They were almost done at the mall when Rogue's cell phone rang.

"Rogue, I'm in a bit of a bind and I'm wondering if you can help me." It was Xavier's direct line, but Xavier was in London on business. His friend Nova was at the helm until Xavier returned, later today.

"Sure, what's going on?"

"Well there's a former X-Man who was on his way here when his car broke down. He's at the train station."

"In Westchester?"

"Yes. His name is Alexander. I was wondering if you could pick him up."

"Now?"

"If you're able."

"No, it's fine, we're right near there. Bring him back to the mansion?"

"Please. I'll tell him what you look like so he can meet you."

"No problem. We'll be back within the hour."

"Thank you Rogue. I appreciate it."

Jean paid for her purchases and they left for the train station.

"He said the guy's name is Alexander. You know him?"

"No, I don't know any Alexander. It's strange, because I've been with Xavier from the beginning. Maybe it's a code name of sorts."

"Maybe. Or maybe he trained with Xavier overseas."

"Possible. Did you get that sweater set?"

"Naw. It didn't fit."

Rogue pulled into the train station's lot and put the car in park. "You got a magic marker?"

Jean handed it to her and she was about to write the man's name on a large piece of paper when-

"Ohmigod. Rogue!"

"What?" She looked up and followed Jean's gaze.

Her breath caught in her throat.

"Jesus fucking Christ."

Logan looked as if he'd aged while on the road. His jeans were tattered, his jacket was tattered, his hair even looked tattered. At his side stood a fake blonde with bleeding lipstick, and she looked the most tattered of all.

"He looks horrible."

Rogue nodded, her mouth dry.

"And what's with the ho'?" Jean asked.

Rogue giggled abruptly. Inside, she felt cold and vaguely nauseated. It had been a regular day, a fairly decent late September Indian summer day, now this.

Jean rolled down her window before Rogue could gather her composure. "Logan?" she called.

He turned to face her and Rogue saw how cold his eyes were. When he recognized Jean his mouth twisted into a smile that looked more like a leer, and did not reach his eyes. He walked slowly to the window, swaggering confidence, and although the look on his face made him ugly, Rogue looked at his body and shuddered. Legs. Ass. Tight thighs. Denim.

"Jeannie. Good to see ya." He stooped down to look into the window and it was then that he saw Rogue.

He stopped for a minute, stopped whatever façade he was putting on for a second's time, and stared.

Rogue had grown taller, the lines of her face sharper . She wore a tight brown sweater with a short plaid skirt and brown tights. Sitting behind the wheel made her skirt look even shorter. Her hair was a bit longer, fuller, wavy, and the white streaks still curled through them.

Her eyes were still wide and brown, suggesting innocence. Her lips were a direct counterpoint, top lip still bowed and luscious, her downturned pout now covered in red lipstick, suggesting rough slow touch, a drawl, sin.

As she turned to face him her hair fell forward to graze her shoulder. Finally his gaze moved down over her breasts, to her polished pink nails. Bare hands.

She appraised him coldly, and he didn't like the sense that he was being raked over by a full-grown woman and found wanting. "Hey kid," he said. She gave him the merest raise of an eyebrow and a nod.

"What are you girls doing here?"

"You're not Alexander, are you?" Jean asked.

"Yep. I found out that's my last name. This is Cindy."

Cindy eyes appeared high and she gave a distracted wave. "Hello," Jean politely said. "Well come on in, we'll take you back to the school."

Jean, read his mind, it could be Mystique.

One step ahead of you. It's Logan all right. And she's definitely harmless.

She looks high as a fucking kite.

Higher. I'll check later but now she's incapacitated.

Groovy, Rogue thought sarcastically.

Rogue pulled out of the cul-de-sac and started driving home. It was silent for a few minutes. Rogue clicked on the radar detector and seamlessly merged onto I-95, quickly accelerating to 85. When she got angry, her foot got heavy.

You ok?

I'm getting more pissed off by the minute.

Well you look gorgeous today, and when he saw you… his brain about short-circuited.

I'd like to short circuit his balls with my knee.

Jean snorted and attempted to hide her outburst. Logan, however, was looking from one beautiful woman to the other. "You ladies care to let me in on the joke?"

"Logan, you're being paranoid," Jean said coolly. Jean was usually one to be polite but when Rogue was her student she came to think of her as a sister. When Rogue joined the team Jean thought of her as a peer. In all the time when they weren't working, they had become fast friends. It was clear that Jean, who had seen Rogue suffer for three years, would like to knee him in the balls.

"Whatever, darlin'."

Logan leaned back into his seat, spreading his legs in his tight jeans. Cindy was looking out the window and he grabbed her large hand into his. She mumbled something.

"So, Logan, what brings you back to Westchester?" Jean asked politely.

"Well, I got bored and figured I'd come down to check out the action." He was leaning back comfortably and watching Rogue's mouth in the rearview mirror.

"Well, I think you might be disappointed," Jean said.

"That so?"

"Yeah."

Rogue was ignoring the conversation and flipping through radio stations. She found a rock station and then leaned back into her seat. Her face was a mask of indifference, but with the all the hard, unyielding tension of a mask. It was a game to show no emotion, not give it away in her breath or her eyes or her body. She felt his eyes and anger coursed through her. She wondered if he could smell it.

He leaned up behind the driver's seat and seductively said into her left ear "what's wrong, Marie, cat got your tongue?" For a second she tried to find the perfect scathing comeback. Then she felt his fingers gently brush the side of her arm. The movement of his finger above her sweater was as light as a crawling spider, and she felt it all the way down to her clit.

"Move or lose it, Logan."

He momentarily froze, stunned that a voice so commanding could come from his little Marie. The corners of Jean's mouth turned up.

"You sure about that, darlin'?" She could feel his breath on her ear. The finger was moving up to her shoulder. She could feel her nipples tighten.

She moved her right hand to the steering wheel and caught his hand in her left one. It contained his fist for a second and then she squeezed.

Nothing could break adamantium bones, but his joints weren't made of adamantium.

"Ouch! You bitch!" Only his being startled kept him from unsheathing his claws. "Aww, god, damn. What the hell, girl?"

"I warned you. Do it again and I'll drain you," she said evenly.

"I suggest you listen to her, Logan," sean said.

It was quiet after that. Cindy was looking vacantly out the window.

I hope Xavier's home, because I don't know what to make of this, Jean thought.

He's creeping me out. Are you sure it's him?

Positive. He's changed markedly but I've been in his mind before, and I know it's him.

I've waited three years for this? she thought.

It wasn't true, anyway. Rogue hadn't waited. By the age of twenty she'd slept with two men, learned to control her skin, graduated from high school, and became second in command of the X-Men. She wasn't exactly waiting in a tower for him to come back wearing shining armor.

I'm trying to read him but there's a lot of resistance. He must have undergone some trauma.

Yeah, well so have I, she thought.

She had been abducted, raped, and beaten to within an inch of her life. It had happened three months after he left, after he promised to take care of her.

She had hated him for over a year now, once she had stopped hating herself for thinking she was stupid. Stupid to cry while she lay dying, hoping, some stupid part of her believing, that he would save her.

In reality, it had been Jean, Ro, and Scott.

She had only cried twice since, once when cutting onions and once when she stubbed her toe. After that she studied and slept and ate trained and even socialized and advanced and went out and trained some more, and while the others around her felt it was unhealthy, she took a cold, hard satisfaction from her regimented life. She marveled at her abilities, the strength she gained, the knowledge, her tactical, psychological and combat skills. Her skills were legendary at the mansion. She marveled at her ability to stop wanting, him or anyone.

When she learned to touch, she had physical contact with friends, and with Jean's daughter, who she loved like her own.

She'd dated three men and slept with two of them; she learned to let herself resonate like a plucked string under a man's touch, quaking in awe of the sensual aspects of coupling, but she stopped thinking about love. Not even when she watched Jean and Scott get married.

That was for them, not her.

She was not cold, she was not mean, but she also wasn't that frightened hopeful kid who'd arrived three years ago.

She counted off the days and weeks and years without him, without a letter, a postcard, a call. She had been more than taken, back then when she would play foosball in the rec room with the other kids, laughing and free. His soul had flown into hers, and hers into him, a flowing, rushing communion that only they could understand. She loved him the way a woman loves a man, and not a man who is her brother or father.

But each passing day without contact was tarnishing that. Trust was too hard to find in the world. She'd lost it when her parents cast her out. She stopped believing in god on the fourth day of her abduction when she was dehydrated and dying. She since believed in Logan a little less each day.

She realized that now, on this day exactly three years after he'd left, there was little trust left. It evaporated into nothing when she saw that flinty look in his eyes.

She didn't love him anymore. But seeing his physical appearance caused sharp ghosts to waft through her. They were an afterimage, a phantom pain, reminding her viscerally of the things she'd hoped for. She'd managed to forget his face. Now she wished he'd never come back.

She slowed and put on her turn signal, and turned into the gates of the school. Jean's voice interrupted her thoughts.

The professor's back. I've explained the situation to him and he's as confused as we are. He's gonna scan them both.

Good. I want him out of my car.

You sure you're okay?

I will be after an hour or so in the Danger Room.

You wanna talk, after?

Probably.

I'm probably gonna have to x-ray his hand.

Good. Print me a copy and I'll make myself a sun-catcher.

Jean shook with a silent chuckle as Rogue parked. She abruptly got out and waited for the rest of them to exit. Trying to piss her off, Logan took his time to gather up his bags. She fought the urge to tap her feet. She looked at his face and hated him. The fact that she had once loved him so, so, much cut into her sharply, then faded. The hard part was over. Three years and the only hurt left was that ghost rattling around.

The anger, however, was ripe, and the second they were out of the car she locked it with a hard press of her keyring.

It was Saturday and the Danger Room was empty. She wore a cotton catsuit with black boots. Her hair was up in a ponytail. She was a dark taut line against the light gray walls and walked quickly to the console. She rapidly typed in her login information and began the process of picking fight conditions.

She walked out of the console room in fighting stance. "Begin program." she said, and the room morphed into a dark alley.

That is how he found her an hour later, winded and sweat-soaked. She had fought her way through Sabretooth, Mystique, Toad, and eleven so-called Friends of Humanity. She had just landed a roundhouse kick to one virtual assailant while punching another in the testicles, a feat requiring precise balance. Her moves were lightning-quick and both men dropped at her feet, then disappeared.

The lights came on and the alley disappeared.

Danger room gray was all around and her adversary was now real. She knew he was there before she saw his silhouette behind the console door.

He stood there, quietly, waiting for her to yell.

When she didn't, he stepped out into the danger room. He had showered and shaved and combed and he looked for a second so beautiful it hurt. Just a ghost, she reminded her self. She took in his entire being and tried to drill it into her brain: This is not Logan, this is only the body of someone he used to be. This is a stranger.

The ghost spoke. "Why are you down here playin' all alone." Suddenly she knew that he had been watching for some time. He had to know that she was doing anything but playing.

The pain was cutting her. She reminded herself: This is not Logan. This is a corpse laid out for a viewing, and the fact that he is talking is just pure coincidence.

She elected not to dignify that with a response. "What do you want?"

He smiled sweetly. She saw hate in his eyes for some inexplicable reason, actual, real, raw hate, and it was a dagger to the heart. She breathed and kept staring at him. Breathed some more. The pain faded.

"Haven't you become quite the little warrior princess?"

"Why do you hate me?" She asked the question without any hint of emotion. The only remotely human characteristic she let into her voice was curiosity.

"Now darlin', who says I hate you?" She was silent. He waited. She was still silent. He was circling, a predator.

"Well I don't hate ya, kid, in fact I like you a lot. I'd like to fuck you." He took her in head to toe with a leer. He was close enough that she could feel his warmth, but she refused to back off.

"The days when I wanted to fuck you are long gone, Logan."

"That's a shame. Jailbait. That would have been hot. I should have taken you a long time ago."

"Probably."

He was silent. He evidently had no comeback for that.

"Either get the fuck out of my way or fight," she said evenly. She could tell that under his sweat pants he was hard.

"Well, I like the fuck part, but the fight part is good, too."

It was all good to her too. "All right. Let's go. Street rules, no powers," she said.

"I pinky swear," he said mockingly, holding up his pinky. Although she didn't know who he was mocking, because she'd never pinky-sworn on anything in her life. She stood in fighting stance, watching him circle, refamiliarizing herself with his fighting technique. She swallowed. This was going to be a challenge.

The hatred in his eyes had been so intense that she thought he might kill her. But something, she didn't know what, kept her from believing that. Maybe it was one last of speck of faith that remained in her once-romantic heart. Maybe it was knowing that he wouldn't want her friends to kill him. She didn't fear him. Her heart began pounding, not from arousal, but from excitement.

She thought about the way he changed and how it would affect his fighting. He was emotionally unhinged, to put it mildly, and she knew that it was a weakness. So different from her, who had packed her fury and pain into a nucleus of focus so tight she hadn't lost a fight in over a year. She could taunt him, and it would trip him up, make him lose control. Of course that might mean claws, so she had to be careful.

He was still good. A kick landed so close to her ear that she heard the whoosh of air molecules. She reached for his leg to throw him, but lightning-quick, he was back in fighting stance with both feet on the ground. Then he threw three quick punches. The only sound was of his breathing and the smack of her palm when she elegantly parried each one and landed a jab to the torso. Rogue one. He made an "oof" noise but continued to circle lightly on his feet, shaking it off.

She thought about lying naked on cement in a bare room wanting him to come protect her. She had blamed herself for being so stupid as to believe his promise.

He threw a punch that she could only hear when she blocked it with a smack, then she moved in with three brutal jabs to his face. Hate you.

He took the first one full on, surprised, then blocked the next two while stumbling backward. She took advantage of his moment of imbalance to kick his knee, hard. But he merely grunted and bounced as if made of rubber, back into fighting stance.

She threw a punch and took advantage of his parry to make a quick jab to his chest. His "oof" was more audible this time, his stumbling a bit worse.

"Good thing I stopped trusting you to take care of me."

"Fuck you." God he was easy. She smiled.

"Alright, sugah, let's dance." She was smiling, sex in her voice.

It kept going that way. Both of them were quicksilver-fast with eloquence of motion, inhuman strength, and tremendous focus. She took a few, he took a few. He healed while she started to ache. Still, she had superior focus, echoes of him in her head, and three years of rage to spend.

Happy anniversary, fucker.

He was a demon and she was determined to exorcise him. They were both sweating and panting.

She deliberately thought of the moment he left her, how the world warped and buckled and crackled like Styrofoam in a fire and she felt as if she were falling.

Her face was tingling with his punches and the feel of his knuckles. He was bruising faster than he could heal. For long moments she focused only on her breathing, and on keeping his face purple and red.

She began to notice that his weakness was his lack of balance. In his cage fights he could always bounce back, literally, but the danger room was huge and there was space in every direction.

The next time he stumbled, she pounced, pinning him.

She was able to land a close range punch to his face. She felt the give of his nose, hard metal underneath.

She saw herself dying and bleeding and smelling like blood and come and her own vomit. She kneed him and he curled up and she took that moment to restrain his wrists above his head. He could not believe how strong she was. He was forced to look directly into her eyes. He decided to draw on other reserves.

"Marie?"

"What?"

"Kiss me."

He said it with just enough desperate longing that adrenaline flooded her, riding on the tail of a dozen different emotions. She felt herself wetten and she saw his nostrils flare ever so slightly, sniffing.

She had to admit that he was good. He knew just what to say, and with those eyes… For a second she felt as if she would cry.

"Why?" she demanded.

"Why what?"

"What happened to you?"

"Nothing, darlin'." It was then that she knew he would never tell her. Whatever it was, it had buried him so deep that the Logan she had known was gone. And she would never have an answer.

Maybe on some level she had been waiting, these three years. Because she felt weight lift from her like a physical thing.

He saw her relieved smile, saw the tears start, and he was confused. She didn't care if he saw, because she was free. She leapt up from him and walked away.

She left the danger room, body wracking with sobs. So much easier now. Because he had ceased to be.

Jean was in the hallway near her room. Jean heard the sobs before she saw the bruises. She walked to Rogue with open arms and held her.

"Oh, sweetie, what happened?"

Rogue's face was red, her lipstick smeared, bruises purpling, and her face was wet with tears.

"I'm so glad," Rogue gasped out before she started sobbing again.

Jean lead her down the hall to her and Scott's suite. "You don't look glad, sweetie, what's wrong?" Jean opened the door and lead her inside, sat her down on the couch.

"It's finally over," she gasped.

"Rogue, you're starting to scare me. I don't understand."

Rogue could not stop, nor did she want to stop, the blessed sobs that were finally freeing her. She took Jean's hand and pressed it to her wet face. Jean recoiled for a second, and then, understanding her intention, touched her. She wiped the tears from her cheek.

In a second she felt the pull. The flow began. Rogue could communicate thoughts and emotions without draining life. She showed Jean everything she wanted to see. The exorcism, the realization that she would never get the closure she wanted, the dizzy sense of elated freedom that nonetheless accompanied her sobs.

Then, just as cleanly as she had started it, the flow stopped. Jean still held her close, wiped her tears away. "Let it go," she whispered.

Scott appeared in the doorway, wearing silk pajama pants and glasses, eyes wide at the sight of Rogue's bruises. Jean met his eyes and communicated it to him, holding a finger to her lips. Scott sat down on the other side of Rogue and held her. She limply leaned toward him, still sobbing. He held her close and kissed her hair.

She could grieve him, and move on. And grieving, while sharp and intense, didn't require whittling off parts of her self. It was easier than the past three years had been.

Jean's sense of empathy resonated with profound relief. She heard Rogue's voice in her head, over and over, as she sobbed. "I'm free, I'm free, I'm free…"