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.
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