Evolution

I wish I was in the land of Cotton
Old times there are not forgotten
Look away. Look away. Look away.
Dixie Land


[Sixteen]

Sweet, simple sixteen. You know, looking back, that was a really good year. A happy year. Mama used to say that was the year I grew into my features. Of course, being a Southern lady born and bred, Mama always had a way of putting things kindly. What she really meant was I'd finally grown into my nose. I'd finally stopped being the gangly, awkward girl with the too big nose and had become the dark-eyed girl with the mouth I'd overheard the boys calling 'kissable'. I sure didn't tell Mama about that. Sixteen was also the year my figure 'blossomed'. Another Mama-ism. In a word-boobs. I might have been one of the last belles at that particular ball, but I've got to tell you, late bloomer or not, Mother Nature did more for my popularity that year than I ever could have.

Back then, I didn't really think of myself as normal. What teenager ever does? But looking back now, I realize just how normal I was. I did all the normal teenagery stuff. I fretted over the parallel parking portion of my driver's test. I hung out at the mall. I had sleepovers with my best friend, Ann. We'd camp out on my bedroom floor and paint our nails as we discussed the future and boys we liked and boys who liked us. We pored over magazines, imagining our perfect homecoming dress and laughed at each other as we learned to walk in our first pair of real high heels-you know, the kind that turn even an old man's head. Mama smiled when she saw them, no doubt remembering her own first pair of heels. Daddy went straight for the liquor cabinet he usually only opened when we had company.

There were other normal teenage things too. I felt the same way about school a lot of kids did-most of it was boring beyond belief, but there were a few classes I liked. I had the usual weird mix of teachers, the P.E. teacher everyone thought was gay, the middle-aged English teacher whose hair made her look like she had a bird's nest on her head, the ancient math teacher who always had coffee breath. I had the usual tedious homework assignments and was picked on by the same bitchy clique of girls that all schools seem to have.

I dreamed of finding adventure and romance in the frozen wilds of Alaska; the most impossibly exotic locale I could imagine actually going to, never having been outside of Mississippi. I mean honestly, I'd never even seen real snow. Ann and I spent many nights planning the route we wanted to take the summer after our senior year. We'd talk late into the night, imagining what kind of adventures we'd have and what kinds of exciting, rugged men we might meet along the way. Men different from the ones we were familiar with. Men who didn't speak with a drawl. Men who didn't think the Holy Trinity was made up of beer, football and NASCAR.

Hey, stereotypes exist for a reason and we are talking about Podunk, Mississippi. I've heard my share of racist jokes and embarrassingly enough, I do know someone who married his cousin. Some of those stereotypes fit my family too. Mama always made fried chicken on Sunday after church, and when people came visiting, the women really did wind up in the kitchen talking about babies and cooking while the men stayed in the den and talked about sports and lawn care. Ann and I used to steal chicken from the kitchen and escape to the tire swing under the big magnolia tree out back. To this day, eating fried chicken still seems strange without the scent of magnolia blossoms perfuming the air.

My family's lived in Meridian for five generations, which really meant something down South. It also meant that I pretty much couldn't go anywhere, especially with my grandpa, where we didn't run into at least one person he knew. I couldn't tell you how many times I waited in the late afternoon heat, dreaming of cherry Slurpees and Alaska while my grandpa caught up with someone he hadn't seen in 'a coon's age'. I suspect that Daddy's getting to be the same way. In Meridian, the good ol' boys' club wasn't so much an expression as it was a way of life.

Like a lot of small town girls, I couldn't wait to leave, to get away from women who still wore pearls and hats to church and from men who measured another man's worth by which union he belonged to and his prowess at fishing or how well his hunting dogs could track a scent. I was tired of everyone knowing me as Bill and Lydia's daughter. I was tired of Wal-Marts and big hair and small town people with even smaller minds, who couldn't conceive of a world outside the simple one they'd always known. And like most naïve teenagers who think they have the world figured out, I sure didn't know how much I'd miss all of that until it was gone.


[Seventeen]

The summer I turned seventeen was magical. Ann and I were inseparable. Mama and Daddy had extended my curfew to midnight and Ann and I got to go to all the pre-senior year parties; bonfires by the creek and dances at Farmer's Field. David, star pitcher of our high school baseball team (and the boy I'd had a crush on for nearly a year) finally noticed I was alive. We flirted at the town's Fourth of July parade and by the time school rolled around, I knew it wouldn't be long before I got my first real kiss. My summer tan hadn't even faded before it happened.

That was the last time I ever thought of myself as normal.

Truthfully, that was the last time I ever thought of myself as just 'Marie'. In the space of a few seconds, I'd gone from the excited, flutterpated feelings of my first kiss to being some horrible amalgamation of Marie/David. It was terrifying. So many foreign thoughts, it was like drowning in another person's soul. I suddenly knew what it felt like to throw a curve ball and to go cow tipping and to want to kiss a girl. I had the urge to call Mama 'Mrs. D'Ancanto' and to pee standing up.

It got worse, more intense, as the rush continued. I felt him inside my head, screaming and screaming as my skin swallowed his mind. I knew about the test he cheated on in Algebra and that his daddy whupped him with a belt when he'd had too much to drink. I knew how embarrassing it felt to get a hard-on in class and that he'd spent half the summer jacking off to thoughts of me. It didn't matter that I'd spent the last year doing pretty much the same thing. There was no way in hell I was ready to see that, to feel it, let alone experience it from a male perspective.

It was like riding the Tilt-A-Whirl at the State Fair after eating too much cotton candy; strapped in to some ride you can't stop, while your stomach's in your throat and every image your brain processes is skewed by dizziness and disorientation from the relentless spinning. I was horrified. Not so much by the details of what I'd seen, but by the fact that I'd seen them at all.

That feeling-the closest I can come to describing it is how I always imagined it would feel to look upon the face of God. Seeing without seeing. Knowing you should look away, but being unable to. Only with God, I imagine there's humility and love. All I felt was fear and power. In an instant, I knew David more intimately than most married couples ever come to know one another. That kind of intimacy grows over a lifetime. I was woefully unprepared to experience it in mere seconds. Anyone would have been.

Worse still was the rush of power I felt as his life poured into me. It was like the buzz when you drink a beer too fast on an empty stomach, except it was about a million times stronger. I felt like beating my chest and throwing up all at the same time. And then it hit me. I was a mutant. I'd never even seen one... well, at least, I'd never seen anyone with any obvious physical mutation like wings or blue fur or anything, and suddenly I was one. Or at least I thought I was. 'David' was sure I was. In my mind he kept shouting the word at me over and over until I could do nothing but wrap my arms around myself and scream.

The next thing I remembered was yelling for Mama and Daddy not to touch me. I'm not even sure how I knew to warn them off. I sure as hell didn't know anything more about what was happening to me than they did, but something instinctive in me was screaming for them to stay away. And so I screamed, told them to get away from me. I think I was partly screaming at 'David' too. I wanted him and all his frighteningly foreign thoughts out of my head.

It never happened.

The rest of the afternoon passed in a blur. I only remember bits and pieces-the sound of sirens. Flashing lights. David convulsing on a stretcher. Mama wrapping a sheet around me. Daddy's voice telling the paramedics I didn't need medical attention, that I was just having a case of the vapors on account of David's 'seizure'. I nearly bit my tongue in two keeping the 'David' in my head from calling him a 'lying fuckwad'.

I remember Mama calling David's parents and then Daddy calling our family doctor. I was never more thankful for the good ol' boys club than I was at that moment. I was also thankful for Daddy's ability to think on his feet. He might be a redneck, but he's not stupid. It's not like he could just walk his mutie freak daughter into the only emergency room in Meridian, you know? And even if he could, they sure as hell weren't equipped to handle that sort of situation. It's not exactly like breaking a leg or something. He knew they wouldn't have the slightest idea what to do with me.

I didn't have any idea what to do with me-except maybe to kill myself before I killed someone else.

That night still remains in my mind as one of the most surreal of my life. Like most Southern women, Mama's answer to crisis was to feed us. Still wrapped in a sheet, I watched her make chicken fried steak and biscuits while we waited for Doc Adams. He came as soon as he could, but it still felt like forever. Mama offered him sweet peach tea like she always did. He took it, but it was daddy's peach brandy that he drank. Daddy explained what happened. Mama hovered in the doorway. I said nothing, afraid if I opened my mouth, 'David' would come jumping out.

I think I knew what was going to happen from the minute I heard Doc on the verandah. There was only one way to find out for sure if my touch hurt people. I knew it. He knew it. Daddy offered to be the one, but I refused. Children aren't meant to know their parents that intimately. The thought of pulling the kinds of things from him that I'd pulled from David terrified me. I was holding on to my sanity with white knuckled fingers. That would have pushed me over for sure, even if it was only the most brief touch they were proposing.

Even though I only remembered bits and pieces from that long-ago night, I can still recall the moments before that touch with heart-stopping clarity. Doc's kind blue eyes were clouded with concern for me, and for himself. His hands shook as he crossed himself and then he patted my knee reassuringly as he asked me in low tones to hold out my hand. He reached out and brushed his fingertip over the back of my hand. The touch lasted maybe 1/10th of a second. He swayed in the chair but didn't fall. Thankfully, I didn't get much from him, but I got enough.

Disjointed scenes from his life flashed in my head like some macabre slide show. Doc skipping school to go fishing. Burying his first dog under the old elm tree in his back yard. Kissing a pretty girl at Lookout Point. Volunteering for a tour of duty in Vietnam. I heard his voice inside my head. 'Rogue mutation' followed by 'poison skin' and finally, 'Hail Mary, full of grace'.

It was 'rogue mutation' that stuck with me. Obviously.

I saw his fears too, not just for himself or for me, but for Daddy and Mama too. I saw men in hoods breaking out the windows of Daddy's truck with baseball bats and women cutting Mama dead at her Garden Club meetings. I saw David waking from his coma and pointing a weak, shaking finger at me while the most vile things spilled from his lips. Doc's fears were all justified. It's not like the Deep South has that great a track record when it comes to accepting people who are different, much less accepting people who aren't human at all. Homo Superior. What a joke. I didn't feel superior. I felt like throwing up.

Thank God Doc was a Marine because I don't think I'd have had the courage to do what I knew I needed to do without his voice whispering in my head, "Steady on, soldier, steady on."

I cried while I packed. Mama gave me her good pearls and the elbow length gloves she wore on her wedding day. Daddy gave me four hundred and thirty-seven dollars and his best hunting knife. They didn't cry until we got to the Greyhound station and I told them it was ok, that I was just going to get to see Alaska a little sooner than I'd planned. I was too scared to hug them goodbye.

It was like a scene from some sad movie, except in the movies they always say, 'she left and she never looked back'. I did. And I cried the whole time.


[Eighteen]

I hated Jean. I hated her, and yet, I wanted to be her. I wanted to be her so bad I ached. I wanted to be the woman Logan's eyes followed. I wanted to be the one his heart belonged to. I wanted to be poised and cultured and elegant. I wanted to be anything but the awkward teenage girl always needing someone to rescue her. I wanted to be touchable. To be whole. To be enough of a woman to attract and keep a man of Logan's considerable appetites. But even more than I desperately wished for those things, I wanted the voices in my head to be silent.

Jean was being kind when she said I'd taken on a few of Logan's more charming personality traits, and yet, they didn't know the half of it. Erik had been bad enough, but the hit I took from him wasn't anywhere close to the hit I'd taken from Logan. And I'd gorged myself on him twice. My mind felt like it was trying to eat itself alive between my jealousy over Jean and 'Logan's' attraction to her.

I followed her, even more than she knew. Even more than Scott knew, and for a guy who only sees in shades of red, he sure doesn't miss much. I was drawn to her, or rather the 'Logan' in my head was. Part of me wanted to be close to her, to know her scent, to watch the way she moved, and part of me couldn't stand the sight of her. It was like being drawn to a scent you know is going to make you vomit, but following it anyway.

'David' was amused by it all. He thought Jean was hot. I could also tell he liked the idea that their desire for her made me physically ill. Even after a year in my head, he was still looking for ways to get back at me. Erik felt nothing for Jean but pity. He thought her mutation beyond powerful, but regretted that Charles had already tainted her mind. She would never join his cause. Considering how he'd come to join the 'Marie Collective', it was odd that I'd find an ally in him, but I did. I knew it was a dangerous to court so powerful a mind, to allow him to infiltrate, to integrate into my consciousness, but I didn't care. 'David' was afraid of him and he brought out 'Logan's' protectiveness of me-something that always overrode his attraction to Jean.

It all came to a head one Saturday afternoon about two months after Logan had left the school. I'd spent the previous evening watching Jean with Scott. They always went to the same little mom-and-pop Italian place every Friday night. It was easy to watch them. They almost always sat at the same table by the window, holding hands and stealing kisses from each other. Jean always had fettuccine alfredo with red wine and Scott always had ravioli with marinara and dark beer.

That was how I discovered Scott was not only a romantic and a shameless flirt, but one with wandering hands as well. Jean never stopped him and she always blushed and smiled when his hand 'accidentally' touched her breast or disappeared beneath the tablecloth. It was never a lewd display, of course. They were respectable teachers after all, but it was clear to anyone watching they were deeply in love. Mama would have called Scott a scamp. Daddy would have had a heart attack if I dated someone like Scott. It was torturous watching Jean, but it bothered 'Logan' too, having to see the way she and Scott were with each other.

That night, I was in the garage when they came home-purely by coincidence. There's only so much kissy-face a girl can take, after all. I ducked further back into the shadows as they got out of the car. Jean was giggling, which meant she'd had more wine than usual. Scott was shushing her and telling her to be good, but you could tell he didn't really want her to. Suddenly his groan drowned out her giggles and he pressed her up against the wall, hard. They kissed those kind of wild, out of control kisses that can only end up one way. I might not have ever experienced them myself, but Erik and Logan sure as hell had. His hand went under her sweater, kneading her breast roughly as they ground against each other frantically. He bit her neck and then kissed her again.

I thought they were going to do it right there, and they probably would have except in her wild attempts to get his shirt unbuttoned, Jean's hand flailed and knocked what had to be every single tool off the workbench and onto the floor. It made a hellacious racket as all that metal collided with the concrete floor. Scott cursed and then chuckled against her neck. Jean exploded into another fit of giggles. I heard the words 'bed' and 'now' and then he pulled her out of the garage and they sprinted hand in hand towards their room.

The whole thing was over in maybe half a minute, like some kind of fierce cyclone of heartfelt affection and animal passion that had blown up out of nowhere and abated just as quickly. It made my heart hurt knowing I'd never have that thing they shared. Not with anyone. I wanted to be Jean so bad it made my insides twist until I thought I'd be sick. I wanted to be the kind of woman who inspired that kind of emotion in a man. No, let's be honest. I wanted to be the kind of woman who inspired that kind of emotion in Logan.

The next day I went shopping. Jubes helped. That afternoon I dyed my hair red. It was an absolute and utter disaster. I wanted to crawl into the deepest, darkest hole I could find and never, ever come out again. Now I was not only a freak, I looked the part as well. My hair turned this putrid cranberry color and the white streaks came out pink. Not just any pink, this God-awful retina-searing magenta. I wanted to die.

To my utter mortification, Jean found me crying in the bathroom. Without a single word, she handed me my sunglasses and wrapped a dark scarf around my hair in that elegantly windblown look I always tried for and never managed to achieve. With a conspiratorial wink, she led me to the sleek black Mercedes with the tinted windows-the one only Scott was allowed to drive. She grinned at me, pulled the keys from her pocket and told me to get in. More stunned than anything, I did as she asked.

To my complete amazement, she pulled her cell phone from her pocket and made an appointment for me with her colorist. Her colorist! I guess the perfect Dr. Grey wasn't quite so perfect after all. My surprise must have projected louder than I thought because she winced and then laughed. On the way there, she told me all about how she'd hated her hair when she was my age and how she'd done the same thing I had, only she'd wanted to bleach hers blond. Her mama had pitched a holy fit. She also told me that I may be envious of her hair, but she was envious of my, uh, figure. Actually, what she said was if Mother Nature had blessed her with the same bounty I had, Scott might never let her out of their bedroom. Looking at Jean, who would have guessed Scott was a breast man?

So that was how Jean and I bonded-over shared flaws and a day of beauty. 'Logan' and 'David' were thankfully silent. I think all the Marie/Jean interaction was freaking them out. It was quite an experience for a girl who'd only ever had her hair cut by her mama. I'd heard Jean came from money, but it had never really clicked for me until I saw her salon. We were ushered to a private room where a dapper, fussy little man named Philippe clucked and tisked as he removed my scarf. I got a little nervous and Jean told me not to worry, that Philippe already knew about my skin.

I was a little lost. I mean, I'd been with Jean the whole time and she hadn't said one word to anyone about my skin. Just then, Philippe laughed, patted my arm with a latex covered hand, and asked me if I thought Jean and Charles were the only 'paths in the city. He grinned, told me it was a skill that came in handy in his profession; how better to judge the wants and desires of his clients? And then he winked at me and told me he could do things with hair that would set 'monsieur Logan' on his ear. I pinched myself. Jean and Philippe laughed.

While he worked, Jean sat in a chair with her legs tucked under her, sipping rich, dark espresso and consulting Philippe about my bone structure and what kind of make-up would best accentuate my features and which colors would go well with my skin tone and eye color. Sheesh, and I thought Jean was a force to be reckoned with in the lab. This was an order of a whole new magnitude. I hadn't even heard of half the things they were discussing. Designers and stylists and lines of skin care products. Jean was right. I'd neglected my skin for far too long, simply because I'd wanted to be rid of it. Jean was also right about something else. Philippe was a master. He restored my hair to its former glory, streaks and all, and gave me a sexy haircut guaranteed to have all the boys at school knocking down my door.

Afterwards, Jean took me shopping and then to dinner. We bonded further over dessert. What is it with women and chocolate? We talked about mutations and fashion and men. She talked about Scott. I talked about Logan, and then to my surprise, she talked about Logan. And not in a bad way, either. She seemed to think I was more than just a responsibility to him; that he had feelings for me that scared him and made him feel things he wasn't ready to deal with. She also told me that maybe he'd never be ready to acknowledge those things, so I shouldn't put my life on hold for him forever.

I wasn't too sure how to take that, so I didn't say much in response. Inner 'Logan' was suspiciously silent as well. Then she smiled and told me that nothing was absolute and maybe someday he would be ready, so I should play the field while I could because he wasn't the sort of man to stand by idly while the woman he wanted took up with someone else. I opened my mouth to tell her, DUH! Look at how he flirted with her even though he knew she was with Scott, but she beat me to the punch. She told me his attraction to her was purely physical and she suspected the reason I felt echoes of it so strongly was because it was fresh in his mind when he touched me. She swirled her spoon daintily in her fingers and asked me point blank if I thought she was the only woman he'd ever had the hots for.

I think my mouth must have hung open because she shrugged and told me I only had to look inside my head to find the answer to that. She was right. He was a man who felt attraction intensely, but that same fierce attraction always faded as soon as he left the bed of the woman who'd inspired it. Savoring her chocolate mousse, Jean fixed me with a pointed stare and reminded me that she wasn't the one he put his claws through his own body to save. She wasn't the one whose life he'd tried to trade for his own that night on the Statue. She wasn't the one in possession of a sliver of adamantium and a promise. Women he lusted after were a dime a dozen. Women he truly cared for were a rare thing indeed.

I was completely floored. In the grand tradition of teenage wisdom, I was so sure the way I saw things was the only possible interpretation, I never even considered the validity of another point of view. It was a Tilt-A-Whirl of a whole different kind. I remember nodding mutely and just kind of being shell-shocked by that revelation.

Knowing better than to push so tentative a beginning, Jean smoothly turned the subject to other things. Over coffee, we talked about the X-Men and how she and Scott felt I was ready to join the junior team (along with Bobby, Jubes and Kitty, Piotr and John). I'd never really given it any serious consideration until that night, but then again, I'd never felt like part of the group before.

Looking back on it, it's funny how things work out. Screwing up my hair was one of the best things I ever did. Getting in the car with Jean was another. She even let me drive it home. One Eye's toy. 'Logan' was thrilled... but I was the one smiling. That was the first night I ever felt like I could ever be something more than the girl with the 'rogue mutation'. I was on cloud nine when we got back to the school. In fact, I was so pleased with life that I didn't feel so much as a twinge of anything but amusement when I noticed the hickey on Jean's neck as we were getting out of the car.


[Nineteen]

Nineteen was my lost year. Like a lot of high school grads, I wasn't sure what I wanted to do with my life. My first love was painting, but it's kinda hard to make a living doing that. I wasn't ready to even think about college, let alone begin to imagine how I'd finesse that one. Can you see me sharing a communal shower with fifty other girls? Hello? Naked, deadly skin! It was a logistical nightmare, so I opted to forgo that choice for the time being. In the end, I took Jean's advice. I didn't really have a burning desire to be some sort of weird mutie superhero, but what else was I really suited for, you know?

So, in the grand tradition of teenage career choices, I settled. It might have been for something pretty damn exotic, but I settled nonetheless. Plus, there was a part of me that was still clinging to Logan's promise and I kinda wanted to be there when (and if) he ever returned. Yeah, so sue me. I'm a torch-carrying kinda girl.

It turned out to be a pretty good choice, and for that, I'll always be thankful. How many teenagers do you know who really want to make a career out of their first job? Of course, that particular road wasn't without its share of bumps. Black Ops isn't exactly like flipping burgers. For as cool as that stuff looks on TV, there's a hell of a lot more to it than just grabbing a gun and flying by the seat of your pants. And responsibility wise, it's a world away from, "Do you want fries with that, sir?"

I'd love to be able to tell you that just because I took to it like a duck to water that I'd been some kinda natural kick-ass field operative, but that just wasn't the case... even with Logan and Erik in my head. I busted my butt alongside Bobby, Jubes, Kitty, Piotr and John. It was tough. Nothing like I thought it'd be, even after watching what went down that night in the torch. We were all green, eager, and worse, arrogant. We made stupid mistakes, managed to hit upon pretty much every last newbie error in the book, from underestimating our opponent to not checking our gear to overestimating ourselves - and our equipment.

Embarrassingly enough, we all tried to do the Rambo thing at one time or another... you know, be the one-man show. Back up? Who needs back up? Huh? This clip? I've got plenty of shots left. Yeah, sure. Me and my mutation can take that out, no problem...

You get the idea.

Scott's right. We're lucky to be alive. We learned really quickly that a soldier is only as good as the guy in the trenches with him. If you're not there to watch his back, when you need him, he's not going to be there to watch yours-and that's how people get dead.

Learn it. Live it. Teach it.

Scott's motto. What really brought it home for me, for all of us, was the day he told us all to teach our jobs to each other so we could still function as a group if one of us bought it. From that point on, it ceased being a game. For every last one of us.

Me, Bobby, Jubes, Piotr, Kitty and John – We got tight pretty fast, and not just because we were friends. Inside six months, we were working seamlessly together, both in combat situations and out. We had nowhere near the field experience the alpha team had, but we had promise. We were still green as freshly mowed grass, but at least when we screwed something up, it wasn't for lack of teamwork.

Things were actually going pretty well. The team was really beginning to shape up. I'd long since stopped wanting to be Jean. I'd finally gotten a bit of stability, of direction in my life. And wonder of wonders, that lost feeling was starting to fade as I gained more confidence in myself and my abilities. I even had a boyfriend. But best of all, I was happy. For the first time since my mutation manifested, I was truly happy.

And then one day out of the blue, Logan came back and I found myself back at square one, wishing I was Jean again and feeling more lost than ever. Only this time, I didn't have any promises from my hero to fall back on and no sliver of adamantium to wrap my fingers around on those nights when I felt like it was just me against the world.

Strangely enough, what bothered me most wasn't that Logan's tags were back around his neck or that he was flirting with Jean every chance he got. It was that all my hard work with the team didn't seem to matter. To him, I was still Marie, the kid. He was still fiercely protective of me, but his eyes still followed Jean. That bugged me-more than it should, and way more than Bobby liked, but what really burned my biscuits was that he didn't take me seriously. Sure, he took me, Marie, seriously, but he didn't take Rogue seriously. He all but bent over backwards for me, except when I put on the leather. Then all of a sudden, I seemed to lose all credibility. Credibility I'd worked damned hard to earn.

I think that's what finally did it for me. Ended my unrealistic teenage crush, I mean. I had all these fantasies, dreams of how things might be when he came back. And not a single one of them came true. Sure, Logan treated me with respect, but he didn't treat me like a woman and when we were wearing the leather, he didn't even treat me like an equal. Inside, I railed at him. I'm ashamed to admit, I took a lot of my frustration with him out on inner 'Logan'. He seemed a little surprised by the vehemence of my feelings, not to mention my 180 in the 'I'm-just-gonna-die-if-you're-not-mine-someday' department, but to be fair, he took it in stride. Ha. Good for him, too, 'cause really, where's he gonna go? My head's not exactly infinite with regards to space, you know?

In the end, I chose to say nothing. It was one of the easiest decisions I've ever had to make, but one of the hardest to stick with. Still, I'm glad I did. Nothing says 'I'm grown up' less than telling someone 'I'm all grown up', you know? (Even if I did feel like shouting it at his clueless ass on more than one occasion.) I just kinda sat back and let my actions speak for me. They spoke pretty eloquently too, if the look on his face after our first joint mission was any indication.

No, I didn't pull his butt out of the fire at the last minute or do anything overly heroic like take a bullet for a teammate or save a bunch of little kids. I did my job the way Scott taught me-calmly, thoroughly and with an efficiency second only to Scott himself... (Thanks 'Erik'.) Well, that, plus I got to kick a little Brotherhood ass.

Ha.

And you know what? I may not be a one-woman army, and I may not be able to do it all on my own, but I sure as hell can hold my own and I don't need rescuing anymore, bub. So stick that in your cigar and smoke it.


[Twenty]

There was no me that year. There was only Carol.

I spent six weeks in Charles' padded room. It was a lot like the 'Big Round Room', only a hell of a lot less curvy and more, well, squishy. Plus it had that whole pesky lock thing working against it as well. No mirrors, either. A good thing too because after I got out and got my first good look at myself with eyes that weren't mine-I spent another two weeks back there, courtesy of one Charles Xavier and his merry band of fellow freaks.

Seeing that change... well, it was sort of the straw that broke the camel's back, you know? I'd wasted so much time wanting to be Jean and now my eyes were greener than hers. I'd always have bigger boobs, but one visit to Philippe for a dye job and a few pieces of elegant red clothing and I'd be good to go.

Too bad by then I didn't want that anymore. Carol sure as hell didn't.

And surprise, surprise. Logan didn't either. Jean was right. His attraction to her was nothing more than a passing infatuation. Don't get me wrong, he still flirts, but now he doesn't do it because he wants to get in her pants. Now he does it to piss off Scott. Carol found their little pissing contest amusing. Somewhere deep down, I did too, but it was a little like one tiny voice shouting to be heard over Hurricane Carol.

Bitch.

She was the first person I ever absorbed completely. As in 'life-sucking, keeping their powers forever because I killed them' kind of absorbed. It was worse than the first time with David when I didn't know what was happening. It was worse than when Erik raped my mind. Even worse than the hits I took off of Logan, and quite frankly, I didn't think anything could be more intense than that. It wasn't the first time I'd killed on a mission, but it was the first time I had to live with the mind of the person I'd killed inside my own head.

It was complete and utter chaos. Not the mission. That ended ok. Not with victory, but rather with a stalemate. We took down one of their side. Carol. They took down one of us. Namely, me. Thank God for Scott's training, because when I fell, Jubes was right behind me ready to do my job.

I woke up in the padded room.

When I finally emerged, not really in control but no longer on the verge of insanity, it was like looking at the world through a new pair of eyes. No pun intended. Not only did I have green eyes and a new perspective, I also had super strength and invulnerable, touchable skin.

Carol went a little wild. Or maybe I did. I'm not really sure I want to know which one of us was responsible. There were bars. And men. And a whole lot of touching that meant far less than it should have, all things considered. I was now the Rogue for an entirely different reason. And strangely enough, it was this time in my life- when I wanted Logan the least-that I truly came to know him. Not as a hero or a savior or even as a teammate, but simply as a man.

He was both less and more than the man I'd built him up to be in my fantasies. For that matter, he wasn't the 'Logan' I had in my head, either. The years had changed him too, just as they had me. I often wonder why that idea was so hard for me to understand. He was still very much a loner; gruff and crude with a wicked sense of humor and a foul mouth. He was vicious in battle and yet utterly selfless in his protection of us-his pack, his family. He still had the propensity to speak his mind, tactfulness be damned. Make no mistake, he could be charming when he wished, but he could also be so damned surly it tried even my proper Southern patience. Mama would have understood, I'm sure. She was the same way with Daddy -all sugar until he crossed the line and then, boy, did she ever let him have it with both barrels.

Seeing Logan through new eyes was fascinating. Men feared him. Women lusted after him. Children adored him. And me? I fell in love with him all over again. Real love. Not 'a little taken with him'. Not a schoolgirl crush. Not hero worship. Love.

He saw me through new eyes too. Not so much because I was suddenly not a kid to him anymore, I think it was more that I had closed the chasm between us. Or rather, Carol had. I was no longer the lily white, naïve little virgin. I'd delved into life and gotten it all over me, stained myself with it, just as he had. We were two peas in a pod, and despite Carol and all the shit I had to go through because of her, I'll always be thankful to her for that.

Still, it was a long row to hoe. Carol's little 'additions' changed far more than just my personal relationships. She changed my dynamic within the team. It was a difficult adjustment to make. For all of us. Honestly, I was... well, a bit much. Mama would have called it 'too big for my britches'. Scott called it reckless. Logan called it something else-but only once to my face.

Aside from the whole screwed up head thing, physically, I felt powerful. No, I was power. I could feel it roaring in me, wild and untapped. I was invulnerable to damned near everything but Logan's claws. I could fly. I could touch and I could kill with a touch. Like a kid in a candy store, I wanted to test the limits of my new 'gifts'-both inside the Danger Room and on my own. I got warnings from everyone. Except Logan. He just smirked and shook his head in amusement.

He was also the one who called me on the carpet and gave me the dressing down of my life when I pushed things too far. I discovered yeah, I might be invulnerable and yeah, I could fly, but there were limits. And I pushed them. With the cockiness of youth (which was given a healthy shot in the arm by Carol's immense ego), I flew too high and didn't get enough oxygen, passed out, crashed back to Earth and broke my leg.

When I came to again, I managed to hang on to consciousness long enough to fly back to the mansion. Barely. I crashed ignobly, digging a furrow into the perfectly manicured front quad. It was far from my finest hour. Logan got to me first. Practically the whole school came rushing out not long after. I suppose I would have felt like an ass if I hadn't been in so much pain. Everyone was so worried Logan would endanger his own life by touching me again. And you know, I think he probably would have if my injuries had been life threatening. He did look a little panicky while checking me over, but once he'd satisfied himself that I was in no immediate danger, he just looked me up and down, grunted something about pain being a good teacher and walked away without a backwards glance.

Of course, it was after he'd gotten the entire story from Jean that the whole calling me on the carpet thing happened. Still, I think he understood my need to find my limits-and to push them. He'd spent years doing very much the same thing. He wasn't trying to push himself over the edge any longer, but he had, and on more than one occasion. Both of us, all of us really, we lived on the edge. It was something that came part and parcel with wearing the leather so it's not exactly like we didn't endanger our lives on a regular basis, it was just that Logan didn't care for the fact that I'd chosen to be so reckless about it. Sheesh, hypocrite much? He only lit into me that one time, and believe me, once was enough.

After my leg healed, I screwed up a few more times before I really got a handle on Carol. I'm not talking about with men in bars or even with my own personal safety. I'm talking about really screwing up. Endangering members of my team. Now I'm not one to cuss much, but she really fucked up my head with regards to the team and my place in it. It didn't happen the first time I went out on a mission. Or even the second. But it did happen.

The fighting was brutal and I, being the cocky, invulnerable kick-ass and take names kinda woman I thought I was, flew head-on into the thick of things and just started going to town. I disregarded my orders, the battle plan and my teammates' safety. You're only as good as the soldier next to you. Unfortunately for Scott, there was no soldier next to him because she was off playing Rambo. Stupid newbie mistake. I knew better and I did it anyway. Nobody was watching his back and he took one in the chest. It was terrifying. Right there in the field, Jean had to put in a chest tube to drain the blood off his lung so he could breathe. I thought he was going to die. He almost did die.

That was the last time I ever played Rambo. And the last time I ever recklessly endangered one of my teammates. It was also the last time I was allowed to go on a mission until Scott had fully recovered. Five damn months of drills in the Danger Room with Scott watching-and critiquing-my every move. I hated every minute of it. But I didn't complain, not once. Because as much as I hated it, he was right, I needed it. I also knew he hated every minute of his physical therapy just as much. He hated not being in control. And he was angry with himself because he's a good leader and he knows that when a soldier screws up, part of the blame rests with the commanding officer.

I screwed up. He screwed up. Despite everything I said to the contrary after absorbing Carol, I wasn't ready to be going out on missions again. He was angry with himself because he should have listened to his gut. I should have been doing the drills back then, not now. Not after the fact. We're all lucky my fuck-up didn't kill anyone. The worst part wasn't that I let myself down, or even that I let the team down, it was that I did something that made Scott doubt himself and it'll be a long, LONG time before I ever live that one down.

You know, once I figured out what being grown up really felt like, I sure did wish I hadn't been in such a rush to get there.


[Twenty-one]

This is the year I finally found myself.

I am Rogue.

A distinct and separate entity from the minds within my own, and yet, they are an integral part of who I am. I am not David, although he's the one I go to when I want to remember Marie. When I see her through his eyes, I am reminded of the girl I used to be, frozen forever at seventeen. There are some days he is still angry about what happened to him, but other days, he's the keeper of Marie's innocence. Like a snapshot of that moment before our lips touched, so sweet and soft and new. He's also the one whose impressive knowledge of useless baseball facts has made me something of a legend among the younger students. Logan might own hockey, but baseball? That's all mine, sugar.

I am not Doc Adams, but he is the peaceful wind in my soul. The calm, steady voice that speaks of love and duty. He is my touchstone. He reminds me that I am the rogue mutation, and I am the girl with the poison skin. I am also the girl who was strong enough to do what she had to do-to walk away from her family and the only life she'd ever known. He's also the reason I occasionally go to Mass. We listen together and it is his words on my lips. Hail Mary, full of Grace. His echo is gentle, and blurred with my childhood memories of him. His blue eyes twinkle and his smile is soft. The first time I went without my gloves, not as Carol, but as myself-it was his voice I heard. Sweet Marie, so full of grace.

I am not Logan, although it his flame that burns the brightest within me. I feel him move, deep in my soul, growling with fire and with great, dark things neither of us were ready for. He is my courage. And my fear. Of them all, his presence brings me the greatest happiness and the deepest sorrow. He is my companion. It is because of him, I learned that I needed to walk with my own heart. If I can't... how on earth is someone else supposed to? He is the fire in my belly, my fervor in battle and the protector of all the things I hide, even from myself. He's the reason I drink bourbon and the reason I find the scent of cigars comforting when every other woman I know can't stand the sweet stench. He is salvation on an empty highway, my joy in simple things, my frustration with redheaded women and the beast that prowls with me when I roam the night. Such a juxtaposition. Light and dark. Man and animal. Humility and arrogance. He is the reason I draw breath today. And the reason I wish to draw it tomorrow.

I am not Erik, but it is his resilience that sustained me through some of my darkest days. He is my drive. He is the reason I fight. I do not want memories of another number burned into my flesh. He is also the example I hold up to keep myself on the right path. Stray too far from the light, and even fighting for a good cause can become unjust. He is the reason I play chess with Charles and the reason I avoid pork. I have never fully forgiven him for what he did to me and he knows it. I have lived his nightmares. Death camps and bodies piled like cordwood. The stench of burning flesh and the desperation that gives him such drive. I do not court his presence often, but he has age and wisdom. Mama taught me to respect both and so we have reached an uneasy truce. I did not banish him forever, and he agreed to leave me in peace those many nights I held a sliver of seductive adamantium in my fist and grieved for all the things that were not mine to hold.

I am not Carol, but it is her power that surges within me. She is the key to my matrix. My Neo. She gave me powers beyond my belief and nearly jacked my mind in the process. She gave me back touch, and made me wish to God she hadn't. It was a long time before I felt clean again. She is the reason I take point with Logan on missions and the reason I understand Scott. She is my Achilles heel. Absolute power corrupts absolutely. And yet, I am thankful to her. Through her, and the damage she wreaked in my life, I came to know Logan. Not the man I thought he was, or even the man he was in my head-the true Logan, flaws and all. She is the emerald fire in my eyes. My wings-and my caution. She is the reason I grew up. And the reason "darlin'" replaced "kid" in Logan's vocabulary.

I am not Marie, but Marie is not dead. I am still a small-town girl. I am still Bill and Lydia's daughter. I'm a Southerner, born and bred. No amount of New York living will ever strip the honey from my drawl or the Mississippi from my soul. Fried chicken will always taste better when the scent of magnolia blossoms perfume the air. Bo and Luke Duke have nothing on my rebel yell, sugar, and the sweet strains of Dixie still get me every time. Marie is all that is young and innocent and hopeful. She is the reason I sassed the Wolverine on that snowy stretch of Canadian highway. She is the reason I longed for touch. She is the reason I want it still, even after Carol showed me that some kinds of touches are worse than being untouchable. Marie is hope.

I am Rogue. And David and Logan and Carol and countless others. I am Marie. Sometimes. I am friend, woman, soldier... lover. I am power. I am a tool for the cause. I am death from above. I am a giver of life. I am many things, and I am nothing. I still dream of Alaska and excitement and of rugged, primal men. Only now, they all have the same face. And they all smell of tobacco and adamantium. Rogue is a changeling. A patchwork of minds that Marie has sewn together. Rogue is the future. She is herself, and she is Marie's hope, David's innocence, Doc's peace, Logan's fire, Erik's spear, and Carol's power.

I am grown up. And I am still growing. I am the keeper of Logan's heart and the woman his eyes now follow. I am Rogue. And I am happy.