Absently, Logan ran his fingers through Rogue’s hair as she slept. When he’d carried her out of the bathroom, he was intent on putting her back on the bed, but during their absence Wanda had sprawled herself across the entire bed and Logan did not want to have to wake her up and then deal with the ambush of questions.
So now he sat on the couch with Rogue lying across it with her head resting on his thigh as she finally appeared at peace as the sun started to rise in the distance. He hated how easily it still came to him, to take care of her despite the anger he felt towards her. He waited for the Wolverine to call him a pushover but it never came, the animal in him appeared content to have that which he considered his mate back in his possession but he could sense him simmering at the edge of his mind with a large amount of pent up energy he was straining to push back. The beast in him wanted her but he also knew that both the man and the animal were in agreement that something was to be done about her betrayal.
He was broken out of his thought process as Rogue sighed lightly, her forehead burrowing against his thigh. It was suddenly becoming an uncomfortable position as she moved against him. Cradling her head he prepared to move her when her eyes slowly opened and focused on him. There was a calmness in her gaze that hadn’t been there before.
“Feel better?” he murmured.
She nodded slowly. “Yes, thank you.”
“Good.”
Suddenly, he pushed her up so she was sitting on the couch and he stood up. She was thrown off by his abrupt actions but remained sitting.
“Since you’re feeling better, and I gave you something, it’s time you gave me answers in return.”
Slowly, she raised her head towards him, her eyes clouding over as she steeled her gaze, the mask of Rogue flashing across her face as she closed off her emotions sensing the sudden territory they were getting in.
“I see,” she remarked coolly.
Logan eyed the rest of the still sleeping occupants in the room.
“Not here.” Reaching over one of the chairs he slid his jacket on.
“Meet me at the diner down the road and leave a note for them,” he spoke over his shoulder as he opened the door.
“You’re not going to watch over me?” she asked in surprise.
“You’re not gunna run now, Rogue, not when I still have the other vial,” he answered with a feral look as he knew he had her trapped.
“Besides you should eat something with that drug running through your system.”
He closed the door before he could hear any attempts at a response.
Rogue spotted Logan reading one of the menus in the corner of the small restaurant.
“So what is this blackmail?” she asked as she sat in the seat across from him.
When he didn’t say anything she huffed in her seat and glanced around the room. Logan didn’t put the menu down until one of the older waitresses came over.
“What can I get ya?”
“I’ll take a number one with coffee,” he replied.
The woman scratched his order across her pad.
“And you miss?”
“A coffee,” Rogue replied.
Logan raised an eyebrow at her.
Sighing, she reached over for the menu and quickly browsed through it. “I’ll have a number three, thanks.”
The women nodded and walked away.
“How long?” Logan grunted.
Rogue stared at him in confusion. “How long what?”
“How long until you’ll need another dose?”
Leaning back, she rubbed the back of her neck self-consciously. “I don’t know. Maybe, a day, a week. It depends if anything triggers it. Before – well before I always had a well stocked supply, it didn’t matter so much.”
“And you were content to be dependent on it like that?”
“No, I wasn’t content, Logan,” she clenched her teeth.
The waitress suddenly came over and filled their cups with coffee with a lacklustre smile.
Logan reached down and picked his cup up as he glanced out the window.
“What can trigger it?”
She sighed as she leant forward and picked her coffee up.
“Heightened emotions and stress.”
Logan snorted and Rogue glared at him.
“What?”
“Seems to me two vials is definitely not going to be enough.”
Glaring at him she whispered through her teeth. “Fuck you.”
His eyes steeled at her words. “How far along was Hank in his research?”
“At last contact he said he was close to creating a serum that could help slow down the change to my mutation, where gradually I’d be able to adapt to each knew gift one at a time. A serum I could take at longer intervals that eventually and ideally would at one point no longer be needed.”
Playing with the handle of her cup of coffee she glanced at the table. “But seeing as how that was a few months ago and I haven’t been there for the tests I have no idea of its advancement.”
“You don’t think Hank has wondered why you may have disappeared off of the face of the earth?”
Rogue was quiet as she fiddled with the cup.
“No,” she whispered.
“No?” he echoed in disbelief.
“In the months leading up to my,” she hesitated. “My death, I wasn’t very reliable.”
She glanced up waiting for his retort but he was silent.
“But I suppose that could be said for some time before that.”
He was still quiet but his focus was on her.
“My behaviour was erratic and Hank said it was to be expected due to the changes brought on by my mutation. I was very discreet about our meetings and I was very discreet with Hank about particular events in my life. He wasn’t happy with my difficulties in fully co-operating but he told me despite everything he held a lot on our past ties and I believe he hoped if he was successful with me he’d magically fix me somehow, fix the problems with all of us and are relations with one another. I told him he was naïve. I told him not to have so much faith in me and well if sometimes I didn’t make a visit, he never spoke of it, he was always just relieved if I showed up the next time.”
For some reason an amount of bitterness tainted her words.
She watched Logan for a response and she hated how sometimes he could just be wall in a conversation, that he knew how to put even her on uneven ground with his silence.
“Hank always was optimist,” he spoke.
A sharp laugh escaped her in disbelief, a smile on her face but unshed tears in her eyes.
The waitress swept in suddenly with their plates and a refill on their coffees. Logan immediately began to eat his eggs and sausages. Slowly, she picked up her own fork and dug into her scrambled eggs around her side of toast.
They ate in silence for a few moments until Logan spoke again, his eyes still on his food.
“Tell me why the government is after you?”
Swallowing her last mouthful of eggs hard she eyed him from across the table.
“Last I checked the government wasn’t after me, the MRA act hasn’t been passed.”
He threw his fork down on his plate and narrowed his gaze on her.
“Stop mouthing off,” he snapped.
She raised her right eyebrow up at him in a familiar gesture.
“Fine,” he remarked. “Maybe the government, the government the public knows about isn’t after you, but someone with a lot of money, resources and man power is after you and frankly after running into them and being shot at, I’d like to know why.”
His dark eyes bore into her. “Is it because of your powers?”
“No,” she responded. “They – no one but Hank knew. Believe me these people have a lot of other stuff to occupy themselves with and I know how important it is to keep this development to my powers quiet.”
“So who are these people?”
Leaning forward she lowered her voice. “A private faction that is funded in parts by the government; dealing with the testing of mutants and what ever they please. But if you asked anyone about it they’d say it didn’t exist. Most of the government don’t even understand what they’re funding.”
“How the hell did you become involved with this, Rogue?” he demanded in disbelief. “Didn’t you have enough going on!”
“It wasn’t that simple.”
“It never is,” he retorted. “So what did you do to piss them off? The mutant woman, who was in charge of the group that came after us, said that her boss wanted to make sure his secrets stayed buried.”
“Mutant woman?”
“Yeah, dark short black hair, snake-like skin, sound familiar?”
“No,” she replied honestly.
“What about lots of men in black fatigues and guns?” he added sarcastically.
“Well, yah,” she responded despite his sarcasm. “One of them was probably who assassinated me.”
Logan’s smirk left his face immediately.
“A sniper from the roof, simple as that.”
“Rogue…” he began in a low whisper.
Gazing up at him she plastered a fake smile on her face.
“Doesn’t matter now.”
Logan’s fist clenched on top of the table. “The hell it does, Rogue,” he added with emotion. “It was cowardly but it’s not going to stop them, once they find out you’re alive…..you need help. Tell me what you know, so I can help you.”
“Why?” she asked quietly. “Why would you want to help me?”
“Damn it, Marie,” he whispered as he leant back. Shaking his head he looked away from her for a moment. “I don’t know…”
Rogue moved away a little.
“Let’s just go with past ties,” he murmured.
“Do you hate me?”
Moving his gaze back to her, he was surprised to see the sudden fragility in her gaze.
“I don’t know,” he replied honestly.
“I wouldn’t be surprised if you did,” she whispered.
Sighing, he leant forward across the table. “Right now, it doesn’t matter about that; it doesn’t matter when your life is on the line. I still made a promise long ago, before any of that shit that I would protect you.”
Rogue smiled tightly at him.
“I took something from one of their facilities,” she spoke suddenly.
“What?”
“I stole something important from The Director of the organization,” she answered, her eyes watching him keenly for some kind of response but he wasn’t sure what kind because he’s next obvious question was, “What did you take?”
“A weapon.”
“Jesus Christ, Marie, when did you become an arms dealer?”
“Look, Logan,” she started sternly. “It was weapon to be used against our kind and I couldn’t let it fall into the wrong hands.”
“So you decided all on your own to become a one-man mission. You could have contacted the X-Men.”
“No.”
“Logan,” she stressed. “It was important that it remained a protected secret.”
“At the cost of your life?!” he responded as his voice rose. “Did you forget you died because of this?”
“That was an unforeseen misfortune,” she replied coolly.
“Are you listening to yourself?”
Running a hand through his hair he took a deep breath before speaking again. “How did you even find out about it in the first place?”
“I accidentally touched a soldier who worked for the company and found the information in his memories.”
“Right,” he snorted. “Accidentally? You happened to run into a soldier and your power switched on.”
“I didn’t know he was a soldier, they do have other lives, he wasn’t dressed in fatigues, it was by chance, my powers were erratic.”
Her scent was fluctuating but he ignored it as her emotions were flaring up.
“Calm down, Rogue,” he instructed. “We don’t want a relapse until we get in contact with Hank.”
Glowering at him, she sat back in her chair.
“So what were you doing in Detroit then? It have something to do with this weapon, what did you do with it afterwards?”
“I was relocating it.”
“Not all your absences from your friends then were trips to Hank.”
“No,” she shook her head. “They were not.”
His lips thinned. “It’s pretty damn clear, you weren’t thinking straight at all.”
“You have no idea…”
“Tell me then. This weapon better be important enough. Risking your life like that,” he shook his head. “What the hell were you thinking?”
“I was thinking maybe for once I shouldn’t be such a selfish bitch,” she threw back in his face. Getting up she spotted Wanda, Pietro and Jaime outside the window.
“You’re going to have to tell your friends,” Logan responded steadily.
Ignoring his suddenly detached demeanour as he glanced at the paper on their table, she turned around and headed for the door in a huff.
“Rogue,” Jaime called out at her as she passed by them.
“Hey,” she murmured and kept walking.
“Wait,” Wanda suddenly spoke as she ran to catch up to Rogue and grabbed her shoulder.
“What?” Rogue snapped.
Wanda eyed her. “We need to talk.”
Sighing, Rogue’s shoulder’s sunk as she blocked her hostility towards the other woman.
“I know,” she responded and glanced at her friend with a small smile. “We will, can you just, just give me a moment.”
Wanda’s eyes narrowed and Rogue forced her smile to appear more easily. “Go have some breakfast and then will talk.”
Wanda didn’t budge but she did glance at the diner.
“I hear their waffles are really good and I know how much you like…”
“Stop it, Rogue,” Wanda interrupted. “I’m not blind you know, I know this isn’t easy for you but…”
“I know,” Rogue interjected with a guilty smile. “You deserve better, Wanda.”
“Good,” Wanda replied. “I’m glad you know that.”
Slowly a small smile found its way onto Wanda’s face.
“After breakfast though.”
Rogue nodded.
Wearily, Wanda threw her another small smile and made her way into the diner.
Rogue sighed as the tension built up in her shoulders again. She felt like she was trapped between a rock and more then one hard place as she glanced through the window at her friends and Logan.
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