Marie lay on her back, head cradled in his lap staring up at the stars. They were outside again. As they ended up whenever the accidents or nightmares drove them from their beds and to each other. Outside. Where they could avoid the whispered accusations of molestation and crushes. Outside where the walls didn't close in on you and the scent of antiseptic didn't lay heavy in the air.

They learned about outside after another 'accident.' Jean tried to wake Logan and got three shallow scars across her chest for her troubles. She should have known better. Marie sought Logan out, to console him and assuage his guilt. Sought him, out there. Out amongst the woods and wilds where he felt most at home. She'd held him and stroked his hair and promised to look after him. He'd smiled and gripped her hands so hard they bruised.

The next week it had been her turn. Scott had forgotten to open the flue when he lit the fire and the smell of smoke and the sight of ash falling gently on her gloves sent her crying into the night, tormented by memories that were not hr own. He'd followed, cradling her to his chest and restating his promise to take care of her.

Another accident. This time Marie got her own room for suddenly everyone realized that having a girl with untouchable skin in a room with three roommates was dangerous. She'd cried on his shoulder and cursed at the world for making her a freak among freaks. He just held her.

Another nightmare. This one shared. Scalpels and laughing and the tinkling of champagne glasses. Solace found only with each other. And the stars.

We're outside again. Nightmares this time. Both of us. Same one too. Well, pretty much the same. We're both at the statue again, but they're lightly different. In Logan's, he was too late to save me. In mine, I held on too long and even his powers couldn't save him. So we're both lying here, in the wet grass, holding onto each other as if the other will turn to smoke and vanish from our grasp. The caresses are soft. Long strokes down each other's backs. Soothing caresses meant to reassure.

But they don't. For either of us. Because there is something desperate in the clutching tonight. Desperate because we came so close to losing each other today in a mission that went bad. A mission that never should have happened. A mission that, if God and the Fates didn't hate mutants so much, never would have occurred.

Tomorrow we bury a friend. Alongside him will be two children: children who never had a chance because they were born different. And this world has no place for different. So they'll lie in graves simply marked 'Brother' and 'Sister', as we have no names with which to mark their final resting place. So tonight we stand in sight of where they will lay tomorrow and rededicate ourselves to the fight.

We're outside again. It's raining tonight. There's something fitting about rain at a funeral. As if the heavens themselves were weeping with us for our loss. I might believe that except that I know it's Storm's doing. The heavens wouldn't weep for the loss of our kind. If they did it would rain all the time.

I turned twenty-one today, but there was no party, no celebration, only the claxon blaring and the feel of leather on our skin as we headed out to save a world that would rather see us dead. We came home and the two of us slipped silently from the hanger and headed outside, to stare at the stars and replay the fight, as we were wont to do.

They met here time and time again as the events of their lives played out.

...The night she joined the team.
...The night he'd returned from finding his past - and wished he could forget it again.
...The night she killed for the first time and emerged with new powers to master.
...The night the Registration Act was signed and they wondered just how long they would remain free.

Over and over. Season after season. Two souls: One wild, one calm, becoming whole only under the starlight.

He asked me to marry him tonight. Right here, under the stars, in the place where we feel closest to each other. I said yes, and the new day broke with us twined around each other in the soft grass.

Logan and I lay in the grass here, staring up at the stars, one last time. The nightmares have encroached upon us taking over our refuge. For tomorrow our place of solace will become a place of rest. The old graveyard was full. We should be sad, but we're not. Our place may be handed over to the dead, but life will go on. We know this, because as we lay here tonight, our baby kicked for the first time.

Year after year when the nightmares drive us from our bed, we come out here, in the dark, and look out over graves that become more numerous as the years go by. Many of which bear no names, just the simple carving of 'Brother' or 'Sister' to mark their passing from this earth. A final refuge for the lost.

Ours is with each other.