DARK SIDE OF THE MOON
thatcraftykid

track three // “BREATHE”

LEAVE / BUT DON’T LEAVE ME
“Kiss won’t kill me,” he murmurs. Have her like any other woman,
he tells himself, and he won’t feel so much like a molester.
– Logan –

Logan doesn’t get out of bed until he hears the screen door clank shut and her footsteps, sliding slightly on dewy grass, fade into the forest. A muggy breeze has been blowing through his window since before dawn, making the sheet stick to his back as he sits up and throws his legs over the side.

Snow’s been melting steadily the last two weeks or so, but temperatures haven’t gotten nearly this high. It’s as if the Chinook wind decided to disregard nature and migrate north just to mark a difference between last night and this morning. An especially obnoxious metaphor.

Still decompressing, he rubs the sleeplessness from his face. As he stands, his narrowed eyes go straight for the thin leather gloves balled up on his nightstand.

How had something so premeditated, so inevitable turned out so fucked up?

A bitter mix of her frustration and fear lingers. Nothing at all like the heady scent of reckless lust that hit his room before Marie even reached his doorway last night, wearing nothing but satin and hard-won flannel. He wore socks and drawstring pants with an open front. The gloves he’d bought were in the drawer with the condoms.

So premeditated.

“Can’t sleep after all, sugar,” she said, toes sliding up her ankle. Fanned out the cards. “Wanna finish our game?” All they did, day and night, was play games. Lively games over arbitrary spoils. Them-vs.-it games, her-vs.-him games. Teasing games with pointed words and arched looks. Cat and mouse games from taunting proximities. Look but don’t touch games. Just an hour before, Texas Hold ’Em in front of a fireplace Marie complained was too hot. She stripped her shirt and added it to the pot.

So inevitable.

No need to keep score, he told her, since she was standing in his doorway. He’d won. Marie let the deck fly as she padded to his bed. He sat back, letting her crawl on top. “Still can’t touch,” she replied, a warning and a challenge. In the clear light of day, Logan can pinpoint that as the moment when sass and daring faltered.

He liked her in the lead; he liked the way her scent kaleidoscoped as she felt out the angles, what exactly she could get away with. A part of him recognized her seduction as an act. It never occurred to him that she wouldn’t eventually be able to bluff her way through the real thing. Yet, for all her enthusiasm, her pace was uncertain, her groping hesitant. Even he, to whom self-denial is a particular sort of pleasure, couldn’t take the fumbling. It aged him.

When he had her on her back, awkwardly rubbing against his leather-encased fingers, he traced a nipple through cotton, slid his shirt to the side. He bent his head, his breath just a whisper against the skin of her breast.

And she flinched. An accusatory, condemnatory full-body flinch.

“Don’t – Just don’t touch me,” she groaned, trying to bring back the rhythm. A half-hearted and futile attempt. Nothing to do but back away, because this time he couldn’t get past taking it personal. Her breathless apologies were on behalf of her skin. The hands clutching his button-down closed to the collar, though, that couldn’t be aimed at anyone but him.

Stumbling out of his bed, Marie made the defeated walk back up her loft. Leaving Logan alone with a slicken pair of gloves and a hard-on that hadn’t waned despite stomach-turning rejection. Even under the spray of cold water, he had to finish himself off. Marie wasn’t a new subject of his masturbatory fantasies, but this was…

So fucked up.

Fallen cards mock him with unfulfilled possibilities as he shoves himself into his jeans and buttons up his shirts.

Biscuits and gravy, saran-wrapped to keep warm, are set out on the kitchen table for him, along with a note telling him Marie’s gone for a morning walk, wants him to enjoy his breakfast, and has something special planned for dinner if he doesn’t mind running into town for her. Her loopy handwriting is cheerful and the biscuits are extra fluffy.

Logan reads between the lines – last night never happened.

Marie hasn’t returned by the time he finishes breakfast, not unusual. If he’s a little grateful, a little quick to grab his keys, he won’t acknowledge it to himself.

It’s a solid forty-five minutes to the nearest grocery store, and in that time he decides there are only two ways to defend himself against a twenty-one-year-old vixen with a mean streak and a heavy load of baggage. He can either go back to countering her teasing with gruffness, or he can go on the offensive. Former’s the honorable thing, latter’s the more appealing. There’s a simpler third option, of course, only he’s not in the mood for the road.

Quagmire preoccupies him as he walks through Palmer’s, crowded for this time of the morning, and starts shopping.

Too easily aggravated, Logan stares down at the plastic bottles in his hands. Hell if he knows the difference between extra-virgin and virgin olive oil, and this week’s grocery list of demands, usually so gallingly specific, offers no illumination.

A middle-aged woman in a t-shirt that emblazons “Hockey Mom” across her weighty chest putters around the condiments. For a second, he thinks to ask for her help; then he scowls at himself and slams the extra-virgin back onto the shelf – on principle, he’s never been a fan of anything virginal, much less in excess. Hockey Mom gives him a startled once-over and scuttles over to the next aisle to leer at him from a safer distance.

He makes a noise halfway between a growl and a sigh. Six more items. Marie might as well be running a bed and breakfast, way she makes a production out of every meal for two. Calls it practice.

Logan puts a tally in the “appealing” category, remembering the way she winked, longneck Molson Dry dangling from satin-covered fingertips, and told him she was using him as much for his stomach as his wallet. When he asked her if that was all, her lips took on a curve that was wicked in contrast to her wide-eyed expression: “I think of any other use for you, sugar, I’ll let you know straight away.”

Unrepentant tease.

Boneless chicken breasts are the last thing he picks up before hauling his basket to the checkout line. While Logan has long been an admirer of quality breasts, legs, and thighs, lately it’s turned into a preoccupation. Makes it so he can’t see straight. Tally for the “honorable” category, questionable motives aside –

“…runaway from the states.” A cop just shy of elderly stands at the till, holding up a photograph to the store owner, Mac Palmer.

Logan can only see the back of the picture, but his blood runs cold so he knows. All this time, not a mention in any newspaper, not a blip on any radar – but he knows.

“Name’s Anna Marie D’Ancanto. Would’ve had a Southern accent. She might’ve passed through here just over three weeks ago. Held up a bar in Laughlin City, took two grand.”

“Two grand?” Mac whistles lowly.

Twenty-two hundred, Marie might’ve corrected, if she were here. But she hasn’t left his property since he brought her there. She can’t be recognized. He has to repeat that to himself.

“What makes you think she made her way through High Level?”

“Girl was seen heading west in a blue and white truck with man in his thirties the morning after the incident.”

Another low whistle. “Little girls and old bastards, no good ever came of that. No sign of ’em?”

“Truck was found burning on the highway just east of here, no remains.” The officer’s responses so far sound like he’s memorized the police blotter, but there’s more personal interest in his tone when he pushes the picture forward. “Take a good look. This girl ran away from a clinic. She’s a mutant and she’s dangerous.”

Mac shakes his head slowly. “No, like I said, doesn’t look familiar.”

“All right, Mr. Palmer. I got flyers, mind if I leave ’em for you to hang?”

“Sure, sure. Mm. What a business.”

Logan watches the officer out of the store, trying to guess where he’ll go next and how far the search has spread. If the law’s just now getting around to checking in High Level, seems likely that the clinic got word and is applying pressure. That means Marie has a shrinking window of opportunity to get to the western edge of Canada and across the boarder into Alaska without being seen.

None of the usual chitchat from Mac as he rings up Logan’s groceries, owing to the grimace etched deep in his face.

Dollars to donuts, the officer has his name, too, only he forgot to mention it. Next place, he might not forget, and a certain few people around town are in a position to put “Wolverine” together with “blue and white truck” and come up with general directions to his cabin. Marie could hide, maybe, but it’s better if she goes. No call for her getting anymore attached to an old bastard like him.

An extra stop before he heads back up to the cabin. The fake redhead behind the counter at the drug store glares at him over her magazine as he comes in through the automatic doors. First and last time he beds a woman in a town he actually plans to be seen in more than once a decade. He glances toward the bulletin board. No flyer yet.

The hair dye takes up four shelves on the back wall. He’s drawn to the shades of red, but Pauline’s brown-to-maroon fiasco makes him think twice. He goes for blonde instead, a honey tone he thinks might be pretty on Marie. He grabs her shampoo and conditioner and throws in a razor, just so his purchase is less noticeable.

Pauline’s register is the only one open. He nods as he sets down Marie’s stuff.

No two ways about it, from the plunging neckline to the paste-on nails, Pauline is stripper-by-night trashy. Logan’s entertained enough trash to be an expert at recognizing it. Only sort of woman he ever seems to attract.

She flips over the razor to find the barcode. “How’s the little thing you got secluded up in the mountains?”

He sets his jaw. Pauline worked when he bought things for Marie before. She made a crack about her being young because of some acne-fighting face wash, though, from the looks of it, Pauline could use some herself. Logan’s no good at guessing ages, but she’s got to have at least a decade on Marie. Probably more, now that it’s on his mind.

“Can’t be doin’ well. Roots’re showin’ through.” She rings up the hair dye with savage delight, then pauses at the shampoo. “You know this is for brunettes? Says it right here on the label. I’m happy to read it for you, since I know you can’t. Or maybe you just can’t read numbers.”

Logan’s only half-listening to her digs. Shit. That cop is going to walk through this door eventually, and Pauline is going to make his case.

He thinks of doing something drastic. Decides it won’t accomplish anything useful, personal satisfaction aside.

“Just ring it up.”

“No cause to be rude.” Pauline finishes the transaction with her trap closed, and Logan takes the plastic bag out to his black GMC and drops it on top of the groceries.

As he’s driving out of town he sees a cop car parked outside Sam’s, a garage he once ordered parts for his old truck through. If the shit hasn’t already hit the fan, it will soon. But there’s time, the afternoon at least. If they know Marie, then they know they’ll need plenty of reinforcements.

On the drive back to the cabin, his mind is occupied by escape routes. Marie could take the pickup, but he’s got two choppers left and either one would be less recognizable. He taught her to ride his ’53 Harley-Davidson Panhead and was impressed with how quick she took to it. She laughed – fair enough, motorcycles are easier to drive than jets. She can handle it on the open road. Put her in that helmet he never uses, and she’ll be about as inconspicuous as she can get.

A tree right on the edge of the dirt road to his cabin gives him an idea. Pulling the pickup into park, he pops out his claws and walks over. Five hard, pressure-releasing swipes and he’s whittled the base enough that he can topple the tree over and onto the road with a shove of his foot.

He gets back into his pickup. That should buy Marie a little time. Ground’s hard enough that she can off-road with the Harley until she gets to the back roads, and if there’s water left in the creek she can fly the damn thing across it.

Logan runs a hand through his hair. The lumberjacking helped, but anxiety’s got him again by the time he stops outside the cabin. Marie’s in there, and he has to tell her to leave. Twenty-five days ago, he wouldn’t have recognized the feeling at the pit of his stomach. Now he can name it: regret.

Nothing for it.

Hanging the grocery bags from his arms, Logan makes his way up the porch. The second he has the door open, he breathes in the smells of wood varnish, pond water, and Marie. He catches himself off guard by wondering how long it’ll take for the Marie smell to fade and how long he’ll be sniffing around for it after it’s gone.

He can’t break the news, thinking like that. Shouldn’t be thinking like that, regardless. Logan’s never had any designs on her future beyond the very near present.

The volume of the music coming from the back porch increases, and Marie’s voice, rich and jazzy, if off-key, fills the cabin in bursts of enthusiasm that trail off into hums: “‘Mississippi, in the middle of a dry spell. Jimmy Rogers, hm, hm, hmhm, up high …’”

Logan lets her serenade him while he deals with the groceries. Normally, he’d have her do it so she could earn the five bucks, but game’s up and he’s stalling for time. Food he’ll probably end up throwing out later put away, he sets aside the box of hair dye and heads to the porch.

“Marie – ”

The rest of his words die in his throat. The screen door hits against his arm. She’s wearing nothing but a pink bra and panties, still damp, so he can watch the crack of her ass as she shakes it to the beat of the guitar solo. Seems Marie’s cheerfulness isn’t about pretending last night never happened; she’s bound and determined to get another shot at him.

“Just a minute, sugar,” she says without turning around, dipping her brush into the bucket. “I just want to finish this one spot around the molding.” With that, she stretches to her tip-toes, lengthening her legs and lifting her ass.

Unrepentant tease, he thinks again, this time with a new apprehension. The girl in front of him will do a lot of things for money, and he can’t help but wonder what she’ll fall back on when waitressing doesn’t let her put away the savings she’ll need.

Marie sways as she paints, belting out, “‘Black velvet and that little boy’s smile. Black velvet in that slow, Southern style.’’” She spins on the canvas and drops to the balls of her feet, flecking clear varnish and bringing the handle of the paintbrush up like a microphone. “‘A new religion that’ll bring ’em to your knees. Black velvet – ’” Eyes scrunched closed, index finger up like Aretha Franklin, she pauses.

Logan remembers a girl covered neck to toe as he tries to figure how much he can blame himself for this transformation and whether or not she’ll remember him fondly for it.

“‘If you please,’” Marie croons, bringing her body down with her finger so that gravity almost forces her breasts from her see-through bra. With a flourish, she snaps back up, posing and grinning at him like a gymnast who just stuck the landing for a gold.

He’s leaned back against the doorframe, scowl in place. “Ain’t you supposed to have a pole for that kinda dance?”

Marie drops her hands to her hips and pretends to pout. “If you didn’t like the show, you can at least appreciate that your porch is finally getting weather-proofed. That’ll bring my total to one thousand, six hundred and eighty-seven dollars.” Pout turns into a grin. “And forty-two cents.”

“Uh-huh. Eight cents if you can tell me why you’re weather-proofin’ naked and have it make sense.”

“I’m not naked, Logan.” She hooks her thumb under the string of her panties. “No different than a bathing suit. See?”

“I’m seein’ plenty.”

She tugs at the end of her long, brown ponytail, straightening out the wet waves. “Anythin’ you like?”

He trails his eyes up and down flawlessly creamy, agonizingly untouchable skin. Calf to crown, a flush spreads where his eyes touch. The uneven rise and fall of her breasts is particularly compelling. Lust quickly replaces varnish as the dominant smell in the room.

Marie clears her throat delicately. The curve of her mouth turns from sweet to smug.

“You’re gettin’ fat,” he says, lying through his teeth. The leanness he attributed to the road has persisted, forcing him to wonder if that means she still has a time to go before she fills out.

Her smile widens, and she gives him a new angle of her breasts. “Thanks for noticing, sugar.”

She bends down to turn off the radio, and his eyes go straight to the juncture between her thighs, then drop to the wide strips of scar tissue that run down the upper portion of both her legs. Surgical, Marie admitted, though she refused to say more. Southaven, obviously. Doctors might not have laid their actual hands on her, even so, they left their marks plain enough.

She needs to go.

“I’ll have you know, I wasn’t lying in wait.” Tone casual now, she straightens and explains, “I just got out of the pond and figured I’d jump right back in to wash off when I’m done. Completely logical, so don’t you try to accuse me of any scheming – and I want my eight cents.”

“Marie, get dressed.”

The playfulness vanishes from her face. “Why?”

“Because I need to talk to you, and I can’t do it with you lookin’ like that.” He leaves the porch. She’s behind him before the door can close.

“Talk to me about what? Logan, what happened?”

“Get dressed.”

“Close your eyes, if you can’t talk to me like an adult. It’s not like you haven’t seen it.”

She’s right at his back, anger making her forget to keep her distance. Turning, his hands go to her head. He lets down her hair and arranges it over her shoulders. Lust turns to nervousness as he knew it would, because Marie can’t watch his bare hands moving behind her head.

Logan tilts her head back, gently. Bends down so they’re breathing the same air. “Kiss won’t kill me,” he murmurs. Have her like any other woman, he tells himself, and he won’t feel so much like a molester.

Tentatively, she raises fingernails to his beard, lightly brushing where the hair is thickest. “You still don’t believe me. I’ll take from you, Logan, and you’ll hate me for it.”

“Don’t – ”

She stops him with a frustrated noise. “You’re not getting it. My skin is literally pulling me toward you. It wants me to touch you. I can’t control it, if I do. I know what I’m talking about. You’ll hate me,” she repeats, brown eyes searching his.

“What I will or won’t do is up to me, darlin’.” The endearment sounds harsh even to his ears.

Her shoulders slump. “I’m sorry. I’ve told you, I’m a terrible tease. I just – I…like being with you.”

Back to feeling like that old bastard again. Carefully, he pulls her in so that her face is pressed against his flannel shirt. She doesn’t relax but she doesn’t flinch away, either.

“Listen, there’s somethin’ I have to tell you.” Logan rubs her hair as soothingly as he can manage. “A cop came into Palmer’s today with a picture of you.” He tightens his grip as she sucks in a gasp. “He had flyers to put up, and he was askin’ a lot of questions. Sooner or later, someone’s gonna recognize my description, and he’ll be up here lookin’ for you.” She tries to pull away, already knows what’s coming. “Marie. Stop, Marie. Listen to me – Marie, you have to go. You have to go now.”

“Okay!” She shoves away from him. “You don’t have to be so mean about it.”

Logan isn’t being mean, and he thinks she knows. But she’s crying already and trying to cover it up with anger. She stands in front of him in her underwear, hair hanging down in a tangle, palm over her mouth. “What – what do I do?”

“Take the Panhead. I blocked the road comin’ up here, so you’ll have to go through the back way. In my closet, there’s a pack you can put the essentials in. I got twenty-five hundred dollars handy, plus what I already paid you. It’s yours. Get on the road, drive north, then cut west. Ditch the bike, fly if you have to. Just get across that border.”

Marie nods stiffly, eyes on the walls she sanded and refinished. “And you…You’re staying here.”

“I can buy you a lot of time if I let them take me in. Tell them you’re headed to Toronto or somethin’.”

Another stiff nod.

“Look it, I’ll come find you in Anchorage, once it’s safe. Make sure you’re on your feet. I pr – ”

“No. No promises.” She’s looking him square in the eye now. “I don’t keep mine, so how can I expect you to keep yours?”

Logan’s answer is a growl: “You can damn well trust me, that’s how.”

But she doesn’t trust him; it’s written all over her face. Not when it comes to her skin and not when it comes to her future.

“I’ll see you if I see you. I can’t trust much more than that.”

“Kid – ”

Marie laughs incredulously, gesturing down at herself. “We’re back to that, are we?” She throws up her hands to stave off his retort. “Sorry, sorry. I’m…going to get dressed and packed. When I come back out, I’ll be properly thankful to you.”

“I’m not lookin’ for any big show of gratitude,” he grumbles.

“I know you’re not. But you’re giving me a lot when you owe me nothing. I may be young, but I do have a sense of proportion.” She thumps down the hallway. “Under five minutes, you watch. I’m good at running, sugar.”

A lump rises at the base of Logan’s throat and it takes an effort to swallow it back. Hell. He thinks perversely, Marie has to leave sometime – better now with a purpose than later with a grudge.

DARK SIDE OF THE MOON
thatcraftykid

track three // “BREATHE”

FOR LONG YOU LIVE AND HIGH YOU FLY / BUT ONLY IF YOU RIDE THE TIDE
“I told you I was dangerous, and I told you I was a liar.
But I wasn’t a monster until they made me one.”
– Rogue –

Face freshly scrubbed, Rogue carries Logan’s hiking pack and her cloak to the edge of the den, where he sits in front of his antique television. The first time she joined him on the couch for a hockey game, Guff let her know in so many words that the stand alone would fetch a pretty penny at auction. When she told Logan, he shrugged – price was nothing to the object itself, its familiarity. Its possible connection to the unknown before.

Rogue longs to give him something of hers, but all she owns belongs to him, except the clothes on her back and a dead woman’s dog tags. She sighs. The truth she could give him, but what would be the point? She couldn’t begin to untangle the knots she’s tied to impress him.

“Eleven minutes,” Logan says, flicking through the few channels he gets.

“Four minutes and forty-nine seconds,” she amends, choosing a random time. “Bathroom doesn’t count.”

He nods toward the coffee table she repaired with David’s help, at a plate of food and a box of hair dye. “Don’t know if you want that.”

Dropping her armload on the floor by the couch, she picks up the box. It’s uncanny, how right the shade is. Carol blonde. “I’ll keep it just in case,” she answers, sitting as she opens the pack to shove it in. “I’ll use it when I need to.”

She holds the plate over her lap, shifting around leftover fried dumplings with her fork.

“Not much of a farewell meal,” he says with a slight grimace. “But at least it’s your cooking, not mine.”

“Don’t give me credit, thank my momma. I never even bothered to learn,” she tells him inexplicably, talking a big bite. That could be an opening to the explanation he deserves. Still, she hesitates.

It hasn’t quite sunk in, the fact that she’s leaving. She waits for a last-second reprieve. Strong words aside, she can't bring herself to believe this is the end. She’s happy here, giving Logan a hard time but taking care of him all the same. And she’s almost there. So close to being comfortable enough in her own toxic skin to be a human being for once. Last night was just a setback…Or she’s kidding herself.

The man on her right doesn’t offer any answers. He’s not even looking at her, rather to the clock sitting on the mantle underneath a set of curved swords. Could be worrying about her, could just be wanting her gone. No way of telling.

If Logan’s still a mystery and Rogue’s still a fraud, then the past three weeks can’t have amounted to much more than a delusion.

Don’t say I didn’t warned you, Anna Marie. Trouble never tells you how Trouble thinks. Just because he never forced you doesn’t mean he never did you harm.

Some opinions never change, some voices never fade.

Rogue looks to the TV to get herself out of her head. Logan’s stopped on the news. A silver-haired man waves to a crowd of protesters hefting signs, one of which reads, “Send mutants to the moon for ever!” Bunch of geniuses.

“State of the world I’m about to return to,” she complains, and asks Logan to turn it up.

“…the missing New York senator was last seen at a press conference two days ago, where he continued to voice his support for the United States’ proposed Mutant Registration Act.”

The large-toothed anchorwoman is replaced by footage of the senator standing behind an outside podium. The bottom of the screen tells Rogue that his name is Senator Robert Kelly, a Republican. She leans forward, something about his face nagging her.

He speaks loudly and emphatically: “I was once guilty of thinking small, believing that a tough American stance on mutants would be enough. But if any good has come of last month’s narrowly avoided terrorist attack on Ellis Island, it is that the world’s eyes are open to the danger that mutants pose.”

With a jolt, Rogue remembers similar words from an identical voice. Senator Kelly has visited Southaven, she’s sure of it.

“That is why I have worked so diligently to get the UN Summit back on track and refocused purely on the mutant phenomenon. The Mutant Registration Act, where passed, will protect the lives of every citizen of the world by preventing dangerous mutant attacks. Now is not the time for fear. Now is the time for the leaders of the world to unite as one against this grave new threat.”

The anchorwoman takes a moment to shuffle her papers, as if she, too, realizes the contradictions inherent in that gem of a hate speech. “Hours before the announcement of Senator Kelly’s disappearance, mutants’ rights activists released a statement that took issue with the Senator’s claim, arguing that the mutant responsible for the failed Ellis Island plot, Telford Porter, aka Vanisher, planned to plant ordinary explosive devices. FBI representatives have confirmed that Porter, currently awaiting trial, has been questioned regarding the whereabouts of Senator Kelly. Officials say that the UN Summit will take place on Saturday as rescheduled, though many world leaders, including our own Prime Minister Allaire, are reportedly reconsidering their invitations in – ”

Logan clicks the power button without warning. He stands, walking to the window, clearly listening intently to noise from outside. As quietly as she can, Rogue slips her cloak over her shoulders. Shoulda, woulda, coulda left sooner. Her heart is thumping so fast, she thinks she can hear it.

Wait. Was that…“A helicopter? Jesus – They have the army after me!” She snatches open the curtain, scanning the woods for Mounties, too.

“Get out of the window.” He tries to pull her back.

Rogue pushes his arms away. She wants to see the soldiers jump out before she makes her move. Through the roof, she thinks wildly. They’ll try to shoot her down and that’ll give her enough adrenaline to get far away. Of course, if they don’t miss, if they don’t kill her, they’ll have her. Back to Southaven, back to the tests, the skin samples, the animals, the people, the dead – Take Logan’s powers, her treacherous brain tells her. There’s no nobility in survival, and if she kills him she’ll live forever.

“Agh!” she groans, pressing her elbows to her head and falling into a crouch. The dark and the monster – she can’t fight them both at once. She knows she can’t.

Metal sings. Rogue opens her eyes to three of Logan’s claws. Hazel eyes meet hers and say, wordlessly, “No one’s taking you anywhere.” She nods, believing. The darkness recedes and the monster crawls back in it.

The helicopter is low enough to be seen now. It makes waves in the big pond as it prepares to land. Navy blue with an American flag painted on the side. But…that’s wrong.

“This can’t be what we think.” Rogue lets him help her to her feet slowly, counting the stars and stripes to be sure. “This would be a violation of international airspace, and, seriously, I am not that important.”

The door of the helicopter opens. They see a briefcase first, then a business suit with a woman inside. Short black hair windblown, she ducks her head slightly as she strides gracefully toward the cabin. She smiles when she sees them in the window, slides off her large black sunglasses to reveal blue-tinged skin.

A mutant. Rogue leans back against Logan in relief. He remains wary, lifting his claws against he window. The mutant businesses woman continues to smile. Holds up her briefcase like a white flag.

Rogue looks up at Logan. “I think she comes in peace.”

Reluctantly, he follows her to the porch, where he opens the door for the visitor, barking, “Who the hell are you?”

Over the roar of the helicopter, the woman yells, “My name is Sheryl Maxwell. I’m a representative from the International Mutant Rights Initiative in the States. I need a moment of your time.”

“Lady, do I look like I wanna subscribe to any newsletter?”

Ms. Maxwell’s smile gets toothier. “We don’t exactly deliver our materials door to door by helicopter, Mr.…”

“Logan.”

“Mr. Logan.” Her attention falls on Rogue, who he’s trying to block from the doorway. “I’m actually here to speak to Miss D’Ancanto about Southaven Mutant Treatment Clinic. We’d very much like hear her story.”

Rogue’s eyes widen.

“Yeah? And what if she ain’t interested?”

She dips under his arm to talk to Ms. Maxwell directly. “You’re pressing charges?”

“We’re setting a trial date as we speak. We need your testimony, regarding the death of Captain Danvers. We know it wasn’t your fault.”

Rogue’s hands clutch the dog tags hanging underneath her scarf. Yes, yes, finally – Somebody. The story tumbles out of her, most of it probably lost to the noise of helicopter blades, some of it unvoiced. “Carol chose to be there because they said they could cure her, but nothing was working – ” She wanted to serve her country more than she wanted to fly with the wind in her face – “She didn’t get a cure, she got me. She was in a coma, and her parents came every day – ” With model airplanes and daffodils and – Here she pauses. How to explain without sounding…“The doctors kept pushing. It wasn’t my fault.” End at the beginning, the only way.

Logan’s arms are wrapped around her elbows, she realizes, holding her up.

Ms. Maxwell is nodding, something hard in her eyes. “Good, Rogue. Good. Our lawyers will take your deposition – that is, if you and your…” Her sharp smile returns. “…guardian? Will consent to coming with us to New York. I understand you’re both wanted by Canadian authorities.”

Rogue flushes, blinking back tears. Can she still testify? Will anyone else believe her? Does this woman really? “I – Hold on, Ms. Maxwell.” She tries to push Logan inside. He’s a brick wall.

Ms. Maxwell frowns. “We don’t have much time.”

“Just one minute, I need to get my stuff,” Rogue replies. To Logan: “Please.”

He steps back and lets the screen door shut, leading her into the den. She stands over his hiking pack, twisting the ends of her gloves. “You gotta tell me what to do. I’m too shaky to see stupid right now.”

Logan sizes her up for what feels like forever. “What does she mean ‘guardian?’ I don’t like the way she said that.”

“Who cares! She’s a way out for both of us. But – ” Rogue is trying to think like him, and it’s hard because he’s not in her head and the possibility of vindication is something she doesn’t want to ignore. “But is it too convenient? Logan! Stop looking at me like that and tell me what to do!”

“How the hell should I know?” he growls, shoving his index finger in her face. “You’ve fed me nothin’ but lies. You’re a goddamn minor! You were never in the army.” He grabs hold of Carol’s dog tags, bringing her shock close to his fury. “You held her until she died – interestin’ choice of words. You ever say anythin’ straight?”

She wants to slap him. Her arms hang loosely. She’s dead inside, but it’s not her own death she feels. “I told you I was dangerous, and I told you I was a liar. But I wasn’t a monster until they made me one.”

His blunt fury twists into a grimace. “Marie, you ain’t a monster. You’re just – ”

Rogue is on the ground, glass raining down on her, before she can find out just what she is.

Hand to her neck where the chain to Carol’s dog tags snapped, she scrambles to the gaping window – punched through and ripped out. Her heart leaps into her throat. Logan is sprawled out on the far grass and leaning over him is Fangs.

Bait! She was bait.

“Leave him alone!” she screams, hurling herself from the window frame despite adrenaline-offsetting nausea.

A strong yank on her ankle drops her flat on her stomach.

Rogue twists painfully to her side, a dark blue face with glittering golden eyes coming into focus. Same toothy smile.

Dark, angry storm clouds gather overhead, faster than Rogue has ever seen. A big, black jet fills the sky. Thunder cracks, and the blue woman straightens like she’s been whipped.

Moment taken, Rogue’s on her feet and fighting against the sudden wind, succeeding about as well as the helicopter. Half-sprinting, half-flying she’s trying to get to Logan before Fangs can load his unconscious body into the helicopter, which is off the ground but at the mercy of the jostling wind.

“Leave him, you idiot!” she hears the pilot scream, a sure sign they’re cutting their losses.

Lightening strikes, hitting the ground at Fangs’ feet, causing him to drop Logan off his back like a sack of flour. Rogue is there in an instant, dragging, carrying Logan through the cold, blinding wind and into the woods, where the brush is thick enough to hide him.

As abruptly as it started, the wind dies.

Jet engines and helicopter blades – former sounds like it’s landing, latter as if it’s unsteadily rising. Rogue is too far into the woods to see the helicopter until it’s cleared the cabin, escaping protracted beams of red light.

Lips near Logan’s left ear, she hisses, “Wake up.” With her gloved thumbs and forefingers, she opens his eyelids. His eyes are rolled far back. Rogue knows comatose when she sees it. Looks like she’s in charge.

Twigs snap as the owners of the black jet enter the forest.

A woman’s voice, lightly accented, calls out, “Hello? If you can hear us, we’re here to help you.”

“We’re from Charles Xavier’s school for mutants in New York,” a man’s voice explains. “We want to bring you back with us. We can protect you from them.”

Biting her bottom lip, Rogue weighs her options. New York is where the blue woman said she wanted to take them, so New York is probably the last place Logan should be. Then again, if he’s been found twice, he can certainly be found a third time. And these people gave up the advantage in the fight to make sure that she and Logan were safe.

Okay. Shooting Logan a look begging for forgiveness if this goes wrong, she stands. A black woman with snow white hair and a brown-haired white man with something covering his eyes are few feet away. Both are decked head to toe in leather.

The oddity of it all gives Rogue a strange confidence. “Excuse me,” she shouts out. The leather-clad would-be heroes turn. “You’ve tried to rescue us twice now. Mind if I ask why?”

“Stay right there,” the man says, putting out a steadying hand as the two jog over. “Are you hurt?”

“Me, I’m peachy,” she says. “He’s unconscious.”

The woman kneels beside Logan, gingerly feeling around his thick skull. “He seems unharmed. Perhaps he fainted.”

Rogue tilts back her head and laughs. “Please ask him that when he wakes up and please, oh, please, let me be there when you do.”

The man looks like he wants to check Rogue for head injuries. “Do you know what’s going on?”

“I know that about three weeks ago a giant fanged mutant attacked Logan and you were there, but I got us away. Now Fangs is back, with a blue woman who tried to trick me and Logan into coming with her to New York.”

“He’s Logan. You’re…”

Her eyebrows come together. “I’m Rogue. The blue woman knew exactly who I am. Didn’t you find us from the police report?”

“What police report?” the woman asks. When Rogue doesn’t reply, she turns to the man. “Scott – This is Mr. Summers. I’m Ms. Munroe.”

“That’s what we ask the students to call us to our faces, anyway.” Guy’s got an awfully nice smile. It almost makes up for the absurdly bulky eyewear he’s sporting. “Behind our backs, it’s Cyclops and Storm.”

That explains the weather patterns. What an excellent mutation.

“We need to return to New York quickly. This man needs medical treatment and she…” Storm turns to Rogue. “How old are you, Rogue?”

The lie is on the tip of her tongue, but a glance at Logan stops it. “Seventeen.”

Cyclops looks sharply at the man at her feet. “And he’s…” There’s something in his tone that’s akin to the blue woman’s “guardian.” An accusation that, catching Logan unaware, infuriated him.

Rogue considers it an act of loyalty to answer firmly and finally, “Looking out for me.”

Gently smiling, Storm stands and puts a comforting hand on Rogue’s arm. “Now let us look out for both of you. Are there things inside that you would like to get?”

She never actually agreed to come to New York, and Storm must realize this. Rogue lets the duo wait a minute before she acquiesces with a shrug. “Lucky for me, my bag’s already packed.”

“Hurry up and get it. Storm will go with you.” Cyclops is leaning down to get Logan up.

“Uh, careful. He’s kinda heavy.”

With a long grunt of exertion, Cyclops staggers back to his feet with Logan’s arms around his shoulders.

“Told ya.”

Through gritted teeth, Cyclops says, “I’ll be fine. You two go ahead.” With small, deliberate steps, he starts to walk Logan to the jet.

Storm puts a hand on Rogue’s back. “We’ll take our time,” she tells him, going for a shared smile.

Showing himself to be good-humored, if judgmental, Cyclops puffs out a laugh.

Rogue could offer to help, but she’s had enough poker nights with Logan to know not to play all her cards at once.

“Did you finish high school, Rogue?” Storm inquires as they walk to the cabin.

“No,” she answers simply, but it’s enough for Storm to launch into a recruitment speech about all the classes she can take and credits she can earn at their school for mutants. She nods appropriately, but her mind is on the police report.

The moment Storm called its existence into question, Rogue made the leap to denial. It’s been three weeks, and now all of a sudden Southaven put two and two together and came up with High Level? Too random. Evidently, the mutants after Logan know enough about Southaven to use her as bait, but they ultimately want Logan. So that means…Well, she doesn’t know what that means. But she does know that the blue woman can change her appearance and the only police car she’d seen chasing after them was driven by a large blonde. So.

So the weight’s off her chest. Southaven never got word of where she is because the police officer Logan saw was a fake, and there were probably never even any charges pressed against her because half the money she stole belonged to the man she stole it from and the rest was dirty. Plus, the cops never made it to the bar…

Could it be that convoluted and that simple all at once?

“This school,” Rogue says suddenly, cutting Storm off mid-sentence. “Sorry. But, you’re saying I can go to this school for free. And I’ll be safe, because no one will know I’m there.” She slings Logan’s hiking bag over her shoulders.

“That’s right. Our enrollment records are kept private. Many of our students have families who don’t know that they are mutants, or families who do know and have ostracized them because of it.”

“Put me in the latter camp.” Rogue inhales deeply. “And sign me up.”

She blows out her breath. There it is, what could turn out to be the second good decision she’s made since breaking out of Southaven. Or the next terrible one. But no way she’s leaving good decision number one alone with the circus. And this place – other mutants, a roof, three squares, free…might be all right. If not, she can always ask Logan for a ride back to Canada when things die down for him.

Storm is smiling sagely, as if she’s proud. A premature evaluation, all things considered. I’m not making wise choices over here, Rogue could tell her. I’m just rolling with the punches.

DARK SIDE OF THE MOON
thatcraftykid

track three // “BREATHE”

LOOK AROUND / AND CHOOSE YOUR OWN GROUND
“You’re givin’ yourself too much credit, kid. Wheels dresses up mutants
in black leather and sends ’em out to save the world.”
– Logan –

His skin breaks, nothing more than a pinprick, and Logan’s off his back and onto his feet. He has the woman with the needle by the throat, holds her down as he scans the sterile, steel room. He’s breathing heavily, inhaling latex and disinfectant, fear and Marie.

Logan glances down at the woman, a red-haired doctor with even, white teeth. He pushes her aside. Not a threat.

He follows Marie’s faded scent into the long corridor. Logan’s never seen the inside of a hospital firsthand, but he can tell this is no ordinary one. This is Southaven, he thinks, and Marie’s somewhere inside. Lost in her nightmare.

Ripping off circular patches from his chest – bare even where his tag should sit against his skin – he cautiously pads further on. Steel doors with Xs. No sign of life behind them. Around the corner, an alcove.

Where’s he going?

There can’t be anyone behind him, but he looks anyway. The hallway is still empty, now eerily so. He turns back to the alcove. Multiple images of his torso reflect on glass cases housing leather uniforms. Couldn’t be police or military.

An open cabinet catches his eye, and he snags a gray hooded sweatshirt. No shoes. He doesn’t know if that will make him more or less conspicuous in this place.

The hallway is endless, but he can follow her scent. It’s been at least a half-hour since Marie was down here. Was she hurt? Where did they take –

Where are you going?

There’s no one there. He’s sure there’s no one there, but he presses himself against a recess in the wall anyway.

The wall beside him opens to reveal an rounded elevator.

Over here.

Marie had been in the elevator. He dashes in before it closes, thinking better of it at the last second. Was it a trap? Had the doctor with the perfect teeth called security? Should’ve taken her with him. At least with a hostage he’d have leverage.

The elevator slides open, revealing a large wooden hallway with warm lighting and thick rugs. Marie’s scent is caught up in dozens of others. Fresh cut flowers, body odor, processed food, lemon-scented cleaners…No blood, no horror.

Whispers follow him, a man’s questioning voice. The voice is in Logan’s head, words overlapping. Here. Over here. In here.

Nowhere to hide from it, he makes a break for what looks like a way out. More voices, echoing naturally off the walls, make him abandon the door for a new hiding spot. Clomping footsteps have his back up against a wooden pillar. He leans around, watching the horde of off-looking adolescents pass by, freely and easily.

A door scrapes against its lock. Logan bounds over furniture to get to it, scanning the hallway as he shuts it behind him.

Movement. Jerking around, he sees a bald man seated behind a desk and half a dozen kids twisted around, staring at him.

“Good afternoon, Logan.” The bald man addresses the room, “If there are no more questions…Very good. An excellent final report, well done.”

A tall All-American and a mousey brunette stand awkwardly at the front, white note cards in hand. They’re younger than Marie – or, hell, maybe they’re not. Any rate, she’s not there and neither is her scent.

The bald man continues, “That will be all for today. Tomorrow, we’ll pick up with the next group.”

Students, obviously. Gathering their backpacks and books, they exit the room one by one. The mouse stops and turns back.

“Forgot again, Professor,” she murmurs with an embarrassed smile, collecting her shoulder bag from underneath her chair.

“Quite all right, Kitty.”

Swiftly, the girl ducks past Logan, not slowing down as she disappears straight through the closed door.

Logan snaps his head back to the bald man, who smiles as he holds up a textbook. “Physics. Another quarter completed. How time presses on, no matter the state of the world.” The man pulls away from the desk, still seated. “I’m Professor Charles Xavier. Would you care for a late lunch?”

The pleasantries make his lip curl. “Where am I?”

“Westchester, New York. You were attacked, for the second time. My people brought you here for medical attention.”

“I don’t need medical attention.”

The bald man in the wheelchair, the Professor, stops a few feet away. “Yes, of course.”

“Where’s my girl?”

The girl, he corrects to himself. Not his. It’s okay to be protective, not possessive. Still, there’s something animalistic to both – something that doesn’t belong in this richly-furnished room that’s too small to fit him, in spite of its actual dimensions.

A pause. Xavier leans back in his chair. “Rogue? She’s here. She’s fine.”

“Really?”

Xavier holds Logan’s challenging stare. Logan doesn’t flinch, though he’s restless under the scrutiny. As if, somehow, he’s giving away much more than he means to.

It’s a relief when the door opens. A man with red-tinted glasses, a woman with white hair, the redheaded doctor, who walks by with a warm grace Logan hasn’t seen in a woman since – well, maybe he’s never seen a woman walk that way.

Dr. Jean Grey, only one of the bunch with a name that doesn’t make him shake his head and laugh. Cyclops, Storm, Magneto, Mystique, Sabretooth. Dr. Jean Grey. He likes that. Suits the tall woman with the librarian neckline and the red pencil shirt. Classy.

Too bad about the company she keeps. Schools for mutants, brewing wars, dumbass nicknames.

With a derisive smile, Logan looks back at Xavier. “And what do they call you – Wheels? This is the stupidest thing I’ve ever heard.”

All he wants to do is ditch the loonies and check on Marie, but Logan’s held up at the door by the humorless clench-jaw in the shades. “Cyclops, right?” He grabs him forcibly by the shirt. “Wanna get out of my way?”

Irritatingly enough, Cyclops doesn’t twitch an eyebrow. Merely looks around him, apparently unable to do anything without the go-ahead from Xavier.

“Logan. It’s been almost fifteen years, hasn’t it? Living from day to day, moving from place to place. With no memory of who or what you are.”

His eyes dart around, how could he – Logan’s voice is barely a hiss: “Shut up.”

That stare again. The one that knows too much. “Give me a chance. I may be able to help you find some answers.”

Voice still failing him, he breathes, “How do you know?”

You’re not the only one with gifts. The same whispered questions from earlier.

Logan’s head jerks up and around before falling back the Professor. A newfound respect and interest in his expression, he asks, “What is this place?”

Excusing his people to get back to their classes, Xavier leads Logan on a tour of the half-converted mansion. Kitchen, security, back gardens – it’s not lost on him that everywhere Professor Xavier’s traveling story time goes, Marie’s faded scent is there to reassure him. Smoke and mirrors, far as Logan’s concerned, until he sees for himself that she’s safe.

It’s as if – Strike that. Knowing his impatience, Xavier guides him back inside, to a classroom where Marie sits uncharacteristically hunched. Through a windowed door, Logan studies her profile as she studies the others in the room.

“The students are mostly runaways,” Xavier explains. “Frightened, alone. Some with gifts so extreme they’ve become a danger to themselves and those around them. Like your friend Rogue.”

That again. He’s annoyed. It’s not Marie who’s dangerous, it’s everybody telling her she is that’s doing the real harm.

“Incapable of physical, human contact, probably for the rest of her life.”

The casual certainty annoys him further. She’s not the kind to be written off so easily.

Xavier continues, “And yet here she is, with others her own age.”

A twinge passes through Logan’s shoulder blades.

Neutral tone intact, Xavier finishes, “Learning, being accepted. Not feared.”

He can see the truth of that, at least, for himself. The ironically-named mouse holding hands with the All-American leans across a gum-snapping Asian girl dressed in yellow to ask Marie a question; showoff kid with a lighter tries to gets her attention, but All-American turns his fireball into shattered ice. Marie sits up straighter, tugging at her gloves.

“What’ll happen to her?” The same question he was asking himself just hours before – not so long ago, but a lifetime away from this place.

“Well, that’s up to her,” Xavier replies. “Rejoin the world as an educated young woman, or stay on to teach others. To become what the children have affectionately called ‘X-Men.’”

Gum-snapper throws up a handful of sparklers, lips clearly reading, “It’s Jubilee. You’ll want to know me.” She winks. Behind Marie’s answering smile is a flinch waiting to happen.

Logan forces himself to turn away, raising an eyebrow at the question he doesn’t have to ask aloud – X-Men?

Xavier nods, wheeling around to move down the hallway. “But the school is merely our public face,” he clarifies. “The lower levels are an entirely different matter.”

Who the hell has a jet? he recalls asking Marie. Now they know, and the explanation is almost as unfathomable as guessing in the dark. Vigilante justice, good versus evil, the end of days. Logan listens without comment, looks over the uniforms, trots through stables, admires the car collection – admires the leggy doctor sitting pretty next to Lockjaw.

None of it does anything for him. He’s not stirred, no doubt the intention of the monologue. Bitter cynicism is all he can feel, because his bones are weighed down by the very worst of humanity and his own mutation proves them right – he’s something other than human. Feral. An animal. Not his words, but it’s as much an exercise in frustration trying to place the voice as it would be to get drawn into all this superhero bullshit.

Find out what Marie wants to do, then Logan’s more than ready to get the fuck out of Dodge.

The Professor once again proves himself a step ahead. “I’ll make you a deal, Logan. Give me forty-eight hours to find out what Magneto wants with you, and I give you my word that I will use all my power to help you piece together what you’ve lost. And what you’re looking for.”

Cryptic. Manipulative, even. Still, it’s a decent proposition. No amount of clawing can penetrate his thick skull. Only someone like the Professor can peel back the layers and tell him what’s so atrocious that his brain has to keep it from him.

So he’ll stay.

Citing a meeting with someone called McCoy, Xavier leaves Logan to make himself at home. Laughable suggestion. Place is a zoo – worse, it’s a freak show without the gasping audience. Surreal to see so many mutations used so openly. Nothing vicious in it, either. Just kids enjoying their gifts.

Gifts.

Not in the real world. Sure, kids look content enough now to learn tolerance and self-control, but he’d bet his balls no one on the other side is teaching the same, even now. Marie is proof enough of that.

Logan’s made his way to Marie’s classroom just as it’s emptying out. A young girl with bushy blonde hair falters when she sees him. He raises an eyebrow, but it takes the decisive pop of chewing gum to get her moving again. What’s her name, Jubilee, sends him a wink, gaze roaming freely as she struts by. Where does she think she is, a honky tonk? Does he have a sign on his forehead: “Jailbait, drop your panties here?”

He scowls as the rest of the brats edge to the safety of the hallway, their eyes darting none too subtly to his hands. A crack of his knuckles sends the stragglers skittering. Oddly satisfying.

Marie’s still inside the classroom, talking to the teacher. Storm’s another looker. Delicate, though. Serene.

“I didn’t know there were places like this,” Marie is saying.

Storm smiles gently. “I don’t think there are very many places like this.”

“And the Professor…He can fix my mutation?”

Christ. The nervous hope on her about knocks him dizzy.

Doubt and pity flicker across Storm’s face. “I don’t think that it quite works that way.”

Marie ducks her head. The movement draws Storm’s attention to Logan, arms folded across his chest. Look on his face can’t be pleasant, yet her expression is welcoming.

“Rogue, look who’s here.”

Pivoting slowly, Marie keeps her eyes on the floor as she trails Storm to the door. Absurdly young – he knew it first thing he saw her sitting on that bar stool. Way she looks now, taking little steps, bowing her head, clutching her books to her well-covered chest, makes him the biggest fool and the worst lecher.

He barely hears Storm’s invitation for Marie to join her for tea in the greenhouse later, barely notes her exit.

Simple fact is, Logan doesn’t know the fidgeting girl in front of him, though he recognizes her as the same girl who dashed from his bed last night. He knows the one who climbed in better, the one with the smart mouth and the wicked saunter. The liar.

Logan shifts his weight, drops his arms to his sides. “Hey.”

Marie tilts her chin up, squinting at him like she’s looking into the sun. A little of the liar lingers around the curve of her lip. “Did I screw up again, or is this place okay?”

“It’s fine. You like it here?”

“Oh, well, gee. Ms. Munroe’s a swell teacher and the other kids are awful nice.” She rocks on the sides of her feet. “You should enroll. Be my lab partner.”

Letting out a laugh, he notes the domed stained-glass ceiling. “Yeah. It’s not my style, either.”

“At least you’ll be safe here. Rescuing you was getting to be a hassle.”

He quirks an eyebrow at her. “That so?”

“That is so.” She shifts her books. “How long are you staying?”

“Couple of days. You?”

“I haven’t decided yet. You’ll give me a lift if I need one?”

Her fidgeting has got to stop, she’s making his fingers twitch. He clasps his hands behind his back. “Sure, kid.”

Marie winces. “I’m seventeen, by the way. Not quite a kid.”

Close enough. He suspected, but he never smelt the lie on her. Her talent or his fault? His eyes fall on the scuffed toes of her tennis shoes. What a bastard. What a blind, opportunistic, old bastard.

“I’m sorry, Logan.”

“You ain’t the only one who screwed up.”

“My daddy told me to always apologize first. You get to take the moral high ground, and you’re more likely to be forgiven.” She focuses what passes for a smile on the wall behind his shoulder. “Of course, he ended up kicking me out, so maybe not foolproof advice.” Her hand goes to her scarf and the tags underneath.

“Didn’t mean to break that,” he tells her. Should’ve kept his temper. Marie doesn’t deserve what he said.

“How come yours is gone?”

He shrugs. Victory spoil for Sabretooth, most likely. Logan plans on taking it back and then some.

Marie chews on her lip and the silence between them for a long moment. “The Air Force thing, that’s all Carol. But the other stuff was true. Nine months ago, I was daddy’s little Southern belle, then I was mutant and I got sent to Southaven.” She meets his eye. “It’s a sick place. I wouldn’t lie about that. I tried to run away so many times. It was like a big joke to the nurses. They’d ask me when I was going ‘rogue’ again. Really funny, mocking someone you’re terrified of.”

Behind his back, he clenches his right hand around his left wrist. He holds level with her watery stare.

“I told Dr. Grey – You know she goes in front of Congress all the time? – She said she’d look into it for me, but…I don’t know if she likes me very much. I mean, she wasn’t mean or anything. She just asked me not to touch anyone. Very politely.”

“I wouldn’t take it personal.”

“Did they make a point to ask you not to claw anyone? Didn’t think so.” Marie rests her chin on the top of her books. “Great. Biggest freak in the freak show.”

“You’re givin’ yourself too much credit, kid. Wheels dresses up mutants in black leather and sends ’em out to save the world.”

Marie laughs, and Logan unclenches his fingers slowly, feeling the blood rush back into his hand.

“‘X-Men,’” she agrees archly.

The click of heels and the scent of perfume makes Logan turn slightly. Jean’s enjoying a private smile as she makes her way toward them, the fireball kid trailing behind her.

“Hello again,” she says, fixing her smile on him and then Marie.

“Hi, Dr. Grey,” Marie mummers, shoulders hunched.

“If you wouldn’t mind, Logan, the Professor asked me to take a few x-rays. It might help us understand why Magneto is after you.”

“My bones are covered in metal. Don’t need an x-ray to figure that out.”

Waste of time, but Marie’s trying to nod discreetly and get his attention at the same time. The lift of her brow says she wants him to do something for her. “You should talk to Dr. Grey. She’s good at looking into stuff,” she enunciates.

Not subtle, but, “All right,” he agrees.

“Thank you.” Jean opens the circle to the kid leaning against the doorjamb, knee cocked like James Dean. “Rogue, I don’t know if you’ve been introduced, this is John Allerdyce.”

“It’s Pyro.”

Jean hides a smile, continuing, “He’s volunteered to show you around the school.”

“If I get my lighter back,” Pyro says, just as Marie replies, “I’ve already had the tour.”

“John, you know the rules,” Jean tells him mildly. “Why don’t you introduce Rogue to Bobby and your other friends?”

He’s all artifice and impatience when he pushes himself away from the wall. “Come on, new girl.”

Marie’s lip takes on an unimpressed curl. She rolls her eyes up and over. “You’ll find me later, Logan?”

“Yeah, kid.”

Brushing by Jean to get out the door, Marie strides right past Pyro. Her saunter’s back, and Logan’s not the only one to notice.

“Nice jeans,” Pyro comments, following her to the stairs at a convenient distance.

“It’s not the jeans you’re complimenting, Sparky,” Marie retorts, sliding her gloved hand up the banister. “It’s the ass holding them up.”

Pyro takes the stairs two at a time, snickering. “Yep. That’s what I said.”

Marie’s already turned the corner at the top of the staircase, but Logan can still hear the acid in her drawl, “A gentleman would advert his eyes. If I have to avert them for you, I’ll make it permanent.”

Seventeen. Hell of an age.

“John isn’t the likeliest choice for the welcoming committee,” Jean admits, starting down the hallway. “But he really did want to meet her. He must have known Rogue would give him a run for his money.”

Yeah, Marie tends to do that. Logan falls into step, hands behind his back again. “She acts a lot older than she should.”

“Not uncommon in people forced to grow up too fast. This hasn’t been an easy year for her.” Jean’s sideways glance is gracious. “You really helped her by taking her in.”

“She’s a good kid,” he replies.

“I’m sure she is.” Jean hesitates. “But her particular mutation doesn’t make it easy for her.”

“Won’t be a problem. She doesn’t like to be touched,” he says briskly. “That clinic did a number on her.”

The elevator opens for them, and Jean steps in. She fusses over the panel instead of answering.

“You know Southaven,” he guesses, watching the doors close.

“I certainly don’t agree with it. It’s a ‘treatment’ facility, which is political doublespeak for finding a cure at any cost. It’s a terrible fact of our government. They refuse to pay adequate reparations to the Vietnamese people for generations of genetic defects due to the use of Agent Orange in combat. But present them with a boy whose gift let him survive the house fire that killed his foster parents, and they’ll pay any price to make sure he gets all the finest medical care.”

The elevator opens to the lower levels, and she’s shaking her head as they walk out.

Turning to face him, she continues, “The Senate Select Committee on Mutants has been pouring money into Southaven since it opened two years ago.”

“Governments are always corrupt. You got ‘gifts,’ fancy uniforms. Do somethin’ about it.”

Jean’s smile is wane. “I’m afraid it’s not that simple, Logan.”

“Place does experiments on mutant kids. Seems simple to me.”

“Genetic testing. Probably skin samples, in Rogue’s case. I don’t agree with Southaven philosophically; however, the evidence does not justify using force against a clinic full of innocent people doing the job that eighty-five percent of the mutants there pay a lot of money for them to do.”

He steps in her space. “What the other fifteen percent want don’t count?”

“Legally? They’re either low-risk convicted criminals or they’re minors with signed consent forms. Rogue made it clear she did not want to be there, and that, I’m sure, influences the way she views her time at Southaven.”

“You’re sayin’ she’s wrong?”

Voice low, eyes meeting his, Jean repeats, “I’m saying it’s not that simple. We wouldn’t have been able to do anything for her while she was there, but I am glad she’s here now.” Another gracious smile. “She needs more friends like you.”

With that weightless elegance, she turns and leads him down the corridor. All the talking like she’s got the world on her shoulders doesn’t show. She’s telling the truth, though, about everything. He doesn’t like questioning Marie on this one. Only, he can’t deny her ability to lie so convincingly to herself that she smells honest.

Jean’s silent until they’re passing the alcove. “You know, the leather’s actually very tasteful. In comparison.” She presses her palm against the wall by one of the circular doors. “You should’ve seen the spandex options.”

Logan eyes her up and down as he follows her into the med lab and decides the good doctor in spandex is definitely is something he should’ve seen.

She slips into a white lab coat and slides on a pair of glasses, her warm demeanor changing into cool professionalism. He stands off to the side, while she fiddles with computers and equipment and generally forgets that he’s there.

He clears his throat.

Jumping slightly, Jean lifts her eyes from the consol to meet his. “If you’ll remove the sweatshirt and lie down on the examining table, I’ll be ready in a moment.”

Yes ma’am, Logan thinks, unzipping the hoody and leaving it on the rack she had her lab coat on.

She doesn’t speak as she attaches the circular patches to his skin again. There’s nothing to do but watch her. He’s glad he doesn’t see any bruises on her neck.

Moral high ground and better chance of forgiveness, Marie said.

“I’m sorry.”

Jean stills, square frames almost sliding down her nose. “About what?”

“If I hurt you.” He points at her neck.

Her smile is forgiveness enough, and he nods.

Jean moves to the machine beside the table. Craning his neck, Logan lets out the breath he’s been holding. He looks down at his chest. Smirks. “So. Couldn’t wait to get my shirt off again, huh?” Gages her reaction.

Seemingly not amused, she presses a button that sends him into a hole in the wall.

Logan settles back, still smirking. If he has to be here, he might as well enjoy himself. He narrows his eyes against the bright lights that’ll let the good doctor have a look under his skin.

At the very least, he’s for damn sure she’s old enough to be qualified to do it.

DARK SIDE OF THE MOON
thatcraftykid

track three // “BREATHE”

ALL YOU TOUCH AND ALL YOU SEE / IS ALL YOUR LIFE WILL EVER BE
“You know, if it kept you from horning in on his fiancée,
I bet Cyclops wouldn’t care if you were screwing me six ways from Sunday.”
– Rogue –

Bouncing the back of her head noiselessly against the metal headboard, she pulls her crossed legs in tighter. Space is rapidly diminishing as her new roommates fling borrowable jeans, tops, socks, shoes, pajamas, and even stuffed animals on what’s been designated Rogue’s bed. Community possessions. A necessary way of life in a place with wide open doors, where an introduction constitutes a friendship and it’s learn to coexist on top of each other or tough shit.

“Jubee, move your booty,” the Brazilian girl, Amara, demands, bumping Jubilee away from the closet with her hip.

Exaggerating a stumble, Jubilee catches her balance on Ric’s slender shoulders and plops herself into his lap. “Lo siento, papi,” she coos as she trails a blue spark down the front of his sweater.

Under normal circumstances, Rogue thinks she’d find Jubilee and her firecracking ways a riot. Right now, the ringing in her ears is making her nauseous.

“How about a little rumble?” Jubilee asks, presumably referencing Ric’s mutation. She wiggles in his lap cleverly. Rogue cringes. Is her own Lolita routine as absurdly transparent?

“Skank-slut,” John coughs into his hand loudly. He spins around in the computer chair closest to Rogue, dodging a slipper thrown by Kitty and a death look from Jubilee.

Ric murmurs something like, “Bless her heart,” making Jubilee focus her glare on him. “What? I said, ‘You’re pretty.’”

Beaming, she snuggles back up. Looking at Rogue, Jubilee explains, “Ric’s a big ol’ queen, if you couldn’t tell.”

“So’s Bobby,” John adds. He’s got his hands on a book of matches and a scented candle now.

Bobby glances up from his textbook, snorting out a frosty breath. “Keep dreaming.”

While the two argue over relative queerness, Kitty gets Ric’s opinion as to whether the boys are bordering on homophobic or protesting too much. Jubilee argues vehemently for the latter, allying John and Bobby against her. For his part, Ric throws up his hands, announcing, “Queen, king – all the same to me, so long as I’m the one handling the pieces.”

Over the fray, Amara emerges from the closet. “Success!” she cries, a pair of long, black gloves draped over her wrists. She presents them to Rogue with a joking curtsey. “For you. If never again I’m forced to sit through another opera, it’ll be too soon.”

“Thanks,” Rogue replies, not knowing what else to say. She lays the lacy gloves out on her knee.

“Fashionable and functional,” Kitty pronounces.

Rogue hopes her answering smile isn’t too bland. The throbbing against her skull hasn’t ebbed nearly as quickly as the Professor hoped it would. He prescribed the company of others to keep her out of her head. Flippantly, she thinks, in or out, her sanity’s in peril either way.

Suddenly trilling what can only be a string of Portuguese profanities, Amara steps right on Logan’s jacket in her hurry to swipe the massively lit candle and matchbook away from John. With her bare hand, she snuffs out the six-inch flame. “Look at the ceiling, otário! Still scorched from last time!”

“All right, all right. But give me the matches, okay? Grey has my lighter.”

Rogue smirks weakly. That’s what he thinks.

Amara raps him on the nose with her fingertips. “No!”

“Woman!” John throws his elbows over his head. “I am not a puppy!”

“You certainly sniff around people like one,” Rogue tosses out, eliciting appreciative noises from the room.

Golf claps hoity, Jubilee says in an affected British accent, “Marvelous bitchery.”

“A stunning display,” Ric mimics.

“Like I should even bother with you.” John’s gaze is on her gloves, and Rogue feels herself flushing with surprise and anger. His mouth twists into a leer. “Good thing I enjoy a challenge.” The last ember on the candlewick flares.

Asshole. Gloves off, she could show him a thing or twenty –

Bobby cuts through the antagonism before it gets ugly: “John, you need to stop talking. Rogue doesn’t want to hear it and neither do the rest of us.” Bright blue eyes find hers, eliciting a grateful smile.

“Seriously,” Kitty puts in. “I mean, can we, you know, actually study for this final, please and thank you?”

“I’d like to graduate,” Ric agrees, shooing Jubilee off his lap so he can read his notes.

Spinning again, John says, “Roman Empire, blah, blah, religious strife, Jesus Freak martyrs, Constantine issued the Edict of Milan in 313 after he contracted Christianity. Essay one, bam. Done. A-plus.”

“First of all, you’ve never seen an A-plus in your life and you will never, because, let’s be honest among friends, I break the curve every time.” Kitty has Bobby jokingly breathe on her fingernails. “Second, ‘contracted Christianity,’ what the heck?” she questions.

“Yeah, contracted. Christianity’s just like AIDS – it’s resistive to science, targets homosexuals, and completely raped Africa.”

Blasphemers burn, Rogue thinks, shocking herself with someone else’s ferocity. There are other opinions, no stronger than a conflicted drone, but the revival voice cuts through them. Should-have-been-voiceless Lora, who knows three ways to perform an exorcism, all of which failed against her Godforsaken deformity. Sinner, I’m a sinner –

Ugh. Rogue follows Ric’s hand as he makes the sign of the cross. Back, demon. Into the dark.

“You are one messed up mutant,” Ric says. No kidding, she thinks, except he’s not talking about her.

Jubilee and Amara trade low whistles and hen clucks, while Kitty’s jaw is practically touching her collarbone. “I’m not even Christian, and I still find that offensive!”

“It’s also a completely invalid comparison, because you can’t just stop believing in AIDS and be cured,” Bobby asserts.

John’s shit-eating grin remains intact. It was the rise he wanted, and he already got it.

What would it be like, Rogue has to wonder, to have someone so completely uncensored flying around her head? Crowded, of course. She’s crowded already, the Professor just stirred her up. Would the devil-may-care be worth it?

Stop it. She massages the base of her skull roughly. Stop it, stop it, stop it.

“You okay, chica?”

A hand on her shoulder makes Rogue jerk back, startling Jubilee. “Yeah, fine. Sorry. Headache.”

“We’re loud, aren’t we? We’ll go to the lounge,” Bobby offers, closing his textbook.

“That’s sweet, but, really, I like the company,” she says, meaning it in spite of her complaining. He smiles, and her head aches anew because suddenly she’s reminded of David.

Your fault. You did this. David’s there but, more than anyone, he doesn’t want to be.

John snorts. “I believe it. Big Bad Claws doesn’t strike me as much of a conversationalist.”

Laughing, Jubilee sits carelessly on the pile next to Rogue. “He has other qualities, I’m sure.”

“Jubilation,” Amara admonishes.

Not getting the hint, John throws up a colorful rubber band ball and catches it. “Makes you wonder how they passed the time.”

Rogue snaps, “You should just change your name to Asshole, save people the trouble.”

“Believe me, it’s starting to stick,” Bobby replies, an apology in his voice.

A knock on the door catches the attention of seven pairs of eyes. Looking every bit the proud teacher, Storm says, “A study party, I’m so happy to see you taking my advice. You’ll all do wonderfully tomorrow, I’m sure.”

Everyone does their best to look responsible. Except John, who slouches further in his chair.

“Could I borrow you for a moment, Kitty? The bathroom in Dr. McCoy’s old room isn’t stocked, and there’s something of a crisis on the third floor.” On cue, the light fixture shakes. Storm looks worried.

Kitty grins and hops up. “Sure thing, Ms. Monroe.”

“I knew I could count on you,” she says, eyes still locked on the ceiling as she hurries away.

John tosses the rubber ball to Bobby, who catches it one-handed. “Bet you wish she polished your apple that hard.”

“If you’re going to be lewd, at least try to make sense.” Kitty points at the hiking pack and jacket next to Rogue’s bed. “I’ll take that, too, if you want.”

“Actually, I’ll come with you,” she replies, gathering Logan’s things.

She can feel John staring at her ass. “Switching rooms – Damn it!” The rubber ball, which must’ve nailed him pretty soundly, rolls toward Ric.

“Shut your mouth,” Bobby orders, very slowly.

Another grateful look thrown his way, Rogue joins Kitty in the hall.

“We’re all really sorry about John,” she says as soon as they’ve started walking. “Basically, he’s like the handsy uncle with Tourette’s no one has the heart to disinvite to the family reunion. But he’s not always this bad – he’s really bring the rude today, clearly trying to get your attention. You know boys. Always kicking sand in your face if they like you.”

“I’m so flattered.”

“Right?” Kitty giggles. “And here we have the supply closet.” White walls and lots of towels. As she collects different items, she explains, “The staff goes home at six-thirty, so we’re on our own after that. They’re really nice, but – I mean, take Carl for instance, the maintenance guy. He should’ve graduated from MIT or something. Only he’s a super obvious mutant, so he’s a janitor instead of an engineer. Makes me so mad. Jubes and I want to become lawyers so we can fight injustices like that, you know?”

Kitty heads out the door. If Rogue’s not mistaken, her shoulder brushed right through the frame.

“Dr. McCoy’s old room is that way, south wing. Now he’s a super, super genius. He looks like a total science nerd – you’ve probably seen him on TV – but rumor has it his mutation makes him a serious beast. He was one of the X-Men, before he became, like, the mutant spokesguy. Bobby’s thinking about politics, too. Very Mr. Smith Goes to Washington, minus the ‘aw shucks.’”

On information overload, Rogue just responds, “He seems nice.”

“Bobby is nice,” Kitty agrees with too much emphasis. Like she’s trying to convince herself of something.

That gets her curious. “Have you been dating long?”

“A couple weeks. Jubes played matchmaker, like she always does. She kept saying I had to seal the deal now, or some new girl was going to swoop in and grab him. It was a little fast for my taste. Not that I’m complaining. Bobby’s wonderful. But I’m kind of on the rebound, because I just got out of a two-year relationship with my boyfriend, Josh. The long distance thing was making me ridiculously homesick, I was always in a bad mood. So we fought all the time and then we broke up –” Kitty takes a big breath and grins. “Drama, drama, drama.”

It’s enough to make Rogue prefer the road.

“This one right here,” Kitty says, tilting her armload toward the corner room ahead. “No need to get the door, just put your hand on me. Step lively.”

With widening eyes, Rogue grips the shorter girl’s shoulder as, together, they shuffle straight through the wall and into the bathroom. While Kitty’s setting down her pile in the sink, Rogue tests the wall’s solidity. Amazing. A touch dizzy, she drops Logan’s stuff next to the toilet and perches on the seat.

“I’m kind of a showoff,” Kitty confesses, filling up the medicine cabinet. “I got my first taste of the limelight in jr. high, when I dominated the all-school talent show. I made The Trib and everything. That’s how Professor Xavier found me. I literally begged my parents to let me come here. I had to promise them I’d go to college back home, like Northwestern or DePaul. Oh, I’m from Chicago, by the way. The suburbs, not the actual city. Although, how cool would that be? How about you?”

Montgomery to Calgary, twelve different answers from the dirty dozen echo in her head. She’d forgotten there are so many. Some are a whisper, some a shout.

“Meridian, Mississippi.”

“Awesome. Finally, something about you that’s not hearsay.” Kitty’s reflection rolls its eyes grandly. “We at Xavier’s Institute are fed by the rumor mill. To be perfectly honest, I’m no less gluttonous than the rest, as you might have noticed. However, I assure you, we are not all as apt as some people to jump to inappropriate assumptions.”

Oh, whatever. Rogue shrugs. “Gotta pay the rent somehow.”

Kitty freezes, her expression caught somewhere between scandal and revulsion.

“That was a joke. I was joking.”

Now Kitty looks embarrassed. “Yeah, totally. I getcha. It takes me a second, sometimes. Jubilee always makes fun of me for it.” Her laugh is awkward.

Saved by an opening door, Kitty motions to the wall. Rogue waves her on, keeping her seat. An exaggerated thumbs up, and she disappears.

So not that big of a deal, God. Her momma begs to differ, but Rogue refuses to listen.

Instead, she trains her ears on the sound of Logan’s voice.

“Where’s your room?” he’s asking, seemingly unaware of her presence in the dimly lit bathroom.

“With Scott, down the hall,” Dr. Grey answers.

Logan’s had plenty of time to ask her about Southaven already, but Rogue hopes that he finds a way to steer the conversation in that direction. It’s important what Dr. Grey thinks of her because she’s in a position to do something. The Professor more or less said so himself.

“Is that your gift? Putting up with that guy.”

Rogue has to smile, even though she doesn’t think Cyclops’s all that bad. He wouldn’t let her play with the controls on the ride to New York, but even his condescension was kind of cute.

“Actually, I’m telekinetic,” Dr. Grey replies. “I can move things with my mind.”

“Really? What kinds of things?”

Doors shut decisively. “All kinds of things.” More softly, Dr. Grey adds, “I also have some telepathic ability.”

Maybe that’s why, maybe Dr. Grey knows. It must’ve looked bad, whatever she saw. If only it was possible to explain.

Logan asks, “What, like your professor?”

“Nowhere near that powerful.”

Rogue’s shoulders relax. No, Dr. Grey couldn’t have seen anything, then. Even invited, the Professor wasn’t able to sort through the chaos in her head. A very fragile equilibrium, he called it, and told her evolution had equipped her with remarkable coping skills.

The devil’s work – Shut the hell up, you goddamn lunatic.

Yeah. Darwin could kiss her ass.

Logan and Dr. Grey are speaking in lowered voices now. Rogue moves to kneel by the open doorway, the better to hear if they get around to talking about something worthwhile.

“So read my mind.”

Rogue’s eyebrows shoot up. Getting information out of Logan was like pouring scalding water into a teacup balanced on the back of her hand. But Dr. Grey gets easy access?

He even goads her. “Come on. You afraid you might like it?”

“I doubt it.”

Ho-oh, not even. Rogue peeks around the corner. She knows Logan’s body language, they’re fucking flirting. Unacceptable.

What did I say about Trouble? What did I say? Her momma crows, triumph making Rogue nauseous again. He didn’t get what he wanted out of you, now he’s moved on to the very next thing in a skirt.

I listened, Rogue thinks fiercely. I didn’t let him make me any promises.

“Maybe your professor’s holding you back,” Logan observes. “Maybe he’s not alone.”

“I hope you’re not suggesting that Scott’s holding me back.”

“I don’t know, he seems a little restrained for a woman like you.”

Rogue could throw up right here. Or all over Dr. Grey’s pointy red tranny heels. What does enormous feet correspond to on a chick? Logan would be the one to ask.

Okay, immature. Dr. Grey’s tone, to her credit, is no-nonsense. “If Scott opened his eyes without that visor, he could punch a hole through a mountain. I think it’s good for all of us if he has a sense of control. Don’t you?”

The floorboards creak under Logan’s weight as he waves the white flag.

“Wait. Come here.”

Dangle a pair of tits in his face, and he’ll come like a donkey follows a carrot on a stick. Spot-on critique, Guff. Also, be quiet.

“All right. I need you to try and relax.” Dr. Grey lifts her hands to either side of Logan’s face.

Both are so absorbed in the silence, they don’t notice Cyclops stop in the room’s second doorway.

Abruptly, Dr. Grey’s head snaps back. Logan grips her bare hands. “What do you see?”

After a moment, she answers, “Scott.”

Rogue can’t read his angle, so she leans her head against the bathroom wall.

“Goodnight, Logan,” she hears Dr. Grey say. To Cyclops she asks, “Are you coming?”

“I’ll be right there.”

Amusement drips from Logan’s voice. “You gonna tell me to stay away from your girl?”

“If I had to do that, she wouldn’t be my girl. And Jean doesn’t strike me as your type.”

Ooh, Cyclops just called Logan white trash. This deserves popcorn and bag of Twizzlers.

“Mm. Well, I guess you’ve got nothin’ to worry about. Do ya, ‘Cyclops.’”

“You know, I’d feel a lot better if you were taking this more seriously. Some mutants take pride in their gifts. Especially those of us who are willing to fight for what we believe in.”

Aw, heck, I knew it! Lock ’em all up. Put ’em in cages ’fore they take over – Eugene the Redneck, ladies and gentlemen. Worst security guard ever.

“Have you ever seen real combat, boy?”

“Have you?” Cyclops shoots back.

The silence takes a turn toward tense. Rogue risks a look.

“Don’t like to talk about your past?”

“Not to you.”

“It must just burn you up that a ‘boy’ like me saved your life. You gotta be careful. I might not be there next time.” Cyclops’s almost got the door shut when he adds, “Oh, and Logan? Stay away from my girl. And the students.”

Whoa now. Rogue stands up swiftly, hands on her hips.

“What’re you doin’ in there?”

Cyclops’s gone, leaving Logan one hundred percent pissed off.

Picking up his jacket, she digs around in his hiking pack as she emerges from the bathroom. “I brought you your stuff. Here.” She tosses John’s lighter and a cigar on the bed. “I thought you could use one of those. Everybody here is so uptight.”

Grunting, he picks up her peace offering.

“I’ll hang your jacket in the closet. I managed to fit a couple shirts and some socks and stuff. All your cigars, too, so you’re set. Oh, and your keys. I couldn’t do much about the window except put some plastic over it, but I did lock up.”

“Thanks, Marie,” he replies absently.

She folds her arms over her chest. “Call me Rogue here, okay?” No discernible response. He’s sitting on the edge of the mattress, puffing at his cigar. “Lighter, please.”

He tosses it underhand, still looking through her. It’s insulting. Less than twelve hours ago, she’d been the only woman in his life. The only person, come to that.

Instead of a left hook, she goes for a verbal slap: “You know, if it kept you from horning in on his fiancée, I bet Cyclops wouldn’t care if you were screwing me six ways from Sunday.”

“Watch your mouth.”

“Yes, daddy.”

Too far. Way too far. He’s gone completely still, but his eyes burn sharp.

“Logan.” It’s almost a whine. “Don’t you think I’ve been called a ‘piece’ enough times to know the difference between a pervert and a decent guy? I’m not thirteen. I’m legal, and I talk a lot of shit. How were you supposed to know?” She kneads her damp forehead with her palms, eyes scrunched shut. “And it’s not like I didn’t ruin everything anyway.”

“Kid, you’re sweatin’ bullets.” He stands, reaching out.

“It’s my mutation and it sucks,” she snaps, backpedaling away from him.

Something is welling up inside of her, a mixture of half-crazed shame and excitement named
Gordon Neville. Thinning hair, doughy, with a new car and a room at the Holiday Inn Express. Harmless in action, not thought. He wanted her to be young, he wanted her to be damaged.

“I’m such an idiot,” she says, hardly realizing she’s speaking out loud. “I should’ve knocked him out with the telephone or something, not my skin. Now he’s – Same for Carol, I didn’t have to. I could’ve just…”

Me. Awake. Aware. Me.

Rogue’s sputtering water, next thing she knows. A gentle tug on her hair lifts her head, and a towel catches the water dripping down her chin. She opens her eyes, watching green fade to brown.

Logan’s face is next to hers in the mirror. “You with me?”

Smiling slightly, she nods. Better. She feels better now. Neatly arranged.

“You were just starin’ at nothin’, about ready to fall over.”

Her coma-narcolepsy. It’s been a while. Not really needing his help, she leans on Logan as he sits her on the toilet seat. He crouches in front of her, hands still on her hips.

She’s ashamed of herself for treating him so awful and then making him worry. “The Professor tried to read my mind earlier, and it scrambled things up a bit. I’m really okay. I just needed to hit the edge before I could bounce back.”

“The edge of what?”

Her one-shouldered shrug is a reflex. Why doesn’t she just tell him?

Standing, Logan hands her the towel so she can dry her face. “You need some sleep.”

Rogue follows him into the bedroom. “Did you find anything out for me from Dr. Grey?”

“Not much. I mean it, get some sleep. We’ll talk in morning.”

“The Professor didn’t have much to say, either.” Rogue frowns. “I figured they’d talk to you, at least. Since you’re…”

Logan holds the door open for her. “An adult?”

She walked right into that one. “I guess I don’t get to be one here. House rules.”

His mouth compresses at her bitterness. “You ain’t an adult, kid. That’s how it is.”

“That’s not how it is, that’s just how it looks to them. You know me. You know I’m just like you.”

He starts to shake his head, so she gives up with an audible sigh. Pivoting on her heel, she chooses the second way out. The door shuts hard, of it’s own volition. He probably thinks she slammed it, like petulant little girl. Kitty said it best – drama, drama, drama.

She should apologize, explain everything to him. He won’t be her ally if she’s not honest.

Before she can bring herself go back, Bobby comes around the corner. “Hey, there you are.” His eyes light up when he grins.

“Hi.”

“So, what’re you up to tomorrow?”

Continuing her endless cycle of trading wrong-doings and apologies with Logan, no doubt. That, or laying bare all her crimes and psychoses. Looking forward to it. “I don’t know yet.”

“Well, I’ve got finals pretty much all day, but do you wanna meet me for dinner? We can to get know each other. All of us, I mean. The whole gang.” He winces slightly, laughing at himself. “I promise I’m not as dorky as I sound.”

Rogue has to chuckle. “Sure.”

“‘Sure’ I’m not dorky, or ‘sure’ you’ll meet me for dinner?”

“Both.”

“Cool.” He starts walking backward. “I’ll see you tomorrow, Rogue. Welcome to Mutant High.”

So much like David. It’s kind of painful.

She definitely needs to wipe the wistful look over someone else’s boyfriend off her face before she gets to her room.

Movement at the end of the hallway catches her attention. A tall, impossibly slender man in a navy uniform whose face and hands seemed to glow milk-marble white pushes a yellow cart. Carl, Rogue remembers, briefly wondering how bad the third floor crisis was that he had to come back and work overtime.

Luckily, the door to her room is open, otherwise she might not have recognized it. Kitty, Jubilee, and Amara aren’t inside. It’s just their other roommate, a younger girl with curly blonde hair named Tawny and a few of her friends. They trade hellos. The girls are studying for world history, too, only their final is multiple choice since they’re a couple grades younger. Rogue listens to them work out the Constantine issue as she tries to figure out what she should do with the pile of laundry on her bed.

“Need some help?” one of the friends asks, smiling just a little too sweetly.

Before she can get out more than a hesitant, “Uh,” the girl purses her lips together and blows. Arms windmilling against a tornado of fabric, Rogue’s compelled backward onto Jubilee’s bed.

The girls collapse into giggles. “Oops! Sorry,” Hot Air manages.

Hysterical. If she weren’t so tired, she’d casually lift the bed off the floor to pick up a shoe or something. That’d put a stop to the new-girl hazing right quick.

Be an adult, she tells herself. With great composure, she walks over to her bed and grabs the last remaining piece of clothing, a long-sleeved pink nightgown. “Exactly what I was looking for,” she says evenly.

Rogue takes her time in the shared bathroom, giving up more and more of the sink as girls of various ages vie for space. A few are obvious mutants, some are just obvious about their powers. Absolutely disconcerting. Mutations are something to be endured or employed, they aren’t, like Cyclops said, something to be proud of.

Shutting a stall door, Rogue changes in the cramped space. The nightgown fits, only she didn’t realize that it’s backless and the sleeves make putting her gloves on too awkward. She’s extra careful on the walk between the bathroom and her bed, hands tucked firmly under her armpits and eyes on the carpet.

If she’s proud of anything, it’s that she never used her mutation on Logan. Clearly, she has enough control to resist him, so all the little temptations around her should be nothing.

She climbs under the covers and curls up, even though the light’s on. Better safe than sorry.

One by one, the other girls drift into their beds and off to sleep. At least an hour passes, but Rogue’s eyes stay open.

So many ways today could’ve gone. Logan could be a prisoner, or Rogue could be on the road. Or they could be together back at the cabin. She’d be sleeping easy, or maybe she’d be awake and not sabotaging herself by over-thinking the one experience every single person inside her head has in common.

What she wouldn’t be doing is lying in the dark compiling a mental list of mutations, evaluating their level of desirability, and hating herself for it.

I wasn’t a monster until they made me one, she told Logan. She wants to believe it’s true. He doesn’t think so, at least. “You ain’t a monster,” he said. “You’re just” – Just what? Confused? Weak?

She needs to know. Right now. She needs to tell him everything and then, all evidence before the judge, make him finish that sentence.

As soundlessly as she can, Rogue slips out of bed and feels her way through the dark. The carpet is littered with shadowy objects, mostly clothes, but she stubs her toe on a textbook and has to bite her lip. Now would be a great time to have Kitty’s mutation.

The lock clicks when she turns the doorknob gingerly. Someone behind her rolls over, likely still asleep. If not, oh well. She could just be going to the bathroom.

She’s not a prisoner. This isn’t Southaven.

Rogue pads down the hallway with a purpose. Logan will wake up as soon as she walks in, but hopefully her lack of gloves will tell him that she’s not there to get him kicked out.

She hears his snuffling moans before she crosses the threshold. He’s on his back, muscles twitching in his sleep. Approaching cautiously, she tilts her head and tries to make out words in his low muttering.

Once, from the kitchen she heard him yell so loudly she shattered the mug in her hand. He told her he dreams about war. She doesn’t dream Carol’s dreams, but if she did they’d be about flying and camaraderie and a job well done, nothing like the violence that shackles Logan to his past.

Bare hand hovering over his shoulder, Rogue leans down to murmur his name. His body jerks, and she pulls her hand away. She tries again, louder, “Logan. Logan, wake up.”

The nightmare has him completely. His breaths are guttural huffs that sound like pleas. Rogue knows what is it be so trapped.

Without warning, his head snaps forward and his eyes fly open, making her catch her breath. She lets out a shriek that’s lost to a roar and a zing and a thud.

The air left in her windpipe chokes her, the sharp metal through her chest pools blood into her lungs. All she feels is the blind hatred on Logan’s face turn to shock as recognition seeps in and he looks down at where his claws join their bodies.

When he retracts them she realizes she’s going to die.

“Help me.” Logan’s wet-bright eyes dart to the open door, to her contorted face, and back again. “Somebody help!”

Rogue can help. Not him. Herself. In the end, she always helps herself.

Pain slowing down her brain, she falters forward by inches. They’re breathing the same air again, only they’ve reversed roles. The apprehension belongs to him. Her lips rest against his. For a moment, she pretends.

It’s a shaky effort to draw at his bottom lip, to press her hand to his cheek for balance and because she needs more. His mind falls open with his mouth. She stumbles back against a wave of shock and anger, grief and loathing. He was drowning in his dream, now she’s suffocating before his eyes. His fault.

Her fault. Fingertips against stubble, pulling from him the strength that siphons out blood and mends her punctured lungs. Rogue breathes, Logan chokes. He’s totally exposed, his expression utterly helpless. Closing her eyes does nothing to take the shame away.

Let go – Not yet, her skin is still broken. So supple, the way it comes together and makes her perfect. It’s the opposite of death, but death is still there, trickling in. She should take more –

No!

Rogue drops her arm. Logan hits the floor, convulsing with seizures.

“Scott, grab a pillow!”

The light is on, and there are so many people. Backing against a dresser, she watches Jean kneel beside Logan and cradle his head. Cyclops pushes past Rogue, and she turns to face Storm.

“It was an accident,” Rogue says.

Storm remains still. Gaping faces crowd the doorway. Sparing one more look at Logan – he’ll survive; she’s never touched anyone as long, but he can’t die, he never does – she sweeps out of the room. Past Amara, past Bobby. Head ducked, she just keeps walking.

Outside is where she needs to be, where the sky won’t pin her in. The lights are too bright, the place reeks, and she can hear the gossip start to buzz in time with the hum of her skin.

Windowed doors lead to a small balcony. The air is crisp in her repaired lungs. She sinks down, drawing in her knees and burying her nose in them.

Now you know everything, she thinks. What’s the verdict?

Logan doesn’t verbalize an answer. It’s enough that he’s there, ruffled and uneasy but not fighting her, not hating her. More than she could’ve hoped for.

He settles into her. She rocks herself, and it’s as soothing as he can manage.

DARK SIDE OF THE MOON
thatcraftykid

track three // “BREATHE”

AND BALANCED ON THE BIGGEST WAVE / YOU RACE TOWARD AN EARLY GRAVE
“Me?” Logan huffs out a mirthless laugh. “You’re the experts.
I’m just the guy who gave her a place to lay low for a while.”
– Logan –

Too slow. The rhythm inside his skull, against his chest. Grasp and release, rise and fall. Consciousness has always come in jolts. From one thing to the next. This murky building of awareness…too much like incremental death. Death as he imagined it was yes or no. There or not. He isn’t prepared for the reality.

Logan can feel Xavier prodding against his mind before he can smell him, well before he can force his eyes open.

He breathes roughly. “What happened? Is she all right?”

“She’ll be all right,” Xavier replies.

The relief hurts, almost worse than the regret. Barely able to lift his arm, he has to shut his eyes to summon the strength. “What did she do to me?”

“Whenever Rogue touches someone, she takes their energy, their life-force. In the case of mutants, she absorbs their gifts for a short while. In your case, your ability to heal.”

“I feel like she almost killed me.” Fair price, set against the alternative. More than fair.

“If she’d held on any longer, she could have.”

Bleary-eyed, Logan studies Xavier. More unsettling than his own mortality is the implication. “What do you know?”

Xavier sits back in his chair, fingers coming together on his lap. “Only Rogue knows what happened to Captain Danvers, and even then I’d be surprised if she knows the whole story.”

“Government clinic. Your fuckin’ enlightened masses.” There’s a break in his voice. Can’t shake the weakness.

“The situation is not that black and white. For the sake of us all, it mustn’t be. Each case has to be judged individually. All circumstances, all sides taken into account.”

“She ain’t a killer.” He’d be on his feet, could he manage it.

“You’re misunderstanding me. The truth – the truth as she feels it – is that Captain Danvers’ death was, in fact, her fault.”

“Her skin – ”

“I agree. However. For better or worse, Rogue is in possession of one of the most complicated mutations I have ever encountered. But what she did or does, the person she is while under the tyranny of others’ influence is much less important than who she believes herself to be, who she wants to be. In time, I can help her to understand that.”

The tenseness in Logan’s shoulders is exhausting, forcing him to settle into the mattress. “Your word again?”

“Yes. This time for free.”

Little choice in believing him. Even so, Logan can’t come up with a reason not to.

Xavier, smiling thinly, pulls back from the bed. “Rogue is perfectly safe where she is. You should rest. You’ll both feel better in the morning.”

The room goes dark, and Logan sinks into sleep. He drowns in it, surfaces, only to be dragged down again. A laboratory is a battlefield. A rent by the hour kind of room, carpet drenched in blood. Claws won’t pierce his chest plate, but his guts are in his lap. He has his fist against Marie’s parted lips. Raised veins around glinting green eyes crinkle like smile lines.

Logan jerks up in bed, holding his bent hand in front of his face. Under his skin, he can see the tip of his middle claw ready to spring.

Fuck’s sake.

When he gets into the shower, he makes sure the water’s boiling. It pounds against his muscles, coiled tight with rushing blood. His body’s overcompensating for what Marie rightfully took, preparing him for a fight that he’s not about to have and wouldn’t win anyway. The pansy-ass designer soap clenched in his fist suffers the brunt of his aggression.

Second morning in a row he’s gotten out of bed cranky and wondering how the hell he’s going to face Marie.

Kiss won’t kill me, he said. What the fuck did he know?

Painfully obvious, he’s in over his head. Yesterday he put food in her stomach and money in her pocket, things she needed. Today he’s got nothing to offer that’s worth a damn, because sometime between then and now Marie turned into a seventeen-year-old kid who wants him to call her Rogue like everybody else, who thinks she’s a monster and says they’re just alike. Its not something he can wash off, the feeling that Marie trusted Xavier with a hell of a lot more than she ever intended to tell him. Not all that surprising, but he reduces two bars of soap to pulp over it.

He’s got no right to fault her for thinking the worst of him. She lied to protect herself. Told him she was older to give him incentive for her to stay, probably, and never let him touch her so he wouldn’t have a reason to hurt her back. He tried to leave her in the bar, the woods, insulted her, doubted her, took advantage. He would’ve sent her off to fend for herself on bad evidence. She’d be paranoid and alone somewhere in the Yukon about now, if Magneto’s lackeys hadn’t made their move when they did. If Xavier’s people hadn’t shown up, she’d be even worse off. Because of him. And when she tried to release him from a nightmare, he skewered her with three foot-long razorblades.

With friends like him.

Dressed, Logan takes off down the hallway on a prowl. He has to make sure she’s okay, only he wants to do it without her knowing. Scent says she’s already checked in on him.

It leads him to the dinning hall, where he can look in from the side door. A handful of kids are scattered along wooden tables, hunkered over notebooks. Marie, wet hair hanging down, is the only one at the buffet. As she leans over to scoop food from the far side, her purple blouse rides up in the back. Denim clings to hollowed contours and unmarked skin. He doesn’t understand how something so delicate could offer so much protection, but he’s grateful to it.

Logan raises an eyebrow when Marie turns, revealing a tray piled high with all manner of sausages and hash browns, none of the syrup-drenched stuff she usually goes for.

She stops abruptly, and he has to stand up from his lean to see past her. A trio of wide-eyed girls, including the bushy blonde from yesterday, aren’t in the doorway for long before hightailing it out of there. Logan’s ready to cross the room when he catches a glimpse of the satisfied smirk playing across her face.

That delicate skin of hers is thicker than he thought.

Marie’s got her back to the door, so she doesn’t see James Dean chuckle his way behind her as she sits down. He makes himself at home, straddling the bench. “Come now, Roguey. That’s no way to make friends.”

She arches an eyebrow, biting into a sausage link. “Sparky, did I say you could sit next me?”

Pyro scoots closer. “Did I ask?”

“Aren’t you brave.” Sarcasm goes wistful at the end, just barely, but Logan hears it.

“You’re not all sunshine and lollipops,” Pyro shrugs. “I can dig it.”

“Such a rebel.” She tears a off a large chunk of biscuit, swallowing almost without chewing.

Pyro tries to snatch a piece of bacon, but she fends him off with her fork. “Down girl,” he yelps. “There’s plenty for two.”

“Listen, I have never been this hungry in my life and that’s sayin’ something. So try that again, and I start callin’ you Stumpy. Get your own.”

He laughs at the three-pronged fork she’s still pointing at him. “Look at you, a regular wolverine kit.”

A fucking riot, this punk.

Snorting, Marie digs up a heap of potatoes. “‘Kit’? You pulled that out of your ass.”

“That’s what they’re called,” he replies, defensive. He drops his elbow on the table, leaning in. “What’s your story?”

“You’re too young to hear it.”

“The rumors are pretty vicious. If I had to sum up a best of, you’d be a kiddie prostitute serial killer who makes trophies out of mutations, and you were in Claws’s room last night shaking him down – He’s either your last john or your pimp, there’s controversy.”

Logan grits his teeth, but it’s Marie who growls low in the back of her throat. An authentic growl, no giggles. He’s starting to wonder what Xavier meant when he said she took his life force.

“You’re full of shit.”

“Don’t hate on the messenger. I actually forgot to mention the part about you being inbred. I’d chalk that up to the twang. I had an Australian accent when I was little. Kindergarteners are mean.”

Her lip quirks slightly. “It’s been a long, tough life for you, I can tell.”

“I’ve been here two years and some people still think I burned my foster parents alive, if that makes you feel any better.”

“How’s that supposed to make me feel better?” Marie lets her fork fall into her food. “Of all places, you’d think people here – ”

“Even freaks need their own pariahs. Ignore it. It’s smoke.”

Logan frowns. He should be the one taking the edge off for her, instead of playing peeping tom spectator like an ass.

Marie mirrors Pyro’s posturing, her expression a smile waiting to happen. “You put a lot of effort into making yourself repulsive.”

“Or am I now putting a lot of effort into getting into your pants? It’s a mystery.”

“Fair enough. But you have to admit it – you Googled the kit thing just so you could make that joke.”

“Slander. I would never go to all that trouble for just one joke. I got about fifty.”

Her smile breaks. “For instance?”

“For instance, did you know that wolverines are also called skunk-bears? I was hoping to mention that to Claws at some strategic point.”

Marie picks up her fork, all traces of amusement gone. “His name is Logan.”

“That’s the rumor. He’s supposed to be indestructible.”

“Yeah, he’s pretty resilient. And it’s a good thing, too.” She half-turns and lifts her eyes to meet Logan’s.

His folded arms drop to his sides. No way she’d seen him without his knowing.

Marie releases her stare, gloved hand going to rub the back of her neck, and he takes the moment to walk away. If she were anxious to talk to him, she’d have said something earlier. She deserves her space, he tells himself, though his gait is a little quick for courtesy.

He heads to the other side of the mansion, to the kitchen where a woman who blinked vertically made him dinner yesterday before the question and answer session with Xavier. What’s the use of a telepath who won’t read his mind? He read Marie’s, mixed her up good while he was at it. Jean at least made the attempt, though she didn’t tell him what she saw. Never told him what the tests were all about, come to that, just took a lot of notes.

Logan slows down. He’s getting jerked around and the front door’s open.

But he made a deal.

Jaw tight, he walks into the empty kitchen and pulls open the refrigerator. All he finds that he can easily fix for himself is ham and cheese. Nothing wrong with a hunk of meat between two slices of bread, but as he chews he recalls Marie leaning over to set down a piping hot steak in front of him, telling him she’s spoiling him rotten with her family’s best recipes and giving him an eye full of cleavage in the process. He had the luxury of being smug then, because all he had to do was sit back and enjoy the show while Marie maneuvered herself into his bed.

Like the thought police, the smell of synthetic amber and sandalwood – bottled urine would be more worth the fifty bucks – hits Logan’s nostrils, making him huff out a growl. He stands up straight, his back to the door on the pretext of slapping together another sandwich.

Pretty boy waits pointlessly for Logan to acknowledge him first. He has most of his second sandwich eaten before Cyclops finally relents. “You’re wanted in the – ”

“Toddle back to daddy, Scooter, and tell him I’m not in the mood.”

Making a noise like he’s shoving that stick further up his ass to suppress whatever it is he actually wants to say, Cyclops replies, “No. It’s Jean who wants you – ”

“No surprises there. But in that case.” Sandwich in hand, Logan shoulders past him.

Following, Cyclops finishes testily, “ – in the med lab for more tests.”

“Jeanie’s nothin’ if not thorough. I imagine she’ll be dedicating a lot of time to lookin’ me over.” Swallowing the last of his sandwich, he steps into the elevator and presses the button before Cyclops can get in. “Sorry, doctor-patient confidentiality.”

“That’s fine. I have an appointment with Rogue to go over makeup classes with her. She missed her junior year of high school.” Second time he’s gotten the last word in because of a closed door, and the sanctimony just rolls off him.

Striding to the med lab, Logan’s got a scowl on his face until he sees Jean massaging the dark circles under her eyes. She quickly stands, sliding on her glasses. “How are you feeling?”

“Better than you, I had to guess. You been down here all night?”

“I couldn’t sleep after what happened.”

Leaning against the examining table, he lifts an eyebrow. “I’m touched.”

Jean shakes her head slightly, tongue resting momentarily against her teeth. “I study mutations. It started out as a hobby but it’s become a bit more than that. I was discussing your case and Rogue’s case with a colleague, Dr. Hank McCoy.”

Logan folds his arms across his chest. “And?”

“And Hank contacted Dr. Moira MacTaggart, who’s doing genetic research at St. Andrew’s University in Scotland. She’s not a mutant, but she’s a very good friend of Charles’.” Jean takes a moment to move over to the computers and start pressing buttons. “She has people on her team who were formerly employed by Southaven.”

“She’s a great friend of mutants. Right.”

“Moira’s won a lot of influential medical professionals to our cause just by being willing to work with them. It’s a strategy and it gets results.”

“Yeah? So what’d she say?”

Jean inhales slowly, lips thin and posture stiff as she sits back down in the desk chair. She’s revving up for a long one, and he can already tell he’s not going like it anymore than she’s enjoying the prospect of telling him.

“I ain’t gonna bite,” he says, relaxing his stance for her benefit.

A flicker of appreciation, then her features settle back into serious. “In Congress there’s something called the Usual Suspects, a group of mutants that the Senate Select Committee uses as reference points. One of our students, Kitty Pryde, is a Usual Suspect. Sometimes she’s invoked as sort of the harmless face of mutants, most recently Senator Robert Kelly decided to use her ability to walk through walls to prove that all mutants are potential criminals.”

“You mean the sonuvabitch who talked himself right into gettin’ kidnapped.”

“Senator Kelly and his aide have been missing nearly three days now. We believe Magneto is involved. Vanisher – Telford Porter, the mutant they arrested at the scene – is almost certainly a scapegoat, only the FBI isn’t letting anyone talk to him but their lawyers. So we can’t be sure what Magneto’s eventual aim is. The chances of the Ellis Island plot succeeding were slim to none, but it’s a distraction that’s working for people like Senator Kelly. Delaying the UN Summit has brought more attention to the Registration Act, something no mutant wants.”

“The MRA passes, mutants aren’t happy. Magneto gets his army.”

“Certainly a possibility, but Charles doesn’t think so. Magneto is a Holocaust survivor, so the Professor doesn’t believe he’d risk it.”

“I were him, I’d risk a hell of a lot to make sure nothin’ like that happens again,” he says darkly.

“If mutants make a preemptive strike, it could become a self-fulfilling prophesy. People right now are scared and some of them are hateful, but that’s a far cry from genocide.”

“Exactly how far away is ‘cure at any cost’?”

Jean seems to deflate. “I wish I had a better response for you than ‘it’s complicated,’ but, honestly, Logan, we’re doing the best that we can.”

“I believe you are.”

To his surprise, her body language tells him she takes his words to heart, they mean something.

“Unfortunately, right now all I can offer is speculation. Hank has a theory about what Magneto wants with you. The adamantium framing your skeleton is an extremely rare alloy with innumerable potential uses – except that no scientist we know of has been able to experiment with it successfully.”

“So this Hank thinks Magneto wants to strip me down and use me for parts.”

“In so many words.”

And for that, he got airlifted out of Canada. Just when he was starting to have something that resembled a life, he thinks, before remembering it was a sham.

Jean sits forward in her chair, the end of her swept-back hair curling around her shoulders as she rolls her neck. “We know that Magneto has some sort of weapon in mind, Charles was able to see enough for that. The best we could do is track his known associates, which is how we found you. Obviously, whatever Magneto is planning is to be done during the UN Summit, or he wouldn’t have bided his time the way he has. And with Senator Kelly kidnapped, it’s turned into a matter of pride. The UN Summit is going to proceed, and it’s going to be more than diplomatic posturing.”

“None of this makes much sense, far as master plans go.”

“Admittedly,” she agrees, sitting back heavily. She smiles wryly. “Magneto is usually two steps ahead, until the last possible second.”

“You had many run-ins with him?”

“A few. Mostly battling it out over spheres of influence. He resents Charles teaching what he thinks of as the revolutionary generation. Magneto organized a ring of mutant gangs in the city, LA and Chicago. We broke them up.” Mouth tight, she adds, “The police came down awfully hard on the ones we couldn’t bring here in time.”

Goes to show these kids have good reason to hate the law. Marie was terrified when he told her the cops were on their way to the bar.

With a bemused smile, Jean studies his face.

“What?”

Coming back to herself, her smile widens. “I’m sorry. It’s just that you’re projecting clear enough even for me. You’re very protective of her. Selflessly so, considering – ”

“Hey, she did what she had to do because I forced her. You shouldn’t have told her not to touch anyone here. Three weeks livin’ with her, and you can be damn sure she never tried anything on me.” The irony of the lecher having to defend the virgin would be laughable, if he wasn’t so dead set on getting Marie’s story straight. “There’s nothin’ wrong with her finding somebody to trust won’t fix.”

Jean nods slowly. “I should have considered her feelings. Alienating her wasn’t my intention. I was…I was taken aback when she mentioned Carol Danvers. That’s what I was getting at, about Congress and the Usual Suspects. Everyone knows Captain Danvers. The bill that forces mutants into an honorable discharge from the military is called the Danvers Act. It went into effect early last year, when her mutation surfaced. Her plane was shot down by friendly fire over a Fallujah school, and she was able to pluck it right of the air and drop it safely. The military didn’t know what to do with her. On the one hand, she’s a hero. On the other…it’s an uncomfortable thought, the idea of mutant soldiers turning into the next arms race.”

He’s been told something like that before. A face flickers in the back of his mind, gone before he can see it. It’s someone else, not the voice calling him an animal. Someone…He tries, but all he can come up with is the worried expression of the woman sitting in front of him. The warmth lingers, the familiar grace.

“Logan – ”

“So Danvers went to Southaven for treatment. Then what?”

“There was a lot of press, at first. A lot of hype – good Midwestern family, decorated officer, very patriotic. She wanted to be the first cured mutant so she could rejoin the Air Force. Camera crews and politicians went with her to all her doctor’s visits. Only Southaven couldn’t offer instant results. The process got longer, she was asked to come to the clinic permanently. The media lost interest over time. Then, three or four months ago, her death hit the twenty-four-hour news cycle. There and gone, because it looked bad from all angles. Official cause of death was ruled accidental, the fault of another mutant usually kept isolated the psychiatric wing.”

He wrenches himself away from the table, taking a few halting steps, rubbing his knuckles. Jean puts a hand to her head and he wonders if she can feel his insides squeezing. He tries to ease off, but stillness just boils at him. “They did it, the doctors. That’s what she said. They tried her out as a cure or something, I don’t know. They pushed too hard, and then they put the consequences on her. Jesus, Jean. What about all you activists? Wasn’t there an investigation?”

“Like I said, both sides wanted the matter to rest. Senator Kelly and the Senate Select Committee – we have allies we trust on that Committee – went to Southaven themselves to assure the American people that the –“ Jean opens one of the neatly arranged files on her desk and skims it. “That’s right, the ‘unfortunate security lapse will never be repeated’ and that the mutant, ‘a minor who remains unidentified for her own protection,’ was ‘under control.’”

Under control. “They hate us most of all because they can’t control us,” Marie told him. Sentiment seems even more familiar now.

Jean ruffles through some pages, most of them printouts with news headers. “The PR pitch was…masterful. It wasn’t her fault, you see. Her mutation was a disease, and it took her over and made her dangerous through no fault of her own. ‘Only a cure can save her.’ Prior to that, Southaven would make sure she couldn’t hurt anyone or herself again. For all we knew, it was true.” She lets the file fall shut. “Until that mutant turned out to be Rogue.”

“So they never even reported her missing. Doesn’t that tell you Southaven is more concerned with coverin’ their own asses than they are with protecting the public or whatever the hell their mission is?”

“Yes, it does. Hank thinks so, too. He’s very influential. I promise you, he’s gathering his own investigative team today.”

“You don’t promise that to me, you promise it to her.” He turns sharply, still pacing. “Don’t suppose she’ll believe you.”

Standing slowly, Jean replies, “She’ll believe you.”

“Me?” Logan huffs out a mirthless laugh. “You’re the experts. I’m just the guy who gave her a place to lay low for a while.”

“You’re her friend. It’s as true today as it was yesterday.” Her gaze is absolutely level, full of expectation. “I can sense…complications. But everything’s different now, and there’s no such thing as a clean break, not when you so obviously care so much. Do the difficult thing. Be her family, Logan. See her through.”

He pauses, hands on his hips, and looks down at his warped reflection the light makes against the floor. Jean’s asking a lot of him, but she’s offering something, too. A kind of death and resurrection. A chance to be somebody who won’t disappoint. Maybe he can take it.

For now, he’ll let it lie.

Rolling up his sleeves, he goes to sit on the examining table. “You wanted to see me about some tests?”

DARK SIDE OF THE MOON
thatcraftykid

track three // “BREATHE”

RUN, RABBIT, RUN / DIG THAT HOLE, FORGET THE SUN
“I killed a woman, and I use her whenever I need to. I can say I’m a victim
because that’s true, but I’m safer locked up and that’s true, too.”
– Rogue –

Rogue drops into a crouch, gripping the top of the wooden banister. Through the railings, she looks down on the main lounge where Cyclops nurses his third cup of Earl Grey.

What is it with these people and tea? Storm might as well have drank it straight from the pot, as hard as she hit it this morning. If Rogue had known how early Storm waters her rainforest, she would’ve thought twice about crashing in the greenhouse for the night. She’s been drenched awake by rain before, but looking out to clear skies while the water dripped down the wrong side of the glass was surreal. When Storm finally finished her kettle, it had been one soggy, ill-tempered walk back to her room.

Cyclops folds over the newspaper he’s reading to take a look at his watch. The sigh he lets out strikes Rogue first as dickish then as well-deserved. She’s over two hours late for their meeting, and he still hasn’t taken the hint that he’s been stood up. He either really cares about her education or he really wants to guilt-trip her. Point or not, the latter’s working.

All she has to do is walk down there. She’s been haunting the school, keeping out of sight for the most part and talking to no one since John at brunch. She’s wandered past this spot a half-dozen times, alternating between thinking Cyclops’s a prize idiot and thinking he’s a standup guy.

But if she goes downstairs she has to commit, and that’s not something she’s comfortable doing.

Frowning, Rogue hugs the railing. Making up a class schedule is not a binding contract and even if it is so the hell what? She’ll leave anyway, if she feels like it, and if she wants to come back she’ll do that, too. Logan’s absolutes are giving her a headache. And he, like his physical counterpart, still hasn’t spoken to her directly.

The top of Jean’s head emerges from under the slight balcony, and Cyclops’s tight expression melts away. She really does just float when she walks. Rogue’s eyes are locked on the sway of her hips.

Pervert.

That fails to get a rise of out the Logan in her head. It should be worrying, feeling his presence so strongly without the interaction that keeps her separate. Instead, as if a hand were stroking her hair, the agitation fades and, with it, her headache. He even does his best to ignore Jean and Cyclops kissing. Rogue glances away as thanks.

Cyclops pulls Jean into his lap, and her laugh, like every noise today, rings way too loud in Rogue’s ears. Like she’s sitting on Cyclops’s other knee, she can hear Jean murmur in approval, “Mm, you’re wearing the Burberry I bought you.”

Nuzzling along the underside of her jaw, he replies, “Chanel today. My favorite.”

Rogue straightens out her arms, titling as far back as possible so she can roll her eyes to the ceiling. Trade the brands for Abercrombie and Hollister and she could be listening in on a conversation in her old high school cafeteria. Besides that, nothing beats the smell of natural exertion on a woman, her sweat mixed with his, arousal at its peak. Heat rises to Rogue’s cheeks. A hint of her own scent makes her close her eyes, remembering a wrestling match from dual perspectives.

I could’ve won that money fair and square, she’d challenged. “No chance in hell, darlin’.” Furniture pushed aside, the den rug served as the perimeter of their hypothetical cage. He standing casually, one hand on his stomach. She bouncing on her toes, fists under brown satin balled up. Her chest rose and fell dramatically, having just escaped a takedown with a knee to the gut. It was easy to surprise him with her strength, so he hit the floor, face down. She straddled his waist and kept him pinned by digging an elbow between his shoulder blades. Leaned in, lips almost to his ear, You’re letting me win. Shifted her weight. Sugar, how come?

On her back before she can blink, his knees pressed against either side of her thighs. Beads of sweat pooled in her collarbone, and if she tasted as good as she smelled…Sharp whiff of fear sours it, but it’s for the best in hindsight because he really was going to put his mouth to her skin, consequences be damned. She almost killed him anyway, a different sort of agony. Alone in his room while she’s out for firewood, new scarf she thought she’d lost covering his fist. Her sweat was on his collar, so he almost pulled a tendon trying to taste it as he raised his ass off the bed –

Rogue’s own ass lands solidly against the floorboards, making her eyes fly open. She lost her grip on the rails. Goddamn gloves.

No one’s around, so she lets her head drift to rest on the floor. The back of her hand comes up to her damp forehead, then to her mouth so she can taste the fabric. For someone who’s forgotten most of his life, Logan sure has some vivid memories.

She groans breathily. He’d wanted her so much, and she had just been hoping against hope. The certainty is an absolute rush. Try to beat that with your sexy librarian glasses, Red. I nearly tortured him, that’s how much he wanted skinny little me.

Oh.

The sudden clench hitches her breathing. Oh, no, sugar. That’s awful. How can you think…The shame recedes as quickly as it washed over her, leaving Rogue lightheaded and struggling to sit up. He’s not trying to overwhelm her, and that’s a comfort, but he just feels everything so damned intensely. The world from Logan’s perspective is too loud, too sharp, too present for Rogue not to have to shrink away. She wants his outward stoicism as much as he wants her internally whole.

That train left the station a long time ago, she thinks, though her momma approves. He’s a bad influence, chickadee, but at least he knows it.

“You’re wrong about him.” Rogue is surprised into turning her attention to Jean, who’s now leaning forward in the chair across from Cyclops. She has his hand in hers, stroking little circles as she continues, “You’re seeing the weapon, not the man.”

“The man hasn’t done much to impress me.”

“Scott.” Jean’s tone is disappointed. “He’s harmless – ” She has to raise his voice to be heard over his incredulous laugh. “He is. But if you keep goading him he’s going to keep taking it further.”

“Oh, so it’s my fault there’s nothing to him but testosterone.”

Rogue scowls.

Jean shakes her head. “You’re both acting like children. Keep it up, and you’ll be splitting detention with John and Bobby.”

Cyclops kisses Jean’s wrist. “I relent.” He picks up his tea cup and finishes the dregs. Making a face, he asks, “Do you think he cares about Rogue’s well-being enough to convince her to stay?”

“That’s not relenting.” Folding her arms in front of her on the table, Jean looks off to the side. “I think he’s the only person who’s cared for Rogue in a long time.”

Anna Marie, she’s wrong. Your daddy and I love you.

Cringing, she bows her head. Her momma still might, sometimes, in her own way, but even she has doubts about Rogue’s father she can’t hide.

“I care,” Cyclops says, making Rogue sit up straighter. “We care. She’s one of our students now. I’ll get through to her.”

“Logan says she’s not quick to trust.”

A sore spot for him, Rogue can feel it. It’s nothing personal, she repeats, but he’s stopped believing her.

Jean adds, “Considering she spent the better part of a year alternating between being out on the streets and living in a psychiatric ward, she’s remarkably well-adjusted. Even more so, factoring in the nature of her mutation.”

Rogue’s mouth twists. The good doctor is ever so generous.

“She’s like a lot of the students,” Cyclops urges. “Like Jubilee, especially. The ones coming from the hardest backgrounds are the ones with such a sense of humor about them. Not fifteen minutes after being attacked, Rogue was giving me a hard time about my piloting.”

Jean smiles. “You can hardly blame her for that.”

“See? That’s what I mean, a sense of humor.” He takes her hand again. “Charles sorted you out. He’ll do the same for Rogue, if she’ll give him a chance.”

“I wouldn’t tell her it’s that simple,” Jean cautions. “It didn’t go well yesterday, to say the least. And after…Whatever Charles decides, it’ll be the best thing for her.”

Getting to her feet swiftly, Rogue marches away. If that’s supposed to be comforting, Dr. Poor-Excuse-for-a-Psychic is missing the mark completely. Everyone in her life who’s ever done her wrong has hidden behind that line. Her father was the worst offender.

Please, please stop blaming him. He was protecting us both.

He was protecting himself from the school board, Rogue returns savagely, loping noiselessly down the stairs. You can’t lie to me. I know what he told you behind my back. “If we let her leave the house, they’ll think we’re negligent parents. They’ll run me out of my job and us out of town.” And then what? You know.

Oh, no, baby. No. You know he didn’t mean it.

He said, “She’s not even ours.” It wasn’t the first time, either. He was planning to send me to Southaven even before you landed yourself in the emergency room. You gave him an excuse, and all because you didn’t believe me. I didn’t have to touch anyone after David to know that my skin controls me and not the other way around.

Stopping abruptly, Rogue drops her weight onto a chair in the little island of furniture in front of Professor Xavier’s classroom. She presses her knuckles to her face to keep in the impulse to snarl and tear up the seat cushions. Between her momma’s shame and Logan’s, it’s hard to tell where her own even begins.

Rogue gets up to pace. She should throw herself at the mercy of the Professor. That’s what her momma wants, and, as much as he hates to, Logan agrees. Only, there’s something underneath. Logan the Absolutist is conflicted because the part of him that’s making her bare her teeth is also telling her she needs to do for herself.

Later, she compromises. She takes off down the hall at a run. I’ll talk to the Professor later.

The smell of new food has her skidding to a halt outside the dinning hall. How is it that Logan can be so hungry so often? He doesn’t even eat all that much between meals. She clearly hadn’t absorbed the full benefits of his metabolism.

Technically, it isn’t dinnertime yet, but the woman putting out the food doesn’t say anything when Rogue picks up a tray. Chicken nuggets with fries and lots of ketchup. The woman places a cookie on her plate, winking vertically with a glittering golden eye. Unsettled in the face of manners, Rogue smiles weakly, grabs a water bottle, and ducks out the back.

Outside is a refuge again. Taking a seat on a bench, she sets the tray down next her and eats mechanically.

She always imagined that if she took in Logan – it’s sick, how often she thought about it even while swearing to prove she had the self-control to resist – it would be like drinking from a magic well of self-assurance. And why? Because he made her feel safe. Because he exercised restraint.

Another sore spot.

Restraint was something he could manage because he let her keep everything between them on her terms, thin as paper and focused solely on what she could do for him. An exchange of services and companionship for money.

With a grimace, she takes a long swig of water. The word “whore” can’t be suppressed, even though she never once felt like one and it’s the last thing he wanted her to be. Still, the shame he feels isn’t just because of her age, it’s because of her disadvantage. If he had offered to pay her, would she have been insulted enough to leave? She liked him from the beginning, but that isn’t the point. She wanted his money, she wanted his roof, and she wanted his company. She would’ve put up with a lot to secure those things for herself.

That’s his take on it. Not flattering and not fair. It wasn’t like that, and she could explain better if she had the space to draw her own conclusions.

“Rogue.”

She turns her head swiftly. “Bobby.” Shouldn’t he be in class?

“Rogue, what did you do?” He sits down on the bench beside her, his expression pinched. “They say you’re stealing other mutants’ powers.”

Earnestly, she leans forward. “No, no – I-I borrowed his power.”

Fiercely, he replies, “You never use your power against another mutant.”

Disappointment settles on her shoulders. Bobby is just like David. Just as quick to judge. “I had no choice.” Off his darkening face, she quickly continues, “No, you – you have to understand me.”

“If I were you, I’d get myself out of here.”

How could he understand her? The All-American boy who welcomed and defended her yesterday thought she was a decent person. She’d proved him wrong. It doesn’t matter that she had a good reason this time. There’s a code of conduct and she violated it. Personal sacrifice, as Logan knows, is the inevitable penalty.

Very precisely, knowing exactly, she replies, “What do you mean?”

“Listen, the students are freaked. Professor Xavier is furious. I don’t know what he’ll do with you.”

Rogue swallows. The best thing. He’s got so many other people to think about, a whole world of mutants. He’ll do the best thing for all of them, even if she doesn’t agree.

“I think it’ll be easier on your own,” Bobby says emphatically.

That hurts. She squeezes her eyes shut against it. Especially coming from someone who’d been so nice. Now he somehow even smells mean. The rumors she could laugh off, but not the confrontation. It’s too unexpected. John lulled her off her guard.

“You should go.”

Her eyes snap open. Bobby has stirred the confusion again. She knows he’s wrong, because Cyclops wants to help her and Logan’s here. She can’t do it alone, she’s tried. And for once it’s actually easier to stay than it is to go.

But he’s right, too, because it’s the inevitable penalty.

Chin jutting doggedly forward, she pushes herself off the bench. She makes it just a few steps before she turns back. Who is he speaking for? The other students? Is this really want they want? Bobby’s expression may as well be chiseled. His eyes are ice, which shouldn’t be as surprising as it is. Even freaks have standards. She takes off at a jog.

Not a sacrifice, she asserts. A stand. She has no right to feel as empowered as she does – what is this but another instance of someone forcing her hand – but it’s the last time. She’s done being jerked around. The door’s open.

An approving growl echoes, at odds with the calming effect he’s trying to have. She pushes him back and keeps her momma from speaking. They both care, but neither believes that’s enough to save her from herself. So why listen?

Rogue stops short at the closed door to her room. She eases it open, relieved to see that Kitty is curled up asleep. In and out, all she really needs is her cloak. John’s lighter, too. At least he tried.

Pocketing it and folding her cloak over her arm, she goes to stand above Kitty. The other girl looks so relaxed. She must be done with all her finals. She’ll probably call her parents later on to tell them how she thinks she did and to ask about their day. If Rogue were a person like Kitty, she wouldn’t even want to leave. She’d trust people. Rogue envies her abilities. She wants the power to walk through walls. Annoyingly symbolic.

She used to be able to justify taking what she wanted from people. Just a brush, maybe a little more. Kitty would sleep peacefully through the morning, and Rogue could make believe she’s invincible again. No point hesitating. Her experiment in morality didn’t work.

Except now Logan’s in her head, and he won’t let her raise her hand. Hot tears sting. Fine. Take Bobby’s side.

The soothing motion. She hurts herself every time she takes in more.

“So what?” she barks.

Groggily, Kitty starts to lift her head, but Rogue’s already out the door. She’s walking to Logan’s room again, only this time he’s not there. She goes directly for the closet, shaking open his hiking bag and pulling out the money she earned fair and square. She stuffs the cash into her pockets, tucking the bigger bills into her well-worn shoes.

John’s room is just around the corner. Sprawled out on the floor, he glances up from his book when she edges into the doorframe. Two younger boys playing video games at a computer don’t take their eyes off the screen.

“How do you get to the roof?” she asks John.

The question intrigues him enough to hop up and toss aside Guerilla Warfare by Che Guevara. How pretentious.

John struts down the hall, expecting her to follow. “You came to the right man, Roguey. That’s my make-out spot.”

“I bet you’ve scorched tons of initials with little hearts around them up there.”

“I’m not one to kiss and tell, but let’s just call it all your roommates.”

“Tawny, too?”

“The one’s who’ve developed breasts.”

“So not Kitty, either.”

“You really are a bitch.” He pushes open a thick door under an exit sign. He must’ve disabled the alarm awhile back.

“That’s a fire hazard,” she points out, going through.

He jogs up the stairs. “What do I care?”

“And I’m the bitch.”

A slight wind pushes hair into her face as she emerges onto the flat portion of the roof. They’re on top of one of the castle-like towers. She peers over the side, which is a view over the gate and down the winding lane to the main road. The sun is just starting to go orange. She’ll be able to get a ride well before dark.

“When did you hook up with Kitty?” she asks idly, trailing her gloved hand over the stonework as she walks around the edge.

“Right after she broke up with her ex.”

Rogue turns her head to cock an eyebrow at him. “But she ended up with Bobby.”

John, who has his arms folded across his chest, shrugs. “I don’t do the dating thing.”

“I see.” She reaches into the pocket of her jeans and presents his lighter.

“Delinquent,” he grins, holding out his hand. Catching it, he flips it open and lights a flame. “Nice one.”

“I figured I owed it to you, since I’m depriving you of the chance to add my name to your list of conquests.”

“I wouldn’t speak so soon,” he replies, concentration on rolling a ball of fire from the center of palm to the back of his hand. “I left, too. Stole a bunch of stuff, joined a mutant supremacist gang.” He pops the flame, intact, up into the air where it puffs into smoke. “Came back, obviously.”

“Mutant supremacist gang? Che isn’t exactly reformed reading, now is it?”

“Here or prison.” He flips the top of his lighter closed. “I actually met Jubilee while I was in LA. She was paying her way doing tricks at the mall. Kind of funny, since her parents were so loaded before they lost everything. Bad business, ended up murdered.”

“Okay. I get it. My life isn’t so bad. Blah, blah.” Rogue leans against the side. “Only Jubilee never sparkled anyone to death, and you didn’t kill your foster parents.”

“That’s the thing, maybe I did. Maybe the fire triggered my mutation, maybe I started it in my sleep. I have no idea.”

God. Rogue’s chin droops. “Do you ever think they’re right about us?”

“That we’re dangerous? Hell yes we are. And if they try anything, we’ll prove it to them.”

“Not what I meant. I’m different than you and pretty much everyone here. I don’t mean to be dangerous. I just am.” Watching her shadow flicker, Rogue says evenly, “I killed a woman, and I use her whenever I need to. I can say I’m a victim because that’s true, but I’m safer locked up and that’s true, too. Only I don’t care about safer. I just care about myself.”

“Who doesn’t? We’re all selfish fucks. That’s about the only thing mutants and humans have in common.”

Rogue smiles grimly, putting her arms through the sleeves of her cloak. “You’re an asshole, John. And I can’t say I’m not glad.”

He shrugs again. Scratches his forehead. “Any farewell messages?”

“Just one. Tell Logan thanks for everything, but I couldn’t wait for a lift.” She swallows thickly. “Tell him he needs to take care of himself and not to come looking for me.”

“Like he’ll listen.”

He won’t, and Rogue doesn’t really want him to. But some things are out of even Logan’s control, and maybe that’s what’s so empowering. “I don’t think he’ll have much of a choice.” The last button of her coat secured, she backs up toward John and loosens her shoulders. “Don’t let anyone know until they figure it out, okay?”

“On one condition.” The smirk on John’s face tells her exactly what he’s after.

“Pft. A goodbye kiss is out of the question, unless you have a thing for comas.”

“You’re confusing me for a romantic.” His grin makes him look like a little boy. “I was actually looking to cop a goodbye feel.”

Rogue, hand on her hip, wonders how someone so smug can be so charming.

It all comes back to Logan, doesn’t it?

Shaking her head, she presses John in a hug. “Like I said, no sounding the alarm on me, okay?” She playfully pushes him away when he squeezes her ass.

He puts up his hands, backing up further. “Roguey, it’s your life. Do what you like.”

“I always get around to that. See you if I see you, Sparky.”

“Sounds about right.”

Filling up her lungs, she takes off at a sprint. This is how she left Southaven, with a leg up over the side and nosedive that turned into a last-second arc.

John’s whoops follow her down and up. “Fucking beautiful!” he exults.

Rogue smiles against the wind, her entire body humming with Carol’s strength. One of the few promises she’s ever kept. Sitting cross-legged in the dark at the end of a hero’s bed, listening to the beat of a heart monitor.

She lets go with an abandon she hasn’t dared in a long time.

I love it when you let me fly. There’s gratitude in the bell-voice, along with an apology. The doctors are to blame, but Carol was the one who provoked the monster, brought on the dark. Only when she flies is it worth it.

Warmth propels her as she makes loops and tight spirals. Rogue can’t look back, not yet.

DARK SIDE OF THE MOON
thatcraftykid

track three // “BREATHE”

BREATHE, BREATHE IN THE AIR / DON’T BE AFRAID TO CARE
He seems to genuinely wanna help you, and that’s a rare thing.”
He tilts his chin closer. “For people like us.”
– Logan –

If Logan gets turned around one more time in this noxious maze of adolescent hormones Xavier calls a school, a gouged-out X is going to mark the spot in triplicate on the door to every room he checks.

For the fifteenth time in twice as many minutes, he wonders where the flying fuck Marie could’ve gone off to hide herself so completely. She wasn’t at dinner like he expected, she wasn’t thumb wrestling with the All-American and the mouse by the fountain, she wasn’t ducked inside any of the supply closets waiting for him to pass by, and she wasn’t crying her eyes out in her room when he’d made his first two rounds. Now on round three, he’s so intent on finding her he’s stopped worrying about what the hell he’s supposed to say. Small favors.

A toilet flushes to his left, and he has the door pushed open before he realizes there’s a big difference between a ladies’ room at a truck stop and one in a girls’ dorm – namely the alarm behind the shrieks. A blast of some ripe odor with enough kick to propel him back into the hallway teaches him that a bathroom in a mutant girls’ dorm is another matter altogether.

Trying not to choke, he lurches down the hall until his watery eyes hit upon a balcony. Fresh air instantly evaporates the effects of what amounts to biochemical warfare. He spits the lingering taste into the thick ivy growing up the side of the mansion. Xavier could raise himself a good little army if he so chose. Except the business of making soldiers is dirty one, and he’s the clean hands type. To become a perfect soldier the man has to die. Can’t nurture his humanity and then expect him to win at any cost or even to do what’s necessary to save his own life. Way things are going, pacifists are sitting ducks and a bunch of do-gooders led by a Boy Scout aren’t much better off.

Not that he plans to say anything. For one, the line between their problems and his is already too thin for comfort. For another, he’d never let Marie stay any place that’d teach her to be less than she is.

He huffs out a snort. Let her. Logan slips a hand into his jacket to pull out a cigar and a book of matches. Possessive and protective. An even thinner line.

Savoring long drags, he watches the last minutes of sunset.

Without doing anything, he knows he’s going about this all wrong. His plan for after finding her is caveman at best. Shove the wrinkled fax he has in his back pocket into her hand, haul her by the elbow down to the Professor’s office, and plant her in a chair in front of a microphone. Stand there beside her, at least, so she knows he’s taken an interest. Listen to her when she talks, even though he’d rather she didn’t.

This whole mess waiting to happen with the fax and the bad news from the Drs. Mc and Mac, and Xavier calling in Logan to get his say so before even mentioning anything to Marie…None of it sits right.

Of course she’ll want to testify about Southaven; she was raring to do it the minute Ole Blue opened her lying mouth about it. But Xavier laid out a lot of consequences that Marie’s probably never considered, wanting to know if he thought they’d be asking too much of her if they go forward now. Role of guardian again.

Thing is, he flat-out does think it’s asking too much. She’s the only willing witness, and, supposedly, she doesn’t exist on record or in the memory of any clinic personnel McCoy’s people could get a hold of. Patient 579, the undisclosed minor who attacked Captain Danvers, sure. Marie D’Ancanto? Never heard of her.

Even MacTaggart’s so-called sympathetic colleagues are tight-lipped about why they left. As if it’s less morally justifiable to breach contract than it is to stand idly by while science plays god with nature.

He stretches his fingers out to keep the metal back. Government funding, under the table experiments, possible military connection – He tugs at his collar in lieu of his tag. Yeah, Marie’s situation hits close to home. He admitted that to Xavier, same time he told him if he were in Marie’s place he’d want to go at the bastards with everything he’s got, uphill battle or no. Kid can handle anything thrown at her, he said.

His gut reaction was just the opposite. If anonymity is a mutant’s first defense, no matter how they play it, win or lose she’ll leave that courtroom Mutant Enemy Number One. By testifying, Marie’s either going to make herself a sacrificial lamb or a scapegoat. Real simple.

But whether or not it’ll be worth it is no one’s call but Marie’s.

Xavier seems to respect that, and Logan figures that’s why he got brought in first. When the chips fall Marie doesn’t mind having him tell her what to do, and if he’d given in to his knee-jerk first impulse he’d have plowed right through any of her resolve.

Tyranny of others’ influence, Xavier called it last night. Today he elaborated: “Her youth and her mutation make her a particularly impressionable young woman.” Beneath the five-dollar words Logan heard, “Don’t let your fucked up sense of the world redefine her.” Fair enough, so he agreed not to intervene. Old man said wrong again. Looked down at the papers he’d been grading, smiled, and told him he needed to learn to navigate the third way between laissez-faire and protectionalism. Logan’s reply, that Marie’s not a damned economic principle, set him off chuckling.

Raving lunatics, every last one of these jokers. And it’s starting to affect Logan, because his response was to say he’d talk to her about it and get his ass-backward self out of there to do it direct.

Talk to her. Practically every on-the-level conversation he’s ever tried to have with that girl ended with her taking a hike. So what’s he want to do about it? Block her exits. Force her hand in the direction of what he thinks she wants but has no real goddamn clue about because she’s a seventeen year-old kid and he’s a character-flawed roughneck who spent three weeks on the verge of fucking her and just a day and a half trying to be her friend.

Christ.

At the sound of Marie’s other name, Logan’s hearing perks up. He steps back into the hall as Storm and the mouse head his way.

“I mean, it’s definitely a tight squeeze but we can manage,” the mouse shrugs. He thinks her name is Kitten but it’s too ridiculous to say out loud.

“You,” he says, making her jump and questioningly point to herself. “Yeah, I mean you. You seen her?”

Swiveling her torso, she looks awkwardly to Storm, who places her hands on the mouse’s shoulders. “Logan, we make a habit here of addressing people by name. It helps avoid confusion. ‘Kitty’ would be your first proper noun. I imagine ‘Rogue’ is your second?”

He blows out a mouthful of smoke. “That’d be the one.”

Kitty – almost as ridiculous – pauses to cough pointedly behind her fist before replying, “I thought I heard her come into the room before dinner.”

“You didn’t talk to her?” he barks.

Eyes gone big, she presses into Storm. “I was napping?”

Logan forces himself to relax. “All right. Keep an eye out for me.”

Kitty sticks her thumb up high. “Right-o,” she replies and side-steps away with an overly chipper, “Bye!”

Storm wipes the pinched expression off her face when he turns to her. Wouldn’t want to be rude. “I’m sure there’s no cause for alarm,” she says neutrally.

“Look, I can’t find her anywhere. Xavier needs her.”

“Did you check – ”

“Inside, outside. I checked. Last I saw her, she was eatin’ lunch. What about you?”

“I haven’t seen her since last night. I was just going to extend my invitation to have tea again.” Storm tucks her arms in front of her. “When you spoke with her, how did she seem?”

“Didn’t say I spoke with her, I said I saw her. She was with that Pyro kid. She was actin’ a little strange, but she seemed fine.”

Suddenly, Storm’s subdued demeanor has a much fiercer presence. “How could you have gone an entire day without talking to her after what happened?”

“Hey, she’s got a right to some breathing room. She wants to talk, she knows I’ll listen. I don’t see any point in smothering her.”

“I don’t suppose it occurred to you that Rogue is in a very vulnerable position, that she might need you to be the one to talk to her.” Storm presses her long fingers briefly to her forehead. “You probably hurt her feelings by not seeking her out earlier.”

He clenches his teeth around his cigar, face impassive.

Storm shakes out her too-straight hair. “Come with me. I have John in detention now. Maybe he’ll have an idea of where she is.”

Logan keeps pace behind her and watches as the tenseness in her shoulders works itself out.

With some grace Storm finally says, “There’s no exact science to understanding teenagers. For instance, right now I’m struggling with John. His opinions about ordinary people are very violent, but he is undeniably perceptive. I often can’t bring myself to tell him he’s wrong. Still, I don’t waste the time he has with me in detention. We debate, or he helps me write letters to Hiram Prison. I know it seems counterintuitive, but it’s made John realize that being a mutant doesn’t place him above the law. He particularly likes writing to Elijah Cross. He’s a reformed mutant supremacist.”

Match made right in heaven. Typical that Marie went and made nice with the school criminal. Can’t have her making life simple for herself.

At the door to her classroom, Storm pauses. “Being a mutant, especially at that age, can be an incredibly lonely thing. A lot of the time all they need is someone who will identify with them.”

That part sticks, and Storm sees it. She opens the door with a smile.

Before Pyro even has time to turn around, Logan’s already smelled Marie all over him. The smirking little bastard adjusts his chair so he can sit casually. “Can I help you?” Pyro asks.

Logan walks into the room slowly, fists tucked under his elbows to keep from doing anything satisfying. “Ten seconds, bub.”

“Logan – ”

“She named herself ‘Rogue.’” Pyro snickers through his nose. “And you’re surprised she’s missing?”

“Missing?” he grits out, same time as Storm, in dismay, says, “Oh, no.”

“Oh, yeah,” Pyro returns. “Basically said to tell you thanks but no thanks, and – ” He rockets one hand off the other. “Vft. Bye-bye birdie. Not too long ago, either.”

Logan moves to rest his hands on the table on either side of Pyro, the lit tip of his cigar coming within a few inches of the kid’s snot-nose. “Where?”

“Didn’t say.” Pyro blows out Logan’s cigar, sending smoke back in his eyes.

Not even blinking against the sting, he takes his time believing what he’s just been told. Kid’s starting to get scared, which is fine by Logan. Better than him smelling like Marie.

Going for broke, Pyro pulls an exaggerated face. “Now I know why wolverines are called skunk – ”

“Shut up.” Logan throws down his cigar and heads toward the door.

Storm, who does not look pleased, sighs. “The Professor will be able to find her,” she says, adding for Pyro, “And you’re lucky he can.”

“Aw, come on. You can’t blame me – ”

Logan cuts in, “I want her found sooner rather than later. She could be anywhere.”

Storm nods. “Exactly why we need to see Charles. He can use Cerebro.”

More gibberish. He’s real sick of this shit, but he follows her down to the lower levels without comment.

The steel door at the end of the hall parts as they walk through.

“Where is she?” Logan demands.

Cyclops looks over. “Who?”

“Rogue.” Xavier’s a lot quicker on the uptake. “She’s gone.”

Logan’s about to make something of Cyclops’s look of accusation when Jean steps into the hallway next to Storm, hugging herself slightly. “This way,” she says.

Immediate action, if not the kind he’d prefer, appeases him. Standing in front of another steel door, he’s able to affect a measure of patience, though it’s tested by the three a.m. science fiction double feature quality of the eye-scan and robo-voice.

Xavier leads Logan out onto a long ramp. “Welcome to Cerebro.”

Raising his gaze from the unnecessarily long way down, he looks up at the arched ceiling. “It certainly is a big, round room.”

“The brainwaves of mutants are different from average human beings. This device amplifies my powers, allowing me to locate mutants across great distances. That’s how I intend to find Rogue.”

Great. Then what’s with all the problems? “Why don’t you just use it to find Magneto?”

“I’ve been trying, but he seems to have found some way to shield himself from it.”

Naturally. “How would he know how to do that?”

“Because he helped me build it.”

That one’s a little more of a surprise. He chalks it up to another riff on “it’s complicated.” These people need to get their stories straight, and fast.

Xavier slips a metal helmet over his bald dome. “Now, if you’ll excuse me.”

Logan accepts the motion to get on with it. Outside the closed doors, he wonders just how powerful this amplification contraption is.

He turns to Jean. “Have you ever…”

“Used Cerebro?” Her eyebrows go up, but she shakes her head. “No. It takes a degree of control and, ah, for someone like me, it’s…”

“Dangerous.” First time Cyclops has unlocked his jaw since finding out Marie is gone.

Between the disappointment in her he’s giving off and the repression he’s forcing on Jean, it’s a lot clearer to Logan how much he doesn’t want to be that fucking guy. So he’ll find Marie and he’ll talk with her. Not at her. He’ll stop being so damn thick and let her know that he gets her. He thinks that’s all she ever really wanted from him.

Credit where credit’s due. The woman to his left, who’s more like the eye than the hurricane, is the one who saw it, just as clearly as the woman to his right knew that for the first time in fifteen years he’s incapable of walking away from someone. It’s like he’s completely transparent to them. Has to be an estrogen thing.

Xavier wheels out of Cerebro, his expression encouraging. “She’s at the train station.”

“Where is it?”

“A few miles west of here.”

Simple. The way he likes it. He starts to go.

“Logan, you can’t leave the mansion. It’s just the opportunity that Magneto needs.”

Hadn’t even occurred to him, but what the hell did it matter? “Listen, I’m the reason she took off.”

“We had a deal.”

That’s the last thing he wants thrown back into his face. He could say his deal with Marie trumps it, but they’d never brokered one. Things between them are up in the air and had been even before this place.

“She’s all right,” Storm says reasonably. “She’s just upset.”

“Storm, Cyclops. Find her. See if you can talk to her.”

They follow orders but Xavier’s got to know it has to be him, if only for the gesture. He hurt Marie’s feelings. Damn it, that means something.

He looks to Jean and sympathy is written all over her face. Still, she purses her lips. No help from that corner. Turning, he walks away.

At the elevator, he hears What will you do?

You gonna keep me prisoner, old man? We had a deal.

Hell or high water, he stands by his word. Logan holds that thought strong in his head until he’s on the main level, until he feels Xavier’s presence recede. At which point he heads directly for the garage.

This once, he’ll make a liar out of himself. For her. He can live with that.

Cyclops’s collection of automobiles runs modern for Logan’s taste, but he can’t deny the anticipation for speed he feels when he walks the Harley-Davidson VRSCA V-Rod out the door and revs up the engine.

The bike rides steady as they get a feel for each other’s curves. She feels almost too light to hold his weight and the brake is too touchy. Once he figures out her triggers, though, she purrs under him like a dream. He glances down at the speedometer and notices three red arrows. The possibilities are too alluring to pass up.

Whoa, shit! The abrupt acceleration jerks him back. He leans into it, the wind and the speed pulling his mouth into a wide, reckless grin. The beginning of a beautiful friendship, no doubt.

The train station comes into sight over the next hill. As he lets the bike breathe so he can park her, he thinks about how much of a selfish bastard he’d have to be to throw Marie on the back and just ride off with the kid. Hell of a time, except that whenever he looked at her he’d know he’d ripped the chance for a life right out from under her.

Place inside is as crowded as he expected. A quick look at the big board tells him track three is boarding for Toronto. If she’s not on that train he never really knew her.

Once onboard, he spots the back of her green hood two cars into his search. The scent of her frustrated misery makes his approach grim.

“Hey, kid.”

Her eyes jerk up to meet his. She looks drained, and it’s more than the flight. There’s a wary silence behind her gaze, like she won a battle but only just.

Logan takes the empty seat beside her and sighs. Finding her is a relief, but he’d counted on defiant, not subdued.

She closes her eyes briefly and looks away.

“I’m sorry about last night.” It’s not the moral high ground he cares about, it’s the better chance of forgiveness.

No hesitation, she offers it. “Me, too.”

“You runnin’ again?”

Tightly, she replies, “I heard the Professor was mad at me.”

“Well, who told you that?”

“A boy at school.”

Christ, she sounds young. Looks it, too. “Pyro?” he guesses, wishing he’d taught him a lesson earlier.

“No.” She smiles thinly. “A nice boy. He said I wasn’t welcome.”

“And you took off without a word because of that?” It’s a job, keeping the offended tone from his voice. “Xavier’s not mad, and I’m not the only one out here lookin’ for you.”

The crease in her brow gets deeper. “Why’d you come?”

“You really thought I wouldn’t?”

“I don’t know.” Marie slumps, chin cradled on both gloved palms, sharp elbows digging into her thighs. “That’s not true. I knew, and I left anyway. I just wish they’d stopped you.”

“Yeah, well, I’m here.”

“That just makes things harder. I am so sick and I’m so tired of putting people at risk. That’s why I left.”

More than hurt feelings. He’s pissed at himself for thinking it would be that easy. Still his fault. “I should’ve talked to you sooner.”

She waves that off with one hand, sitting up to look out the window. “I know what you think anyway.” She sounds resigned. Too certain.

“’Bout what?”

Her shoulders lift and fall on a breath. After a long pause, he realizes she’s not going to say anything more.

Logan fumbles for a new tactic. “I came to tell you that the trial you wanted, Southaven and all that, it can happen. Only if you want it to. No one’s gonna lie to you about the chances. So far it’s your word against theirs and there’re no records to back you up. But you got the truth, and that’ll count for something.”

She drops her head against the seat, bottom lip caught painfully between her teeth. “No.” It’s hardly a more than a moan.

“It’s what you wanted before.”

“Sure, when I thought there was proof.” Almost at a hiss, she lets out, “Whatever they did to Carol to make her want to die – You have no idea how…blank she was. And they’re going to get away with it. I-I can’t do anything. I never could. I just – I give up, Logan. On everything.”

“Kid, decide whatever you want. But there’s no givin’ up.”

“Why not?” Her look is sharp. “You have.”

Logan doesn’t bother asking how she knows. “I’m done with that, and I have you to thank,” he tells her. “No – stop. Listen.”

Mutiny flickers crosses her face. Then her lips part and she sits forward.

Quietly, he continues, “I can’t even show you the scars from all the times I’ve tried to kill myself, because they just disappear.”

No shock registers, like she knows that, too.

“But when you touched me, and I was lying there with no healing ability to rely on – that’s the closest to death I’ve ever been.”

Her face starts to twist into a grimace. Damn it, she’s going to hear him out.

“And I realized I didn’t like it.”

Something like understanding dawns, softening her face.

“Okay, you’re a powerful girl, Rogue.” It’s strange to call her that and it makes her blink, but she said she prefers it. He wants everything to be on her terms. “And I understand if that frightens you. But if you don’t get help then your power is going to be your curse. It will plague you. You understand?”

She’s motionless enough to keep the tears in her eyes from spilling. “You think I should go back.”

He has to look away. “No, I think you should follow your instincts.”

Frustration spikes softly. Enunciating clearly, she replies, “The first boy I ever kissed ended up in a coma for three weeks. I can still feel him inside my head.”

Inside her head. Did that explain the tyranny of influence?

“And it’s the same with you.” She says it like a confession.

His life force, his personality. His memories.

Marie presses her eyes closed, trailing tears down her cheeks. The deep breath she draws in is shaky with suppressed pain. He lifts his arm to rest his hand on the top of her head. Another breath and she leans against his chest like she’s letting go and grabbing tight all at once. Her nearly inaudible gasps strike him as sobs.

Voice pitched almost at a murmur, he says, “There’s not many people that’ll understand what you’re going through. But I think this guy Xavier is one of them. He seems to genuinely wanna help you, and that’s a rare thing.” He tilts his chin closer. “For people like us.”

She sits up slowly, her eye contact so compelling it takes the jerk of the train to make him remember where they are. He lifts his arm, looking around. She sits back heavily.

He’s going to have to duck into the bathroom when the ticket guy comes around, but that’s all right. They’ll ride this one out.

“So, what d’you say?” He turns back to her. “Give these geeks one more shot?”

Her lip quirks.

“Come on, I’ll take care of you.”

Marie glances away. When she looks at him again, that quiet sass he likes so much is back. “You promise?”

“Yeah,” he replies dryly, swallowing immense relief. “Yeah, I promise.”

There’s a certain amount of satisfaction in her profile as she looks out the window, and he feels the same. Marie knows he doesn’t mean just until he gets her back to the mansion or until he gets restless or even until she gets sick of him. His promise ties them both to a future.

Twenty-six days ago, he wouldn’t have recognized the feeling crushing his chest. Now he can cop to it. The girl’s gotten under his skin, and it’s complicated and it’s going to take some getting used to.

It’s worth it, though. Having Marie’s trust.