"Don't give her to me, don't!" I try to scream, but suddenly my voice disappears. The doctor's smile is wide, from ear to ear. And he's getting closer.

I'm trying to get away, to run, to hide, but I can't move.

"Don't give her to me, please!" my lips tell him without any sound coming out.

"Ms. D'Ancanto, don't be nervous. Some young mothers sometimes feel a bit frightened at the beginning, but then..."

"YOU DON'T UNDERSTAND!" my brain screams hysterically.

"Ms. D'Ancanto, you have a beautiful daughter. And she wants to meet you. Don't you wanna take her?"

"NOOOOO!"

He puts a small warm body, still covered in blood and slime in my arms, and I'm desperately crying, because there's nothing I can do.

She's got silver eyes, her father's eyes. I can see them when they open wide, looking at me with horror. My arms hold her tightly. The process has begun.

She has no thoughts inside her head yet, so I can hear only her desperate cries in my brain, as I can feel them with my skin. Please, God, stop this. I don't need it. I don't need her. She's my daughter, I can't steal from my child.

Dark blue veins appear on her fresh pretty face like disgusting worms. Her eyes are bulging from her head, and thin streams of blood are running from them, along with her nose and her mouth. She has no power to fight me. She has no power to move. My nameless child has enough power only to die in my arms.

Her cries become quieter and quieter, her heartbeat knocks wildly inside me. My tears are falling on her face, on the stiffened mask of suffering. With every single beat my world is crashing around me. Finally, her heartbeat slows down and loses its rhythm. Convulses once, twice--then silence. One, two, three...please, God, give her a chance. One single chance. One…

It's over. I killed her. I killed my nameless child.

Suddenly Logan is here. My hands have found ability to move. I stretch them to him, showing him all I had done. His head falls down, and when he faces me again, I see pure disgust and hate. I open my mouth to say something, to try to explain, but he raises his arm and all I see is the sparkling light of the hospital lamps, reflecting in his released claws.

I have sinned. I will pay for that.

I wake up with muted cry, trying to catch my reality here, in Xavier's mansion. I can barely walk, but I need to go to the bathroom, to see my face. It's pale, my lips are shaking, sweat is streaming down, but there's no three identical deep scratches from his claws on my cheek. I stay there, near the mirror, trying to put my doubled reality into one again, because I'll lose my mind if I don't.

"It's booooooring," John says, extending the words.

"Nobody says you should listen. You can go wherever you want, moron." Probably Kitty.

I can't say for sure, because my eyes are closed. After a nightmare there is always this weird feeling--you are not sleeping and you are not awake, you remember the fear, the pain, the heaviness on your heart, but you don't remember what exactly caused them. But thanks to Jean, I just have remembered. She must be kidding me.

"…you know nothing, you can't see, hear, or think clearly. All your world is narrowed around what you are feeling. It is been proven that it is very important for a baby to feel. Some scientists and teachers say that it's wrong to hold your baby, even if he or she is crying. Because you can "spoil" the child. This is a big mistake. It's no surprise that we have wars in the world. Skin contact is the only thing newborns know and recognizes. A blind, deaf, or lost baby will feel his mother with his skin among others. Of course, you can be a busy mother. You can find a nanny for your child and go make big money right after the labor. Nobody will resent you for that, because this is our crazy world. But then, ten years after, you will spend all your free time on the psychologist's couch, trying to understand why your child is closer to nanny than to you. Mother is not the person child sees. She is the person the child feels. Through his skin right with his soul and..."

I'm sick. I'm jumping from my seat and go quickly to the door, then to the toilet. I was right. My breakfast leaves my body, and then my supper, and then my throat continues to spasm, trying to turn out my stomach.

I'm not pregnant. But someday I will be, because that's the woman's purpose in this world. I start to cry, quietly, helplessly. Nobody will help me. I'm the result of ozone holes, exhaust gases, explosions in atom power stations, the damn x-factor and God knows what else. Freak of nature. Sometimes I understand all these military people who dream to destroy us. We are useless. All we bring to this world is suffering for those we love.

He enters when I'm already entirely sure that I shouldn't have stolen his ability to heal that night, when he nearly killed me with his claws. Maybe he was right.

I'm sitting on the cold tiled floor, pulling my knees up to my chest, resting my back against the wall. I would run away from him, but the damn wall limits my space. I guess I look awful. I can see this from his expression. He left in the morning, taking Cyclops' bike again, and hadn't the chance to see me after my night adventure.

"Marie?"

"Leave me alone," I whisper. "Leave me now, because I don't want you to hate me."

He takes a step forward.

"How can I hate the only person who really loves me?" he asks, kneeling beside me.

There's something weird about Logan. When he's near, he radiates some healing energy. It comes from him naturally with the smell of cigars, sweat and sweet male skin. He is the furious animal for all the surrounding world, but he keeps his source open just for me. My body absorbs it, and now at least my knees stop shaking.

I'm lost in the silver moonlight of his eyes. He is reading me. Not the way Professor or Jean can--his own, private way.

"Her heart," I whisper. "It just exploded. And I took everything from her. I sucked her dry."

He hides his face in my hair, keeping me warm with his breathing.

"I wanna be a real woman for you. To give you everything."

"You already gave me everything. You gave me a reason to live."

"It's..."

"One day the Professor will come up with something. Until that day you are my baby."

He understands me. As he always does. Two derelicts, who have nightmares, can always read each other's minds. There's no need for telepathy. We have too many things in common. Sometimes it makes us one person.

Logan picks me up in his arms easy, like I am a baby. I can feel his hard muscles flex under the leather jacket. He carries me away from my breakfast and from my nightmare, letting it know that if it comes back, he will deal with it personally.

I'm touching my cheek again. No scratches.

"You're my baby," he repeats, closing our door behind us.

Leaving the whole world waiting.

THE END