone. “Stitches will help him heal better, and avoid infection. Otherwise he might scar.”

Wolverine shook his head again.

“Okay,” Heather said slowly. “All right.” She lowered her hand, and he let go of her as she set the needle on the dresser

Instead, she picked up a cotton pad and tape and bandaged the wound.

“You—you seem to understand well enough. You do speak English, don’t you?”

Wolverine reached over her, taking hold of the hydrogen peroxide. He sniffed it, then recoiled sharply, dropping the bottle. It clattered to the floor, spilling down his front and onto the floor as he staggered back, clapping a hand over his nose with a choked gag.

“Oh, God,” Heather sighed, pushing aside her bag. “Okay. Listen, it’s all right, okay?” She stood, catching his arm as he took a blind step backwards, his eyes streaming.

Wolverine snarled, knocking her hand away sharply and reeling back to put distance between them again. He turned his back on her, wheezing slightly, wiping his eyes.

“All right. No touching, then. I should have figured that out already, huh? Guess I got luckier than Remy.”

Wolverine turned, wiping his eyes as he glanced back at her. His eyes lingered on the bed, and for the first time something almost readable passed across his expression.

“He’ll be all right,” she said, going to the drawers and opening one. The front was cracked from Remy’s weight. She pulled out a pair of boxers, a towel, and a t-shirt. “Here,” she said, holding them out towards him. He took a wary step back, and she rolled her eyes. “Come on. I told you I wasn’t going to hurt you—not like I could if I wanted. From what Remy said it was just because you were already weak that those bullets hurt you as bad as they did. Here.” She pushed them into his hands and he took hold of them reflexively. “Now the bathroom is through that door. You hand me out the pants and I’ll put them in the wash. James didn’t bring many clothes up with him, and I don’t think his jeans would fit you.”

Wolverine had looked down at the pants, but was now watching her almost quizzically—his head tilted, his brow furrowed slightly.

“What?” Heather asked. He didn’t answer, and she bit her lip. “Hey, Remy said you could understand and talk just fine—just that you didn’t like to much. I . . . ” She trailed off, looking down. “God, I can’t believe I’m saying this. Getting shot in the head wouldn’t, you know—oh, God. Listen, you can understand me, can’t you?”

A pause. He nodded.

“Good. Good. Okay. Feel free to use James’ razor. I’ll go start dinner. If you’re half as hungry as Remy I’ll need enough to feed an army. Get your . . . healing working right again.”

She pointed him to the bathroom and left the room. Wolverine didn’t move at first, watching after her until he could hear her moving around in another room. He hesitated, then bent over, sniffing the clothes in his hands before straightening. He glanced at the kid, then slowly turned and went into the washroom.

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Wolverine stared.

And stared.

The mirror stared back.

It wasn’t like a reflection in the water. That had been blurred, rippled, like from a dream. But if it weren’t for the fact that the man in the mirror had no scent, he would have thought that someone else was standing there looking back at him.

He lifted a hand, touching his face.

He didn’t know himself.

And that wasn’t right, was it? He could recognize the kid, even recognize the lady by sight already.

But he was a stranger to himself. A dangerous one, by the sight of him—smudged with dirt and blood, his hair wild and thick with filth. When he’d turned around from closing the bathroom door he’d almost popped his claws and snarled at the reflection before he’d caught himself—hair wild, eyes wide like a deer caught in the headlight, though they immediately narrowed and his lips curled in a snarl at the stranger in the mirror.

He didn’t like the look of him.

He used the toilet and turned on the shower and adjusted the temperature. He was in the shower, his face towards the spray as months of sweat and dirt and blood washed away, before he even realized what he’d done. He paused, blinking through the stream of water down at the knob. He reached down, taking hold of it. It felt odd—hard, but not wood, not metal—plastic. He twisted it slowly.

The water turned icy-cold, so quickly that he jumped, and twisted the knob the other way.

He ended up playing with the knob until the hot water was gone.

He tried twisting it to hot again, but it was no good; the water had gone cold—almost as cold as the river. After a mental shrug he turned to washing, though after a sniff of the bottle on the floor he let that be, instead using the bar of soap. It still smelled, but didn’t cling to him like a cloud.

He finally turned off the water and stepped out, shaking himself before remembering and grabbing the towel from the counter.

He toweled himself dry, then stopped, sniffing the clothes. They smelled funny. He could smell the lady on them, and someone else—a male—and then something scented—soap. Clean. He pulled on the clothes—only having to try twice to figure out the arm holes from the head hole. The boxers and shirt were too small—or maybe they were supposed to fit like that. Still, the loose pants had felt more comfortable.

He padded from the bathroom, head low as he breathed deep. He paused, then moved over to the kid, sitting down warily as the bed creaked underneath him. The ropes he’d cut through pooled around his feet.

The bed was soft. The air was warm and quiet. It was weird. He was twitchy—uneasy in this unfamiliar setting, but in a way he felt almost comfortable, like he could lie down and sleep for days without bothering to move. That only made him more uneasy.

Noise from outside the room drew his head up. He pulled his hand away from the kid’s forehead and padded, his nostrils flaring, and he swallowed the saliva that had flowed into his mouth at the scent.

What was that smell?

He glanced at the door, then to the window. The lady’d closed it again, but water droplets sat beaded on the windowsill. His eyes went to the kid.

He should take the kid now and go. He was feeling better—he’d drunk his fill from the faucet before his shower, and while his stomach still felt like a dried-out corpse, he could hunt. He could carry the kid for hours before having to stop.

It wasn’t safe here.

He glanced between the door and window again, then stood slowly. He moved forward, putting a hand on the window and sliding it open an inch. Drops began bouncing onto the sill, the rain battering against his hand through the glass as webs of condensation crawled outwards from his palm.

He looked back at the room, the shadow of the coming night casting it in a comfortable shadow, cut only by the warm yellow light from the hallway.

He took a deep breath, trying to ease the growing tightness in his chest. He pulled the window closed again and turned to the door.
 
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Wasn’t hard to find her. I guess government-supported superheroes don’t really feel a need for discretion.

Apparently they have a tower—yeah, a tower—right in the middle of Manhattan. Real discrete.

I was going to track ‘em down the old way: hittin’ the streets. But Kitty caught me and pulled up the information on the ‘net. Everythin’ was listed there, from the address with a picture and the people seen comin’ and goin’.

Captain America. Ironman. Scarlet Witch, Quicksilver, Ms. Marvel. Some butler guy named Jarvis.

Gotta count on SHIELD having some guys there—and probably a mob outside. People aren’t happy with Ms. Marvel goin’ down.

Shouldn’t be a problem.

---------------------------------------------------

Logan lay flat in the vent, peering between the grating.

Place had good security. Not good enough.

Snikt.

He popped a single claw, slipping it into the edge and slicing around the sides. He slid out, coming out in a roll and standing. Immediately the hair rose on the back of his neck and he turned sharply. No one was there.

His nose twitched.

Nah, that wasn’t right.

He stepped forward slowly, hands ready at his side.

And . . . there.

He took another step forward, but the scent moved back. Couldn’t hear them, couldn’t see them, but they were there.

Not they. She.

He straightened. No use sneaking now. “Done playing games?” he asked, his voice low.

The Scarlet Witch stepped out of the air—no other way to describe it. Reality bending and all that—who knew if this lady had a limit? No wonder SHIELD was treating her like a bomb ready to go off.

He caught a quick scent of surprise that he had sensed her, but her face showed nothing. She lifted a cold eyebrow, keeping her distance.

Smart girl.

“They knew you were going to come. Fury swore that you would, and he is rarely wrong,” the Scarlet Witch said, not moving from where she was sitting in the shadows. “They wanted to assign me with enough security to make the president feel stifled.” Her eyes glinted. “I turned them down.”

“Wishin’ you hadn’t?”

A soft snort. She stood, the folds of her robes falling around her. She’d bathed and changed since the morning. She smelled clean and starched and angry, her dark red clothes the color of blood in the shadows. “You really thought you could take me, Wolverine?”

“You’re one of the good guys,” Logan said, standing his ground. “They say you don’t kill.”

“They say you can’t die. It looks like neither of us need worry about ruining our reputations.” She took another slow step forward, a slant of light touching her chin. Her eyes narrowed as she looked over his face. “You don’t even have a mark on you.”

“What did you do to her?”

She folded her arms. “Fury has been trying to get to me all day. You really think you, of all people, are going to have any better luck?”

“Listen, lady. You can do this the easy way or the hard way—”

“You mean, I can just tell you or you can try to beat it out of me.” She lifted a hand, and Logan suddenly couldn’t move from the neck down. “Try again,” she said, taking a step closer.

“You’re one of the good guys,” Logan gritted. “Fury must’ve told you what went down there; Hank McCoy was shot, for God’s sake, and it ain’t like you lot were listenin’—”

The Scarlet Witch’s eyes flashed, and she took one last step forward, staring down at him. “I know what happened,” she said, each word sharp. “The Teeps at SHIELD say that Ms. Marvel’s gone—that you’ve sucked her personality right out of her, with something they’ve never come across. So I’ll tell you this: you make Ms. Marvel right, and I’ll tell you where to find your *****.”

Logan growled. “We don’t even know went down out there, let alone how to make it right—”

“You send out weapons you can’t control?”

Logan bristled. “It was a kid,” he snapped. “You’re a mutant. You didn’t just wake up one day knowin’ what the hell was goin’ on.”

“You sent her to fight.”

“She was flyin’ the plane. Can’t blame her for comin’ to help, considerin’. She didn’t know what would happen.”

“Stupid.”

“I ain’t the one who crashed a rescue party, lady.”

Wanda Maximoff glared, but she stepped back, and Wolverine found he could move again. He shifted his weight slightly, but didn’t move forward.

“Go,” she said. “But you will not find your friend until you fix this.”

“Damn you,” Logan said.

“And Wolverine? You touch my brother again, and I will kill you.”

“’s long as he doesn’t give me a reason to, I won’t,” Logan said. “You might have found me this time, sister, but you can’t keep your guard up all the time.”

Wanda’s expression was cool. “You are a stupid little man,” she said. “Threatening me like that. I could rip that metal right from your bones—”

“Nah. You ain’t got the guts.”

She hissed softly, her eyes narrowing, studying him. “The world wouldn’t even miss you,” she murmured.

Wolverine just looked at her, unmoved. She looked away first.

“Go.”

Logan growled softly, clenching his fists. “You think I’m gonna leave so easy? Listen, lady—” He took a step forward.

Something hit him hard enough to turn his vision white. He had nothing to brace against as he was launched across the room and bulleted right through the window. Glass rained down around him as he began to fall.

Senses reeling and half-conscious, Logan’s claws shot out as he began to freefall.

Ah, great.

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TBC . . .
 
So, I've officially posted all the finished chapters I have done. Now that one semester is over and the summer semester hasn't quite set in, I'm trying to whip myself back into action and get on the next chapter.

So what's the point of this post? The main one, honestly, is to try and bump this thread to the top of this board without actually having a chapter to post :D. Hopefully some new readers will be drawn in due to the satisfaction/dissatisfaction with the Wolverine movie ;). The second is just that chapter spacing might stretch out a bit more--but the next chapter is coming.

Encouragement, criticisms, and advice are always welcome (and begged for :)).
 
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I'm a bit behind on my reading due to the big distraction of a certian Wolverine movie that opened this weekend. I will try to catch up with this soon. :)
 
squeekness said:
I'm a bit behind on my reading due to the big distraction of a certian Wolverine movie that opened this weekend. I will try to catch up with this soon. :)
Click to expand...

Completely understandable. Why do you think I've fallen behind in my writing? ;)
 
Well, this is a bit weird.

This thread has disappeared out of the fanfiction section for some reason, yet the link still works. So I figure I'll bump this thread and post a new chapter, and then see if it reappears.

If it does, I hope you enjoy this new chapter. Sorry about the delay!

And this is an extra-long chapter, so any reviews/responses/whatever would be extra appreciated! :D

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Chapter 33: Falling

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Now:

Logan hung there in the air, arcing outwards from the building for an eternal millisecond, the sunlight glinting off his claws and the shattered glass floating around him.

The moment passed, and he dropped like a rock.

He twisted wildly in the air, spinning around to watch the ground rush up towards him.

Or was that the wrong idea? Would it better to land on his back?

Blood blinded his right eye, streaming from a healing cut on his cheek from the glass.

Probably didn’t matter either way. ‘Sides, he’d rather see it coming.

He pulled in his claws—this was going to be messy enough without having to deal with digging his own claws out of his guts—and bared his teeth.

Screams from below. Hell, he hoped he didn’t land on anyone. That could get messy.

This was going to hurt.

He was going to kill her, that *****—

THUD!

Flesh and muscle bent around unbreakable bones as he hit the ground, and dirt mixed with blood, grinding against metal.

Logan saw white, and then red.

Then nothing.

Darkness.

Logan gasped, lifting his head from the dirt and rearing up. Snapped rosebush branches caught at his skin, but he popped his claws and ripped them away, staggering out onto cement. He fell to his knees, a dribble of blood leaking from his mouth.

“Sergeant!? Sergeant—”

Logan wiped the string of blood from his mouth, turning his head aside to spit blood into the dirt, climbing back to his feet.

“Keep goin’,” he growled, shoving the concerned soldier away. A bomb blasted into the earth just yards away, and Logan ducked, holding up an arm to shield his face. Dirt blurred his eyes, and the bullet that’d buried itself in his side worked its way out, falling in the dust behind him as three more slammed into him, turning his vision to blood—turning his blood to fire—blinding him . . . . Thunder, deafening him.

Logan gasped, blinking wildly. His face was wet—but where the blood was coming from, he couldn’t tell.

He couldn’t see.

Where were the shouts? The screams? There was nothing—only dead silence. Not even his own heartbeat.

Hecouldn’t hear.

Deaf? Blind?

Vibrations in the cement, under his hands.

The stink. The stink of blood. He spat again, still blinking—at least he could. Both eyes were there, but burning, stinging. Mashed in his eye sockets, the nerves screwed to hell, or something. Healing, but slowly.

He spat again, trying to smell beyond the blood. Cigarette smoke. Men—men, leaving. Running. Terror. Exhaust.

Gun oil.

He jerked his head up, reeling off-balance, but keeping his hands planted on the cement to ground himself.

Bombs. Had to get up—get to his men. Keep going . . . .

No! Not bombs, dammit. Just a 20-story fall and a crappy landing.

Thunder. Bombs all around him, flinging blood and bodies and mud, caking him. Gunshots whizzing through the air, and grunts of men falling—going down for good. Bullets shooting through him, taking down the soldier next to him. Just a boy. All just boys . . . .

Something cold and metal pressed against the back of his head.

Gun!

SNIKT!

His arm shot out as his throat ripped in a snarl he couldn’t hear. His claws snagged something wildly, but he couldn’t tell what—couldn’t see. He smelled hot copper, mixed with fear and pain like rust—he’d caught somebody. How bad, he couldn’t tell.

No! Dammit—this wasn’t then. This wasn’t then.

When was he?

Tightness, grabbing at his chest—panic setting in, making him gasp. No—just blood. Crushed airway.

Just breathe. Slowly, slowly. Think.

Gun oil. Lots of it, now. And people, again—stinking of sweat. They smelled grim, like bodies hot under uniforms so used their scents had been sealed into every stitch of the fiber, even beneath the various soaps they’d used that morning (except for a couple who he wasn’t sure when they had bathed last . . . . ).

Damn.

Police? SHIELD?

He just cut off some bastard’s hand?

Blood clogging throat. Rage rising—pain wanting to strike out.

Breathe.

Dammit!

No—not enough blood. But they were angry, now. They’d stepped back, but were waiting. Waiting for a pin to fall, though, by the smell of them.

What were they doing? Probably shouting at him to get down, put his hands in the air . . . .

Logan turned his head, spitting out a mouthful of blood and a couple shattered teeth on the cool cement next to him. The taste of copper made him gag.

He kept his head down, retracting his claws slowly. “Listen,” he tried to say, gritting the words between his remaining teeth. Speaking felt like gravel on an open wound—must’ve smashed his throat. Hoped they could hear him—hoped they could understand. Hoped it was loud enough. He raised his voice, just in case. “I can’t hear—” Stop. Pant. Breathe. “—a damn word you’re saying . . . so shut it.” Probably too loud, now. Could be shouting for all he knew. He stopped to spit again. Someone’s scent behind him drew closer, and he turned sharply to face him, baring his teeth. “Touch me, I’ll kill ya,” he snarled. He didn’t need eyes or ears to do that. ‘S long as he was breathing, he could do that.

He could almost feel the restless shuffling. Feel it like he could feel his organs crawling back together, inch by agonizing inch. He bit down on a gasp of pain, choking it off and swallowing it as he clutched a hand to his chest.

He hissed between his teeth, then inhaled, bringing in a new scent—this one familiar. Irritated. Up-tight, but with an unshakable foundation of confidence, and a thick, unmistakable scent of cigars.

Fury.

Could almost hear him. Could almost hear him shouting, over the bombs, over the roaring of the planes.

“Nick.” He shook his head slightly, straining for the slightest sound. The gasp of his breath, the growl of his own voice. Nothing. “You—” Stop. Breathe. Blood like water clogging his lungs. “You sic your men on me and I’ll—I’ll take ‘em down.”

Yeah. That was convincing.

“You think I can’t?” He had to stop again, panting for breath. “Try me, bub.”

Pause.

Heal, dammit.

What were they doing now? Laughing? Could be. Smells were mixing—it hurt his head as he tried to keep them separated, but he wasn’t about to pass out on them. He did, there was no way of knowing where he might wake up.

“This isn’t . . . . what it looks like. Jus—just gimme a minute, will ya?”

He spat again, rubbing his eyes and feeling glad he had lids enough to do so, even if his whole face was still slick with blood and he could feel the puffed flesh receding. His lungs were peeling away from where they’d wrapped around his ribs, his liver was crawling back into place after crashing and scrambling with his diaphragm.

POP.

“—know it’s you?” a woman’s voice asked.

Engines, voices, honks sounding angrily above it all—the never-ending murmur of the noise of New York City.

It came down like a wave, and Logan flinched, immediately toning it down. He’d been listening so hard, having it come all back at once was like running into a wall.

“Scent,” Fury’s voice replied. “Seen him track a platoon three days ahead of him, through mud and rain. Stumped me how he did it, that first time.”

“Damn.” Logan felt his nose cracking as it crawled back into place on his face. The lady made a soft sound of disgust. “Well, that’s disturbing.”

“Give him a minute and he’ll be back on his feet.”

A noncommittal noise from the lady. “We’re not taking him out now why?”

“Logan’s brash, but he’s not half as stupid as he looks. And to be honest, I’m not sure what we’d to with him if we did detain him.”

“Chuck him in a cell?”

“That wouldn’t solve the problem.”

“Shock me,” she said dryly.

Fury didn’t reply, but he shifted suddenly.

BAM!

Logan jerked sideways, his ears ringing as a shot clipped his cheek. “Dammit!” he snarled, or at least tried. His throat cut on blood halfway through and he choked, sputtering as he leaned forward, spitting onto the sidewalk. The cement beneath him tilted, and he threw out a hand, catching himself. He lifted his head, looking blindly towards Fury’s voice and scent. “Wha t’hell s’at fer?” Yep, hardly understandable. But it was enough.

“I was going to ask you the same thing.”

Logan blinked, squinting to see something—anything. Fury’s voice was fading forward and back like waves against the sand, and it was making him dizzy to try and hold onto it.

Damn, his head hurt. Felt like it’d been filled with cotton—or maybe his brain’s turned to mush on the sides of his skull from the impact. His heart pounded in his forehead, ricocheting around like bullets.

“Di’—I din’t do an’thin’,” he slurred. He turned to the side, spitting out another tooth. Yeah. Real convincing. He cleared his throat, and grimaced at the feeling of a knife slicing down his neck.

Hated being blind, on the ground. Helpless. Gotta get up, stare them down. Hide the weakness.

He let go of the ground with his hands, balancing unsteadily on his knees.

He bared his teeth, growling softly. The soldiers closest to him shifted—he could hear the rustling of their clothes, smell their wariness.

Not enough. Up. Face-to-face. Stare them down, blind or not.

He rose slowly, keeping his hands in front of him and in sight. Like that mattered.

A short, plaid-wearing, bloodstained hairball surrounded by dozens of sweating elite SHIELD operatives. It was almost funny.

No one moved. Logan climbed his way to his feet, his hands out for balance as much as anything.

“What the hell are you doing here, Wolverine?”

Was always weird to hear him call him that. Came out wrong, when Fury said it.

His voice was like water, swaying back and forth. Made him sick, made the sidewalk beneath him rock beneath his feet.

Turbulence. Logan gripped the side of the plane, his teeth clenched tight as the freezing wind cut through his uniform, curling up next to his skin like ghosts of ice. He pushed away, and he was falling, bodies falling around him—

Falling. He was still falling, falling with glass and bodies and blood, and he couldn’t see the ground—

Still falling . . . .

“You have 60 seconds to tell me why my men shouldn’t shoot you to hell and lock you away for the rest of your life.”

Logan flinched backwards, but immediately bristled. He braced himself, feeling the firm ground beneath his feet.

What the hell is going on?

He shook his head, burying it all. Deal with it later.

Guns sighted on him; he could feel them like eyes.

“You know it’d take a whole lot more than this to take me down, even now,” he growled slowly. Fury wouldn’t try it.

“Special ops team, Logan. You know what they deal with. Forty-five seconds.”

He thought he could bully him? Screw that.

“Go t’hell.”

“Forty seconds.”

Logan bristled, and he swore he could smell the slightest smugness leaking into Nick Fury’s scent, even through the clotting scent of his own blood and the mix of gun oil and New York filth. But he’d bet the seasoned soldier’s face betrayed nothing.

Fury wouldn’t do it. Too much danger, here. Trying to take him down like this would be like firing a cannon blind—he wouldn’t know who he would hit.

And Logan wasn’t going to let them take him.

Logan hunched his shoulders. Let them try.

“Twenty.”

He could almost see Fury raise an eyebrow.

Wait.

The school. The kids. Storm. A fat lot of help he’d be to them if he was on the run from SHIELD, and Fury knew it.

Dammit.

“I didn’t do a freakin’ thing,” Logan snarled, taking a sharp step forward. The guns snapped to follow him, and he cast a dark glance towards the scent of the nearest soldier. There was a spike in fear, quickly stifled. Smelled barely more than a kid. Well-trained, though.

Fury wasn’t impressed. “Ten seconds.”

Logan silently cursed him, but continued, holding out an arm as his balance wavered beneath him. “Went t’talk to the *****, and she threw me out the window.” Sure it sounded like bull****, but damn him if Fury expected him to plead for him to believe him.

Fury didn’t move. Logan gritted his teeth, but then immediately stopped at the shot of agony down his jaw.

Dammit. Teeth were the worst to regrow.

His flesh crawled. He could feel Fury still watching him.

Or maybe that was just the scrapes of his skin growing back.

Logan spat again, but it was thick and dry—not even bloody, except for the taste. Damn, he needed a drink.

“You went to talk.” Fury’s voice was still deadpan, but damn him if it still didn’t sound as dubious as it could.

Logan folded his arms, waiting.

Was that an edge of grey leaking through his vision, or was he imagining things?

Still waiting. Heart pounding in his ears—in his brain. Wish it’d shut up.

He didn’t have time for this.

Finally, Fury barked: “Back to positions. Move out. Agent Carter, I want this place cleaned up.”

“Yes, sir.”

“You, Wolverine—with me.”
 
People were moving, and Logan froze, his nose twitching and his ears tuned. Fury was already moving away, his scent mingling with others even as the soldiers moved away, careful to keep their distance from him.

Damn him.

Logan unfolded his arms, but refused to hold them out blindly as he stepped forward slowly, then again. Fury had moved downwind, and Logan furrowed his brow, focusing on his scent as he stepped forward again—and tripped down the curb.

He staggered, throwing out a hand. He fingers smacked against a car door, the metal of his bones tolling like a dull bell as he reeled back, catching himself with his other hand before he face-planted it on the asphalt.

“So you’re not joking about the eyes,” Fury stated, drawing closer again.

“Do I look like I’m joking?” Logan snarled, straightening.

“You were lying about the hearing.”

“Fall burst my eardrums. I healed.”

“Your eyes look fine.”

“Doesn’t mean crap.” Could be brain damage, nerve damage, or something that Fury couldn’t see still healing in there.

“How long, then?”

A last hitch of breath. Logan swallowed thickly. “Soon enough.”

Fury was silent—still watching him. Logan heard him shift, flick a lighter, and light up a new cigar before taking a long draw from it.

Why did people think they could stare just because he couldn’t glare back at them?

Logan grimaced, bringing a hand up to his jaw. He reached in his mouth, grabbing one of his front teeth and slowly twisting it. Hurt like hell, but it felt better once it was back in place. He spat out a stream of blood and rubbed his eyes. Grey was lighter—a good sign.

“I’ll go lay low and get outta your hair, then.”

“Not so fast, Logan.”

Logan glowered. “What? You want a ‘thank you’?”

A blurred shape. Light, dark. Lots of grey, and a spot of glowing embers. The end of Fury’s cigar.

He was still just a big, blobby blur, but it was a start.

Fury took the cigar from his mouth, frowning.

“What you lookin’ at?”

Fury put his cigar back in his mouth and started forward. “I want a drink. You’re paying.”

“Yer crazy,” Logan said, rubbing his head and grimacing at a lance of pain from his neck to his temples. “I . . . I ain’t buyin’you a drink.”

“At the moment you are near the top of our red alert list. I can’t just let you walk away.”

“So you’re chargin’ fees in beer? Nice.” He rubbed his eyes again, opening them again to light. Sure, it was still plenty blurry, but it was growing clearer by the second.

Fury glanced at him, not a trace of humor in his expression. Logan had never thought that he could be so glad to see his ugly mug.

“We need to talk.”

Logan snorted at that, but followed, taking the hem of his plaid shirt and wiping blood from his face.

Fury just walked across the street to a small diner, and the waitress behind the counter gave them a startled look.

Fury sat down in a booth, his back to the wall, and Logan begrudgingly sat across from him, his back to the door.

“C-can I get something for you?” the waitress asked, glancing between the two of them. Her eyes lingered on Logan’s face, and he wondered how much blood was still smeared there. He was starting to feel sticky as it dried.

“A beer.”

“Make that two,” Logan said, his voice still raspy. He coughed, tasting blood. “Nah—better make it three.” The waitress left, and Logan glowered at Fury. The colonel didn’t seem pressured; he looked out the window, watching the cars drive pass by as they waited.

What was he up to?

The lady came back with the beers, leaving them there and practically fleeing after one last pale-faced glance at Logan.

Logan snorted, grabbing one of the beers and popping off the cap before tipping it back. He pooled it in his mouth, the chill and flavor sending new spikes of agony from the gaps of his missing teeth, then swallowed, washing the taste of his own blood down.

He glanced at Fury, but said nothing. If the clown wanted to talk, he was gonna have to start it.

Fortunately, he didn’t have to wait long.

“She threw you out the window.”

Logan bristled. “She’s a reality warper. Wasn’t nuthin’ I could do about it.”

“I believe you. But I also know that you didn’t walk in through the front door, Logan.”

“Wouldn’t’a let me see her, if I had.” Logan put his elbows on the table, rubbing his eyes.

“What happened?”

“Crazy ***** zapped away the leader of the X-Men, didn’t ya hear?”

“I told you to keep low, Logan.”

Logan grunted. He took another long drink, enjoying the brief buzz. Alcohol always got to him better when his healing factor was busy elsewhere. He just wished it would hurry up and get rid of the headache. He rubbed his head.

“Doesn’t matter anyway. She doesn’t know.”

“Doesn’t know what?”

“Where Storm got to.”

Fury waited. Logan took another long swig, draining the last of the first beer. The world spun, and he threw out a hand, catching his balance on the seat before the buzz began to pass. An odd wave of distant giddiness swept over him.

Drunk. He loved the feeling—distant, cloudy, numb.

But the brief moment passed as his healing factor adjusted, and he dropped the beer bottle on the table, completely sober and feeling his insides crawling back together. Not a comfortable feeling, even if it didn’t hurt like hell. He grabbed the second one, flicking off the top.

Fury was still waiting.

“Kid’s as scared as you are, Fury; she just ain’t ready to admit it. All upset about Ms. Marvel’s powers gettin’ sucked away, but at the same time her own powers got away from her. Not willin’ to admit it, but she ain’t got a clue what she did.”

He tipped his head back, draining half the next bottle in one go. He’d smelled it on her—fear and uncertainty. She was hiding it behind anger—hiding it as she blamed Rogue’s lack of control, when that was all that was on her own mind.

Where did that leave Storm? Damn it if he knew.

Logan wiped his mouth and glared at Fury. The hallucinations from getting dropped on his head were gone, and despite the lingering pain of healing the beer had brought the world into sharp focus.

“If I were you, I’d be worried about her. No tellin’ what a kid that powerful might do given the wrong circumstances.”

Fury sat back, frowning around his cigar.

“Now what about you? Thought I’d had ta take down some of your guys before you let me go.”

Fury let out a large cloud of smoke. “To be frank, I’d rather have to deal with you than an untrained, frightened, confused, leaderless rabble of mutants on my hands.”

“I ain’t a leader.”

The colonel cocked an eyebrow. “Call it what you want. I want you and your team to leave the Scarlet Witch to me.”

“Like hell—“

“You leave her to me, Logan, and I’ll let you keep your soul-sucking student instead of having SHIELD haul her here to find out what she did to Carol.”

“Are you threatening me, Fury?”

“I’m cutting you a deal. Are you in?”

Logan took another drink. “So. Beast’s outta commission, our leader’s dead or gone, and you want me to be happy with a truce?”

“I don’t care how you feel about it. But I don’t want a mutant riot on my hands, and you’re smart enough to know that you’re not in a position to make more enemies right now.”

And he knew it, dammit.

Logan took another drink, distancing himself for another moment. The cars on the other side of the glass sounded miles away, but he could hear Nick Fury’s heartbeat pounding steadily across the table. Logan grimaced, rubbing his forehead.

“Sarge—”

“What?”

“Colonel. Whatever. Hell, does it look like I care? Listen, Nick—” A lance shot through his brain between his eyes and he flinched despite himself. “Goddamn it—”

Blood.

He sprinted up the wooden stairs, grabbing a hold of the doorframe as he threw open the door to the dark room.

No.

Thick, cloying blood filled his senses. Hers.

No. Nonononono.

The dim light from the moon touched her feet, lighting her sprawled figure and turning the blood on the floor around her to black silver.

NO!

“—gan?”

He fell down next to her, but he couldn’t touch her. He couldn’t bring himself to touch her—

“Logan!”

Logan looked up sharply, panting. Colonel Fury was watching him, unreadable as ever.

Oh God.

What the hell had that been?

He swallowed with difficulty, letting go of his shirt he’d clutched over his heart as the staggering pain faded, leaving an empty echo of pain and the scent of blood and something painfully familiar.

A flower?

“What?” Logan bit off, his voice harsh.

“What the hell was that?” Fury asked.

Hell if I know.

The war nightmares were one thing—he could deal with that sort of horror. It was his life. Didn’t like having them when he was awake, but he could deal with them.

This, though . . . .

“I just got tossed out of a 20-story window, Fury! I’m healin,’ that’s what I’m doin’.” That’s right. His lungs were still healing—he could feel the familiar burn. Probably bruised his heart, too. Major case of whiplash. He stood. “We—we done?”

“I don’t want to see you around here again, Logan. Or any of your X-Men.”

“Whatever.” He nodded at Fury’s untouched beer. “You gonna drink that?”

Fury shook his head. “I don’t drink on duty.” Not even a hint of a smirk. Bastard. But Logan couldn’t get himself to really care.

He snagged the beer and turned, rubbing his chest absently. “You’re the government guy. Put it on your tab, or whatever the hell.”

The door swung shut behind him, and Nick Fury sat back, frowning as he watched him go.

---------------------------------------------
 
-----------------------------------------------------------

Then:

Wolverine was standing in the kitchen doorway for a good four minutes before Heather noticed he was there.

She was stirring a large pot on the stove absently, looking out the window at the rain and biting her lip. She adjusted her glasses and sighed.

She smelled worried. It made Wolverine edgy. What was she worried about? She didn’t smell panicked, but something was bothering her.

Was there something out there? He hadn’t smelled anything, but what if she was waiting for it—waiting, like Wolverine waited for the soldiers that hunted him. They were out there, somewhere. Hunting.

Maybe she was being hunted, too.

Wolverine hunched his shoulders slightly, his hands curling into fists.

But where was her weapon—the gun? If she was worried, why wasn’t she ready to fight? And where was the other human—the male one. What was it that they had called him? A name.

He couldn’t remember. He hadn’t figured it mattered, but now it bothered him. For some reason, it was important.

A name. Something to separate him from other men, something that was his, like his scent, his appearance.

Like the lady—she had a name. Heather.

The kid had a name, too, though Wolverine tilted his head to the side, as he tried to think of it. It’s not like he had a reason to remember it. He was a kid, and he smelled—sounded, looked—different enough from everything in the woods that he was himself, embodied by everything that made him what he was. Next to that, why did anyone need names? Why would Wolverine care what it was?

But it was important anyway.

He frowned.

That’s right. Gambit. But that wasn’t even his real name, was it? Something else. Something . . . girly.

Girly?

That’s right. There were girl names, and guy names.

Why?

Who knew?

He couldn’t remember the kid’s real name, dammit.

He couldn’t remember.

But Heather had just used it, in the room. She’d been talking about the kid, used his name.

He should remember.

God, he should be able to remember.

He took a step back, bumping against the wall, and he leaned against it. His hand was shaking, and his throat tight.

He couldn’t remember.

But it was just a name. He could go ask Heather, or even the kid. It didn’t matter anyway.

But for some reason, forgetting made him feel sick, and he looked out the window at the rain, searching for lights, for the chance of his hunters drawing close.

He felt like they were right behind him, right over his shoulder, and he could never turn fast enough to see them.

Surrounded by the stink of people, everywhere.

He looked down. He’d popped his claws in one hand without thinking, and now turned back to the hall, his nose flaring as he searched for danger—anything that he could fight, to stop the pressure building around him, suffocating him.

He needed to remember.

“Oh! Hi.”

Wolverine looked up sharply, his claws hand jerking upwards instinctively as he saw Heather watching him—looking right at him, again. Her direct gaze made the hair on the nape of his neck rise, and he hunched his shoulders, fighting a wave of dizziness as adrenaline swept through his overtaxed system.

How long had it been since he’d eaten? Days? Too long for the damage he’d taken . . . .

Heather looked surprised herself, and looked away. It made Wolverine relax a hair, but he didn’t move. She cleared her throat, quickening her stirring of the stew for a minute. “You were in there a long time. Must feel nice. Remy said he hadn’t bathed in weeks.” She was watching him sideways and trying not to look like she was staring.

The grip in his chest relaxed, so quickly that Wolverine almost gasped.

That was it. He remembered now. The kid’s name. Remy.

French, not girly.

French? The word called forward a surge of images, of colors, of lights—all a confused, muddled mess that meant nothing, but demanding to be heard. Loud, building pressure in his head, shouting.

None of it made any sense. Like a dream—a nightmare, crowding in around him, blinding him with the weight of something just out of reach.

Too heavy. Too loud. Too much. It was choking him, stifling him.

He pushed it aside—pushed it all aside. There was too much to think, so he let it all go.

So much easier to think nothing.

He shook his head slightly, withdrawing his claws with a snakt that had Heather eying him again with wary but innocent curiosity.

He drew in a slow, deep breath to cover his reaction, though something inside him laughed.

Heather put down the spoon, moving away from the stove as she went over to a packed cupboard and began searching through it for the salt. “You just checked on him?” she said. He didn’t answer after a moment, so she glanced back at him and just nodded. “Yeah. I did a few minutes ago too. Just sleeping now, isn’t he?” She hesitated. “I gave him some painkillers. He’s going to have a killer headache when he wakes up anyway.”

He’d smelled that on his breath. He didn’t like it, but the kid didn’t seem worse off than before. If he took a turn for the worst Wolverine’d kill the lady, and that’d be that.

For some reason, though, he didn’t want to.

Just a name, Wolverine. You forgot a name and nearly hyperventilated.

He tried to ignore it, but the tightness in his lungs returned, if not so strongly as before. He rubbed his chest absently.

Hunger?

No, you stupid bastard. You know what hunger feels like.

Heather. Remy, or Gambit. Why two names?

What about his name?

Wolverine.

‘Wolverine—dat’s an animal, you know dat? You—you a man.’

Kid had said that. But Heather—heather was a plant.

It was?

Not any plant he ever remembered.

He ran into another dead end, and reared back mentally.

Was heather a plant?

Yes. He remembered.

A tree? No—something else. Flowers? Maybe.

He couldn’t remember.

Not important, smartass.

He shook his head, breathing deep again.

One thought at a time.

Wolverine—dat’s an animal.

Animal. Not a man. But he was a man.

Wolverine wasn’t a man’s name, then?

Then what was his name? Did he even have one?

He shut his eyes, shaking his head. The wall behind his back supported him.

Light-headed. Needed food. Needed water.

Those were easy things. Things he could get.

He looked up, fixing his sight on the pot Heather had left as she sorted through a counter to the side.

Something cooking. He’d recognized the scent of meat, but there was something more—something much more.

His feet carried him automatically towards the pot on the stove. He sniffed at it, swallowing a groan at the smell.

He reached for the lid, only to be stopped as Heather put a hand out, warding him off. He stepped back sharply away from her reach. “No you don’t.” Wolverine bared his teeth and her expression faltered for a second before she drew herself up, glaring. “Listen, buddy. I’m not going to be pushed around in my own house—cabin. Whatever. I don’t know who you think you are, but if you aren’t going to talk then at least you’re going to listen.” Wolverine actually took a step back, uncertain at her tone. She was angry, but didn’t smell angry. More . . . indignant. Demanding. Alpha-female, demanding to be obeyed. He didn’t like it, but uncertainty overruled.

Had he done something . . . wrong?

Heather nodded as he pulled back. “Good. Now go get some bowls for us from the cupboard. That one, right there. There you go. Spoons are in the drawer to the right.”

Why?

Because that was how it was supposed to be.

It’s what men did.

He was still uncertain, but willing to comply for now.

Wolverine glanced back, then padded over carefully, his bare feet silent on the cold wood floor. He could feel Heather’s eyes on his back; he didn’t like it. But it wasn’t like the eyes of the soldiers—it didn’t stir up the usual hate, the fury. Made his back itch, made him want her to shut her eyes, or look somewhere else—anywhere else.

He retrieved the bowls and spoons—though the bowls had been on a higher shelf, and he’d had to stretch to get them. He’d almost sent the whole stack of bowls onto the floor, and only quick reflexes had kept it from happening. He set them on the table, looking at Heather again, trying to ignore the pain in his gut. He licked his lips, stepping back a wary distance.

She wasn’t watching him anymore, but was stirring the thick stew in the pot that he could see bubbling. His eyes drifted across the food, then on the lady.

She glanced back as she turned off the stove and smiled slightly. “Thank you.”

The words made him feel a little funny. They were good.

He frowned deeply, trying to figure out how that worked.

Heather brought the soup over and dished a healthy portion into each. She sat down, and Wolverine paused a moment before grabbing a chair and mirroring her action. The chair groaned slightly under his weight.

There was nothing he wanted more than to bury his face in the bowl, but he forced himself still, still watching Heather as she closed her eyes.

“Lord, we thank thee for this food, for our safety and health,” she said. Wolverine frowned at her, unmoving, uncertain. “We ask thee to watch over James, and to help Remy to wake up soon and be well. In thy Son’s name, Amen.”

She opened her eyes and picked up her spoon. Wolverine followed her example and picked up the spoon, holding it awkwardly in his fist before ducking his head close to the bowl and digging his spoon in eagerly to catch the first bite.

God, the taste. It was almost enough to make him pause despite his starvation—made him want to sit back and groan with pleasure. As it was, he stopped, shutting his eyes as he was almost overwhelmed by it.

God. Oh, God.

It made chocolate and white bread, cheap steak and beer at a bar in the middle of nowhere taste like dirt. Made fresh hot red meat taste cold and bland.

It burned his tongue, but healing took care of the pain as fast as he acknowledged it. Prepared now for the sensory overload, he dug in eagerly. His bowl was empty in seconds.

He looked up, wiping his arm across his mouth and looking up, panting. The bowl’s contents had seemed a mere pittance—not even a full hare. And he couldn’t remember not being starving: not since before fighting the men. How many days ago had that been? It seemed impossibly far away. Impossibly long ago.

His bones still ached from phantoms of pain. Not physical—but he could remember it. Remember getting his guts and flesh blown to hell, seeing the cold metal beneath his skin. Made him sick to think about it. Made him cold, even while the stew in his stomach still burned, trying to warm him from the inside in vain.

He stopped a shiver, glaring unseeingly at his empty bowl.

“More?” Heather asked.

He looked up sharply from his hunched position at the end of the table; he’d almost forgotten where he was. But he quickly pushed his bowl forward.

The memories didn’t make him sick enough to lose his appetite, that was for sure. They’d go away—fade away, like wounds healed over. Even the memory of the pain would leave. It didn’t matter, in the end.

He snarfed down the bowl of stew just as fast—though this time cautiously reaching out and trying a slice of bread with it. Thunder pealed above the house.

He bent down, licking the last of the juice from the edge of the bowl before looking up. Heather was sitting with her spoon unlifted in her bowl, watching him openly with round eyes behind her glasses. Without waiting for him to ask, she ladled his bowl full again.

He attacked this one slower, but with a grim seriousness that Heather noted with interest. She took a bite, watching him.

“You’re even hungrier than Gambit. Is that . . . because of your healing?”

Wolverine glanced at her, then grabbed another piece of bread and continued eating without answering.

Four more bowls later and a loaf of bread, and he was done.

He polished off the final bowl, wiping around his last scrap of bread in the dish to get every last drop of the stew. He swallowed it and licked his lips. He wanted to say something, to say . . . .

Oh, yeah.

“Thanks,” he said roughly, wiping an arm across his face.

Heather looked surprised, but recovered quickly. “You’re welcome,” she said with smile.

Wolverine looked down at his hands. They were clean, warm. No blood and dirt around his fingernails, ground into the lines of his palm. Two of his fingernails were half-grown stumps, and he frowned.

Still growing back.

He couldn’t remember how he lost them exactly, though.

“Well,” Heather said. “I guess there’s nothing left to do but clean up and head to bed.” She stood, gathering her dishes. She looked at him, holding out a hand towards his bowl. “You finished?”

Wolverine looked up at her and nodded, piling his plate, bowl, and cup and standing with them. He looked at her expectantly, waiting to continue to follow her example.

Heather smiled at the strange man, who continued to avoid looking her in the eyes. Like a shy five-year-old. “Well, then. Okay. We’ll just wash them over here. You can dry.” He copied her in putting his dishes next to the sink, and she handed him a towel. “Just stack them up there when they’re dry, okay?”

Wolverine did as he was told. He was careful at first—the dishes were slick, and the touch of them strange in his hands—but after a minute he turned his attention to the woman.

She was watching him again. Had hardly stopped. She had smelled nervous whenever he’d looked at her so far, so he kept his eyes down, studying her nonetheless.

The scent of fear had faded, now replaced almost completely by intrigue and . . . amusement? Did she think something was funny?

“So, are you going to say anything?”

Wolverine glanced up at her.

“It’s just weird, you know. I don’t even know your name.” At his expression, she backtracked. “Okay, Wolverine. But that’s not a name.”

So the kid had said. So he had thought.

Wolverine looked back down.

“Remy—he wouldn’t say much. He’s—he’s as careful as you. Almost,” she said, with a soft chuckle. “He’s been claiming that he’s French Canadian. I think your silence works better.”

Wolverine didn’t react to that. She cleared her throat.

“So, what’s the deal? He your son?”

Wolverine raised an eyebrow, looking at her sideways as if she’d popped a brain stitch or two.

“Okay. I’ll take that as a no. Where are you from, then?”

A pause. “. . . . dunno,” he murmured. He stacked the last dish and dried off his hands, dropping the dishtowel next to the sink. Heather leaned forward slightly to catch the soft mumble.

“You don’t remember?” Heather asked, rinsing her hands before drying them as well.

Wolverine paused, tensing at that, but then shrugged with forced nonchalance. Lady was talking too much. What’d she want from him? His life’s story?

Didn’t matter. ‘sides, why did she need to know?

“How did you two end up out here?” Wolverine looked at her. “I mean, both of you, together—both mutants—”

Wolverine felt the hair raise on the back of his neck. His eyes widened, and his fists clenched as he looked at her sharply. “Mutant?” he repeated sharply.

Heather frowned at his reaction. “Yes. You know—people like you and Remy. Your healing, his eyes. James works with people like you.”

He waited, but she didn’t volunteer anything more.

He swallowed.

It was just a word. Just a word.

But for some reason it turned his blood to ice, made his comfortably-stuffed stomach grow tight, made his claws itch in his forearms.

He turned to look at the rain pattering on the window, trying to calm the tightness building up in his chest.

What did it all mean?

TBC . . . .
 
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LOL, they created a new forum called Fandom Come a short while back and dumped all the creative stuff in there. I am not all that happy about it because it's not that obvious -- to me anyhow -- that that is what it is for. Fandom is not a word I am that familair with. I only know it's for creative stuff because my own fanfic thread was moved here also. I get the same amount of hits so I guess everyone else is smarter than me on that score. :p

These newest chaps are good as always though I always have to reorient myself with the time switches. I am always happy when you update us on the Remy sections, which of course, I love best. ;)

EDIT: JUst saw your other thread -- Even tho you didn't see your story here, I can vouch for the fact that it was visable to the rest of us all along. :) I still saw it every time I updated my own. :up:
 
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Gah! Sorry, guys--I've been out of town quite a bit for various vacations this summer, so I haven't been around much at all.

Good news, though, on story updates.

I've been writing whole lot over the past few months, despite the large gaps between chapters. The problem is that I wasn't writing chronologically, but just anything that came to mind. That means at the beginning of this summer when I decided to try and start posting more regularly, I found myself confronted by something even more daunting than a blank page--over 50,000 words of unedited, unorganized text.

I managed to pull the last chapter together pretty fast, but have been working on the larger picture since. Finally, recently it has finally started taking shape again. Which means that even if I'm not posting every day, I'm hoping to get posting a bit more often, at least. :)

Anyway, the point is to bump this thread and to tell everyone that the next chapter should be out within the next couple days. :)
 
Sounds good to me. :D If I don't reply right away it's because I am leaving sunday for Ohio, gonner ride me some roller coasters! Yippie!
 
All right! Thanks for your patience, everyone. Here we go--and another long chapter for your goodness. :)

But first, I’ve had a couple people ask if the new Wolverine movie is going to affect The Meaning of Pain in any way, and I’m going to say right now—no. Absolutely not. Putting aside the fact that I was completely unimpressed by XO: WV from plot to character portrayal (I'm a purist by birth), it just wouldn’t fit in with how my story is going and how I’ve been planning on steering it. So I’m completely ignoring it, and any similarities at this point are completely coincidental (Or it could be because we may be drawing from the same source material. Either way. ;) ).

Enjoy!

---------------------------------------

Chapter 34: Going Rogue

---------------------------------------

Now:

Logan was bristling as he roared into the driveway. He got off his bike stiffly and cracked his neck, glaring at the front of the X-mansion.

He parked his motorcycle in the garage and moved towards the mansion, but then stopped on the sidewalk. He pulled out a bent and smashed cigar and lit up, breathing in deep as he moved forward again—trying to ignore the burning scent of the blood that had soaked through the cigar’s wrapping.

First the beating this morning, and then a toss out a window, and the day wasn’t even over yet. It was enough to leave any man dead a couple times over, and tax even his healing factor.

He rubbed his head. He couldn’t remember the last time he had had a headache—but this one felt like it had moved in to stay.

Nothing sounded better right now than a day of drinking followed by a week of uninterrupted sleep. Forget things for a little bit, let the aching in his bones fade from memory.

But he had to find Storm. Sure, the Elf got along good with the kids, but Logan’d been able to keep to the background, more or less. Let Storm be the authority around here.

But now what?

He’d never missed the professor so much. Five minutes on Cerebro and they’d be on their way to pick Storm up right now.

If she’s even around to find.

Dead? Or just vanished? Blinked into the middle of nowhere at the thought of a crazy broad?

Did it matter one way or another? Semantics meant nothing. Gone for good? The end was the same—good as dead, no matter whether it was intentional or not.

He’d keep looking, but there were more immediate problems. Beast and Rogue, to name two.

Logan took hold of the doorknob and pushed into the entry hall.

“Logan!”

Think of the devil.

Logan turned, looking up to the stairs just as Rogue lifted off the second floor and flew down. She landed, catching him in a hug and lifting him right off the ground, his feet dangling inches from the ground. He grunted, almost losing his cigar in the surprise that came after the quickly-stifled panic at the restraint. “Where have you been all this time, you dog?”

Ah, Hell.

She dropped him and held him back, looking at him with a broad smile. “After you disappeared from ‘Nam I wondered if you’d finally gone underground for good, until this . . . .” She jabbed him in the shoulder, right in the X-Insignia of his newly glass-torn leather jacket (the x-insignia’d been Storm’s idea, after his old one’d been shredded by that Bloodscream guy). “Who’d have thought that you’d end up as a superhero? An X-Man.” She lifted her eyebrows, getting a good look at his appearance. No doubt he looked scuffed up good, no matter that he’d healed up pretty well at this point. He could feel the itch of a fading scar the length of his face from crashing through the window. “I see some things never change. What the hell happened to you?”

‘Nam?

Blood, dripping off leaves like black rain, soaking. Boys—just boys—silent: they’d long since stopped screaming, though he could hear one gasping his life away, his legs blasted off and chest shredded. He’d be dead in minutes . . . . life dripping away drop by drop by drop . . . .

“Logan?”

His breath caught, and he looked up at her sharply, panting. He barely kept himself from leaping forward, grabbing her by the shoulders, and shaking her until he got everything she knew about him.

She remembered him. Remembered him from before.

He pulled his hand down from his forehead, frowning at her.

She spoke like she knew well, in fact—like a friend. Her eyes were bright, but she carried herself differently. Her hips more forward, her chin higher—she had a confidence that Rogue didn’t usually have: a swagger . . . experience. Despite her light words and tone, there was something in her eyes as she looked around, looked at him. Calculating. Cautious. Logan’d bet that if he could get inside her head he’d see she’d analyzed this place top to bottom already, and him along with it.

Beyond paranoid. Like him. This lady was good—probably the only reason she was alive. Or had kept her alive.

Well, being invulnerable probably helped, too. Even better than a healing factor, he’d bet.

“Logan, what is it?” At his reaction her voice had become more cautious—wary.

He hunched his shoulders, his eyes narrow. “Rogue?”

“What?” she answered, frowning at him—analyzing him again. He didn’t think he’d ever seen that expression on Rogue’s face. It wasn’t her expression.

Logan stepped back, giving himself some distance, still watching her warily. “Listen, you shouldn’t be up.”

“I don’t know what happened, short-stuff, but I’m fine. A lot has changed since Lubyanka.”

A shot of pain through his skull. He pushed it aside, managing not to wince. What the hell?

Short-stuff?

“Yeah, Ms. Marvel ‘n all,” Logan murmured, taking her arm. She didn’t move at first, until she took a step forward. Logan wasn’t sure if he could’ve gotten her to move if she hadn’t allowed him to.

She rolled her eyes. “All right, it’s bad, but it could be worse. It’s not like you can talk, Wolverine.” She reached out, grabbing his sideburn and giving a tug.

It wasn’t painful in the slightest, but Logan pulled back with a snarl, knocking her hand down sharply. “Hands off, lady!” At least she was wearing Rogue’s gloves. Still, the sharp movement had sent him into fight mode. His claws had come half into his hands before he’d been able to stop them, but at least they hadn’t broken through his skin. He forced them back into his forearms, letting the dark bruises in his hands instantly heal over.

His heart was pounding, red itching into his vision as his mind screamed at him to do something—fight or flight. Demand answers, or somehow just fix her—put Rogue right.

She was a stranger—a dangerous one. Put her in her place. Watch her, be ready for anything.

No! This was Rogue.He had to . . . had to—

The air was cold—turning his breath to frost, even inside the truck. He glanced over tensely at his passenger, frowning around his cigar.

Rogue turned at looked at him—youthful caution out-weighted by her southern sass.

“You know, you really should put your seatbelt on . . . .”

. . . . .

. . .

Logan jerked back sharply, a hand flying to his head as he staggered back, catching the wall. What the hell was happening?

Inside of his skull was aching, itching, crawling—like his brain had been infested by fire ants.

Brain damage—is that it?

No time for this. No time, dammit. He had to focus—he had to think. This was about Rogue, not him. He’d heal—he’d deal. It didn’t matter.

Rogue had actually taken flight in alarm at his reaction, hovering just out of his reach as she stared at him.

“Logan, what’s—?”

He unclenched his hands, forcing himself to relax a hair, and pushing back the rising clamor crushing him in his own skull, forcing back the chaos. He breathed in tightly. “You’re not Ms. Marvel. You’re Rogue. A mutant. Ya came with us to get Hank McCoy and ended up absorbing Ms. Marvel—taking her powers, and a good deal of her memories.” Rogue was staring at him, but she’d drifted back to the floor—a good thing. He grimaced at another bolt of pain, pressing against his right temple. “I talked ta the Scarlet Witch, she said somethin’ went wrong. Hell if I know what. But you’re Rogue, an’ I don’t care who’s in there with ya—you gotta wake up and take control. You’ve got the experience. Now wake up!”

The last word was half-snarled, and Logan stood tensely, his shoulders hunched.

She frowned—but it was no longer at him. She’d landed and now turned in a slow circle, looking around the hallway, and Logan wondered if she’d even heard him.

Rogue shook her head. A hand went up to her face and she inhaled softly. “God, Logan,” she whispered.

There she was. That was her vulnerability, her southern innocence, her confusion.

Was this what it’d been like when she’d absorbed him for the first time? Jean’d said Rogue took on some of his characteristics, but had it been this bad?

Had she actually thought she was him?

The thought made his stomach turn.

He knew she’d felt some of his memories, even his personality, and would give anything to take that away from her for good.


But what else had she remembered? What else had he felt?

The pain? The bloodwrath? The hate?

The memories?

He stepped forward cautiously. “You back, darlin’?”

“Ah never went anywhere,” Rogue said, her voice shaking. “Ah—ah’ve been awake. Ah am awake. ‘s just—” She shut her eyes, rubbing them with the palms of her hands. “Ah’m Rogue. Marie. Born in,” she paused, “Missouri. Ah’m one of the X-Men.” She opened her eyes, looking at him. She was pale.

“So . . . you all right, then?” Stupid question. Any fool could tell that she wasn’t all right, and Logan could smell her. She smelled terrified, confused—and still smelled off, though it was hard to pinpoint how.

“Ah . . . ah’m . . . no, ah’m not okay. Logan, I can’t remember. ‘s’like . . . memories. They’re all confused,” she admitted. “When I try to think what I did yesterday it’s like . . .’s like . . . ah remember two lives, two thoughts—all me. Not like a shadow. It’s me—mine, Logan. And when I look at you, I—I remember—”

I remember—

She cut off, turning away sharply. “All right. Okay. Listen, I’m going out. Ah—I can’t think like this . . . .” She stepped towards the door, but Logan caught her arm.

“What do you remember?” he demanded, his voice rough. Blood and screams danced just beyond the grasp of memory, shadowing his thoughts, but slipping out of reach.

He hadn’t been going to ask. He wasn’t going to. But having answers—so close, right there . . . it felt like being thrown out of a 20th story window all over again, hanging there just before beginning to fall.

Still falling . . . .

“D-don’t ask me,” Rogue whispered. “Logan, ah . . . ah gotta go. My head . . . ah can’t think. There’s too much. Ah can’t . . . .” Her voice cracked and she looked, putting a hand over her eyes. “Oh my God . . . .” she breathed, but in Ms. Marvel’s accent.

“Ya know I can’t let you go. Not when yer like this.”

Rogue gave a choked laugh. “You might be able to stop me, Wolvie, but it’d be one hell of a fight.” She looked back at him. “Ah gotta get outta here,” she whispered. “Somewhere—somewhere away.” She pried his fingers from her arm—and though he let her, the strength he felt in her fingers said she’d probably be able to throw him through a few walls if he had refused to let her go.

Rogue smiled, though it was tense and didn’t reach her eyes—again, not her expression. It was eerie. “I’m grown up now, Logan,” she said softly. The smile faded, and suddenly she looked years older as her eyes traced the lines of his face. She reached forward, but stopped short of brushing his face before pulling back. “Thanks for watching out for me,” she whispered.

Her eyes dropped, and she turned away. “Ah . . . ah have to go,” Rogue whispered, sounding close to horrified tears.

What was he supposed to do?

“Rogue.” She turned as he called her name, looking up at him with trusting eyes—always trusting, even when he wasn’t sure who was looking back at him. He swallowed thickly. “What if ya forget? Fly off and don’t remember ta come back?”

Rogue blinked at him, then reached into her jeans pocket. “Got mah phone,” she said, still softly. “Call me. I’ll come. I—Carol—Ms. Marvel’d come too.”

“Rogue—”

“I’m not a child, Logan,” she said coolly, then stopped herself, her eyes dropping. “Ah’ll be back.”

She stepped away from him.

And there was no way he could stop her.

Her scent burned his nose—familiar mixed with unfamiliar—trust with mistrust—friend with stranger. He didn’t like it.

Was she even vulnerable to adamantium? If she went crazy, had to be put down, could she even be stopped?

No.

Stop thinking.

She was still watching him, her eyes wide, her lips pressed together—terrified, yet determined.

There was no fighting this. This was something that she had to figure out on her own.

More than anything, he could understand that.

Logan nodded. “Guess you can take a car—” he said grudgingly. But Rogue had already opened the door, and with a last glance back at him, had taken right into the sky and vanished. “—or not.” He stepped out, looking up into the sky in search of her. He saw a small figure blur to the south—might have been Rogue. Mighta also been a bird, a fly, or nothing at all.

Just like that, she was gone, leaving him feeling like he’d been sucker-punched.

He leaned back against the doorframe, aching down to his bones and feeling as old as he ever could remember feeling.

---------------------------------------------------------------------

Least Beast’s doin’ better. He woke up just before lunch time, I walked in on him hooking himself up to an IV, calling a friend named Dr. Reyes or somethin’ ta come give him a more permanent cast for his leg. Apparently she’s a mutant doctor who’s come around a few times to patch people up. Beast tried asking me where I learned how ta fix him up. Didn’t have an answer for him.

Don’t have an answer for anyone.

---------------------------------------------------------------
 
Logan spent the afternoon locked in his room. The kids had a day off, and he could hear them moving around downstairs. Their voices were softer—the laughter quickly stifled in the heavy air. Questioning. Logan didn’t have any answers.

He made his calls. It’d been years since he’d cut his official ties, but he still had friends with connections, and people with eyes and ears beyond the media or maybe even Fury. Nothing.

He tossed the phone away, done trying for now.

Finally, he sat in relative silence, listening to the ghostly echoes of the distant children as he stared at the wall, waiting.

Waiting.

Waiting.

. . . .

Nothing.

His head was beginning to ache in earnest again, and his stomach was gnawing grumpily at his backbone.

With a weary sigh, he reached down pulling out his journal from where it was tucked between the mattresses and pulled the pen from between the well-wrinkled pages.

He paged to the back of the slowly-filling pages, then let it fall open. A short list, written in a hand even coarser than his usual, looked flatly back at him.

Tank, Champagne, Cement Walls

Drowning

Alkali Lake?

STRYKER

The list had been the first thing he’d actually written in this damn journal, when Xavier had first given it to him, and before he’d forgotten it after Alkali Lake. Since then, the list had grown.

Bloodscream, and added later, off to the side: French?

France

Madripoor

Patch?

That had been the beginning, hadn’t it? Bloodscream, and suddenly the nightmares he had become almost familiar with had changed. The list continued.

Ninjas??

Trenches, gas

Seriously.

He readied the pen, then carefully added to the page.

Ms. Marvel—‘Nam, Lubyanka

Guerrilla warfare

He hovered, closing his eyes—trying to remember, but his brain returned nothing but a grey fog over a river of confusion: he couldn’t think.

Nothing but nothing.

He opened his eyes, frowning at the list, then closed the journal carefully and stuffed it back in its place, not even close to satisfied. He rubbed his eyes, standing up and heading for the door and dinner.

Kylee was pouting at the end of the kitchen counter when Logan came in to the dining room. He hadn’t eaten a bite all day, and what with the healing he’d had to do, he felt hungry enough to eat a horse.

He slumped down heavily next to Kylee, loading his plate up with spaghetti and smothering it with sauce before glancing over at her dully. She’d hardly looked up, and was stirring together her peas and spaghetti morosely. No usual grin, tackle, or even a hint of a smile.

He glanced over her with a raised eyebrow, but she didn’t look at him, and just gave a soft sniff into her plate.

Logan grunted softly and took a big bite of spaghetti.

He was too tired, too busy, too whatever to care. Why should he care? He rubbed his eyes again—the vision was still a bit blurry. He hoped it wouldn’t take too long until he got back to speed.

He dug into his food. First things first.

He was only interrupted when he heard an audible stir around the kitchen, and a whiff of a familiar scent. He looked up, swallowing a mouthful of half-chewed food.

Rogue walked into the kitchen. A hair of tension left Logan’s shoulders at the sight of her safe and present. She looked better—clear-eyed. She’d showered, and had done her hair and make-up, and walked in on dangerously-high high heels. Though she still wore a long-sleeved, dark-green shirt and gloves, they were form-fitting and left little to the imagination, compared to her usual conservative covering.

Her appearance was enough to pull him out of his head, and he watched her walk over.

Well, damn. When had the pale-faced, big-eyed, frightened kid on the side of the road become a woman?

Kitty followed in on her heels, looking distinctly uneasy. Kitty stopped at the door, turning to talk to Jubilee in quiet agitation.

Oh, yeah. Rogue roomed with Kitty. Wondered what was going on over there.

Whatever it was, Rogue had already dismissed it—Kitty being one of her best friends or not.

She saw him and smiled. It was a bit shaky, but it was there. “Hey, Logan.”

He looked up, meeting her eyes squarely. “Hey.”

She smelled wrong—tight, unmoving. Rogue might not be a teenager anymore, but she was still Rogue. Kid was passionate, and never smelled like this. Usually was a mix of impatience, excitement, frustration . . . but now, nothing. Like a bottle with the lid screwed on too tight.

Logan shifted, feeling uncomfortably on edge. Felt like he was sitting across from a stranger, and a dangerous one at that.

The Scarlet Witch’d said Ms. Marvel’s soul was missing—if you believed in such a thing. Had Rogue stolen that? Was it inside of her? How much of the person in front of him was Rogue, and how much was someone else entirely?

More importantly, how long was this going to last? All the staff that had been around after Rogue had absorbed him were gone or dead (what a pleasant thought that was), and Beast and ‘Crawler wouldn’t be any help. They hadn’t been around then.

He might have to talk to the Popsicle. They were an item still, weren’t they?

Rogue reached over, carefully taking some spaghetti and piece of toast from the center plate. She buttered the bread carefully with just a hint of butter, then began to eat.

Logan watched her. She usually pasted the butter on quite liberally, and the way she was eating now compared to how she usual did was almost absurdly cultured. He’d never seen someone turn their fork like that to cut her noodles, and she did it as if she’d been eating that way her whole life.

She took a few bites, and then looked at him, a spike of irritation slipping into scent. She put down her fork and looked at him, her eyes narrowed.

“Quit it,” Rogue said.

“What?”

“Watching me like I’m about to go crazy.”

Logan grunted. “You ain’t yourself. It shows.”

She looked away from him. “Ah know,” she said softly, picking up her fork again. She spoke quietly—her voice buried beneath the murmur of the room, but it was still just loud enough for Logan to hear, but no one else around them. Somehow, she knew exactly how loud she had to speak—softer than she usually spoke to him. “It’s never been like this, Logan.”

“Yeah?”

“Ah told you . . . every time ah touch someone, they’re in mah head. It’s not like a voice, though . . . it’s like . . . ah know them. Like, ah am them. For a split second, ah’m thinkin’ like they’re thinkin’—feelin’ what they’re feelin’. But right after it all starts to fade—more like a memory, and after a while even that goes away.”

The ache that had faded with the first bite of food had returned, and Logan had to clamp down on the temptation to take off right then—go get a beer or four until he could think straight. Until he could figure himself out first.

But Rogue needed him now.

He swallowed a wave of rage rising from nowhere—gritting it down, grinding it into powder and storing it for later. Taking a deep breath, he took a drink, formulating a proper response. “Not this time?” Short, but good enough.

Rogue rubbed her forehead. “No. I woke up in the med lab and didn’t know who I was, Logan. I was Carol, wondering how in the world I had ended up in a young girl’s body.”

“Carol?” Nick’d mentioned a Carol, but Logan hadn’t bothered pressing him about it.

He wondered if she realized how much her accent was switching. How differently her sentence structure came out. Eastern high-class mixed with southern belle. Experience with youth.

“Carol Danvers,” Rogue said, her voice still soft, though growing thick. “Ah good as killed her, didn’t ah, Logan? Ah stole her life away, memories an’ all. She’s here . . . just . . . right here.”

Logan didn’t have anything comforting to say to that, so he stayed silent, feeling like his stomach was still healing up inside of him. Maybe it was.

Rogue stopped, putting her face in her hands.

“God,” she breathed. “I don’t know what to do, Logan. She’s so . . . angry. Lost,” she whispered, with a tremor in her voice. “She wants out, ‘n the only thing keepin’ us both from freakin’ out is . . . .” She stopped, falling silent her elbows on the table and her face hidden. There was a lengthy moment, and she let out a long breath, lowering her hands and opening her eyes. She stared unseeingly at her plate.

“Where did you go?” Logan asked, his own voice soft.

Rogue lifted her fork, moving her vegetables around on her plate uselessly.

“Missouri,” she said. “I just flew by—wanted to see my mamma. But—well, ah guess they’d moved. Nobody was home, had a ‘For Sale’ sign up ‘n everythin’.”

She’d flown to Missouri and back, and still returned in time for dinner. Well, hell.

Logan took a deep breath. “We can find out where they went—”

“Doesn’t matter,” Rogue shrugged away. “This is my home now anyway.”

Silence.

“Ah also went to see Carol,” she admitted softly.

Logan looked up sharply. “What?” No doubt Fury or the Avengers or whoever the hell had her under enough security to make the President green with envy, especially after he’d come around.

“I had to. It’s—that’s me lying there, Logan. It was . . . it was so strange, to see my own face—unconscious. I’m not—Carol is not in there. Somehow—I took all of her. We’re both in here both of us, but both me. An’ . . . An’ ah don’t think she likes me very much,” she said, trying to smile and failing miserably. Her hand was shaking, and she put her fork down carefully, picking up her napkin and bringing it to her lips. “Ah don’t know what t’do. Jus’ . . . wait it out? Maybe this will go away, like it always has. But . . . if . . . .” she trailed off, not able to put to words the horrible possibility.

What if it’s permanent?

Two people in one body?

Rogue, and a stranger.

But damn it, Carol Danvers had known him. That’s what she’d done, just before Rogue had touched her—she’d called his name. She’d been surprised to see him, but she’d known him. Even through the haze from getting his face smacked clean into the asphalt, he remembered seeing the shock on her face as she recognized him.

And the way she’d greeted him in the entryway. Carol had, with all that nonsense about ‘short-stuff’ and the KGB. Didn’t like the sound of that. Black Ops, maybe. Anywhere between World War II and the 80’s. But Ms. Marvel hadn’t looked that old.

Hell, he wasn’t that old, was he?

Why not? Dreams and flashes of war and the trenches. There’d been a weapon’s truce on gas by World War II—and he could remember the gas. Remember seeing Bloodscream between the trenches. World War I, maybe earlier, unless he was finally just going crazy. Couldn’t trust anything anymore.

World War I . . . .

A gloved hand slipped over his, and he jerked back without thinking. He glowered at Rogue, but she looked unapologetic.

“You’re brooding.”

“’m thinking.”

“You look like you swallowed the kitchen knives, short-stuff, and one got caught in your throat,” she said, half-teasing as she tried to smile again.

Logan frowned at her.

Her expression faltered. “I guess I’m kinda freakin’ you out, aren’t ah?”

Logan grunted. “Not the words I woulda used.”

She looked away again. “Ah don’t know how to act. It’s just . . . When I saw you this mornin’, it was . . . I was so happy. Like I hadn’t seen you for years. I . . . Carol didn’t really think you’d died, ah guess, but thought maybe somebody’d gotten to you somehow. And she was right.” Her expression turned stony. “You think Nick had something to do with—”

“Nah,” Logan said, putting a hand up and surprising himself in the action. Never thought he’d be defending Nick Fury. “Probably knows plenty now, but I can’t see him . . . .” What? Slicing him up? Torturing him? Locking him in a cage and turning him into an animal?

Wasn’t like he knew Fury that well. He sure knew he didn’t trust him. But he just didn’t strike him as the type. Manipulating bastard, sure—but not that.

There was a long silence, and Logan felt sharply self-conscious as he felt Rogue’s eyes picking him apart.

She smelled of emotion at last, but beyond the fear and tenuous grip on control—she smelled angry: like she was ready to punch down a door. And having felt what damage Ms. Marvel could do first hand, he didn’t doubt her abilities to do it. Worse, she smelled . . . what? Protective? Of him?

“How do you remember him, then, if they erased all your memories?” she said slowly, her eyes focused outward, and clearer because of it.

So he had known Fury before. Just as he thought. Logan swallowed the rumble of a growl rising his throat, consciously opening his fingers from the fists they had unconsciously made.

“Don’t think I wanna talk about that right now, darlin’.” Just because she seemed to know him didn’t mean he could trust her. After all, Bloodscream the Psycho Vampire-Guy had claimed to know him too.

Rogue seemed to understand his suspicion and sat back, glaring at her plate before taking a very Rogue-sized bite of her spaghetti. No delicacy there.

Time to turn the tables. “So this Ms. Marvel, Danvers, or whatever the hell—she knew me.”

“You practically trained her,” Rogue said. She smiled, and though it was slightly tremulous still, it was more sure than it had been before as she looked at him. “You worked for the secret service—CIA, Secret Ops. You and Mike risked your lives to break me out of the Lubyanka prison in Moscow. Went against orders, too.”

“Sounds like me, all right.” Damn. Did she even realize that she’d started talking in first person?

She leaned forward suddenly. “Logan, ah can help you, now. Ah know you. Ah might not know everything, but you were a legend back in the field.”

“Okay, okay. Slow down,” Logan said.

His appetite was gone. He pushed his plate aside, leaning forward, his eyes narrowed. “How am I supposed ta trust you?” he demanded, spitting the question out.

Rogue’s eyes widened. “Logan, it’s me.”

“Yeah, but it’s someone else in there, too. Ms. Marvel—Carol, or whatever. Works with Nick Fury, could be just as bad as him.”

“What do you mean?”

“Dunno—tryin’ ta get me back t’working for SHIELD, or somethin’. I’m done, you hear? I’ve had enough of t’government, any government, group, secret service--all of it.”

“You suspicious bastard,” Rogue said, torn between exasperation and affection. “You haven’t changed a bit, have you?” He didn’t answer, and she took another bite, looking at him thoughtfully. “Of course, you being locked up with all these kids to take care of has nothing to do with not taking off.”

“I ain’t locked up anywhere. Rogue knows that.” He was cut off as Kylee tugged on his sleeve. He looked down, and she pointed at a pitcher of juice without looking at him. Okay, kid was still pouting about whatever. Mad at him? Wonder what he did this time. Whatever it was, she’d get over it. He grabbed the pitcher and poured her glass full, ignoring Rogue’s small smile as she watched the silent exchange.

“But with Storm gone you ain’t gonna slip off and leave us high and dry.”

“What about you?”

“Ah’m still Rogue, Logan. Ah’m not goin’ anywhere.” Her expression flickered for a moment, and then she glowered, looking stubbornly Rogue indeed, before she softened. “It’s the best place for me to be right now.”

BAMF!

Logan was out of his seat in a fraction of the time as usual; being on edge cut his reaction time in half. He caught Nightcrawler by the throat, slamming him against the cupboard, and drawing up his free hand.

“Not in the kitchen,” he snarled.

Kurt blinked, surprised at actually getting caught. “All right, all right, Logan,” he consented breathlessly. Wolverine let him go, and he rubbed his throat a bit ruefully. “You are beginning to sound like Storm.”

Logan ignored that. Couldn’t think about that right now. “Any news?”

“Nein. Just figuring out classes. Kitty agreed to oversee math until Henry gets back on his feet,” Nightcrawler spoke, his tail still twitching a bit nervously. “I can take on physics until then, and history. You can cover English?”

Logan ran a hand through his hair. “Yeah, whatever. What’re they reading right now?”

“Crime and Punishment, if I recall.”

Oh, hell. “I’ll take history. You can take English.”

Nightcrawler’s eyebrows lifted. “You’ve read it?” he queried, having read him correctly.

“Well, Kylee over there says mosta these kids think I’m illiterate,” Logan said, dodging the question. He nodded towards Kylee, who had slid from her spot and was walking dispiritedly out of the room with her glass of juice. As if she heard her name (maybe she did), she turned with one last sullen glance before slipping out the door. Seriously, what was up with the kid? She was too young for mood swings. Well, whatever it was, she’d get over it. “I c’n cover history. Easier to fudge.”

How had Kurt convinced him to teach, even for a day? Oh, yeah. There wasn’t anyone else. Even trying to call Alex Summers and Lorna Dane had come up empty—no one had answered. Logan’d have been more than willing to leave the school in their hands and go off to try and Storm himself.

They’d try again. Maybe they were just busy—what did Storm say they were up to?—digging. Archeology. Why the hell a Magnita Jr. and Summers II would be interested in archeology, of all things, he didn’t know.

Hopefully by Monday they’ll be back here, and Logan’d be free to get to work.

He turned away from Kurt, looking for Rogue, but the kid’d flown the coop—maybe literally. Logan swore under his breath.

Maybe he didn’t trust her, but that didn’t mean he didn’t want to hear what she had to say. And what if they had blown this out of proportion? What if this was all just going to fade away? Was he missing his only chance to find answers?

Husk and Cannonball—two corn-grown siblings from Kentucky or someplace—ran past, and Logan stepped back to avoid being collided into, feeling a little disgruntled at that.

He headed out of the kitchen, his stomach still grumbling, but his appetite gone.

---------------------------------

It’s a well-known thing, I think, that I ain’t what you’d call a people person.

Too much drama. Too much worryin’ about what to say, how to say it, and how ta act. I go my own way—mind my own business—and that’s that. I figure there’s too much time and effort wastin’ on that kinda stuff—just move on.

I never wanted to be any kinda leader. Never asked for it, never looked for it. Figure anybody who would actually fight to be a leader just goes to show how stupid they are. Too much to worry about. Too many other people to worry about. I got enough problems of my own ta want t’chuck a bunch of others’ messes on the plate.

Sometimes I feel like there’s not enough room in my head. Can’t get away. And that’s without anyone else t’worry about.

But here I am.

But this won’t work for long. I gotta get out of here—never liked staying in one place, ‘specially when I had to. Gotta find Storm, or somebody.

Leadership ain’t for me.

But Fury’s right about one thing—these kids aren’t ready to go out on their own. Some of the younger ones wanna head out and do some head-bashing for answers—some kid called Hellion’s head ‘a that group. Lee was in it, too. Had to growl at them to stop them talkin’ nonsense, though. Kids just don’t see the big picture.

Storm wouldn’t want Charlie’s dream burnin’ t’ashes under a banner with her name on it.

---------------------------


TBC . . . .
 
It was good as usual but.... no Gambit :waa: I need my fix! :p
 
Well, I was planning on updating sooner at the end of August, but you know how summer life goes. And then school life. Meh. Excuses. Life’s always dishing them out by the truck full.

It doesn't help that this chapter just isn't singing to me like they usual do. So I figure I'll kick it out the door and move on to a better one, whether it's as good as I want it to be or not.

But for a more legit excuse for future absences: I just dove into student teaching this last month. I’ve made a goal to post at least one chapter per month, but I just wanted you to know that if I disappear for weeks on end it just means I am being overwhelmed with RL—but haven’t forgotten this. I'm planning on sticking to at least a chapter a month until the end of this semester. <knocks on wood>

Wish me luck, and enjoy the chapter.

As always, reviews are very, very welcome.

-------------------------------------

Chapter 35: Nothing to Fear

-------------------------------------

Then:

Heather heard him from her bedroom across the hall.

It started with a soft thump—like cloth-muffled metal thudding onto the floor. She opened her eyes, immediately awake and aware how vulnerable she was in the darkness.

What had James been thinking, leaving her all alone in the middle of nowhere?

Of course, he hadn’t known that the wild man would wake up while he was gone, let alone be walking around.

She’d shot him in the head, for crying out loud. Twice.

And besides looking a bit off-balance and pale, he’d been just fine only hours afterward. Well, more or less. The man acted like little more than an animal.

Heather pulled the covers up to her chin, eyeing the shadow of the closed bedroom door. She’d locked it, but she’d seen Wolverine’s claws. The door might as well not be there.

Wolverine.

He was hairy, wild. The look in his eyes when she’d first walked into the room and found him awake—there was no rationality there, only madness.

Like when he almost killed James.

She hadn’t hesitated—hadn’t stopped to think. She’d raised the gun and blasted him right in the head.

She never would have thought she could do such a thing.

She shivered, feeling the bruises on her arm from where he’d grabbed her, teeth bared with hatred in his eyes.

A killer.

But no.

There had been something else. Something behind the madness. Something behind the rage.

Fear.

A wild animal. Dangerous, certainly. But what was the saying? He’s more afraid of you than you are of him.

She breathed out a breath that was almost a laugh.

But later . . . she'd come in to find him checking on the boy. Remy. He'd looked human then, if only for a second.

He'd looked suspicious, wary--but it was something even more than that.
He'd looked tired.

Thud.

There it was again, audible even over the rain; she hadn’t imagined it the first time.

She sat up slowly, hugging the blankets around her against the chill.

Later—after he’d bathed and dressed—he hadn’t looked half so frightening. His hair still damp—still wild despite the water weighing it down. His head bowed, his shoulders hunched, like a wary wolf. Avoiding her eyes at times, only to glance up, catch them, and hold them as if he were trying to stare her down. Challenging.

Confident as a man could be, but at the same time, confused. Lost.

Despite her own wariness, Heather was intrigued.

The man had a metal skull—strong enough to not even be dented by a shotgun at almost point-blank range. That wasn’t normal, not even for the strange things she was beginning to become familiar with, with what her husband dealt with.

Head trauma, Remy had tried explaining away Wolverine's manner and amnesia when he first ran into them. But if bullets hardly phased him, what could have done that to him?

She climbed out of bed, slipping into her slipper and pulling her robe from where she’d draped it over the chair by the bed. She pulled it on, shivering at the cold as she tied it at the waist and unlocked the door.

The hall was dark and empty. The heavy rain’s dull roar was muffled from here—the dark patter on the windows distanced in the still of the cabin.

She could hear the sounds clearly now: the restless noises from the bedroom across the hall. She stepped forward as quietly as she could. The door was cracked open, and she put a palm against the chilled wood and pushed it open softly.

Wolverine was lying on the floor. It looked like he had fallen asleep on top of the sleeping bag, but it had been twisted and all but discarded, and now he was curled on the carpet. She could see sweat gleaming on his skin from the dim light from the window, and his breathing was rough and heavy.

As she listened, a soft, choked gasp—like a breathless scream—strangled the air above him. It was a horrible sound—enough to make her own breath catch.

A nightmare.

Not just any nightmare, though. Not just the kind that left a man shifting restlessly, or a dog twitching in its sleep. She flinched as a choked snarl caught in his throat—the sound more chilling than the cold of the air.

She took a step forward to wake him, but then froze.

What if he didn’t recognize her? He’d attacked Remy when he first woke up here, and Remy was comfortable enough about the man that they must’ve known each other for some time.

She swallowed, wetting her mouth, and turned on the light as she called his name.

“Wolverine?”

SNIKT!

Wolverine’s breathing cut off in a gasping cry—half-snarl and half-aborted-scream—and he jolted up sharply, his feet immediately beneath him in a crouch. He looked around wildly, his hair defying gravity as he squinted in the sudden brightness, his claws bared in front of him.

“Wolverine, you . . . you’re safe.”

He stared at her. She watched as recognition re-entered his eyes, and he sagged back onto the floor, panting softly, his hair and face damp with sweat. His claws retracted slowly.

“Just a nightmare,” she said, trying to keep her voice soft and calm despite the goose bumps on her arms beneath her robe. She was proud that only a small quaver entered her voice. “Are you—are you all right?”

He didn’t meet her eyes, but raised a hand to his forehead as if to rub away some pain. His hand was shaking.

Heather took a step forward and he immediately tensed, his eyes shooting up and his teeth baring in a warning growl. She stopped, putting her hands up placatingly, retreating again. “Okay, okay. It’s all right. It’s just a dream.” She lowered her voice further with a glance at Remy’s sleeping form. The boy hadn’t stirred—not surprising. Over the last day she’d realized he was a sound sleeper, if anything.

He looked away again, rubbing his eyes. Heather glanced at him, then moved to the side towards the window, looking out into the night.

The rain had slowed to a drizzle for now and a heavy white mist lay thick upon the ground, the cold of the night turning the moisture to frost.

James . . . .

Wolverine shifted behind her, and she glanced back as he climbed to his feet slowly and moved against the wall away from her.

“Dammit,” he mumbled, still not meeting her gaze as he wiped his face again.

Heather was startled by the soft words, and she turned to look at him. “It’s all right,” she said, beginning to realize that there were few things further from the truth. She paused, as Wolverine scratched at a spot of spilled stew on his borrowed t-shirt intently. “What—what was it about?”

He looked up crookedly, his brow furrowed. “Eh?”

“Your nightmare. It . . . .” She looked down, seeing for the first time the three long claw marks that had cut through the sleeping bag, carpet, and deep into the floor. A faint mist of blood had sprayed from when he had popped his claws. She looked back up at him; he was rubbing his knuckles with still-shaking fingers, though he stopped when he saw her watching him. He went still, looking up at her through his wild hair. “It sounded pretty bad.”

He frowned, then shrugged noncommittally

“Do you want to talk about it?”

Nothing. Just another stolen glance at her from those strange eyes—so dangerous, yet somehow harmless as they stared at her: searching.

“Can I get you anything?”

He shook his head slowly.

“All right,” Heather breathed after a long pause, with each of them eying the other. “I’m going back to bed, okay? If you need anything, just knock.”

Wolverine tilted his head, then nodded. Heather smiled softly, then stepped back to the door. “Do you want me to leave the light on?” she asked, feeling completely ridiculous as soon as the words left her mouth.

He just gave her a strange look, still not moving from the wall.

She wasn’t surprised. Whatever this man was afraid of—it wasn’t the dark.

Heather paused, waiting for the man to say something—anything. He didn’t.

“Okay. Good night, then.”

She turned off the light and closed the door all the way shut before moving quickly to her own room, her heart pounding in the darkness as she relocked the door and burrowed back into bed, pulling the covers up to her chin against the cold.

She stayed awake a long time, staring at the dark shape of her door.

--------------------------------------

I lay down for a few minutes, but hell if I could sleep. Sure I was tired, but surrounded as I was by everything—the smells—couldn’t even close my eyes for a second without givin’ my heartbeat a shock-start—almost as bad as the dreams. Like tryin’ ta sleep in a bed of snakes. Only snake’s’ll only bite ya if they feel threatened. Men—ya never know.

Waited until I couldn’t hear her movin’—‘til I was sure she was asleep—then went hunting. Sniffed out every corner of the cabin from top to bottom. Found the root cellar hidden under the rug, the beer stashed in the back of the closet and helped myself, then hid the bottles. Went out the front door and circled the house a few times, even scouted out the woods. Went a good mile radius around the house before I was satisfied.

No scents of anyone recent. Just the kid, Heather, and James. Tracked Mac out a few miles before coming back. Coulda left, but something drew me back.

I stopped on the porch. Remember the rain’d stopped—still cold, though. Looked out into the dark forest and just stopped to look ‘n listen.
I’d spent plenty’a time just lookin’ at the woods. Had become familiar, if it ever had been unfamiliar in the first place. It was cold, harsh, beautifully wild—but it was familiar. I knew the rules.

The cabin and the lady behind me were part of another world—one that turned my gut to ice and made a hunger grow in my chest.

As much as I loved the wild, there was somethin’ missin’ out there. Somethin’ I was beginnin’ t’look for. Figure I’m still looking for it.

Was feelin’ more human that night. Finally startin’ to really think, and even if I didn’t realize it then, I figure some part a’ the animal I was realized that Heather could help find some of the answers.

And if not that, then at least I knew I wouldn’t go hungry under her roof.

----------------------------------
 
Heather walked into the kitchen in her robe and slippers to find Wolverine sitting on the floor, digging into the leftovers of the stew from the night before. He looked up when she walked in, then scrambled to his feet, a spoon still clenched in his fist as he eyed her.

Heather blinked at him through her glasses and the haze of fading sleepiness, taking in his half-soaked and muddied appearance. Mud had splashed up to the knees of his borrowed pajama pants, and his feet were filthy.

Wolverine shifted, uncomfortable with her gaze, but stared right back challengingly.

Heather was still too sleep-groggy to care. She stifled a yawn, then stepped over a muddied footprint towards the cupboard. She pulled down a cup, filled it from the sink faucet, and took a long drink before looking back at him, running a hand through her hair.

He looked up at her briefly, trying to figure how to react to her presence. “ . . . Mornin’,” he tried, his voice a soft murmur.

She looked back at him, slightly surprised but not showing it. “Morning,” she said. “I suppose it’d be silly to ask how you slept.”

Wolverine looked at her uncertainly, not sure whether he was supposed to respond. He settled with a shrug, then stepped forward, picking up the pot of stew and holding it close as he took another bite, scraping the bottom.

Heather rubbed her eyes, looking away from him. She let him stand by the wall as she put water to boil and made hot cereal for breakfast, both of them stealing glances at the other, but content to remain in silence of the morning.

Heather dished her bowl full and sat down at the table, pushing her hair from her eyes.

Wolverine was watching her steadily, the now-empty pot still balanced in his hands. Heather put down her spoon.

“You still have room for some breakfast?”

He paused—a delayed reaction that Heather was starting to realize was normal for him—and then nodded. Heather stood, retrieving another bowl and heaping it high. So the man was a bottomless pit. Why not?

“Well, then—come on over and have a seat,” she said, encouraged by their interaction (such as it was). Wolverine obeyed—putting the empty stew pot on the floor and edging forward slowly. She waited until he was seated to come forward, keeping her pace slow as she approached him. She sat down, reaching over to put his bowl in front of him and pulled her arm back.

Her hand brushed his arm, and Wolverine shot back as if burned, a snarl snapping from his throat.

He reacted sharply, jerking backwards so fast his chair fell back, and he scrambled to keep from falling. He caught his balance and backed against the wall, tense, his fists clenched.

Heather had leaped to her own feet, but now froze, not moving. Her heart had leaped into her throat, and now pattered away frantically even as she clamped down—nothing was wrong. He wasn’t about to pop his claws and kill her.

She hoped.

Heather swallowed. “Hey—it’s okay. It’s okay.”

He was trembling. She was sure it wasn’t voluntary, and wasn’t sure the man even noticed. He’d gone pale and tense, and despite his rage the panic beneath it was palpable.

It was ridiculous to think him afraid. He wasn’t—not in the normal way. She could see in his eyes that he knew he could take her apart without even trying. No—his reaction had been thoughtless, automatic, ingrained. Like a victim of abuse flinching away from a raised hand, no matter the intent.

Instinct.

She couldn’t help but immediately think of his nightmare the night before—the sounds of pain, of fear.

He’d been hurt—and more than just her shooting him, or even the unimaginable fight that Remy had told them about. He'd been hurt down to the bone.

She had felt fear, wariness, and curiosity battle within her towards the man since he’d woken up. But all of those were swept away in a sudden surge of pity, so sharp that it washed through her chest, catching in her throat.

A man—mutant or not. She suspected he’d been experimented on—memories lost, humanity washed away. What abuse had he suffered? What horrors plagued his dreams?

Tortured into mindlessness. Hunted like an animal.

The horror of it struck her momentarily silent as she stared at him, breathless.

No wonder he had reacted so violently when he had first seen her.

She’d heard about rumors of experiments on mutants, but she’d never imagined . . . .

Heather wouldn’t call herself naïve, but she was horrified at the thought.

Had Wolverine just been a normal person, nabbed off the street just because of a mutated genome? Had he had a job, a life, a family? How old was he, anyway? Couldn't be older than 30 . . . . but at second glance he couldn't be younger than 30, either. His eyes were too old.

But what about his healing factor? She'd seen him regrow his face in hours. Would that affect his aging as well . . . ?

Did he have children? A wife?

How could somebody do this to another human being?

“Stop that.”

The words were sharp, but clearly spoken—less growly than anything he had said so far—and they surprised her from her pity. Wolverine was glaring at her now, his eyes more human than she’d seen them so far—narrowed with anger.

“Stop . . . what?” Heather asked hesitantly. Part of her was immediately terrified at his anger, but something told her that he wouldn’t hurt her—not intentionally. She didn’t know how comforting that was supposed to be.

Wolverine stared at her, anger at her fading as his brow furrowed in vague confusion—at himself? He had opened his mouth to respond, but now cut himself off with an almost animalistic growl, turning away from her.

He lowered his head, looking down at his arm where she’d touched him—uncertain what had just happened.

Heather stepped around the table, her own heart thudding as she dared move towards him. Wolverine’s head shot up at her movement and he eyed her warily, trying to guess her intent.

“Do you . . . remember something?”

He blinked, his expression shifting a hair. “I . . . .” he whispered, the soft rumble of the word more seen than heard as he looked down again, the thought unfinished.

So much to say, but no words to say it with.

Heather hesitated, then took a bold step forward.

“Wolverine,” Heather said. He looked up at her, his dark eyes questioning. She licked her lips and took another slow step forward as she raised her hand—watching his eyes as he tensed slightly, unconsciously. “No one is going to hurt you.” She took another step forward, and another, into his personal space, reaching towards him slowly. “It’s okay.”

Wolverine looked up slowly, watching her hand as if it were a viper as she reached slowly towards him. He leaned back slightly, eyes wary, but his expression was unwavering. Her hand hovered over his arm, and then lightly her fingers brushed his shoulder. He flinched slightly—but didn’t pull away.

“You’re safe,” Heather said, resting her lightly palm on his shoulder. She could feel him trembling slightly beneath her hand; his arm was tense as rock. He didn’t move, didn’t say anything—watching, frozen. “Listen. We’re going to figure this out.” His eyes met hers—and for a second he looked truly human. Heather felt like she couldn’t breathe.

She swallowed. “What happened to you?” she managed. “What’s your name?”

He stared, wordless. His throat worked—as if struggling with the words. His eyes turned inward—confused. “I . . . I don’t remember,” he whispered, his rumble of a voice a soft baritone.

Heather slowly pulled her hand back. “Why—why Wolverine, then?”

Wolverine frowned, his hand going to his chest. He froze, looking up at her sharply—his eyes narrowed, almost accusatorily.

“What?” Heather asked. “What’s wrong?”

“Ulgh.”

They both jumped, and Wolverine was suddenly two feet away from her, glowering at Remy as he walked into the kitchen, rubbing his eyes. He stopped as he saw both of them standing there and frowned. “Everyt’ing okay in here?”

Heather nodded, curling in her fingers that had rested on Wolverine’s arm. “How’s your head?”

“Ugh,” Remy repeated, running a hand through his hair and cringing. “I’ll live, I t’ink. No t’anks t’you, Wolvie.”

Wolverine didn’t react to that, but inhaled deeply as he looked at him. Taking in the boy’s scent? It was a strange thought for Heather, but why not? Whatever it was he smelled, the scent of the hot cereal seemed to draw the most of his attention, and with one last closed glance at Heather he went back to the chair, lifting it from where it had fallen on the floor and sitting as he took his spoon in his fist.

Remy watched him openly, grogginess disappearing as he watched Wolverine dug into the hot cereal, not bothering with milk or sugar. He still held his spoon in his whole fist as he ate, his shoulders hunched over his bowl as he focused completely on his meal.

Remy glanced at Heather, who looked up from watching the wild man and caught his eye.

“Would you like some breakfast, Remy?” Heather asked, moving forward. Wolverine glanced up as she passed behind his chair, but didn’t react further.

“Oui, and t’anks,” Gambit said, pulling out a chair and plopping his boyish self down. He accidentally kicked one of Wolverine’s legs under the table, and Wolverine jerked his leg back, growling softly. “Ah, shut it.”

Heather slid him a bowl and Remy thanked her. He lifted his spoon, glancing thoughtfully at Wolverine again before digging in.

Heather sat down with her own bowl, but then reached over and brushed against the bandage across Gambit’s forehead. “Are you sure you’re all right? No dizziness?”

“None, mon chere,” Gambit said with a small smile. He glanced back at Wolverine. “Though . . . y’wouldn’ happen ta have an aspirin o’ sometin’? Got a bit o’a headache.”

Heather went to fetch some, and Gambit turned to Wolverine, who was already scraping the bottom of his bowl. Remy hesitated, then cleared his throat. “Not quite like dat, Wolvie,” he said softly. Wolverine looked up, looking irritated. Remy held up his spoon, showing how he held it. “Like dis, see?”

Wolverine frowned, loosened his grip on his spoon, then carefully adjusted it in his hand. Satisfied, he lifted his bowl, concentrating on catching the last of the cereal in his spoon and finishing it off.

Remy dipped his own spoon in, but then stopped again.

“’bout what I said, before—at da river,” Remy said, looking at him sideways. “Gambit don’ think you a coward, you know dat. I not dat stupid, you jus’—you jus’ talk more when you mad, dat’s all. I was jus’ tryin’ ta help, petit.”

Wolverine didn’t answer at first, but licked his spoon clean and placed it back in his bowl, frowning. “Stupid,” he said at last.

“Yeah,” Gambit said, running a hand through his hair. He smirked slightly. “Don’ worry. Not gonna try dat again, I promise.” He sobered. “You doin’ okay here, mon ami?”

Wolverine looked back at him, his eyes narrowing.

“I mean, wit’ Heather and all. Tell me you at leas’ talk t’da lady.”

Wolverine lifted an irritated eyebrow and returned his attention to his food.
“Listen—I know dat I just a kid, but I read people. Heather—she’s got a heart ‘a gold, else I wouldn’t’a told her anythin’. She c’n help you. Y’can trust her. Maybe even help you find out what happen to you out dere.”

Wolverine couldn’t have been making a better act of ignoring him. He’d downed his cereal, and was finishing off the last couple drops when Heather came out and put a couple small pills in front of the kid. Gambit thanked her and tossed the pills down his throat. At Wolverine’s deepened frown, he explained. “Painkillers, mon ami. Takes some ‘a da discomfort of dis, t’anks a lot.” He pointed to the bandage on his brow.

Wolverine’s confusion seemed to grow at that explanation. With a strange look at Gambit, he looked back at Heather. Reading him right, Heather took his bowl—being careful not to touch him on accident—and returned it full again.

“Okay,” she said, sitting down and pushing her untouched cereal aside. She pushed her sleep-tousled hair out of her eyes and adjusted her glasses. “What do we know?”

Gambit tapped his spoon on the side of his bowl. “What d’ya mean, chere?”

“Wolverine found you about three weeks ago, and four days ago you were attacked.”

“Like I say before, could be longer. Was out like a light more dan once—maybe longer, maybe less.”

“Wolverine?” He looked at her, waiting. Heather clarified. “Does three weeks sound about right? Since you found Remy?” He stared blankly at her. “A week is seven days.”

That didn’t seem to help. After all, Wolverine hadn’t even bothered counting the days.

It felt like yesterday. It felt like a lifetime ago.

“. . . Dunno.”

The answer was useless, but it was enough to make Remy grin and sit back.

“Okay. What about the first thing you remember? Can you tell us that?”

Wolverine glowered at Remy, seemingly annoyed by the kid’s pleased expression at his response. He sat back, folding his arms. His expression was enough that Remy’s grin faltered, and his gaze dropped. Wolverine seemed to relax a bit at that, but then let his own gaze fall. He didn’t say anything, but glared at his hands.

He didn’t like them looking at him, Heather realized.

Maybe they were going about this the wrong way.

She glanced at Remy, then back at Wolverine. “Don’t worry about it,” she said at last. “Everything’s going to be okay.”

He snorted softly. A laugh? She couldn't tell.

But that was what was important right now—making sure he felt safe. Making sure he stuck around, at least until James came back.

Try to help jog his memory, but above all earn his trust. He was wary—defensive to a fault. If she was going to help him he would have to be able to open up to her—to talk.

She reached over slowly. He watched her hand as it came closer, until she rested it on his arm. No trembling this time—but just tenseness. Tense as coiled steel. The man didn’t have an ounce of fat on him.

He lifted his unreadable eyes to hers and she pulled back, bringing her bowl forward and digging into her breakfast—her determination set.

TBC . . . .
 
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