Logan glared at the clock again, for the fourth time in the last twenty minutes.
It was ten past four, and Marie still wasn't back. He was trying to control the urge to ring her and demand to know where the hell she was, it was well past Lydia's nap time, not that he needed to remind Marie of that, he knew he was just being paranoid, and he needed to trust Marie. Maybe they'd just lost track of the time, or were stuck in traffic.
It was eleven past four.
"Fuck it," Logan muttered, pulling out his cell phone he hit the speed dial for Marie's phone. It rang, and rang, and rang. Just as he was about to give up and hang up the line clicked. He could hear a baby crying but no one spoke. "Marie? Marie are you there? Marie?!" He was beginning to think something was terribly wrong, images of broken bodies, in broken cars, in a ditch on the side of the road, were flashing through his mind, when a chilling sound cut across the line.
The dark chuckle, moments before the line went dead, turned his blood cold.
Going back to his phone he pulled up his contacts and dialled Jubilee's number, the phone was answered on the second ring. "Logan?! Give me a sec... Rogue it's okay, everything's going to be okay..." Jubilee was clearly panicked as she spoke to someone in the background.
That someone turned out to be Marie. "It's not okay, he has my baby!" She stated, equally as panic stricken. "I need- I need Logan, I need Lydie, oh God he has my baby!" She broke down in sobs, on the verge of hyperventilating, when Logan interrupted across the line.
"Jubilee, where are you?" Logan demanded; he'd heard enough to know this was very bad.
Jubilee quickly told him where they were, and explained that Sabretooth had run them off the road, damaging their car, before grabbing Lydia and taking off. She assured him they were stranded but unharmed. Logan told her he would be there soon and to keep reassuring Rogue, Lydie would be back with her before she knew it. He burst into the teachers’ lounge as he was hanging up the call, giving everyone who was there a brief run down on what he knew of what had happened.
Scott followed him to the garage to take a second car to collect the car full of teenagers, Charles went immediately to Cerebro to begin searching for Lydia and Sabretooth, Jean and Ororo went to the sublevel to prepare for a mission, one to stock the med lab, the other to begin pre-flight checks on the jet; it shouldn't take long to collect the girls and for the Professor to track down Sabretooth.
As he sped down the highway Logan tried to hold the sheer terror, that was his worry for Lydia, at bay. Surely Sabretooth hadn't kidnapped her to harm her, she was biologically his child after all, but why had he taken her!
He saw a car up ahead off the side of the road, a police car parked on the shoulder beside it. Shit. The last thing they needed was law enforcement getting involved in this. Pulling up, skidding to a stop on the loose gravel on the side of the road, he leaped out of the car before the engine had even fully died. Jubilee was talking to the cop, assuring him everyone was fine, she was giving the cop a sanitized version of how they were run off the road by another motorist who had then taken off, it seemed she was leaving out that they had had a baby with them who had been taken. Logan discretely nodded his thanks to her as he moved over to the group of girls sitting on the grassy bank beside the car, most comforting Rogue and trying to help her hold it together.
Rogue threw herself into his arms the minute she saw him, sobbing and babbling incoherently about Lydia. She had the presence of mind to keep her voice down so the cop didn't overhear her, as she explained in detail exactly what had happened. Scott rolled to a stop a short time later, heading directly to the cop to assure him the girls were being taken care of and would be gotten back to their boarding school, a tow truck had also already been sorted out to come and collect the car before the end of the day.
The cop had finished taking statements, and waited for the car to be emptied of personal belongings and shopping, before he slapped a sticker on the car so any other passing officers would know the wreck had already been cleared. Quickly the teens piled into the two cars that had arrived to pick them up, and they sped off back to the school.
Part way back to the mansion Logan's phone rang, being answered by the cars handsfree, and they were patched into a conference call with the mansion, and Scott in the other car.
"Charles has located Sabretooth, and Lydia, she is unsettled but unharmed, we're ready to leave as soon as you get back," Jean advised hurriedly.
"We'll be there in three minutes," Scott replied, before ending the call.
"I'm coming," Marie demanded immediately, a fierce determination replacing her earlier anguish.
"It's too dangerous Marie," Logan argued, not taking his attention off the road as he sped home. Marie would be nothing but a distraction, and if he knew anything about reading an opponent, her being there, would likely play right into Sabretooth's plan, whatever it was.
Before Marie could argue further, he pulled sharply into the school’s driveway, gunning the car up to the front door, skidding to a stop in a spray of gravel right out front. He was out of the car and inside as Scott pulled up beside him on the driveway in much the same fashion, and followed him in. Logan hit the call button for the elevator, Scott joining him as the doors opened, before the doors could close again Marie had slipped into the elevator.
"It wasn't a request," Marie snapped at Logan, as the doors slid shut.
"Marie, you're playing right into his hands darlin, this is what he wants, he's trying to torment you..." Logan started, trying to explain his reasoning to her.
"I'm going. To get. My baby," Marie ground out, her tone meant to shut him up.
The elevator opened in short order and Scott and Marie leapt out and headed toward the locker room. Logan faltered, pausing momentarily as a stab of pain shot through his chest. His pause didn't appear to be noticed before he started after the pair, though Marie noticed that he wasn't with them by the time they got to the locker.
"What?" she asked worriedly, noticing the suddenly wary, guarded look Logan was wearing.
"Nothing," he muttered, as he stepped past her into the room and roughly yanked out his uniform and began to change, otherwise ignoring her.
Marie shrugged off his odd behaviour, she had more important things to worry about right now than him getting butthurt over her asserting herself in a serious situation. Scott handed her one of Kitty's training uniforms, acquiescing to letting her come but warning her to say behind the rest of the team, reminding her she had no formal training. He too was obviously uncomfortable with the idea of her coming along.
The rest of the team dressed quickly and disappeared to the briefing room. Despite the fact he had started changing first Logan took his time, waiting for Marie to finish dressing before he turned to her. Giving her an appraising once over he nodded as if satisfied, she was indeed presentable as an X-Man.
"Hurry up, we have to go get *your* baby," he snapped, turning and stomping out of the room.
It took a moment for what he had said to sink in, Marie was halfway out the door when it hit her. With a gasp she froze, tears welled in her eyes as she clapped her hand over her mouth, he thought... "Oh god, I didn't mean it like that Logan, I swear I didn't mean it like that," she said, watching as he too froze a few steps ahead of her in the hallway. She threw herself toward him, wrapping her arms around him as she buried her face in his leather clad chest. "I'm sorry, I'm so sorry, I didn't mean it like that," she sobbed.
Here he was, the man who strapped on leather to risk his life to save hers, now doing it all over again to save their daughter, and she had so cruelly and heartlessly hurt him.
"Our baby, Logan, I just didn't want to be left behind, I need to be there for her too, like you are," she tried to clarify, judging by the look on Logan's face though he wasn't in the right frame of mind to hear her out just yet.
"Whatever, this isn't helping her," he snapped, pushing her away and turning her around, guiding her towards the briefing room.
Ororo was laying out the entry plan as they entered the room, detailing how many people the Professor had detected in the area. A sudden spike of fear from the girl in front of him softened Logan's hurt some as he turned to her.
"What's wrong Marie?" he asked, a mite gentler than he had spoken to her previously.
"Why there?" she whimpered, "That's where Magneto was holding me, that's where...” she broke off, she didn't need to finish her sentence for Logan to know, this was where Sabretooth had raped her, this was where Lydia had been conceived.
"He's trying to torment you, this is what I was trying to explain, this- this isn't about Lydia, Marie, this is about you, he's trying to get to you, Lydia is just bait in his trap." He gently turned Marie around, cupping her cheek lightly, his hand protected from her skin by a fall of hair. "I know you want to get to Lydia, I know you want to be there for her, but you're just going to end up putting everyone in danger Marie, especially Lydia, if he threatens her, he knows he's got you. If you come will you trust me, stay on the jet, I'll bring Lydia straight to you once I've got her," Logan pleaded with her. He didn't want to see Lydia threatened any more than Marie did but he knew Sabretooth wouldn't pull that shit with him.
Marie paused, obviously conflicted, before she nodded. "I trust you Logan," she replied.
The team left not even two minutes later. It was only a short flight to where Lydia was being held. They didn't bother with subtlety, landing the jet in plain view of those who were waiting for them, before disembarking. Marie caught Logan's hand as he was leaving, and reached up to peck him on the cheek, if he noticed he didn't comment, barely paused, before he told her she could monitor the comms from the control console and hurriedly followed the team off deck. The hatch closed automatically behind him, leaving Marie feeling more alone than she had in a long time.
She sat down at the console, brushing away her tears. Lydia would be fine, even if Logan was upset with her, he wouldn't let Lydia suffer for that. She flipped the switches she needed to patch the comms through, turning the others down, and Logan's up, she wanted to know the minute he had baby.
She didn't have to wait long.
She managed to patch into the bodycam feed too and watched as Logan stalked into the lair, paused briefly as he scented the area, before stalking toward where he knew Lydia was. Several people tried to stop him, and were either gutted on the spot or thrown out of the way immediately, they weren't his objective so he was leaving them for the rest of the team.
When he stepped into the last room, the room that had been Marie's prison for mere hours but still featured in her infrequent nightmares, Marie froze. He looked around the room, before he called out quietly, "Lydie, where are you bubba?"
An excited squeal sounded through the audio link. "Dada!" Lydia called, drawing Logan's attention to the back of the room.
He stalked quickly across the room, spotting the little girl in a makeshift crib covered with a thick blanket. Pulling the blanket back, they both saw Lydia's grubby, tear stained face, staring up at Logan with a brilliant smile. "Hey kiddo, how you holding up?" Logan asked gently.
Marie was confused about why he didn't just grab her and get out as she watched him gently stroke baby's head reassuringly, before he turned around.
Sabretooth was standing right behind him.
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