With a nudge of his boot, the front door gave way and he maneuvered the listless body in his arms around the tiny cabin. The bedroom was in the back, past the kitchen and adjacent to the tiny washroom, with a tattered red curtain serving as a makeshift door. Once he'd pushed his way through, he sat her down gently on the goose feather mattress.
She let out a weak moan at the scratchy poke of tiny, down quills along the back half of her body and tried to shift her weight around the discomfort, but Logan held her still with a soothing hand on her shoulder and the top of her head.
"Got hot," she said a few moments later, her eyes still closed and a feeble smile spreading across her lips at her play on his words.
He nodded in agreement as he crouched down next to the split log bed frame. "I can see that. Why'n the heck didn't you have a hat on, or a wet rag around your neck?" He frowned as he pulled back a few of the sweaty strands of hair that were plastered on her face and inspected the reddening skin around her nose and cheeks. "Got sunburned, too - you're gonna be hurtin' t'morra."
"I know. Can already feel it."
"Your neck get any? I'll put some vinegar on ya later."
Her eyes fluttered open and a true grin broke free as she finally saw the face she'd been longing for all these long months.
"You're back," she said simply and reached up, running the pads of her fingers along the edge of his scruffy jaw line.
Gone were the digits softened by lotions and bi-monthly paraffin treatments. In their place were calloused patches of skin that gave rise to the true meaning of hard work. He covered her tiny hand with his own, pressing it to one of his unkempt sideburns before pulling it away with a chaste kiss to the heel of her palm. "Still alive, I see. Guess things didn't get too rough for ya."
She slipped her hand from his and pushed herself up a little higher on the bed. "Oh, I don't know about that, Mister. Me an' that woodstove've had quite a few knock-down-drag-outs since you been gone. But first thing's first - how're we doin' on the outside? Are we gonna be headin’ out t’night?"
He was silent for a moment, then reached around behind him, his arm covering the almost negligible distance from one wall to the other, and pulled up a sturdy, wooden chair to sit in. "Not so good and no, it‘s gonna be a few days at the least," he answered, deciding to come right out and tell her the truth. He hadn't ever pussy-footed around with her before - there was no sense in starting that now.
"I found most of 'em. Well," he corrected, "I found all of 'em. All that's left, that is." He was quiet once again, letting the meaning of his words sink in.
"I haven't made up my mind about Charles yet. I finally found out where they're holdin' 'im, but..." He paused once more, this time to run a hand over his short-cropped hair, capping the gesture off with a frustrated sigh. "I think it’s best for me an’ you ta try and get the others out first. Maybe get some manpower in behind us before we tackle that. They’ve got all the telepaths on lockdown. Usin’ their powers ta figure out where the cells are."
"But how? I mean, how can they control them? And...cells?"
"Remember that shit we ran into at Alkali Lake? That mutant with the mind-altering capabilities? Well, it works on the same principle as that, best I can tell. Just a mutated form of it, if you can stomach the irony. As for the cells, they’re groups, people who hadn’t submitted to the DNA testing to be tagged, back when it was all optional. Seems like quite a few of ‘em have found one another an’ banded together, tryin’ ta protect what little they got left."
With a cautious glance to her side, she studied his hardened features for a moment, decided that he looked older, much older than he should have for the time that had passed since they last saw one another, almost as if his age had tried to catch up with him while he'd been gone, if that was even possible. He was wearing his grief plainly on his face, not even bothering to hide it from her.
"Is - is it really that bad?" she chanced, already knowing the answer to her question.
He shook his head. "Darlin’, you have no idea."
She let that thought settle in her mind as easily as it was able and tried to leave it alone for the time being. She’d known that a lot of things had probably...changed from how they used to be during the time that she’d been out, safe on her own, personal refuge, but to hear it spoken aloud, and from Logan no less, just made the reality of the situation hit that much harder.
Whether it was her mind's natural tendency to wander, or some form of mental preservation kicking in, she thought back about what he’d said earlier, about Charles and whether or not they’d be able to save him when something clicked in her brain. "You said they were holding all the telepaths - what about -"
"She's gone," he interrupted, stopping her before she could even say the words. "They got rid of her. Guessin’ her telepathic powers weren’t high enough for ‘em and they didn’t need a teke for whatever the hell it is that they’re doin’."
She hated the way he’d said that, cut her off, his voice void of emotion. She knew it’d hurt him deeply to lose her, and not just as what one could only describe as a ‘tumultuous’ love interest, but also as a teammate, and more importantly, a friend. For Logan, those came few and far between and Marie knew that the damage was heavily felt.
Her hand slipped off the mattress beside her and settled gently atop his, letting the slow, steady thrum of his pulse reassure her that there was still a chance that things would turn out all right. She was silent and, unlike the other times, he didn’t move away from her touch.
"You been practicin’," he said with half-hearted smile as he glanced down to their hands, to her skin resting safely on his.
Nodding, she pulled her hand away. "I got it up to about two or three minutes, I think. Hadn't been able ta test it, but I can tell when it's off - feels diff'rent. I’da been able ta touch you longer, but I’m still feelin’ a little weak from a few minutes ago."
He nodded in kind and settled back into his chair a little further.
"So where ya been to?" she asked, trying to lighten the mood a little before they went any deeper into the previous conversation. She was anxious to know all that he’d tell her, but she could see that he was frazzled around the edges from more than just his probable lack of sleep. She didn’t want to push for too much right away.
He smirked and she could see the playful dance of his eyes under their half-closed lids.
"Nowhere. Ev’rywhere."
"Bastard. Cryptic doesn’t suit you."
He arched a brow and cocked his head to the side, effectively making her eat her words.
She sighed good-naturedly and rolled her eyes. "Okay, so it does - but where? Tell me."
"Went as far South as Tennessee. As far West as Nevada. T’the East I made it to New Hampshire and North...well, here, I guess."
"And where exactly is here?" she asked, voicing a question she’d toyed with ever since she thought to ask him the first time. Trouble was, he’d been gone for two days by then. Things had been in too much of a flurry before then and she'd trusted him well enough to know that where ever they were, he'd picked it for a reason and that she was safe.
He brought his foot up to rest across his knee and flicked a dried chunk of mud out from the tread on the boot, sending it skittering under the bed. "About sixty miles north o' Berlin."
"Hunh - I was thinking we were in Canada."
He shook his head, letting a grim expression fall over his face. "Didn't wanna risk crossin' the border as many times as I woulda had to've done workin' on this place. Things were already startin' ta heat up, so I thought it was best ta stay on the south side. We're still close enough that if we had ta make a run for it, we could."
"You thought of it all, you know that?"
He shrugged and she knew that this was probably the one time he hated having been right about everything. "S'what I do, darlin'."
She watched him then, following his eyes to the spot on the floor where some of the dirt from his shoes had landed.
"So what about the others? How many’ve you been able ta find?" she finally asked, unable to take the thick silence in the room any more than she could keep her curiosity at bay.
Marie knew from what she'd heard in the news before leaving the hotel that not everyone at the mansion was taken. She could only assume those that were left had gone home, sought refuge where ever they could.
"Eight. Mostly the older ones - it’s been a practice o’ theirs ta do away with the kids."
He hated telling her all this, hated the way her face fell, showing just how terribly her heart was breaking with each new revelation, but there wasn't any way around it. The world had changed drastically in the past eleven months, been thrown off its entire axis...and Marie hadn't even felt the tilt.
A tiny part of him wished that he'd taken her along with him, but most of him was glad that he hadn't. She didn't need to see any of the things he'd seen.
"Jubilee, Remy an’ Hank - found them in a station together. Upstate. Bobby an‘ St. John are with one another, too. Couldn‘t get an exact location on them, but I found ‘em in the same network I found the other three in, so they can‘t be too far away. Kurt - he‘s in Michigan, Detroit, with Warren. ‘Ro an’ Scott - they’re on the outside."
"Outside?"
"Yeah, they’re lettin’ some of ‘em go after they’ve done their...work. I haven’t been able to contact ‘Ro, but I found Scott."
"And?"
"Heard some stories, too."
"About what?"
"’Bout some o’ the mutants they’re releasin’ bein’ spies. Been brainwashed, micro-chipped an’ runnin’ surveillance once they get in on those cells I was tellin’ you about. Workin’ hand in hand with the telepaths - and the enemy."
He snorted out a growl and shook his head. "Damn sons o’ bitches. We ain’t good enough ta share a planet with, but we sure are good enough ta do their dirty work. Fuckers. Don’ even hafta lift a finger - all they gotta do is just press a button and we’re at their whim."
With that, he cut himself off, feeling that familiar rage starting to rumble beneath the surface. He didn’t wanna blow up here, not right in front of her. Yes, he was angry, but this wasn’t the time or the place to let it all out. The world had only witnessed the true fury of the Wolverine a few times during his realized existence, but the chance for it to be seen was coming again, and soon.
Marie resisted the urge to reach out to him again, to try her best to calm some of the frustration she could see etched clearly on his face. His ire was justified and she wanted to let him feel it. To try and soothe it all away would be like saying that it wasn't warranted and she didn't want that.
But instead of sitting around and stewing about it all while getting nothing done, Logan decided to kill two birds with one stone and put some work in on the side. He'd gotten a look at the backyard and catalogued some of the chores that still needed to be done on his way down the footpath, before Marie had collapsed.
He let his foot fall back down to the floor with a heavy clunk and clapped his hands down on his thighs, pushing himself up from the chair. "Look, kid, you need ta get some rest," he started, and she didn't miss the fact that he'd deliberately chosen that pet name to call her - it put her on a lower level than him and let her know that he wasn't in the mood for any arguing.
"I'm gonna go 'round back an' get some o' that shit taken care of. Take a nap and I'll wake you up for supper."
She wanted to argue, wanted to let him know that the iron ribbon in her spine that he'd always talked about hadn't rusted while he'd been gone. But she didn't. She read the situation for what it was - he wanted to get out and get some fresh air, vent a little through hard labor after everything that he'd just spilled to her.
"All right - make sure an' get me up, though. Don't go hoggin' all the food for yourself." She ended her mild rib with a wink and settled back down into the pillows a little further, thankful for the chance to actually take a break and have some work get done at the same time, but mostly just happy that he'd returned, like he'd promised he would.
She let her eyes linger on his back, his shoulders as he started to leave the room, taking the few, precious moments to savor the way his muscles played under the damp material of his t-shirt.
"Logan? Why isn't your hair growing back?" she asked suddenly, remembering the time he'd lost a bet and let her shave his head, knowing full-well that it’d be back to its normal length by early that same evening.
"You rest, all right, kid? I’ll finish up with the waterin’ an' stuff out back," he answered, not even bothering to hide the obvious dodge of the question.
"But -"
"Later, ‘kay? Just get some sleep an' we'll talk about it when ya wake up."
And with that, he disappeared through the doorway, pulling the curtain closed with a snap of his wrist.