Chapter 18: Now

Electrical impulses. Sparks triggered in the brain to the nerves to the muscles, the neurons firing along. Movement wasn’t so complex until you thought about it, the dozens of chemical reactions taking place to even lift a finger. Maybe that was why, Logan thought, he hadn’t summoned up the will to move. He hadn’t even set eyes on the lake yet, but he knew, deep down, something was wrong.

The feeling had started when he had decided to pull the tired, faithful Bronco off the road quietly onto a bed of pine needles in a relatively decent clearing. Logan knew it was another two or three-mile hike from the roadside to the lake, but he didn’t want the Bronco going anywhere near it. The engine fell quiet and then died as Logan sat there, scarred hands still tightly gripping the leather of the steering wheel, watching his now visible breath flow out in the quickly fading heat of the Bronco’s cabin. In front of him there was only wilderness, a thick snarl of dense pine and oak and cedar and larch. Even in the Bronco, he could smell it, among the fading scents of dying shrubs, wax current and juniper and chokecherry. The wind was kicking up, and there it was: the nitrogen dioxide, the telltale hints of crystallized water. Since Logan had parked the car, he realized it had begun to snow. As tiny intricate patterns of ice pressed themselves gently onto the windshield of the Bronco, Logan helplessly watched the lingering warmth of the car melt them into liquid in the dew of the growing light. Snow was something he had been desperate, eager, excited to show Laura. And now, here it was, snowing, and here he was, without her.

Logan had driven blindly north through the night, the light thrown across the black pavement racing toward him as he sped down roads ascending once more into the Canadian Rockies. He hadn’t slept more than six or seven hours in almost four days. Almost four days since she had been missing. Jesus. Exhaustion began eating at him early on, and he cursed his stubborn, fading health as his eyes struggled to stay open. Finally, Logan had unsheathed a claw and had shallowly scraped it across one thigh, carefully avoiding his femoral and anything that would cause him to overly bleed, the stinging pain forbidding sleep. It had worked in keeping his eyes open, and as he got closer to Alkali, rising paranoia did the rest of the job. Was he going to get any closer? Was coming back here part of the search to rescue her or some masochistic urge to settle a score that had already been settled, but then undone, with the jump in time? How the fuck was he going to go up against dozens and dozens of people like this? He had a handgun, adamantium claws that were only effective in a range of about eight feet, and a spent healing factor that wasn’t likely to do him any more good. And, meanwhile, the lead was still thin. It had felt so promising when he had left Kelowna, but now… now.

Fucking electrical impulses. The snow had picked up and was falling in sheets, and he knew if he didn’t leave soon, he wouldn’t be able to manage the hike up to the lake all that easily. Instead of getting out of the car, though, his muscles had him reaching once more for a plastic bottle of whiskey that he had thrown up on the dash earlier. One more nip then, before he set out. Before, maybe, he didn’t come back.

Te amo, papa. That was what she had said, her voice small and light, two evenings before she had disappeared. He hadn’t even thought of the memory again until this moment. Her voice, calling in the night. Laura, his own blood. A young girl in a red coat bouncing a ball off a dilapidated motel wall, stopping as the limo’s tires had driven up into the parking lot. The girl he had tried to leave behind in the smelting plant with the Reavers under the scorching Mexico sun. The girl he sloughed off, screamed at, his temper boiling in rage at every turn at her damn insistence to stick with him, so much of himself mirrored back in her face, in her movements. But then, he had lost Charles, she had lost the others. They both drove away from North Dakota with no one but each other, and the very things he saw within her that had reminded him of himself had become the reasons he now sworn to protect her. Until now. Until…. he had fucking squandered it. Lost it. Again.

Laura, the second person in the world he remembered murmuring those words to him. Te amo. I love you. It was probably because he was near delirious from the lack of sleep, his mental defenses no longer working properly, but in the quiet moments of the past few nights, memories of them both had begun whispering to him once more. Marie’s gentle hush, the feel of her massaging a sore notch in his spine. The worried look, the telltale concern, as she discovered another small scar from a wound that hadn’t healed quite right. And then, after it had all ended, Laura, the fierce creature, that fiery spirit, willing and ready to bring the world to its knees if she needed to. Marie had died that day in Westchester, and then Laura had…moved something within him. Something he had considered long since departed along with the woman he had loved. He hadn’t dwelled, hadn’t thought…and yet. Laura had done it. Laura had done it.

And now, here he was, back at the beginning. Nothing more than an animal, at the mercy of the pine and the juniper and the snow and his fucking instincts. Alone. But, then again….

“Marie?” he impulsively whispered to the darkness.

….

“Marie,” he said again, his voice trembling.

….

“God damn it. I know you’re there, baby,” he growled.



Nothing. Nothing but the thoughts in his own damn mind.

“Fuck. Ah, fuck!” he shouted, throwing a fist hard into the Bronco’s steering wheel. And then he was desperately reaching for the bottle, polishing off the rest of the liquor, and then fishing for it and found it dutifully waiting for him as ever, at the very bottom of his coat pocket. His hand shook as he brought it out. The metal glinted in his outstretched palm, winking at him as the early dawn light reflected off of its surface. It rolled lightly across his scarred hand, hands that had forcefully brought so many electrical impulses, so many biological choruses to so many brutal ends. Death was not something quiet, something that was gently snubbed out. A life, any life, was ruthless, demanding to exist, and it was only with force and a perverse sort of power that you could end it. His life, too, was like any other. It would take more than most.

He had discovered the adamantium bullet in his room after the jump, and knew it for what it was. It had traveled with him, after Westchester, after Mexico, after Oklahoma, into Hay River. Devotedly it followed him, an obedient companion, an ugly reminder. Logan could feel the Wolverine inside drowsily snarl from the spot where the animal lay, offering up a quiet, mild disgust; the very thought of suicide was unnatural, nothing the tired animal could understand, despite all the same hurt the Wolverine felt at the grief of what they had both lost. But the man… It wasn’t the first time Logan had dreamt of ending his life. Hell, he had tried, even, when he was younger and more stupid, all to no avail.

What did it feel like, to be lost somewhere in the void between humanity and not? How did it feel to lose those you most loved, over and over again, drifting somewhere far off in space, on the verge of a dead star? He hadn’t been meant to love. Wasn’t built for it. A brand that sticks. And yet, it had found him. For precious, brief stints of time, it had found him.

With this in mind, he put the bullet back in his coat pocket and resigned himself to open the car door. It was the sound of a telltale crunch as his boots pressed down into the rapidly accumulating snow, as he climbed out of the Bronco and slammed the door shut. He turned, staring back at the old thing for a moment, giving it its due. The car had witnessed Charles’ burial from afar. Had witnessed the moment Laura had seen Logan collapse, eager for something to end out on that open highway. And then, later, when he and Laura had made their way on their own, all the way to Hay River. How many countless trips to the grocery store, to Laura’s school, to the lake house, that damn place Logan had been so blindly intent on making his own?

He took one last look at the Bronco, bidding it farewell with a slight nod of his head before he set off quickly in the silent snow, headed for Alkali, headed for something, for nothing, a potential end, another lead, the last answer, or perhaps, maybe, a final resting place.



--

The dam was out of view for most of the hike, nestled as it had always been on the base of the lake. Through another steep climb up a hill, though, Logan had really gotten his first decent view accidentally. He had stopped for a moment, leaning up against a tree while he suffered through another goddamn coughing attack. He had been apathetically staring at a spattering of fresh blood blooming red on the freshly-fallen snow, when he looked up, and saw it.

Alkali, remade. Suddenly restored, as if the X-Men hadn’t fought so hard to destroy it, as if Jean hadn’t sunk to her grave in the lake’s watery depths. The sun was truly rising now, but with the snow still falling and the sky overcast, the dam was nothing more than a grey smudge on a white landscape, the rest of the color drained out of the frame.

The feeling that something was not right had not subsided, and upon seeing the dam that very same feeling intensified. If this was still a processing plant, it sure as hell didn’t look like one. It looked like a fucking dam, which was what it was, and if Linda had been describing the same spot correctly like she had insisted there must have been somewhere for ignorant assholes like Carl to park their cars. For another, Logan was picking up a similar feeling to what he had felt at Two Rivers when he had accidentally happened upon it with Laura several weeks ago. A ghostly quiet. An eerie calm. It was as if the place knew Logan’s same secret: that, even though it still existed, it should have no longer.

Begrudgingly, his tired mind began rehashing his shitty excuse for a plan, as he started again towards the base of the lake, still intent on staking the place out. He knew the facility like he knew his own mind, not only from his time with the X-Men here but also after the worst of his memories returned to him, seen mostly through the Wolverine’s eyes as he had been experimented on. He knew the only way covertly inside from this direction would be through the spillway doors, and he hoped they still worked. The spillway mechanism farthest to the right, Logan realized, was still fairly accessible from his side of the lake, and it wouldn’t take much effort to climb inside its long, sprawling tunnel. After that, he wasn’t sure what the hell he was going to do, but he was hoping to maybe set off a couple of alarms, get somebody to notice him, mow a few people over, then make himself scarce as he staked the place out to look for any sign of Laura or a hint of where else she might be. He’d torture as many fuckers as he had to for any new scrap of information.

As he reached the base of the dam, however, it looked even more deserted. A rusty ladder clung to the side of the wall, and Logan tested his weight on it before wearily reaching his way upward to the closest spillway about a hundred meters. As he gripped the edge, he now climbed into the nearest spillway, an open mouth eager and intent in swallowing him whole. He found the same grates under his feet as when the team had made their way through the same entrance almost thirty years and another timeline ago, and the sound echoed the same as he walked further down the tunnel, but the light was all wrong. The feeling completely foreign.

He was eager to find some sort of surveillance equipment, some sort of clue the base was inhabited. Maybe not the kind of security systems he had seen all that time ago with Stryker, but something. However, as Logan made his way further down the tunnel, it looked more and more evident to him that no one was watching him from inside. No scanners, cameras, sensors, anything discernible that he could see.

It didn’t take long to reach the spillway doors, his way forward abruptly ending, and as he stared up at the hulking circular metal frame, he finally accepted that it had been a mistake coming here, a waste of his fucking precious time. Parts of the structure were entirely rusted over, and it was obvious they hadn’t been used in years. The door off to the side Logan was hoping to enter through was also entirely missing, maybe had never been there in the first place, and he realized there was no possible way in on this side of the damn. Just as he was considering somehow scouting out a path toward the top part of the dam, to reach the old facilities that had been attached, he heard a sound, another heartbeat, another set of lungs breathing, another pair of boots on the grate, walking toward him.

As he turned quickly around, he was just beyond his knowledge, beyond his comprehension, as he took in the sight of her. There she was, the precious thing, walking a couple of steps further and stopping at the half-way point in the tunnel, simply staring at him. There was no way, no fucking way—you must be hallucinating—and yet, he could smell her, hear her, breathe her in.

“Laura?” his voice betrayed him, unbelieving, and yet so desperately hoping to believe.

She wore the jean jacket, the grey t-shirt with that fucking ridiculous unicorn on it, and those boots, and only after he spoke, did she seem to recognize him. She took him in oddly, slowly, as if coming out of a confused daze, and he found himself instinctively walking over to her small frame in three determined strides, before stopping and kneeling down to her cautiously, a hurt, terrible look dawning on her face as she realized who he was.

“Daddy?” she finally said.

“Hija,” he barely whispered. Daughter.

“You’re here?” she asked, hesitantly, and her small hand reached out warily to cup the side of his gruff face, thin, smooth fingers lingering over beard and scars alike. He couldn’t help but lean into her warm palm, and he could hear the pulse of her steady heartbeat, smell the adamantium in her forearm. She had to be real. God, how did she escape? How was she fucking here, alive?

Something dark set about Laura’s eyes though, as a single tear rolled down her cheek. Then the hallway seemed to be spinning, falling away, and it was just these two lost in a truth, or a lie, or just a world that no longer mattered around them.

“You lost me, papa,” she said bleakly.

“I know,” he barely whispered. “I’m sorry.”

“You said you would take care of me…” she murmured.

“Laura,” his voice broke, unable to truly understand. What was she saying? Why was she acting this way?

“Just like la mujer,” she whispered.

“What?” Logan asked, caution growing in his voice.

“You lost me, just like Marie,” she said bitterly, her lips now forming into a sneer.

“Laura,” he murmured and as her look darkened further, Logan instinctively moved away from the girl, standing up abruptly. Laura took a couple of steps forward threateningly, as Logan inched backward, unable to abstain from growling instinctively as the Wolverine detected the growing threat in front of him.

It was then, though, he watched his daughter dematerialize in front of him, gone in a puff of smoke, and his claws were out as he whipped around, sensing the change in the air, and another person, another presence moved over and around, quickly wiping his legs out from under him and landing him hard on the grates of the spillway.

Logan looked at his chest to see a spear just hovering a hairsbreadth away from his heart, and as he rose his gaze, following his way up the length of the spear to its owner, he saw a young woman with long black hair looking down at him, a predatory, wild color in her eyes. He simply breathed for long moments, struggling for his lungs to not seize up once more, and then the look the woman wore softened as she stared down at him.

“Sensei?” she barely murmured. He closed his eyes for a moment, focusing on breathing properly, even as she removed the spear. Just then, she was in front of him, taking part in a traditional Japanese bow as Logan wearily heaved himself into a sitting position.

“You’re here,” she murmured through the beginning of a smile, after she rose to stand once more. Logan said nothing as his mind struggled to catch up.

“Watashi no chikara o shiyō shite mōshiwake arimasen, Sensei. Watashi wa anata ga shin'nyū-shada to omotta. Anata wa hijō ni kotonatte mieru.” Forgive me for using my powers on you, teacher. I thought you were an intruder. You look so very different.

Then, it all made sense. There was only one person Logan knew who was Cheyenne but who also spoke fluent Japanese, who could kick his ass in Karate and whose power it was to create visual apparitions of her enemies’ most deep-seated fears. Laura hadn’t been real, only a manifestation of Logan’s nightmares, a symptom of her power. The real mutant standing before him was a girl when he had last seen her over three years ago, their vicious round of hand-to-hand sparring in Fight Club bringing him to his knees that day, right before everything had really gone to shit. Now, the girl was gone, the mutant in front of him clearly and obviously a woman.

“Mirage?” he croaked. She extended a hand then, helping to bring Logan to his feet, now smiling wildly.

“Sensei Logan… welcome.” Logan’s mind was still trying to catch up to the events happening around him so quickly, but his body began to feel an odd warmth flooding through him. The Wolverine whispered the words in his ear before he could even realize what it meant. This is what you need. Help.

“Why are you here, Dani?” he finally asked, massaging his neck as he did so.

“This is the newly established headquarters,” she said through a wicked smile.

“Headquarters?” The fuck? “Of what?! Of Alkali? Of Transigen?”

“No. Not anymore,” she said, through a savage grin. Logan raised his eyebrows in suspicion, as he stared at her, still a bit unbelieving.

“Sensei,” she said through another knowing smile. “Welcome to Alpha Flight.”
Chapter End Notes:
Sorry this chapter’s a little on the short side, friends. It was originally part of something longer, but I had to split it in order to add a couple more chapters to the story to keep things paced correctly. Chapter 19 will be on its way before the weekend, I’m hoping. Thanks for all the beautiful feedback for the last chapter. Writing that one took it out of me, and receiving those comments was so darn encouraging. Hope you’re all having a good week.
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