Et Lux In Tenebris Lucet by Artemis

It was fall, one of those gorgeous bright red-and-gold sunlit days, and Marie was at school, and he'd gone to meet her in the West Village.

That was how the day started.

Logan didn't particularly like how it had developed. There were soldiers, suddenly, and a pair of black vans, and if it hadn't been in the middle of fucking Washington Square Park with its million different scents he'd have realized it in time. As it was, he didn't notice a thing until the darts hit him in the back. Then all he had time to do was to order her to run before blackness overcame him. They'd known exactly who he was. It took enough tranquilizer to bring down a rhino to knock him out, and they knew it.

He wasn't sure how much time passed then. He was aware of needles, occasionally, and something running through his veins that burned and seemed to fuck badly with his mind before his body erased it. Whenever he was aware enough, he tried to lash out against whatever was holding him down, but he was never able to connect with anything that felt like it bled. He just wanted to keep them as busy as possible, to buy her time. At some point he became just alert enough to drag his eyelids open.

There was a hand in front of him, holding a syringe, and what was in it glowed strangely.

“More ketamine, and more of the neural inhibitor. He's coming out of it again.” And then they must have really dosed him, because he went out completely.

The first thing he realized, when he realized anything again, was that he was strapped to an examination table. That alone was enough to produce a rush of adrenaline.

The next thing he became aware of was that she was nearby, or had been.

Fucking hell. Whoever these people were, they'd gotten both of them.

“Wolverine, I'm aware you're awake. Please do me the courtesy of opening your eyes.”

His eyes snapped open, to be faced with glaring lights burning down onto him, hurting his sensitive retinas. He squinted and tried to turn his head, but there were blocks in place that wouldn't let him move. He didn't know that voice, not quite, but its rhythms and intonations seemed vaguely familiar. Almost-but Stryker was dead. And it wasn't his voice, not exactly.

Something was in his mouth, running down his throat-some sort of breathing tube, he supposed, and he couldn't speak. He could feel heavy straps over his chest, his arms and legs; his hands were bent back sharply and wedged into place with a bar across the palms of his hands. He imagined that the idea was that he wouldn't be able to pop the claws that way; he wasn't in fact sure that he could, and if he could and did the damage to his hands would be considerable. His arms were held at an angle to his body, anyway, so trying wouldn't accomplish anything. He looked down and saw the sensors attached to his body; machines that stood beside the table were recording things with soft beeps and whirrings.

He strained against the straps, but they weren't going anywhere.

A door opened somewhere behind him and he closed his eyes in anguish. He knew who was coming.

She came and stood quietly beside him; he could barely see her where she had taken up her position, and she smelled--odd.

“Rogue has proved more amenable to treatment than you have, Wolverine.” He clenched his teeth. What was this fucker doing to her? He was a walking dead man. That was all there was to it. “Rogue, please remove Wolverine's breathing apparatus. He won't be needing it for the present.”

She came around him and now he could see her, as she reached towards his face. She wore something black and close-fitting, not what she'd been wearing in the park. Her eyes were pale blue, and he recognized their blank expression all too well. Her gloved fingers took hold of the device and pulled; he coughed violently as the tube snaked through his throat. He didn't try to speak to her. He knew it wouldn't matter. He'd seen this before.

“What do you want?” He snarled it as soon as he could speak.

“That's a good question, Wolverine. What do I want…” The voice paused. “I want nothing from you, I'm afraid. Nothing that I would trust you to provide. We will use you, naturally, learn from you. But we don't need your cooperation for that.”

“Fuck you.”

“Language, language. There's a young girl present.”

His eyes went back to Marie in spite of himself. She showed no reaction to anything that was going on. “Let her go. She's just a kid.” This was intolerable. He didn't even know what the point was, beyond using her to get to him. “Just tell me what you want.”

“I want to see you suffer.” The silky disembodied voice was cool, detached. “And I would like the young lady to watch.”

Fucking hell on fire. He stared at her as men came into the room, men in white coats and military-issue clothing, She moved to the foot of the table when she was told to, stood quietly while they attached things to his body, patches with wires that ran to a box that stood beside the table, and he kept his eyes on her.
“I know you're familiar with the drug we developed. We've made adjustments to it, actually. I was rather surprised to see the level of your resistance to the new formulary. Artificial now, of course. That may have something to do with it.” The machine was turned on, with a strange humming sound as it powered up. “We welcome the opportunity for advancement of the science. Meanwhile, testing your resistance to other forms of trauma may prove enlightening.”

Logan braced himself before the first shock hit him. They weren't holding back; the electricity ripped through him, twisting his muscles into rigor before it ended, leaving him gasping for breath. “Again, please.” Another shock, and when this one ended one of the white coats came to make sure his straps were holding. If he'd moved a little closer, Logan was fully prepared to test the theory of extending the claws through his hands, but they'd obviously been warned. The man stayed out of range.

It went on for hours. They never asked him anything, never made any demands. None of it made any fucking sense. If they didn't want him, what the hell was this about? Although if all they wanted was to torture him-well, they'd certainly found the way to go about it, having her watch.

People were going to die for this. Slowly.

He was barely conscious when they finished, when they removed the electrodes and took her away. She hadn't moved a muscle from her place, hadn't shown the faintest sign of reaction to anything she'd seen.

He hoped she just wasn't aware of it, but he had a sinking feeling that that wasn't the case.

Someone injected something into his neck as he tried to turn his head to watch her leave, and he snarled and snapped his teeth at the retreating hand. He made contact with something that gave and heard a scream as his eyes rolled back.

Good.

He could still taste the coppery tang of blood in his mouth when he woke up.

“Good morning.” The voice was back. “I trust you rested well.”

“What the fuck do you want?” He could sense a little more about this place now. Scents were becoming familiar.

“I believe we covered that yesterday.”

“What's the point of this? You want something.” Whatever it was, they had to know that while they had her, they had him. “Just tell me and let's get this over with.”

“Always trying to find the simple solution, Wolverine. It doesn't work that way.”

The door opened behind him and he tightened his lips. She came in, alone, and came to stand beside him again. He didn't look at her this time. “She can't help you. I can.”

“Oh, I don't agree with that. We isolated an interesting substance from your blood, one that may explain some of your increased resistance. She'll make a useful test subject.” The voice sounded amused. “It's certainly quite clear that she is your weak point.” The voice changed subtly. “Rogue. Pick up a scalpel, if you please.” Logan watched, horrified, as she turned to a tray of instruments and lifted a blade as directed. “I could have her slit her own wrists. Or yours. Which would you prefer, Wolverine?”

He ground his teeth, but remained silent.

“Rogue, please remove the gentleman's shirt.” And her hands reached toward his white t-shirt, pulled it free of his jeans, and the scalpel sliced up through it, splitting it. She cut through the arms and pulled the ruined garment free of his body, out from under the straps that held him down. Now she stood, the scalpel held lightly in one hand, waiting for further orders. “What would you like Rogue to do now, Wolverine? We have plenty of time.”

“Don't do this. She didn't do anything to you.”

“Would you like to put little Rogue out of her misery? She knows what she's doing, Wolverine. She just isn't able to resist the effects of the drug the way you are.”

“I will do what you want if you let her go.” He said it pointedly and clearly. If she could hear that, in any way--“This isn't going to help anything.”

“But it will, Wolverine. It will make me feel better.” There was something different about that cloying tone, and he couldn't quite place it. It sounded like the microphone was feeding back or something, there was a metallic tinge to it--

It hit him like a ton of bricks, and he just hoped it didn't show in his expression. It made sense, all of a sudden, the insanity of it all.

He didn't know why the hell that bitch was working with the government now, but the next time he stabbed her, he wasn't going to stop until there was nothing left but little blue scraps.

And this was just plain unequivocal bad. If it was her-this was a mind-fuck, pure and simple. There wasn't any negotiation to be made here, nothing he could bargain with. She wouldn't give shit about anything except revenge. She hated his guts.

And Marie was trapped in the middle of it.

“Rogue, please release the strap on the wrist nearest to you. Just the one strap.” She obeyed, and the block holding his left hand straightened out. His hand was still trapped under the bar that crossed his palm, but his wrist was no longer forced back. It didn't do much good--he still couldn't move his arm--but at least--

“Turn around, Rogue. Put his hand up against your body.” Her small hands closed over his, pressing his knuckles into her belly, and he felt a stab of pure fear. If he lost control--

“I won't,” he said thickly. “Don't be afraid, kid. I won't hurt you.”

“She wants you to, Wolverine. She told me she would rather die than do what I told her she was going to do today.” He stared at those blue eyes, willing her to show just a spark of recognition. “Not at the moment? Very well. Rogue? The scalpel, please. Open his bowels for me.”

Logan clenched his teeth as scalpel rose. Descended.

He refused to scream, refused to give any more reaction than what his autonomic systems forced from him. He wasn't going to have that on his conscience. Let her think he didn't feel pain. Anything. And he had to throw every bit of concentration he could muster into not popping those claws, because she was standing right in front of them.

He was covered with his own blood.

So was she.

His arms had been flayed down to the bone, more than once. She'd scored his face, his chest. She'd cut him deeply and shallowly, put her gloved hand into his cut belly and twisted his entrails in her fingers. Everything the voice told her to do, and without hesitation. The healing factor was holding, but barely--they were making her work slowly.

He just tried not to watch.

“I think that's enough for the day. Rogue? Why don't you kiss your little playmate goodbye until tomorrow?”

Sick goddamn bitch. Marie was leaning towards his face, and there was no good answer to this. If he turned away, and she knew it, it would rip her apart-and if the bastards hadn't been watching, he'd have kissed her hard enough to make her understand, if she remembered it at all, that he didn't blame her for this. But he knew who was watching, and damned if he was playing into that prurient little game.

So he held completely still as the small hands touched his face, slick with blood, stayed impassive as the soft lips met his, and then suddenly it occurred to him that this was skin-to-skin--

But she stood up, too quickly for the pull to begin, and left the room when she was told to do so.

He lay there, breathing shallowly. Soldiers in protective gear came, strapped his left hand back into place, hosed away the blood and gore that covered him.

He didn't sleep. He focused on memorizing every detail his senses told him about these people, this place. It wasn't big-with this kind of operation, it couldn't be. Too much risk of one fucking human being with a conscience slipping in; this crowd was inner circle only. And they weren't buried a mile underground-he could smell the outdoors on the men who came and went and sucked blood from his veins. That gave him some kind of hope.

She'd been cleaned up the next day as well, and she came in, as impassive as ever, to stand beside him. He wanted to try and reach her, try and speak to her, but he knew that would only be used against them.

“Good day, Wolverine. Shall we continue?”

“Do whatever the fuck you want.”

“Temper, temper.” A screen slid down in front of him. “First, a little instructional film.” The screen flickered into life and he saw, to his horror, that it was Marie, in another cell.

The drug had clearly worn off. She was huddled in a corner, sobbing hysterically, holding her bloody hands out in front of her.

“No. No. Please. I can't do this-I didn't. It wasn't me…” She was barely coherent. “Oh, god, please, no. No. No.”

It was ripping his heart out. As he watched, orderlies in full contamination suits entered the room, ignoring her screams, stripped her and forced her under a shower. He wouldn't look at that. All he wanted to do was somehow get free, find her, hold her. Tell her it was all right. When they had her dressed again, they put her down on a cot and strapped down her arms and legs. She had gone limp, unresisting, but after they left he could still hear her crying quietly.

“It's okay, baby,” he muttered desperately. He knew he could be heard, but it didn't matter. “Don't worry about me.”

“How very sweet.”

“Fuck you,” he repeated. “I wasn't talking to you.”

“No, I quite realize that.” The screen rolled away. “This goes on for some time, you realize. I'll play the full tape for you after we're finished today, but for now…”

“Whatever he makes you do, it's not your fault,” he said quickly. “Remember that, kid.”

“If you have anything to say, Wolverine, please address it to me.” It was a source of satisfaction that at least he'd forced that much out of that bitch. If she didn't want him to talk, it was because Marie could hear him, and that was all he had to work with right now.

“Fine. I'm telling you--whatever you make her do, it's not her fault.”

There was a pause. Then the door opened and someone else came into the room, one of the guards, and he smelled blood again. The man came to stand beside Rogue and handed something to her.

“This will probably make things easier on all involved. I'm assuming you won't attack the young lady the way you did the officer.” Logan saw that the man's hand was bandaged.

“Damn. Didn't get the whole finger off,” he taunted, and the guard started forward.

“That's enough. Rogue, put the mouthpiece on him.” It was similar to the protective gear boxers wore, but it had straps to hold it in place. He didn't fight when she held the device to his mouth, let her slide it in and fasten the strap behind his head. He could smell her so intensely, leaning over him that way; he tried to meet her eyes, but the cool blue gaze slid over him impersonally.

“The last two days we worked with physical pain,” the voice went on, amiably now. “Today…what about pleasure?”

No.

“Rogue. Begin with his chest. Gentle touch, as we discussed.” Her hands came down over him, began to stroke his body. “Be sure to keep your skin away from his, please.”

Oh, jesus christ. This was worse, somehow. He knew damn good and well that she had an attraction to him. For them to force her into this--she was the one being violated, and there wasn't a goddamn thing he could do about it.

He looked up and those strange blue eyes were staring back, impassive and icy. And it made him want to throw up that even while he was gazing into those eyes that weren't hers, even though he knew this was something the real girl would never do, it still felt good, the way her gloved hands were caressing him.

“Undo his pants, please, Rogue.” The voice grew even more malicious. “Or should we use first names? We're all friends here, after all. Go ahead--Marie.” Logan felt her hands moving down to obey the command as fury twisted in his belly. “We didn't have much trouble with her, as I told you. She was very forthcoming.” Goddamnit. That was information that could do Mystique no good at all, except that she wasn't supposed to know that and she was letting him know she did. That name was between the two of them, not--

Oh, christ.

Now she had the buttons of his fly undone, and he could feel himself hardening under her touch in spite of everything he was doing to will it otherwise. He didn't want her to see this. This wasn't something she was supposed to know. He was supposed to protect her, not react like some fucking horny teenager when she was being forced into touching him.

He told himself that, but it didn't matter.

He tried to shut his mind off from what was happening, to force down his body's response, but it was Marie doing this, and he couldn't ignore her. She was too much a part of him, too entangled in every part of his mind. And her instructions had obviously been explicit. She stroked him, teased him past the point of endurance. The mocking voice continued giving her instructions, suggestions, and she did everything she was told.

He came, hard, his teeth sinking into the rubber bit between them, but it didn't stop. She just continued to caress him with gloves now stained with his seed, and he wished like hell the healing factor didn't work as well as it did, wished that instinct wasn't as powerful in him as it was, because then the idea of her being marked that way wouldn't do what it did to his heart and his mind.

And Mystique wasn't finished with her bright ideas. There were condoms, which Marie rolled onto him with an all-too expert-seeming touch, and when her mouth closed over him he thought he would die with the humiliation of it, but she coaxed out his response over and over again, until he was sweating, gasping, twisting in his bonds.

When she leaned over him now, her scent was mixed with his, and that was so primal, so primitive a trigger in his brain, that there was no fighting it off. If they hadn't been where they were, he'd have lost himself in the intensity of that touch that he'd dreamed of for so long. He could feel his control slipping, and he was grateful as hell that they hadn't had her unstrap his hands today. He honestly didn't think he'd have been able to keep from that other release, not while her hands and mouth were on him, doing all the things he'd never even let his own sick mind imagine.

It didn't seem to affect her at all. She simply kept up the relentless assault until she was ordered to stop, and then she just stood there, expressionless, until she was told to leave.

He obviously hadn't been able to mask his reactions this time. His chest was still heaving with exertion when the screen rolled down in front of him again and the promised replay began. The impassivity she'd displayed in the room was a stark contrast to what he saw on that screen. He tried not to watch, but there wasn't anything he could do about the sound of her sobs echoing in the room.

At some point it switched to live action, and that was worse. She wasn't crying this time. She was in the same cell, walking back and forth along one wall, making no noise at all. She kept one hand on the wall as though she was afraid she'd fall if she didn't hold herself up.

She looked like a broken doll, all loose limbs and near-inanimation.

He watched as they brought her food, but she didn't eat. Eventually she sat down in a corner, rocking herself back and forth, still silent. She didn't fight when they came to strap her down again, either.

On the screen, he saw her raise her head and look at the camera. He could see her eyes were brown again. She swallowed.

“Just kill me,” she called out suddenly. “Please. Logan--”

The feed cut out and was replaced with the previous night's tape. Logan focused on staring straight ahead.

There were three more days of it. By the end of the next day he was stripped; clothing just got in their way, and his blood-soaked jeans were easily cut away. Sometimes they came to draw blood or run their own tests before they sent her in, but he saw her every day. At least it meant he knew she was still alive, though they didn't let him speak to her again.

When he could speak--they didn't want him dying, and they made her remove the mouthpiece to give him water--he always demanded to know what they wanted from him. Let Mystique think she was hiding in that control room behind the fucking microphone; damned if he was going to give her the satisfaction of acknowledging her game. Sometimes it was one of the others giving the orders; it didn't seem to matter. Marie did whatever they said, and when they showed him the tapes from her cell she no longer seemed to be reacting at all. She would be sitting or lying still, unmoving, eating when a guard instructed her to, nearly catatonic otherwise.

He wanted to believe she just didn't want them to see her cry, but he couldn't.

They tried other drugs on him, things he could feel trying to get inside his brain. None of it worked for them for more than a minute or two, which gave him a savage satisfaction. He was no scientist, but Mother Nature plus however many years of an overcharged and consistently stressed enhanced immune system was kicking their engineered concoctions to the curb, and he taunted them with their failure.

Then they'd bring Marie back, and he cursed their success. They varied what they made her do to him, in fact they were pretty fucking imaginative about it, and it wasn't until the seventh session that anything changed.

She was leaning over him, preparing to give him water. And he saw that her glove didn't reach all the way down her wrist; it was caught up, hadn't been smoothed down into place over her arm. It wasn't much, but it was a bare chance. He raised his head and seized that bare skin in his mouth, sinking his teeth into her hard so she couldn't pull away. She dropped the cup she held and the water spilled down his chest.

“Rogue! Step back!” The voice on the loudspeaker sounded alarmed for the first time, and he knew there wasn't much time. But he felt the pull starting, felt his gift being sucked into her, and her eyes changed, grew wide and terrified even as their color darkened to familiar brown--he let go before he could black out completely.

“Marie!” She jerked her arm away from him and stumbled back, clutching it to her chest as the wound healed up. “Marie. Fast. Please. Get the straps. Now, baby. Please--” Thank god, she was reaching towards his arm. They'd be here--any second--

She got the wrist strap free, the second one, just under his elbow. He heard them at the door and with a roar he shoved her away, released the claws. He slashed down, heedless of the danger to his own body, tearing through the leather that held him. He was up and charging the guards before they could even get through the door, dispatching all three of them in a spray of blood. Alarm bells started to ring.

Et Lux In Tenebris Lucet by Artemis2050

Logan turned, shaking viscera from his hands and claws, and saw Marie curled into a heap on the floor. He went back, reached down to haul her up, dragged her out of the room with him, moving quickly down the corridor. Have to find somewhere to regroup.

“Hang in there,” he told her. “I'm gonna get you out of here.” He felt her hands on his side, scrabbling for a grip, then falling away. “It's okay, darlin'. Just hold on.”

She didn't respond. He found a stairwell and ducked into it, down a flight of stairs, out into another hallway. They passed a door and he tried the handle, then plunged his claws through the lock. It was an office, and there was a window. He shoved her inside and slammed the door behind them.

A military-issue duffel bag was standing beside a desk. Logan tore it open; wonder of wonders, there was clothing that looked like it would fit him. He found a set of fatigues and yanked on the pants; that would have to do. He went to the window and looked out. About a hundred yards to a fence, and there were woods beyond that. If they could make that--

“Just leave me here.” He turned; Marie had sunk down onto her knees where he'd let go of her. “I can't--I don't want to--”

“That's enough. Come on.” When she didn't move, he threw up the window and bashed out the covering screen before he went back for her. She didn't resist as he picked her up, but she didn't help either as he started to ease out the window.

They were several stories up. He shifted Marie in his arms. “You gotta hold on, darlin'.” She shook her head. “Marie.” They didn't have time for this now, goddamnit. “Put your arms around my neck. Hold on.”

“I can't.” She felt completely boneless in his arms. “Just go.”

“No.” He reached over and ripped down a curtain that hung beside the window; he tore a long strip from it and seized her wrists. “I'm sorry, baby. But I've got to do this.” She realized what he was planning and started to fight as he brought her wrists together, but he was far stronger than her and he quickly had them tied together, wrapping the long strip around and around between her bound hands to cinch the knots tighter. Then he put her hands over his head.

With his arms free, he was able to use his claws effectively as pitons and scaled down the wall. He cradled her against his body again as soon as his feet hit the ground, crouching over as he ran for the fence. He could hear the alarms behind him, hear men running and dogs barking, as he sliced through the chain link and carried her through it. He kept his head down and raced for the woods. He didn't stop; he dodged trees and slid down embankments, trying to keep branches from tearing at her as much as he could. He had to slow down eventually; they were deep enough in the woods that he could no longer hear the alarms behind them and it would take some time to organize a tracking team. He heard water; a few minutes later they came to a stream and he walked straight into it.

He waded upstream for almost a mile, holding her above the icy water that started off at his ankles but eventually reached above his knees. It was nearly dusk now; finally he headed for shore, where he saw a pair of fallen trees he thought he could use as a shelter of sorts.

She hadn't moved at all. Her face was turned away from him because she couldn't bring her skin into contact with his bare chest; she was trying to hide her face against her arm. He got them out of the water and set her down on a smooth rock, lifting her arms from his neck. She sat there, unresisting, as he worked the knots loose and freed her hands. It would have been easier to cut through them, but he had a feeling he might need the cloth again.

He knelt down in front of her and took her hands in his, rubbing to restore the circulation. She wouldn't look up. “Marie.” He squeezed her hands. “It wasn't you, doing that stuff. You gotta pull it together for me here, darlin'. I need you to be strong for a little while longer.”

“I don't want to.” She pulled her hands away “I can't. I don't care what they do to me.” She drew her knees up and put her head down on them. “Leave me alone.”

“I'm not leaving you, baby.“ He wanted to put his arms around her, but that might just make it worse. “Hey. Listen to me. It was me they were trying to fuck with, you know that. They were just using you.”

Her head came up at that. “That's all I'm good for, isn't it? Getting used to hurt people.” Her eyes were swimming. “Just forget it. I'm not going to make it out of here, Wolverine.” She stood up shakily. “You go one way, I'll go another. That'll give one of us a better shot.”

Logan grabbed her wrist before she could get more than a step away. He had no idea what to do here. She'd just lived through a fucking nightmare, he was always going to be a part of that, but they were still in serious danger. “You know I'm not going to let you do that.”

“What're you going to do, tie me up again?” The pain and anger in those brown eyes was killing him, but he made his voice carefully neutral.

“If I have to. Is that what you want me to do?”

“Yes. I want you to tie me down and cut me open and rape me--”

He yanked her closer, turned her around and wrapped his arms around her, holding her arms crossed in front of her. Her legs gave way and she slumped against him, sobbing helplessly, and he sat down, holding her tightly. “It's all right,” he said quietly. “Let it out. I know you didn't want to do those things, baby. Don't even think about it.” He knew that was a useless instruction. “It doesn't matter, darlin'. You're alive, that's all I care about.”

“I'm sorry,” she choked out. He stroked her hair back carefully.

“I know, baby. I'm sorry too. I would've done anything to keep them from hurtin' you.” That just made her cry harder. “It's going to be all right. I promise.” He wasn't at all sure that it was true. “We're going to get out of here. I'm going to get you back home.” He just held onto her until her sobs died away; he didn't think that was the end of it, not by a long shot, but at least she was quieter. He kissed the top of her head and to his dismay, she tensed every muscle.

“I'm all right,” she said quietly. Then she moved, for the first time with purpose, to extricate herself from his arms. That cut as badly as the blades he'd been tortured with. She got to her feet and took a couple of steps forward, squatting down beside the stream and pulling off her gloves before bathing her face. Then she stood up again, suddenly strangely emotionless. “Do we keep moving?”

All right. The first thing was to get her out of here; the psychological fallout would just have to wait. He got to his feet as well. “Yeah. Can you walk?”

“Yes.” He picked up the cloth anyway and stuffed it into a pocket before holding out a hand to her.

“Come on.” She didn't take his hand, but she moved past him obediently. He got in front of her once they'd reached the upper part of the embankment; she didn't talk, but she followed him as he led the way through the trees. Her silence was disturbing, but for the moment it was better than having her hysterical. At least she was moving.

He finally stopped around midnight. He'd tried to follow the stream as best as he could; it was an old woodsman's trick. Problem was, although it was bound to come out somewhere, that 'where' could be a hundred miles away. At least this way they were near fresh water.

Marie still hadn't spoken a word. When he told her they could stop, she simply sat down on the ground and waited for further instructions.

He squatted down in front of her. He could see well enough in the filtered moonlight, but he wasn't sure about her. “We'll get a few hours' rest. How are you?”

”I'm fine.” She turned her back on him as she lay down abruptly, curling up into a ball. He moved closer and started to lie down behind her; she hitched away. “Don't touch me.”

“You're gonna be cold. Don't do this, baby. Don't let it get to you like this.” He felt sick. Her voice was so detached, so unlike any way she'd ever spoken to him before. Everything was different now.

“I just don't want to be touched. I can't. Not if you want me to be able to do this.”

“Do what?”

She raised her head just slightly. “Oh, you know. Follow along and be rescued like a good little girl.” There was raw pure pain in that carefully controlled tone.

“That's not how it is. That's--”

“Logan? Just stop talking. It isn't going to help.” Her voice was even colder, if that were possible, as she put her head back down.

He sighed. “All right.” Reluctantly, he settled himself against the trunk of a tree a little way off. He waited some time, and she remained absolutely still, but he knew she wasn't asleep. He could feel the tension coiled in her body and he just knew she was biding her time, hoping he'd fall asleep first. “I'll find you if you run,” he said suddenly, and he heard her gasp of surprise. “Don't try it.” If she wanted mean, he'd give it to her. Anything to keep her angry, keep her moving.

“Fuck you.”

“Whatever.” He wasn't going to let her know it got to him, either.

She sat up. “Better stay awake then,” she said tightly. “I don't care about getting home, do you understand that?”

“Marie--”

“Rogue. Marie's dead.” She stood up and simply started off into the woods. He scrambled to his feet and came after her. She whirled around suddenly and held out a hand; he could see she'd stripped off one glove. “Get away from me. I mean it. I'll drop you and leave you right here for them to find.”

“You wouldn't do that.”

“Try me.” She backed away from him slowly. “I want you to leave me alone, you get it? I'm leaving. You go another direction, or I'll do it, I swear.”

He had two choices, as he saw it; one involved tackling her and tying her up again, which he considered to be last-resort material, and the other was to let her go.

He stepped back.

“Fine.” He nodded back towards the water. “Follow the stream. It'll lead to people eventually. Call Chuck the second you reach civilization. Don't trust anyone you meet, just find a phone. Don't stop, and don't get away from the water.” He saw her hesitate. “So what're you waiting for? Go on.”

“Don't follow me.” Her voice still held deep suspicion.

Yeah, right. “You leaving or what?” After another second she whirled and ran. Apparently she could see well enough, because she moved fast and she didn't fall. Logan waited fifteen minutes before setting off after her.

She tried. The teenagers had had some survival training, and she knew enough to go into the stream from time to time, but she couldn't stay in the icy water for long, and he tracked her without any real effort. He knew when she paused, when she changed directions, when she finally sat down and rested. He heard the cars on the upcoming road long before she did, and he got closer to her as they neared the edge of the woods.

He broke the treeline just in time to see her standing, wavering, at the side of the road. A truck was coming and at first he assumed she was going to flag it down, but she didn't, and then he bolted forward just in time to take her down as she began to lunge forward. The pickup slammed on its brakes and swerved, but didn't stop as it continued down the road.

He'd knocked the wind out of her, but she began fighting as soon as she got a lungful of air. “You bastard--I warned you not to follow me.” She tried to get her gloves off, but he caught her wrists and pinned them down on the ground beside her head.

“Cut it out. You're not going to hurt me,” he told her. She twisted furiously in his grip. “And I'm not letting you hurt yourself, either.”

“Get off me.”

“Don't really trust you right this second, kid.” He made his voice as cold as he could. “And I never said I wouldn't follow you. You know better than that.”

“Yeah.” Her chest was heaving. “I know. Makes you feel better.” He glared down at her for a long moment and then let her go.

“Get up.” When she didn't move, he reached down and yanked her to her feet. “Stay on the inside, away from the road. Follow me.” Sullenly she obeyed him. He got away from the main road as soon as he could; it was too likely that they'd be seen by someone they didn't want finding them. He cut across some fields; he saw fences, and someone must've put them up.

It was a couple of miles cross-country, but eventually there were houses. Logan stopped by the last of the wooden fenceposts. He was going to scare people looking like he was, half-clothed and bloody; all she'd have to do would be to scream once and there'd be an uproar, which was the last thing he wanted right now. And he didn't trust Marie to follow orders once she was out of his sight. His hand went to his pocket and she shied away. “What're you doing?”

“I'll give you a choice. I'm going to find a place to break into and make a phone call. Either convince me you're not going to run or make trouble, or I'm tying you up and leaving you right here till I get back. You got ten seconds.” She swallowed hard. “Five seconds.”

She stepped back, pulling her hands behind her and away from him. “Why would you believe me?”

“Because it's you.” He kept his eyes on her. “Your choice.”

He saw the fight go out of her. “I won't do anything. I promise.”

He nodded slowly. “You want to stay here or come with me?”

“Come with you.”

It didn't take long. It was Sunday, it turned out; the locals were probably all at church. Logan made the call, extracted a promise that the Blackbird was already in the air and on its way, and committed the additional misdemeanor of stealing an old t-shirt from a drawer in a bedroom upstairs and a sandwich and glass of milk, which he made Marie force down while they waited, while he sponged off the worst of the blood in the kitchen sink.

He didn't try to touch her again, but it wasn't until they were safely on the plane and Jean had taken charge of Marie that he finally let himself relax even a hairsbreadth. And as soon as he did, he had to stagger backwards, barely getting to a seat before his legs gave way. Jean came running, and he tried to tell her not to bother, just to make sure Rogue was all right, but she stayed with him anyway. He pushed her hands away when she tried to examine him, but he drank the water she gave him and nodded when she told him to rest, just relax, they'd take care of everything.

He could see Rogue across the plane, strapped into her own seat.

Her eyes were brown, but they were as expressionless as they'd been when they were blue.

Et Lux In Tenebris Lucet by Artemis2050

Logan got back to the Mansion near midnight one night in late October. He left the bike in front of the garage and wandered through the house until he heard voices in the kitchen. It was Scott and Jean, speaking in hushed tones and looking worried. Jean got up as soon as she saw him and ran to give him a hug. For once, it didn't seem to bother Scott.

“Thank god you're back.” Jean clung to him for a long moment. “It's good to see you.”

Scott was waiting when she finally stepped back, and held out a hand. Logan took it briefly. “You finished what you had to do?” He'd been gone almost six weeks. The military base had been easy enough to find again, and he never forgot a scent. He'd known exactly who he was looking for.

“Yeah.”

The younger man nodded once, abruptly. “Did you find out who they were?”

“Stryker's second in command and his crowd. One fuckin' psychopath and the rest believers in the cause.” They were all dead now, anyway. And he didn't feel the need to convey any information about that reptile-skinned bitch. Mystique hadn't been there any more, but he'd found her. Eventually.

He didn't want to discuss the details. “How is she?”

“Not good.” Jean answered that. “She still won't talk to anyone. Whatever happened, it's eating her up.” Her eyes were anguished. “We're really worried about her. All I can think of to do is to put her on a suicide watch, but I'm afraid that'll make things worse. She hasn't tried anything that I know of, and she's over eighteen--she can leave if she wants to, and I'm afraid she will if we push her.”

“I know. She promised she wouldn't--not till I got back, anyway.” Strictly speaking, that wasn't quite true, but Jeannie didn't need to know the details of that either. What he'd done was to inform Marie that he was leaving and that if she promised to be there when he got back, he'd have a headcount for her. It wasn't the kind of promise he wanted to be making to her, but he'd been reasonably sure it would keep her there, breathing, till he got back. Anyway, it was the best he'd been able to do. “And I know, I ain't a psychiatrist, and that was all wrong, but it worked, right?”

Jean gulped back whatever medical advice she'd been about to spout and nodded. “Are you staying?”

“Long as it takes.” He saw Scott's look of approval with wry surprise; so this was what it took to impress the Boy Wonder?

Funny thing, adversity.

“I'm going to find her.”

Jean nodded. “That'd be good. Whatever we can do--you know that.”

Logan could see the conflict in her eyes, the desire to do more, to ask more questions, to take action. He could understand the impulse. Jean was the doctor; why should she trust him to handle this? He didn't really trust himself.

He knew Jeannie also didn't understand why he wouldn't talk to her, tell her what Rogue wouldn't. He could have. He could have given far more than the brief, detached report he'd handed over, given them the information and let them all do their jobs. He'd been torn. It was probably the best thing he could have done for Marie.

There really hadn't been a choice to make. He wasn't sure of much, but this much he knew: if he took that away from her, revealed her secrets without her permission, that would be it, game over, no more discussion. He understood that in a way few others ever could. There were so many possible rationalizations, but what it came down to was that Marie would see it as a betrayal, and he couldn't face what would happen after that.

Marie had touched him, she'd seen his own nightmares, and she'd kept her mouth shut. What he was certain of was that she expected the same from him.

So he let Jean fuss over him for a few minutes, admiring her resolve not to pry, and then he went to deliver his message.

*****************************************************************

Logan found her up on the roof, sitting on the parapet outside the attic doors, several beer bottles discarded beside her and a cigarette in her hand. She looked like she'd lost weight. She looked around when he stepped out the doors, then back out into the night. “So?”

So? Quite literally, the first syllable she'd spoken to him since they'd gotten onto the Blackbird. This from the girl who used to want to tell him everything, who would chatter for hours if he'd listen. Now, a single word. All he could do was answer the question he knew she was really asking. “Eighteen of them. The one with the voice lasted the longest.” He wasn't planning to tell her who it had really been either, not yet at least. He dropped into a crouch an arm's length or so away from her. “You mind getting back from the edge there, kid?” Her feet were dangling over the wall she was sitting on.

“Don't worry. I'm not going over. Tonight.” She took another slug of her current beer. “Congratulations.” She didn't look at him, but he could tell she was relieved, in a way.

“What's going on with you?”

She laughed. It wasn't a pretty sound. “Jeannie send you to check on me?”

“Nobody needed to send me. You know that.”

“Yeah. I know that.” She stubbed out her cigarette savagely and then lit another. “One of us needs to leave.”

He looked down. He'd figured that was coming, but still. “You mean the roof, right now, or the School?”

“Pick one,” she returned.

Logan sighed and held out a hand. “Can I have a beer, at least?” She turned, a little suspiciously, but she picked one up from a cooler beside her and held it out to him. He cracked it open and took a deep swig, wishing it was something stronger.

At least she was staying where she was. In the week he'd spent recuperating before setting off on his self-imposed mission, she'd instantly left any room he came into, the very few times she'd left her own. She hadn't spoken a single word to him, hardly more than that to anyone else as far as he'd known, and the only reason he'd been able to get her to hold still long enough to let her know what he was going to do was that he'd waited for four hours outside her room, and when she'd finally opened the door she'd barely let him get out the two or three sentences he needed.

She'd nodded--once--and closed the door in his face.

He watched as she drew deeply on her cigarette, breathed out the smoke in a long stream. He'd know for years that she snuck beer and cigarettes from time to time, but it had always been more of an act than anything else, a little mocking nod to the tastes she'd picked up from him, playing with rebelliousness. This was different. Deliberate. Destructive. He didn't know what it was that was making her act like this--anger? Shame? Disgust? Probably a combination of all three.

Unfortunately, it was behavior he understood all too well. He just didn't know how to keep it from being directed at him.

“I don't want to stay here, but it isn't really safe for me out there,” she said finally. “They--those people, other people like them--they know about me. And I can't really make a living, or be around normal people without putting them in danger. So it probably ought to be you.” She paused for another drag on her cigarette before she added with cold deliberation, “You were never going to hang around anyway.”

“Okay.” He rolled the neck of the bottle between his fingers. So this was how it happened. How it ended. Pretty goddamn ironic, the idea that he'd ever have to be told to leave anyplace. “First you gotta tell me why.”

She flung an impatient glance over her shoulder. “Don't go all 'we gotta talk about this' on me, sugar. It doesn't suit you.”

“You're still going to have to tell me why I should go. Think I'm going to leave you here to slit your wrists?”

“I won't do that.”

“Whatever. Convince me you'll be all right, I'll leave if you want me to.”

“It doesn't work that way,” she snapped. “I can't just be all right for you, even if it makes you feel better.”

“I know that.” He took another swallow. “Tell me how it works, then.” She didn't answer. “Wasn't so great for me either, you know.”

She flinched at that. “I know. I know. Jesus, you think I don't understand that?”

“Not really, no. Not if you still think this is your fault.” He stood up and came to stand behind her; he hated that he could feel her tension increase as he approached. “I can live with what happened to me. This is worse, seeing what it did to you.”

“Yeah, well, leave and you won't see it.”

“Can't do that.” He finished the beer and set down the bottle.

“Well, I can't keep seeing you around here. So where does that leave us?”

He shook his head. “Christ, kid.” She was hurting bad, he couldn't imagine what he could say that was going to help, and leaving wasn't an option either, not yet. Stalemate.

“I'm not a kid.” She'd said that to him before, but it had always been playful, teasing. Now her voice came out hard and clipped. “Never have been since you've known me, really, but I'm damn well not one any more.” She threw her bottle over the side of the building and it shattered somewhere below. “So you can just quit calling me that now.”

“Then quit acting like one. Sulking and throwing beer bottles around ain't exactly signs of maturity.” She was right, though--he didn't have the right to call her that any more, not after what had happened. He put a hand on her shoulder and she jerked away. “Marie! Watch it.” She was still on the edge of the roof.

“Rogue. If you have to talk to me, it's Rogue. And don't touch me.” He didn't know which instruction cut him worse, but she was pulling out all the stops, that much was certain.

“Turn around, then. You're makin' me nervous.” After a minute, she did, turning to bring her legs inside the roof, still avoiding his touch and his gaze.

He sat down next to her, not too close, and reached for another beer.

“Hey. Buy your own.” She swatted at his hand ineffectually.

“Later.” He opened it and took another drink. “You gotta talk to someone. I thought you might want it to be me.”

She snorted at that. “Why?”

“I was there too. I know what happened. You don't have to explain it to me. And I need to talk about it.” He felt, rather than saw, her start of surprise. Good. Might shake her out of this self-flagellation crap, or whatever it was that she was doing to herself. “The shit they made you do--that was nothing. You asked me to kill you, for chrissakes. They were using you to hurt me and it was killing you. That's what they wanted me to see. You think I can live with it if that worked?”

“Stop it,” she muttered. “It didn't. You got us out. You won.”

“Not yet.” He dared to hitch a little closer. “What if it had been you?”

She shifted nervously. “What?”

”The drug didn't work on me. So what? That's just a freak thing. If it had, they'd have had you on that table and--”

“Don't!” She clapped her hands over her ears. “Don't say that. They couldn't. I don't heal.”

He laughed grimly. “You ain't nearly creative enough. Think about it. They could've made me cut you. With my own claws. Then heal you.” He spaced the simple, blunt sentences out and let it sink in. “They could've made me rape you.” Her whole body went rigid when he said that. He reached towards her then, took her shoulders and made her turn to face him. “That it? You think that matters?”

“I don't know what you're talking about.” No, she wasn't in the least convincing as a liar. She twisted her shoulders uncomfortably and he let his hands fall away. All right. No touching. That hurt. She was so shy of any kind of physical contact, understandably, but she'd never been that way with him. He'd always thought of it as something he could do for her, something she needed.

He hadn't realized how much he needed it too.

“If it had been you--would you blame me? Would you hate me because I hurt you?”

“I don't think you hate me,” she said weakly.

“What is it then, baby?” Her eyes filled with tears. “Hey. Just tell me.”

“They knew,” she whispered.

“They knew what?” He didn't dare move; she seemed to be holding herself together by sheer force of will.

“Everything. They asked me questions for hours and I couldn't keep from answering. They knew I didn't want to hurt you. But the other stuff…” The tears started to trickle down her face. “That was--”

Yeah. He'd been sure that was the worst of it for her, having even the limited amount of contact she could have turned into something sick and twisted. Logan reached out to her automatically, but she turned away from him even as she dissolved in tears. “I'm sorry, baby.” There was every reason for her to want him to leave her alone, he knew that, but he just couldn't force himself to get up and leave. Even tears were better than that emotionless impassivity. She seemed to be trying to say something more, but finally she just shook her head helplessly. “It's okay. Take it easy.” Christ, it was hell watching this.

He just wished he'd been able to kill that shape-shifting cunt an inch at a time, over the course of a month. Maybe more. His knuckles itched with the desire to make someone suffer exactly as much as Marie was, but he knew he didn't have that power. That had been pure evil; evil didn't suffer like that. Not like her.

She dashed the back of one gloved hand across her face angrily and looked down. “What're you going to do?”

“Depends.” He sat back a little. “You said you wanted me to go. If all I'm doin' is making it harder on you, I can do that. Whatever you need.”

“I don't know what I need.” She twisted her hands together in front of her. “I just feel--dirty.”

“No. Baby--it wasn't like that.” He didn't know what to tell her. She'd never be able to look at him without seeing it all over again, her hands and mouth moving over him like that--but what was he going to tell her, that he'd liked it?

It was a perversion of his deepest fantasies, but he couldn't tell her that.

He looked at her, and the heartbreak was evident in her eyes. But jesus, she had to understand that what they'd forced her to do wasn't her fault. He'd tell her that a million times if he had to, but it didn't seem like she was going to believe it, and he didn't know why.

Then, suddenly, he got it. They knew, she'd said. Mystique had been even more inventive than he'd realized.

“What you told them--that's what they had you do.” Logan knew he was right the second he said it, just from her reaction. She bolted for the doors and he followed, seizing her arm and pulling her back out onto the roof. “Wait. Don't just leave, darlin'.” This was exactly the wrong thing to do, he knew it--he was only going to scare her this way. He let go of her arm quickly. “Sorry.”

“Don't touch me. Don't. Don't look at me.” It sounded like her words were being forced out over razor blades. “I didn't want to. I didn't. But they made me tell them and they made me…” She was staring down at her gloved hands as though they weren't part of her. Her voice had sunk to a whisper. “And you didn't want that.”

He had to make her listen. Somehow, this had to stop. “I didn't want it like that, darlin'. Don't ever think I didn't want you.” He saw her hands tighten on each other; she was shaking like a leaf. “I've thought about you touchin' me that way, believe me. But not like that, when it wasn't your choice. Not like that, and not outta some crush or being grateful because I saved your life, just because it was me. I thought you'd…”

Whatever he'd thought, it didn't matter any more. He could see that much. “They wrecked that, didn't they?” He reached out and stroked a lock of her long hair; surely that wasn't too threatening, and this time she didn't stop him. He'd never forget that silky texture, even if she did make him leave, even if tonight was the last time he ever felt it. He didn't see how she could possibly get past this, but he wanted that one last touch of her to remember. “I'm sorry for that, darlin'. More than anything.”

She looked dazed, and he realized she hadn't responded to anything he'd said. But at least she wasn't running away, and whatever else she needed to hear, he'd figure it out, if only she'd listen--

“Can you go now?” Her voice was gentle, but firm. Logan looked at her in shock. No. Not yet. Not this soon. “I don't mean for good. Just-I need to be alone for a while.”

“Okay.” That much he could manage. He stepped back, toward the French doors leading into the attic. He looked over his shoulder before he went in and saw that she'd returned to the parapet, drawn her feet back up onto it and lit another cigarette. He could see its glowing tip wavering; her hands were still shaking. She didn't turn around.

He went inside and left her there.

Et Lux In Tenebris Lucet by Artemis2050

Logan didn't see her at all the next day, or the day after that. But on the third day she was in the dining hall, sitting with some of her friends, even smiling occasionally at something that was said, as her friends hovered around her protectively. And a few days after that he saw her at Jean's office door; he stayed down the hallway until he'd seen her knock and go in, and he didn't leave until she came out hours later.

Marie didn't see him there, but Jean did when she left a few minutes later. Her eyes were red when she came up to him wordlessly and put her arms around him. He accepted the embrace silently. Jean never said a word, but she gave him a sad smile before she touched his face briefly and moved away. He would have given anything to know what Marie had told her, but he didn't ask.

That seemed to be the deal now.

The next day Marie borrowed one of the Mansion's fleet of cars and he watched her drive away. She hadn't taken a suitcase, but she hadn't confided in him either, so he just skulked around the grounds until he saw the blue Acura return, some hours later. He watched as she unloaded some bags from the passenger side before returning to the house, and he breathed a mental sigh of relief.

She wouldn't buy new gloves if she wasn't planning to live to wear them.

It went on like that. She didn't seek him out, but she didn't actively avoid him, either, so he followed suit. It didn't seem like there was much more he could do.

She never spoke to him, and after a while he stopped waiting for that. She didn't seem angry now, but her withdrawal was almost as bad.

He saw her sometimes with her friends, with Jean. It made him ache with the loss of the companionship he'd come to count on, because he figured that was gone forever. One day he saw her with Bobby Drake, in the garden, standing close beside him, and he saw Bobby reach out to take her hand, and she didn't pull away.

He almost left that day, because if she found solace there or anywhere he wanted her to have it, but damned if he could watch. But he didn't. I don't mean for good, she'd told him, and he held onto that, held onto the hope that there was still more to be said between them, because he had to. It was all he had left.

He watched, and he found things to keep him relatively busy during the day, and he woke from the unrestful sleep he fell into at odd hours of the morning gasping and sweating, reeling with images from new nightmares that had replaced the old. There was a difference. He never woke with the claws springing free any more. Even in dreams, that release was denied him.

He watched Marie, and he knew Jean Grey was watching him. She offered, more than once, to listen if he wanted to talk, or to suggest someone else. He turned her down, as politely as he could at first and then more brusquely, and finally she didn't ask any more. He didn't need anyone to explain anything and he damn well wasn't asking anyone's opinion. He figured he'd know when his obligations were over.

Marie didn't return to classes. He knew she was studying because he saw her in the library; she was probably working with the Professor or the other teachers privately, and one day he heard Jean talking with her there, discussing other schools, other colleges. He got as far as pulling his old knapsack out from under his bed that time. But November and December came and went, and she didn't leave.

He went up to the roof sometimes, and though her scent was still there it was fainter, and there was no longer constantly the stale scent of beer and cigarette smoke clinging to her when she passed.

Bobby left for California in January, on an internship to Stanford. She stayed.

In March, Logan was working in the garage when he heard her coming, and he stood up, wiping the grease from his hands. As soon as he saw her, he knew it wasn't an accident that she was there.

“Hi.”

He nodded a greeting.

“I wanted to ask you something.”

“Sure.” He put the towel down.

“It wasn't just the government, was it?”

He hesitated, then shook his head. “No.”

“I knew it had to be--personal.” Her voice was stiff with tension. “When they didn't want you to do anything for them.”

“Yeah.” There wasn't much more than that he could say. “It was personal.”

“How did she know?” She came a step closer. “That it would work.”

He exhaled a breath. “Wouldn't have to be a genius to figure it out. She'd tried to get to me before, using other people. She saw what worked best.”

Marie--no, Rogue, he reminded himself--bit her lip and looked down. Then she looked up at him and gave a quick, sad smile. “Yeah.” She turned to go, and it took everything he had not to try and stop her. She hesitated just for a moment. “Thanks.”

“For what?”

She didn't look at him when she spoke. “For answering.” She started to move again, and paused for one more second. “For still being here.” And then she was gone, and he had to listen as her footsteps faded away.

He kept expecting the dreams to fade, but they didn't, and he just tried not to remember them when he saw her.

It was a week later that there was a knock on his door, long past midnight. He was lying on his bed, but he hadn't bothered to even undress for the night--he'd already known he wasn't going to be able to sleep. He went to the door and found her there.

“Did I wake you up?”

“No.”

“Good.” She took a deep breath and then gave him the least glimmer of a smile. “Can we talk?”

“Yeah. Sure.” He started to step back, opening the door wider for her to come in, but she shook her head. She hesitated, then held out a hand and he took it; her silk-covered fingers slid against his palm and tightened over his hand. “Come on.”

He let her lead him out of the room, up the stairs and back through the quiet upper floors until they reached the attic doors. She pushed them open and he saw that she'd already been out there; it was a chilly night and a blanket lay on the roof where she'd left it. She let go of his hand and went to sit down on the blanket; she patted a space next to her and he settled himself beside her--not too close.

“So I've been thinking.” Marie kept her eyes straight ahead. “About what you said that night.”

“What about it?” He remembered it as though it had been yesterday.

“Did you mean that?”

Logan wasn't in any doubt about what part of it she meant. “I've never lied to you. Rogue.” Her mouth twisted wryly at that.

“All right, I was being overdramatic with that.” Her hands were twisting in front of her again, and he really wanted to reach out and stop that tormented motion, but he didn't. “You said--they wrecked that.” She sounded nervous as all hell.

“If you can't stand to be in the same room with me, yeah, they did.”

“What about you?” Her voice was shaky.

Logan put his hand down over both of hers. She didn't pull away; in fact, he felt her fingers close over his. “Never changed the way I felt about you.” He felt her hand tighten its grip. “Never will.”

“You just mean you don't hate me.”

“No, I mean it didn't make a damn bit of difference to the way I feel about you. I wish things had been different, because I want to get past the shit that was happening and fix this. Just not if it hurts you. I mean, I know you can't exactly forget it, but...” It took him a second to say the rest. “I mean I love you.”

“Oh.” Just that one syllable. He searched her face for some clue to what she was thinking, but there was nothing to read there. But after a minute she silently slid a little closer to him on the blanket; he put his other arm around her back and she rested her head on his shoulder.

They sat quietly that way for a while. All Logan could feel was immense relief. She wanted this much from him, at least. It was something. He bit back any shred of disappointment he might have felt at her silence. That didn't matter--not as long as she was all right.

“It's not a crush,” she said suddenly. She raised her head and looked up at him. “I don't think it's been a crush for a long time. I think…” He felt his lungs stop working as he waited for her to finish that sentence. “But I can't touch people, and I always figured that was the end of that.”

“That--that's not even close,” he managed. “That's not even--”

“You're the most physical man I've ever seen,” she interrupted. “And I know what you like. I've seen it, Logan.” She tapped her head. Her voice was tight, like it hurt her to talk. “You can't have that with me.”

“That--it doesn't matter.”

“It does. They couldn't make me do everything I told them, you know. You want me to tell you the rest? You want me to tell you about the ones they couldn't play out because--”

There was only one way to end this. Words weren't going to cut it; not his words, anyway. Logan leaned forward and captured her lips with his own, tightening his arm around her so she couldn't pull back, although she tried to. It took a surprisingly long time before he felt the pull begin, or maybe it was just that her mouth opened under his and he felt like that moment was stretching into a thousand years. He reluctantly pulled back before the draw was too great. He waited a few seconds for her to assimilate whatever she'd seen.

“If I can have you, none of the rest of that means shit,” he said bluntly. “It's nothing we can't work around. You think needing something like this to make it happen--” He pulled the thin scarf she wore around her neck free and let it trail through his fingers. “You think that would make a difference?” He shook his head. “You gotta be kidding me.”

“I don't want to hurt you,” she said, and it sounded desperate, like she was clinging to straws. But her eyes didn't look empty any more, they looked alive, watchful. Hopeful, even.

“You won't. Not that way.” He didn't know what she'd gotten from his mind this time; didn't care, even. Let her know it all, he didn't give a shit. The she reached up and took his face between her gloved hands, and he wondered if she'd seen that, his fantasy of her hands in silk or leather moving over him--

She kissed him again, and he tasted the beer she'd been drinking and the last cigarette she'd smoked, the warm sweet taste that was just her. He had time to savor all that before she pulled away again, and this time he hadn't felt the drag of her mutation at all. He leaned forward, pushing her back down onto the blanket, until she was lying on her back under him and he felt her hands come up to rest against his chest as he dipped his head close to her neck, barely brushing the skin with his lips. He could feel her blood pulsing just below the surface, feel her throat move as she swallowed.

This was it, he knew it. If they could find a way past this--he could make her accept his touch, he knew that much. He could make her stay with him.

But if she didn't stop being afraid of herself, he'd never have her, not really, and he knew that would tear them both apart. If she slipped back into her secrets she'd stay in that veiled world forever, hiding behind her skin and her thoughts.

And it wasn't just her mutation. That had let her see into his own dark soul and she'd never been afraid of any part of him, even now. She was scared of what was inside her own skin, of what she hadn't wanted him to see. He was certain, now, that the reason she hadn't wanted him to touch her wasn't just that she was afraid to hurt him, and it wasn't revulsion either. She was afraid to find out what he thought about her.

“We can have that,” he said quietly. “I promise, baby. Every way that counts. Let me prove that to you. I love you so much, darlin'. Don't let that go.” He heard her breath catch, a whimper in her throat quickly choked back. “That's the truth, Marie. Hold onto that.”

“I love you too.” Her arms went around his neck and held him there. “I do. Just as much. More.” She moved under him, pressing up against him, and he breathed in her scent like it was the last breath of oxygen on earth. “Don't leave.”

“Never wanted to.” He placed gentle kisses along her neck, light and quick. “Not unless you were with me.” He sat back, finally, resting on one elbow and looking down at her. “You get that?” He really wasn't sure how it worked. He'd never exactly asked. Hadn't been sure he wanted to know--and damned if it hadn't been for the same reasons as her. He'd never much like having his secrets revealed for him either.

“I got that.” The big brown eyes were warm and alive now, and her hand ran down his arm, tightened over his bicep. “Why didn't you tell me before?”

His brow knit a little. “I would've.” He wished to hell he had. It would have been different, if there had already been something between them. It would have made all the difference. “It's just…you're so young, and I'm--” She put a hand to his lips.

“You're just Logan,” she said. “That's all.” He didn't quite know what she meant by that, but he forced himself to hold still, to wait, to let her do this in her own time. He lay back on the blanket with her, and she shifted so that she was lying with her head resting on his shoulder again, looking up at the stars. “Want to go in?” she asked after a while.

“Sure.” He wasn't sure whether or not they were done for the night, but all he could do was to follow her lead, and at the head of the stairs she stopped him, pressed him against the wall in a tight embrace.

“I used to dream about it,” she whispered against his chest. “I used to dream you'd let me touch you like that. I used to imagine what it would be like if I could do that.” Logan could feel how much it still cost her to make that admission out loud. He lifted her chin and kissed her quickly.

“Yeah. Me too.” He met her eyes. “You can have anything you want from me, darlin'.”

“You already know what I want.” Her tongue crept out and ran over her lip; he didn't think she was doing it on purpose, but it was incredibly erotic. “What do you want?”

“I want…” He wanted to be one of those poetry-spouting twerps for just five minutes, because god knew he'd already said more to her than he'd ever thought he was capable of. Although maybe that wasn't what she needed. Maybe she was as tired of her enforced role as the untouchable good girl as he was of the playing the noble protector, and maybe--just maybe--what she really needed to hear was something that would burn right through her. Something that would burn away the shadows, or at least show them for the ghosts they really were.

And that he could do, because dark places inside that reached for the light he understood. “I want to strip you naked and keep you that way for about a week, for starters.” Her eyes widened, but he didn't stop. He ran his hands up her arms and took hold of her shoulders, backing her up step by step. “I want to taste you and feel your breasts under me and I want your mouth on me, because I haven't stopped thinking about that for more than an hour straight in the last six months.” Her back was against the wall now and he held her there.

He knew every shift of her muscles, every nuance of her scent. He was looking for fear, anger, withdrawal. It wasn't there. “I want to feel how much you want me and I want to fuck you hard enough to make you forget everything else but that. I want you. All of you.” He could see her pupils dilating, her breath coming more rapidly, as he spoke, but his other senses told him what that response meant. He'd smelled it on her before, even if he'd never let himself acknowledge what it really was.

Desire.

Her hands closed around handfuls of his shirt. “Let me stay with you. Tonight.”

'Let her?' Christ, he wanted to wrap her in silk and eat her alive. And he planned on making that happen, sooner rather than later. Maybe he should tell her that. “Yeah. And don't think you're leaving tomorrow.”

He infused the sentence with just the hint of a growl and her lips curved up in a smile that promised the world and a bit over. “Okay.” He gentled his touch then, slid his hands up to tangle in her hair as he kissed her for as long as he dared.

“I'll make it good for you,” he pledged when he'd reluctantly pulled away. “I swear to God.”

“I know.” The tip of that tongue crept out again and this time it was damn well on purpose. “You already have.”

Finis