Chapter 21: Three Little Words
The report arrived on Magneto’s desk that afternoon. Silver-haired and cloaked in royal purple, he’d been standing before the window when it arrived, looking out at a world he believed to be on the verge of great change. A man old enough to have seen his share of wars past yet young enough to look forward to the best to come, he’d long dreamed of one day becoming the father of the new era.
This was not to happen today, however. He knew this the moment the dark-clothed figure appeared in the doorway of his study, two file folders in hand. Still turned toward the window, he signaled for the man to enter, gleaning all he needed to know in the somber footsteps crossing the room. The agent placed the files on the desk and stood back, waiting to be addressed. Magneto let the reports sit on the polished marble for a long moment before approaching to look at them.
He looked down at the first report, tapping a fingertip lightly on the brown cover before opening it to review its contents. He lifted a white sheet of paper from the file, his jaw tight as he read the simple information typed on it in black ink:
File No. X-71484
Subject Name: Rogue (surname unknown)
Vital Status: Deceased
Cause of Death: Fatal stab wounds to abdomen; drowned...
He skimmed the details of the incident before turning to the second report:
File No. X-25243
Subject Name: Wolverine (surname classified)
Vital Status: Deceased
Cause of Death: Fatal gunshot wounds to chest and abdomen; drowned...
“If that’ll be all, sir...” The agent bowed his head and turned to leave as Magneto looked over the reports, silently processing the information. He was almost out the door when Magneto stopped him with a question.
“Were the bodies recovered?”
The man turned back to face him. “No. But...”
He stopped then, perhaps because he’d seen the glint of hope in Magneto’s eyes as he quickly looked up from the report. He held the man in his glare, waited for him to finish. The agent cleared his throat before continuing.
“It’s just... I was there, sir. Saw the girl’s life bleed away right before my own here two eyes. And as for the other one...Wolverine, is it? Well...I don’t need to tell you that my men are sharp shooters. And they pumped him right full of bullets.”
Magneto looked down again at the open reports on his desk.
“If you want my professional opinion, sir,” the agent finally said, “There ain’t no way in hell anyone coulda survived what happened today on that bridge.”
The agent turned to the door again, leaving Magneto in silence. He sifted through the contents of the first file until he came across a photograph. He lifted it and looked at the girl in the picture old enough to have borne the ills of the world and too young yet to have realized her potential, her ultimate glory in the new dawning.
That dawning would need to wait, how long he couldn’t know. His dream now as dead as the young woman whose photograph he thumbed, he would once again go back to watching...waiting...and preparing for the tide to turn again.
With that thought firmly in mind, Magneto unlocked the filing cabinet beside his desk and put the folders in their respective slots, where they would remain with the other closed files and lost dreams.
~*~*~
His eyes had opened up again before his body even hit the water, wounds closing up as the searing bullets exited his flesh and rained like a hailstorm into the rushing river below. Scrambling for his senses, he’d barely had enough time to take a desperate gulp of air before plunging in after them, his heavy body thrown about effortlessly by the violent crash of the waves as he struggled to get his bearings.
The river thrashed him, tormented him, threatening to swallow him whole as it careened his along its path. Logan’s body ached as he fought the waters to no avail, grasping for something, anything, to slow the onslaught. Over and over he turned with the waves, sky and sea becoming one in his vision as he gasped and gulped for air.
Realizing too late that the river up ahead was about to
end in a sharp drop, there was little he could do to brace himself for the fall. He grasped fruitlessly at an overhanging tree branch as the water forced him toward the edge. Digging his heels into the increasingly shallow water, Logan tried to stop from going over the lip of the escarpment, but the force of the water combined with the slippery surface of the rocks proved too much even for his reflexes. He lost his grip and went over the edge, nearly buried by the force of the waterfall as he crashed down into the lagoon below.
Waving his arms through the blue water, Logan swam up toward the light and broke the surface, sucking a deep gulp of air into his burning chest. Treading his arms to stay afloat, he coughed and gasped as he took a moment to catch his breath. When his senses finally snapped back, he filled his lungs with air and dove beneath the surface.
The silence of the calm water closed in around him like a murky blue cloak as he drifted down to the bottom of the lagoon. Swimming around the perimeter of the small pond, he stayed under as long as his lungs would allow, scouring the depths and finding nothing.
Logan drifted up to the surface of the water and filled his lungs again before diving back down to the floor of the lagoon. Still, he could find nothing, and a sense of desperation began to knot his stomach as he searched to no avail. He was almost two minutes into the second dive, and quickly losing hope, when he found what he was looking for.
She was an angel if he ever saw one, a vision in white amidst the deep blue as she rested at the bottom of the lagoon, her hair and dress floating up all around her as though in a dream. Logan drifted down toward Marie and got behind her, wrapping his arms around her waist. He used his legs to propel them back up to the surface, breaking it with a loud gasp as he sucked a fresh gust of air down into his lungs. Marie’s head lolled back onto his shoulder as he caught his breath.
“C’mon,” he whispered, patting a gentle hand to her wet cheek. “Come on...turn it on, baby.”
Logan closed his eyes and waited for the pull. Waited for her to take what she needed from him, take all of him. It was the only good thing he could see left in all of this, to be swallowed completely by her, to give up all the world and everything his soul had ever known, if even to become a mere part of her.
“Come on, Marie,” Logan said when nothing happened. He’d been careful not to spear any vital organs, so she should still be alive...albeit barely. Hand cupping her face, he pressed his warm cheek to her cool one as he held her against his chest. “Breathe.”
Again he waited for something to happen, and again there was no reaction from Marie’s skin. His breath tight in his throat, Logan drifted toward the bank of the lagoon and hoisted Marie up and out of the water, her hair and dress clinging to her soaked skin as they collapsed onto the grass.
Logan quickly sat up and straddled Marie’s hips, hands going to her chest as he began to pump her lungs. Water dribbled up from Marie’s lips and spilled down onto the grass as Logan worked on her, panic swirling deep within him as he silently willed her to wake up.
When her lungs were clear, Logan leant down and covered her lips with his, breathing down into her chest. He sat back up, hands returning to her breastbone as he started to pump again, a desperate growl on his lips as he worked on her.
Christ she was pale. Paler than he’d ever seen her...and cold. She was so damned cold. Logan knew he was pressing down too hard on her small frame, but he couldn’t stop. All he needed was one pulse, one goddamn beat...
He bent forward again to place his mouth on hers, fingers sliding up into her wet hair as he breathed into her lungs once more. Hands going back to her chest, he resumed pumping, but knew there was no point. Logan felt his insides crumbling as he collapsed on top of Marie, all sorts of scenarios spinning through his mind as he cradled her lifeless body to him.
He’d missed his mark by an inch, punctured her lung. He’d taken too long to get to her, she’d drowned fully. There had been too much blood, her heart had failed...
Whatever the reason, it didn’t matter now. He’d fucked up and now she was gone. A roaring growl tore from Logan’s chest he clutched her to him, claws shooting forth from the knuckles of one hand as he stabbed them into the ground beside her.
Logan dragged Marie’s limp arms up around his shoulders, his tears soaking her neck as he shook against her. He wasn’t a hero, he was an animal. A goddamn animal. Probably always had been for all he knew, except that someone had finally gotten it in their head to give him claws.
If he’d only kept his hands off her in the first place she would be alive and warm and safe in New York, not cold and dead in his arms as she was now. Holding her against him, Logan sobbed into the grass, his insides twisting with grief.
I’m sorry, baby. I’m so sorry. It was the only way...
The thought had barely formed in his mind when a sudden spark of white heat ripped through him, starting in his toes and spreading through his body like an inferno. He felt numb, couldn’t breathe, and knew he wouldn’t want to even if he could. He felt his body prickling all over as he instinctively fought the tug at his consciousness...and then an almost peaceful sense of release washed over him as he finally gave himself over to the seductive pull, his entire world spinning as his soul swirled down into the abyss.
He was plunging down into the bottomless black, past the point of no return...and then, suddenly something was coming in through the black, opening it up, and he was not alone anymore...she was not alone anymore...he was there with her, wrapping his soul around hers as he snatched her back from the brink, and then they were careening back into the light, and though in the end she hadn’t been afraid to die, she let the him pull her back, let him carry her on those three little words he spoke to her on the bridge just before the adamantium sliced into her flesh. Three little words...
Trust me, Marie.
The light was splitting into the black now, rushing down into the very depths of her being. She felt like she was bursting from the inside out. Too much, it was too much to hold in, the life force bursting in through her every pore, splitting her apart...
Marie’s eyes snapped open, her pupils narrowing painfully at the brilliance of the sun above as a burning gust of air rushed down to the bottom of her lungs. Cold, wet, and shaking, it took a moment for her to sort through the foreign thoughts in her head and realize that Logan was still wrapped around her. Regaining her control, she switched off and pushed him away from her, his convulsing body rolling over onto the grass beside her.
Marie blinked down at Logan for a moment, scanning his memories and putting together what had happened. Her eyes blurred with tears as she used her new strength to pull Logan into her arms. Fingers combing gently through his hair, Marie held him as he shook against her and waited for him to come back to her...because she couldn’t wait to look into the beautiful hazel eyes of the man who, so that she would never need to feel fear again, had been willing to sacrifice everything for her - everything including her - and tell him...
...it worked.
~*~
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