When Marie woke up it was already dark outside and she sat up abruptly remembering that she had to check on Victor. Her jostling out of bed and getting dressed woke Logan too. He sat up with a growl and studied her sleepily. They'd only gotten to sleep an hour ago after making love all afternoon.
"Baby, what're you doing? Come back to bed," he told her.
"I've got to check on – um – Tigger," she told him hurrying into her shoes now. Then she paused and looked over at him. "How'd you know about that anyway? I didn't tell you on the phone."
"Gumbo did when I got here and asked where you were. You named it Tigger?" Logan asked amusement lacing his tone. Then he glanced out the window and frowned. "Darlin, it's already dark out."
"I'll be fine, Logan," Marie flashed her bone claws at him to remind him she was nearly as indestructible as he was nowadays. He didn't look impressed. "Sugar, he needs his bandages checked and some supper. It won't take me long."
He studied her a moment longer then sighed and laid back down. "Fine but if you're gone longer than an hour I'm coming to get you," he told her.
"I won't be that long," Marie assured him on her way out.
Marie made her way to the cave with supper and some fresh medical supplies for Victor five minutes later. A guilty feeling was knotting her stomach at not telling Logan the truth about her 'wildcat' right away but honestly she didn't see him taking the news well at first and Victor deserved at least a fighting chance when Logan confronted him. Given the brothers' history of violence with each other the likelihood of it coming to blows between them was high.
Victor was asleep when she came in, or she thought so anyway, so she tried to be as quiet as possible while she laid out his food and the other supplies then replenished the smoldering fire. That she let so much time pass between visits that his fire was down that low made another feeling of guilt appear on top of the one she already had about keeping him secret from Logan.
"I take it the reunion went well," Victor's voice startled her making her let out a short scream and jump then whirling to face him. He gave her a grin so wicked he should have gone up in smoke, lying there wide awake and watching her. "You are drenched in Jimmy's scent and well -,"
"Yes, I know," Marie snapped blushing furiously. "There's no need to point it out. Mind your manners, Tigger."
He scowled at her then. "Why do you keep calling me that stupid name? What the hell is a tigger?"
A mischievous grin came over her face and she shook her head before kneeling down beside him to examine his wounds. "You should be all healed up in a few days," she murmured almost to herself. "Most of these don't even need bandages anymore. They're scabbing over and most of the stitches have fallen out."
"You've done a good job," Victor agreed.
She got up and gave him his supper while she heated some water to bathe him with and injected him with another shot of penicillin just in case. After he'd gotten his sponge bath and was dressed in fresh clothes she'd snagged from Pete again and laying on clean blankets, she packed up to leave.
"Where's Jimmy?" Victor asked her as she was about to go. "You've barely said a word about him the whole time you've been here tonight."
"I didn't tell him about you yet," Marie admitted quietly.
"Honey, that ain't the way to go about this. You're his mate now, he took you today when he got home, didn't he?" he asked and she nodded. "You can't keep this from him. Don't worry about me if that's what bothers you. I can handle Jimmy. Talk to him about when you go back and bring him back with you in the morning."
"Logan's gonna be mad at me," she sighed in defeat shaking her head and dropping down to sit on a rock nearby. "We just got it all in the open about our feelings and then we made love all afternoon and it was perfect, Victor. You can't imagine how perfect it was. But now it's like there's this big Tigger-shaped cloud hanging over me twisting my stomach up in knots because I told him I was looking after a wildcat I found injured in the woods and not one of his most hated enemies, no offense. He's just gonna be so mad at me. I mean, I only did it 'cause you're his brother and you could tell him about his past so he won't have to go off looking for it anymore. Then I got to know you a little and you love Logan, not as much as I do because no one's gonna love Logan as much as I do, but you do care and then you told me about Anna and I don't know what to do."
Victor just stared at her astonished that she got all that out without taking more than one breath. Then he tried to think of what to say to make her feel better. She had a point. Jimmy was gonna be pissed that she kept this from him but he'd get over it. He cleared his throat and she looked at him expectantly.
"Jimmy will get over it," he said simply. She just stared at him a minute then nodded slowly and stood up and picked up her bag again. Victor frowned. "What? He will. He may be pissed but he'll get over it. He loves you."
"You don't get it," Marie shook her head. "Trust and honesty is everything to Logan. I may not have outright lied to him because you are catlike and big and you were injured but I omitted some pretty big details. We're 'finally' together. What if he gets so mad he changes his mind about us?"
"That won't happen, honey," Victor shook his head. "Worst comes to worse, he'll just chop my head off, pace around and growl at you, maybe sulk in his beer a few days then he'll be right back to dragging you to bed every chance he gets. He's less of an animal than me I'll admit but Logan's still ridiculously easy to please and his animal is predictable as hell. You're Wolverine's mate. There's no 'changing your mind' after the claiming and that's what happened this afternoon. You'll be his and he'll be yours the rest of your lives. There will never be another for either of you. Any man who tried to touch you from this day forward he'd kill him and he'll expect you to protect your territory just the same. You feel in love with a feral, darlin and from what I can tell you got some of it in you too. Once we meet our mate then we're committed for life."
Marie was quiet a moment then closed one fist and let out her bone claws. Victor stiffened and met her eyes with shock reflecting in his. She smiled sadly and explained, "I've absorbed him so often that my DNA restructured itself. I got these and his healing factor and some feral senses but they're not as strong as Logan's or yours either probably. My animal's not much different from Logan's Wolverine. I call her Rogue for lack of a better name and because well, it was already my code name anyway. She can be a selfish bitch sometimes but not about Logan. He's our mate. I'd die for him.
She paused and looked away a moment then met his eyes again with a hard glint in hers. Her voice was harder too as she said, "I have killed for him too. That's how I absorbed Carol Danvers. She had Logan down during a mission and beaten so badly. She was about to break his head off his neck, I got that later from her thoughts, when I rushed her and grabbed hold of her face. Then I couldn't let go. I killed her, took her into me completely and got her invulnerable skin and flight and strength powers. You should have been around while I trying to lock her away in my head and then learn to use her powers. She tried to take over my body, did a couple times too before they locked me in a cell in the med bay and the Professor and Logan helped me get her under control. You'd have found the powers thing funny, though. I crash landed through the roof and two floors one day right into Scott's Calculus class. Then another time I went to open the fridge and pulled the door right off. Logan helped me get control of the strength thing and Ro helped me with the flying." She retracted her claws when she finished then walked away into the night without another word.
Victor just lay there a while wondering why she had trusted him enough to share all that. He was glad she had but at the same time she had to know that he was still dangerous no matter how he felt about her and Logan. They were pack and he wouldn't want to cause them permanent harm but they were still enemies fighting on different sides. Magneto would have given his right arm for the information she had just given him. They had all wondered what the repercussions had been regarding the incident with Danvers. He hadn't liked the bitch but she had been working for the Brotherhood so they were technically allies.
He was glad about the healing and claws she got from Jimmy, though. That meant she actually had a chance at staying alive and keeping his brother happy. She wouldn't die on him the way Anna had or grow old and do something stupid. Maybe, he thought, just maybe it was time to rethink where his allegiances belonged. If Rogue could help him square things with Jimmy then he might be willing to join the X-Men instead of sticking with the Brotherhood. He still couldn't stand their do-gooder attitudes and he'd like sharpen his claws on that little uptight shit Cyclops but he'd tolerate it if it meant him and Jimmy would be okay again. Plus, he was curious to find out what was gonna happen between Jimmy and his mate.
When Marie got back to the bedroom Logan was still asleep sprawled naked in the sheets. She smiled and undressed then went to take a shower. She wasn't in there five minutes when Logan slipped in behind her and wrapped his arms around her kissing her wet skin on her shoulder.
"I thought you were sleeping, sugar," she said smiling.
"I was but I heard you turn the shower on," Logan murmured between kisses. Soon he had her up against the shower wall, her legs around his waist and fucking her hard and deep in an excruciatingly slow rhythm that had her legs shaking before she came screaming his name so loud it should have shattered the glass in the room. He followed her over the edge growling with primal satisfaction and coming deep inside her.
"Christ, Logan, you're way too good at that," she told him breathlessly as they calmed down. The water had gone cold so they turned it off and got out. They recovered fast thanks to their healing factors but she was still tired from their afternoon session and then tending to Victor so she just collapsed on the bed when they left the bathroom.
He got in beside her and looked down at her propped up on an elbow. "Tired, baby?" he asked.
She nodded and yawned but said, "Yeah but I need to talk to you about something. You're not gonna like it."
"We're not going back to the way we were," he growled darkly.
Marie saw the feral look in his eyes and shook her head quickly sitting up to face him. "No, sugar, it's not about you and me. We're fine, better than fine even. You and I are perfect, Logan."
"Then what is it?" he asked allowing himself to relax a little now. "I don't really give a shit about much else at the moment."
"That's sweet, baby but you will this," she said laughing sadly. Taking a deep breath then letting it out she met his eyes and said, "My injured wildcat is actually Victor Creed."
"Sabretooth," Logan's dark glare returned and he sat up looking at her with warring emotions of shock, anger and a little betrayal and hurt mixed in. "Why, baby?"
"Because he told me he's your brother and that he would tell you all about your past if I helped him heal up. He went up against a couple of those new Sentinels and they nearly killed him. Something about their metal makes the healing factor slow down and he needed help," she explained. "He said your full name is James Logan Howlett and he's your older half brother. I told him he'd have to tell you the rest in person. He wasn't lying, Logan. And he cares about you. I know that's hard to believe considering how much he likes fighting with you but I've talked to him a lot the past few days and he does care about you a lot. I wouldn't have helped him if he wasn't your brother, Logan. I'm sorry I didn't tell you right away but you weren't here when it started and Scott and the others wouldn't care if he was related to you or could help you with your memories or not. They'd just kill him or lock him up. Then when you did get here there wasn't time and when I went back tonight I hesitated because – I didn't want you to be mad at me and I didn't know how to explain."
"Where is he?" Logan asked finally after a long silence.
"In the cave by the creek that you showed me," Marie told him. "He wants me to bring you with me in the morning when I take him breakfast. He said he'll tell you anything you want to know, Logan. And he hasn't tried to hurt me or anything. He said he knew I was your mate when he first saw me during the whole Liberty Island, Magneto kidnapping me thing. He actually apologized for that if you can believe it."
"Marie," he said getting her attention. She looked at him fearfully nervous but he just reached out and pulled her into his arms and held her close. "It's okay, baby. I'm not mad at you exactly, now that I know why you did it. You did it for me, because you love me and want to help me, and I can understand that. And you're right about the others. They wouldn't have cared if he's my brother or not. He has tried to kill them all at one time or another. But you and me are fine, baby. I love you."
"I love you too, Logan, so much," she whispered wrapping her arms around his neck and burying her face there. He kissed her temple and tightened his embrace. After a few moments she leaned back and looked at him. "What are you gonna do?"
He let out a deep sigh and frowned thoughtfully. Then he shook his head, "I don't know yet, baby. Do I want all the answers he could probably give me? Yeah, I do. But what's he gonna want for them? You said he's almost healed up. Once that happens he can go on his way whether he's kept his word to you about me or not. There won't be much we could do to stop him. But tonight, I think we'll just sleep on it and then I'll go with you in the morning and talk to him. It's all I can think to do right now."
"I am pretty tired," she agreed yawning again. "I don't think I'd have the energy to referee a fight between you two tonight."
Logan chuckled and kissed her gently. "Baby, if he and I start fighting you just stay out of the way altogether. Anything happened to you and I would kill him. That I promise you," he told her. "Now, let's go to bed and get some sleep."
The next morning Marie awoke to find Logan sitting up against the headboard and pillows beside her, wide awake and brooding. She knew what had to be on his mind of course and knew he likely heard her waking up with his senses so she just waited silently for him to say whatever was on his mind. You couldn't rush Logan when it came to talking. If he had something important to say then he'd say it when he got his thoughts in order and not a moment sooner. Pushing him only led to him shutting down on you.
Logan knew she was awake. He'd heard her heartbeat and breathing change from sleep to waking a few moments before. He had been awake since before dawn trying to decide what to do about Sabretooth and so far he had come up a big fucking zero in the idea department. That left only one thing to do and he'd never done it with anyone else before in all his remembered history. He was gonna ask someone's opinion. And of course, the only person he trusted enough to value their opinion was Marie.
"What do you think I should do?" Logan asked, his voice startling her a little bit coming out of such a long silence. He looked over at her lying beside him and she met his gaze with a puzzled frown so he sighed and explained, "I know I don't – haven't ever really –asked anyone their opinion before, mainly because I could always make my own decisions and didn't give a fuck what anybody thought of it. But I've been up for the past few hours thinking about this and I don't know what to do. Tell me what you think I should do, Marie. I trust you."
"Well, sugar, it's a hard one I'll admit," Marie sighed scooted up a little rested her head on his chest, an arm thrown over his torso. His arms came to rest around her naturally. "I don't think you should go in spoiling for a fight with him for one thing. He is still injured after all so it wouldn't really be fair. And maybe you shouldn't hold it against him how often you've fought each other before, like on missions and stuff. I mean, you can't tell me that you don't enjoy it. I'll even venture to say you look forward to it. I've heard you more than once on the jet talking about how you can't wait to "smack that big kitty around"."
Logan chuckled and nodded. "You've got a point there," he conceded. "It's always challenge to go up against him."
"But you've never 'really' tried to kill each other," she pointed out. "Why is that? You think the animal in you recognizes each other as pack? I know he knew you were his brother so it's likely he's never really tried but you didn't."
"There's been something familiar about him that nagged at me but I never could place it. The only time we were in each other's company was during a fight and our brawls tend to get interrupted because of some reason or another," Logan admitted thoughtfully. Then he sighed and shook his head running his fingers up and down her back idly. "I guess I'm just wondering if I really want to know everything he has to tell me. There's darkness in me, Marie. I can feel it and it's not just the animal. I'm capable of things no good man should be. I know you love me despite it but it's still there. What if I'm better off not knowing what kind of man I was?"
"I don't believe that and from some of the things he's told me, no don't give me that look because I'm gonna tell you he is, then you have always been you," Marie said firmly.
"What did he tell you?" he asked despite her previous warning. She huffed and sat up to glare at him.
"It's nothing bad about you, Logan. He told me about a woman you knew a long time ago," she said quietly looking down at her hands in her lap now. "She was very special to you. And when I say a long time ago, I mean like during the Civil War."
"Christ, how old am I?" he asked shocked by that admission.
"I don't know, he didn't tell me that," Marie shook her head sadly then moved to straddle his lap and took his face in her hands to make him look at her. "Logan, no matter how old you are or what you've done I will still love you. We're mated now. There's no going back from that. So I don't want you to worry about that. Besides, I'm a healing feral now too so it's looking like we're gonna be together a very long time."
Logan nodded, kissed her then wrapped her in his arms. After a few moments of just holding each other he sighed and said, "Well, I guess we need to go take Tigger his breakfast then."
She started laughing and leaned back to look at him. He grinned wickedly back at her. "I wanna see his face when you call him that," she managed to get out through her giggles.
"I can't believe you call him that. It was Yellow that came up with that nickname for him," Logan shook his head laughing with her.
"She said it only made sense since sabretooths were a kind of tiger and Tigger is a tiger, plus he does like to pounce first and ask questions later like Tigger does too," Marie pointed out. Then she laughed again and told him, "He doesn't know what it means. He keeps asking me what a tigger is."
Logan was still smiling about it when they were packing up breakfast for Victor twenty minutes later. He hadn't laughed that hard in a while. It was gonna be funny when ol' Vic found out that he'd been nicknamed after a bouncy, enthusiastic cartoon tiger by the entire junior X-Men team and some of the senior ones. Logan really hoped he didn't try to gut Jubilee for it. Hell, she called him Wolvie and he had managed to restrain himself, mostly, so far anyway.
He and Marie had already had their shower, some quick shower sex, gotten dressed and had their breakfast. Now they were packing up Victor some eggs, bacon, sausage and biscuits and a Thermos of coffee to take out to him. Logan was still apprehensive about the confrontation that was to come but he figured with Marie there and Victor still injured there was less likely a chance they'd get into a fight. It was still hard to digest Sabretooth being his brother, though, and that part about him being around during the Civil War.
It was still pretty early and a Saturday so no one was up yet but them which was good. Logan wasn't looking forward to the 'talk' he knew would be coming at him from Scooter and the rest of them about him and Marie's new relationship status. It wasn't any of their fucking business to tell the truth and he planned on pointing that out but he had more important things to do this morning than argue with One-Eye.
"Okay, sugar, we're all set," Marie declared closing the fridge and turning to him. She had the food in plastic containers to keep it warm and he was carrying the coffee as they made their way into the woods. She really hoped Logan and Victor were able to keep their tempers and pride in check today.
Victor woke when he heard their footsteps approaching. Testing the scents he relaxed recognizing it was Rogue and Jimmy. So she had told him. He was proud of her for going through with it. He hoped Jimmy hadn't taken it badly. He couldn't smell any salt from tears so at least she hadn't been crying. He did smell food though and he was glad because he felt like he could eat a horse this morning.
Rogue's step didn't falter at all when she neared the cave, having visited Victor so often before, but Logan's did. His step turned cautious and Victor could understand it. Even if she'd told him about their brotherly status Jimmy still didn't remember him and they'd been enemies for years now. He'd have been disappointed if his little brother was walking into the situation too trustingly. Their instincts had taught them to always err on the side of caution and that had gotten them out of more bad situations than he could count.
"Morning, Tigger," Marie said giving him a bright smile as she walked over and started laying out his meal. Logan bit his tongue to keep from laughing at the petulant scowl Victor gave her.
"One day I'm gonna find out what that means," Victor muttered under his breath. Then he looked at his brother standing nearby watching him silently. "How ya been, Jimmy? I hear you finally pulled your head out of your ass and claimed your mate. Took you long enough."
"Now, don't you go starting an argument first thing, Victor," Marie said sternly giving him a light warning smack on his arm then handing him his food. "That's between me and Logan."
"I was just congratulating him on his decision to stop being a dumbass, darlin," Victor gave her a look far too innocent than he should have been capable of. She didn't look impressed, just raised a disbelieving brow at him, so he shrugged and turned his attention back to Jimmy. "Where were you anyway, little brother?"
"North," Logan answered gruffly then sat down on a rock nearby watching Marie give Victor his breakfast and check his bandages. "Rogue said you have some answers I've been looking for."
"Yeah, I could probably tell you everything you want to know about your past before you got the claws and even how you got them. I doubt Stryker was very forthcoming when you ran into him at Alkali Lake that time," Victor nodded. Then he gave Logan a calculating look and asked, "Do you really want to know everything, though? You were never as bad as me but you weren't a saint either, particularly after you lost Anna."
"Is Anna the woman you told Rogue about?" he asked. Victor nodded. "Who was she?"
"Rogue didn't give you the details?" Victor asked glancing over at Marie who shook her head.
"I told you that you had to be the one to tell him," she reminded Victor.
"Get him the picture then," he said in a resigned voice. He didn't want to tell this story again. It was hard enough to get it all out the first time. After Marie got the picture from his wallet and handed it to Logan though, he did just that. He recounted everything that he had told Rogue before and watched Logan stare at the photo in his hands with a look of shock, awe, sadness and disbelief as he did so. When he finished Logan looked at him for the first time in years without hate or murder in his eyes. Victor was shocked at how relieved he was by that.
"How old are we?" Logan asked him finally.
"You were born in 1832, me in 1829," Victor told him, "In British Columbia near the East Kootenay Valley. Your mother's name was Elizabeth and her husband, your father's name that raised you was John Howlett. Our father's name was Thomas Creed. We got our mutations from him."
"Is he still alive?" Logan asked and Victor shook his head. "I thought we couldn't die."
"He got drunk one night and fell asleep on a train track, cut his head clean off when it came through," Victor explained. "That happened in 1952. I guess we can't get up from that. We aged naturally until around twenty-five or thirty and then it just stopped. The senses and the claws, yours were bone like Rogue's are before Stryker put the metal on you, and all the feral stuff didn't kick in until around twelve years old. You got real sick just before it hit you, just like it did with me, running a high fever and everything. Your ma thought you were dying but I knew you weren't because I'd already been through it. There was a fight that night in your house. Our father came to get me and wanted to see you too. He was talking to your ma about you and them and your other dad Mr. Howlett overheard them and got into it with Pa. Pa killed him and you went into a rage and drove your claws into Pa's stomach then took off shocked and scared at what you'd done, what you'd become. I followed you. We took off together and looked after each other for a long time after that, right up until the 1980s in fact."
"What about the wars? I get nightmares sometimes about them," Logan asked. "Sometimes it's just flashes and sometimes they're clearer."
"We fought in the Civil War like I mentioned before, you hated Sherman by the way, called his methods with the civilians down South barbaric. Let's see, then there was the time we joined the Rough Riders with Teddy Roosevelt. That was kinda fun. Next was the First World War. What a waste of four years that was. We were bored as hell sitting in those fucking trenches. The French girls were nice, though, and the wine too. We must have hit every brothel from Calais to Nice by the time we were done with them," Victor smirked evilly at the look of disgust Marie gave him for that tidbit of knowledge and Logan was looking a bit uncomfortable too. Victor figured he might be having this conversation around his sweet and still fairly innocent young mate.
Continuing Victor said, "We went and joined the French Foreign Legion after that and played around in North Africa and the Middle East for a while during the 1920s and 30s. It was fun I guess. Morocco was okay. Europe was a bit too tense at the time with the Nazis on the rise and all. Neither of us could stand them and we were only too willing to join up and fight them when the Second World War started. That one was definitely my favorite. We were never bored, killed a lot of people, and hell even saved some. They kept transferring us to different units but we fought with the British Army most of the time. The Americans didn't come into it until Pearl Harbor got bombed in 41 and didn't even enter Europe until D-Day in 44. That was a bloody few days there. We were on the first wave on the beaches. Those fucking tin cans they had us in were suicidal and the Nazis were more than prepared. I still don't know how the others made it. You and I both had more bullet holes in us that we could count. They sent us to the Pacific not long after Berlin was seized and the Germans surrendered. The Japanese took longer. We stayed there a while in Japan when the war ended. I didn't really care for it but you loved it; the culture and the food and yeah, the women, too. We learned some new fighting styles there, though and trained under an old samurai in one of the mountain villages. He said I was hopeless because my animal was too restless to find the calm needed for the meditations and katas but you excelled at it. Then of course, came Vietnam and it was really my fault we did that one. I had gotten so fucking bored in Japan and all that I practically dragged you to the recruiting office to sign up for it. We were back in the States by then anyway. You had run into some trouble after sleeping with the fiancée of one of a prominent Japanese family's young men. He challenged you to a duel, you won and killed him and we got the hell out of the country. They'd all be old or dead by now though. She wasn't worth the trouble, Yukio or Yoshi or whatever the hell her name was. I forget. I told you she was trouble but you didn't listen. Anyway, it wasn't till Vietnam that I got out of control and yeah I admit it, I did lose control. It was so easy to let the animal out there, though, with the humans acting just as badly, even worse than I was all around us. And I'd been good for too long, hadn't been up to any trouble or killing at all in Japan or the States and we skipped the Korean War altogether. I got us into trouble one day at a village just south of Cambodia though, murdered a couple of village girls and then killed an officer who tried to stop me. You killed another soldier, both were on our side, defending me and we both got sentenced to execution by firing squad. Well, it didn't kill us and that's when William Stryker came into our lives. He offered us a place on a special unit for soldiers that had 'abilities' and we took it and went to work for him. Then there was a thing at a village in Africa in 79 and you decided you'd had enough, just dropped your gun and walked off leaving me behind with them. I stayed with Stryker but the unit disbanded not long after you left. I started rounding up other mutants for him taking them a place on Three Mile Island in the Gulf and at Alkali Lake up north. He didn't let you go entirely, though. Stryker sent a mutant woman named Kayla Silverfox to get close to you, keep tabs on you until he was ready to bring you into the Weapon X program. See, you were always his favorite. He saw the potential in you to become the perfect weapon but he couldn't control you. This girl, God I hated the bitch for her part in playing you, made you fall in love with her. Her mutation was tactile suggestion. If she touched your skin she could influence you, get you to do whatever she wanted or said. I hated her too because I felt like you were betraying Anna being with her like that. You'd had other women since Anna died but you never loved them. They hadn't mattered to you really. I shouldn't have helped Stryker with his plan to get to you, Jimmy. I had some conflicting feelings about it. On the one hand I felt like you'd betrayed me, abandoning me like you did in Africa, so I wanted to get you back for that. On the other hand, you're my brother and we'd looked out for each other for over a century by then, nearly two.
Victor paused then and thought how best to tell the next part. Marie had moved to sit next to Logan on the large flat rock nearby and he knew both were waiting for him to continue. Finally he decided to just to put it all out there. "When Stryker got ready for you to be part of the program, we staged Kayla's death at my hands. I caught her on the road between your house and where you were working as a lumberjack in the Canadian Rockies, injected her with something to stop her heart and breathing imitating death, then sliced open a bag of her blood we had on hand all over her body to make it look like I'd kill her. I even clawed up her car and left a dead wolverine for you to find in the woods nearby. You wanted my head after that and it was just what Stryker wanted. You found Stryker and he offered to give you the tools you needed to defeat me. You agreed and that's when they put the adamantium into you. He promised to do it to me too but the tests showed I wouldn't have survived the procedure like you did. But somehow you overheard them talking while you were in the tank about how they were gonna wipe your memories so that he could control you like he did later with Wade and you lost it, got out and escaped with brand new shiny, indestructible claws. They went after you. A couple of farmers got killed and you told Stryker you were coming for him when you realized you'd been played. They moved from Alkali Lake to Three Mile Island for good after that. That's where you found us later; me, Stryker and a very alive Kayla. Stryker had finished Wade by then who was now Deadpool or Weapon XI and set him after you. I fought with you against him after I found out Stryker had played me too and I wasn't gonna get the operation he promised me. We tore that facility apart between the two of us fighting with Wade. You and I said our goodbyes after Wade lost his head so I don't know exactly what happened after that except I heard Stryker had been found walking up and down the island aimlessly with bloody feet and Kayla's dead body was found near where we destroyed that silo by the beach. I do know that Stryker had a gun fitted with adamantium bullets. If he managed to get a shot or two into your head it would explain the memory damage you have now. And I know Kayla died of a gunshot wound so he might have done that too. I highly doubt it was you. You'd have used your claws. I'm not sorry she's dead, though. And that was the last I saw of you until the thing with Rogue and Liberty Island. I didn't look my best then, I admit, letting the beard and hair grow out like that. And we hadn't really had time to talk since being as we usually set straight to fighting. There're more stories I could tell you about the years we've been around but that could take weeks, maybe months even."
Logan was quiet a long time after he finished, digesting all that information. All this time the one person who could give him all the answers he needed had been right there as his enemy. It was a lot to take in. He felt Marie put a hand on his back and rub it soothingly then rest her chin on his shoulder wanting to comfort him. He wound an arm around her waist and gave her a reassuring squeeze before he cleared his throat and looked at his brother.
"If I talked Chuck into letting you stay at the school, would you make an effort to mind your manners and not hurt anyone?" Logan asked seriously.
Victor considered that a moment then gave Logan a firm nod. "I've been thinking that it might be time to change my allegiance but I still don't agree with everything the X-Men do, Jimmy. For you and your girl there, though, I'd try," he told him honestly.
"Well," Logan said standing up and Marie stood up with him, "I guess we need to go have a chat with Chuck then. We'll be back."
Victor nodded and watched them go. He was sort of relieved to have gotten all that out but he knew Jimmy'd have more questions later. Well, whatever he could tell him he would. And maybe with Jimmy and Rogue there then it wouldn't be so bad being a good guy for a change. He hoped, anyway.
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