No one understood, at first, why it had happened. There weren’t even whispered gossip sessions in the library or over coffee about possible motivations, reasons why it would never work, how someone had seen it coming and how someone else would never be able to comprehend it. They were all too stunned. And by the time the surprise of it all wore off, it looked like it might be going to last.

Naysayers and prophets of doom held their tongues for fear of being ridiculed, and everyone else held their breath in a kind of morbid fascination.

Wolverine and Rogue were lovers.

Madness or not, they’d uncovered something between them and hadn’t been able to ignore it after the insanity faded. They’d tried to; from the moment the pain of Rogue’s mutation had snapped Wolverine out of his haze of desire and he’d stumbled away from her, they’d acted as if it hadn’t happened. But Logan hadn’t been lying when he’d said there had always been something between them, and she hadn’t had to conjure up that soft sound of pleasure and want that she’d sighed into his mouth.

No amount of craziness could fabricate the electricity that sizzled and popped along their nerve endings in the two and a half seconds before her skin kicked in.

That made it easier to walk away when Remy’s attention strayed -- in hindsight, Rogue wondered momentarily if his wandering eye hadn’t simply served as an excuse for her to run back to Wolverine and lift her face to his wordlessly. They hadn’t been so careless the second time around; with a clear head on his side, Logan had kissed her with measured passion, his abandon bridled only by his desire to stay conscious long enough to make sure he did not take Remy’s place of being a “non-tactile, pretend lover.”

Gloves and thin cloth and creativity had provided the “how,” and the tender tremble in his hips that echoed through her body had been all the proof of “why” that they needed.

In the long stretch of time before speech returned, they’d watched each other intently, his hands and eyes never leaving her body, her breath fanning lightly across his face. Finally, when he’d felt her muscles beginning to melt into the mattress, drowsiness creeping into her eyes, he’d whispered softly, “What took us so long?”

“I dunno,” she’d answered honestly.

He’d cupped his palm over the firm muscle of her hip and slid it smoothly down her thigh until his fingers rested lightly just above her knee. He’d pressed gently into her skin through the sheet, coaxing her leg over his and bringing them closer together again. “Why now?”

This time her eyes clouded slightly and a wrinkle formed between them as she’d considered his question. “I guess I just finally saw you as somethin’ more than a fighter,” she’d answered. “Never thought of you as a lover before... least not mine.”

He’d somehow been satisfied with that explanation, at least enough that he’d rolled them gently so that he was flat on his back, his hands massaging, coaxing into her skin as she stretched out along the length of his body. The second time was every inch as searing as the first, and by morning, they had wordlessly made each other understand that one night would never be enough.

If she’d worried that being Wolverine’s lover would make fighting beside him more difficult or complicated, her anxiety was banished in the first battle. If anything, she found herself able to read the language of his body more effortlessly than before and they began to be as seamless in war as they were becoming in love.

They knew about the shock that had rippled through their teammates the first time someone had put together all the obvious clues, but neither of them were interested in making it easier for their friends to get their heads around. As far as they were concerned, it was a fair play and they didn’t owe anyone an explanation.

In time, everyone got used to it and their odd juxtaposition was no longer the center of attention. Other pairings and break-ups and affairs became the central elements of the soap opera that was life at the mansion, and life went on. But sometimes late at night, as the two of them lay awake, silently touching, eyes locked in the dim light, they marveled at the sum total of their life, the passion of love and war, and the ease with which it all came together.

The End