Logan watched the tape of Rogue walking into the building, exploring, releasing Ella while Shadow-Cat got the other two mutants out of their cell, and then the five of them walking out.
He continued to view the tape, over, and over until, as his is eyes were about to drift close he saw for the first time Rogue pause before opening the door.
“What the…wait…what!” Logan’s eyes had just dropped closed and they wanted nothing more than to stay close when his mind processed what they just saw. His mind went into over drive, and his eyes conceded and opened up more alert than ever. Logan rewound the tape for the hundredth time and looked to see if it really was a pause. As he looked again at the part of Rogue opening the cage door, using what little magnetic power she still possessed, he indeed saw her pause just slightly.
With renewed energy and glance at the clock that read 2 am, Logan was off to the Danger Room’s control room to review the tape with more features than his little TV and VCR (though more advanced than a common VCR) allowed him to do.
To no surprise the halls of the mansion were empty, not that Logan took the time to notice, but none the less all the students were asleep or at least in a room at this hour. If he would have taken this fact into consideration, he would have made some comment on how it was a first, and that he didn’t get stopped and question as to where he was heading at two in the morning in such a hurry.
Upon entering the Danger Room’s control room, Logan immediately entered the tape and started zooming into Rogue’s face. He first wanted to make sure that in fact that she did pause and if there were any signs on her face to show why. He knew her the best, and he spent hours memorizing her different facial expressions, not like a starker but in order to tell if she was being honest with him and that she was happy, health, etc. It was the wolverine in him that forced him to have an excellent knowledge of his mate’s movements in order to protect her. As he watched the zoomed in tape he noticed that her eyes squinted and drifted to her wrist just slightly. Not her hand but her wrist, has if something had poked her, and since she was not wearing her gloves (because she needed to use the magnetizing power she had) she just brushed it off as nothing. But what she just brushed off as nothing could have been something, and Logan was determined to figure out what.
Sleep was forgotten on this night for the Wolverine.
*********************************
Around eight that morning Logan visited Marie in her room and tried to get more information about the mission that the tapes were not providing him with.
“Marie you paused, look at the tape. Right there you pause and looked at your wrist, why?” Logan said pointing to the evidence of her movement on the TV that was before her.
“Logan it’s early, and I’m exhausted. I don’t see any pause.” Marie whispered.
Logan sighed and moved over to Marie’s side. He gently kissed the top of her hair, and put a reassuring hand on her shoulder. “I know darlin’, but try to think, what happened in the warehouse. Tell me what you remember.”
It was Marie’s turn to sigh, but she started her tale. “Everything was going alright, no complications, no resistance. When we saw the two separate cages, I went with Kitty to release the captured mutants. I wasn’t planning on using any of Erik’s power I just went along to back her up and to help them get to the jet. But when I saw Ella curled up and scarred, I just took action. I had been working on using the different powers that I had obtained recently to see how much I had control on and could use on missions. The metal wasn’t very strong and the lock simple to manipulate.” Marie paused in her story, and since Logan had been watching her face he noticed that she did remember something. “When I started to move the metal I felt a little poke in my wrist. I thought it was probably just the magnetism running through me, but it felt like something small bit me, a bug or something. That’s why I looked at my wrist, but I was worried about the child and brushed it off the feeling in my wrist.”
Marie pulled out her gloved hand and started pulling down the fabric. Logan took her cleared arm in his gloved hands and started examining her wrist. At first he didn’t see anything so he pulled out a magnify class that he brought with him, and he found a very small speck as if something did just barely bite Marie’s wrist.
“Do you see something?”
“Yeah, I just don’t know what it is.”
Logan left Marie soon after that, she had fallen asleep while they brained stormed what possibly could have bitten her while she was on a mission. Logan still wrapped up in all of this could no get any sleep, so he went to collect Ella from Scott’s.
“Logan, you came at the exact right time.” Scott said as he opened the door to his and Jean’s apartment.
“Why is that Scooter?” Logan asked as he walked into the living area, but Scott wasn’t given the chance to answer before Logan picked up the two voices in the other room arguing.
“No it is my turn to play.”
“But I won so my turn is longer.”
“That’s not fair.”
“You lost, I won.”
“Fine then I get to win.”
“No I win.”
“DAD!”
“They are starting to fight. We already ate breakfast, and Ella is all packed.” Scott said as he led Logan to Aiden’s room where all the screaming was coming from.
“Dad, can’t I win next time?” Aiden asked as he saw his dad in the doorway.
“It’s a game Aiden, you have to play by the rules and try your hardest to win.”
“But Ella always wins, I want to win once.”
“Wolvie! You’re here already. I’m not ready to go. I don’t want to leave yet. Can’t I stay just a bit longer?” Ella said while seemingly refusing to get up from her spot in front of the small TV that she and Aiden were playing a video game on.
“No, Sunshine it’s time to leave Aiden and Uncle Scott alone for a while.”
“But I don’t want to.” Ella said with a pout.
“Come on Ella, I have something planned for us today.” Ella’s eyes brightened and she started to stand up. Aiden immediately picked up the control she dropped and claimed it has his and that it was his turn. Ella didn’t seem to care, more set on what her guardian’s plans were.
“Can I see Mommy again?” Ella said while picking up her bag and walking over to Logan and Scott.
“No I’m sorry Ella, we can not go see mommy today.” Logan hated telling the small girl that she could not see her mother, but he had no choice. The joy that Ella’s eyes had just shined with dimmed, while she exited the room. “What do you say to Uncle Scott and Aiden?”
“Thank you for inviting me over and letting me stay the night Uncle Scott. Aiden thank you for letting me play with you.” Ella said as she went into Logan’s arms for a hug. Logan did not know how he knew that she needed a hug, but he just instinctually opened his arms for the small girl to fall into.
Scott watched the pair, and frowned at how sad they looked when Rogue was mentioned. He wished that he could do more to help them, and help Rogue get better. He knew that Logan appreciated him taking Ella for the night, but other than that he felt like a failure as leader with two of his team members in so much pain.
“Aiden you look after your old man.” Logan said to the young boy who was still playing his game.
“Bye Uncle Logan.”
“Bye Kid. Bye Scott. Thanks for watching her.” Logan led Ella out of the room and towards their rooms. “You need to change into work cloths, and then we can leave.”
“What are work clothes?”
“Old clothes that probably have holes in them.”
“But Mommy says not to wear cloths that have holes in them. Why would I need to wear them now?”
“Because we will be outside, and you don’t want to get your nice cloths dirty.”
“But my cloths always get dirty.”
“Ella, please just go change.” Logan was on his last nerve, no sleep and now her questioning him was getting to be too much. Ella felt this exasperation and her eyes started tearing and her lip quivering. Logan smelled the salty tears and lifted the girl into a hug. “I’m not mad baby, just tired.” He said to comfort her before she started crying.
“Then you should take a nap while I play quietly with my canyons. That’s what momma always had me do when she got tired and no one could watch me.” Ella said knowingly trying to take care of her guardian.
“I don’t need a nap, but thanks for offering to play quietly. Now why don’t you go change in some of your holist cloths and then I will show what I have planned for us.”
“Are you positive we can’t see mommy?” Ella asked in hopes of Logan changing his answer.
“Yes, she’s sleeping right now and we don’t want to wake her up.” Ella nodded her head in understanding, though she really did not understand, and scampered to her room to change.
While Ella changed, Logan thought about the time he took Marie on a special trip to his cabin in the Canadian Rookies. It was the summer she graduated from high school, or rather the institution, and the roads were finally clear enough to get a car through without fear of getting stuck in mud. She had begged him to let her take a year off to do nothing but train to be an X-men and do some traveling. Though she would not do this arguing in the mansion where they would be both over heard vocally and through their thoughts by the professor and the other teacher. No she waited to do all of the arguing at the Lonely Grill.
The Lonely Grill was one of the few bar places he trusted Marie in, and even then only when he was there. He understood that she grew up in the south and got much of his habits stuck in her brain, and thus she occasionally needed a drink or just the masses amount of smoke to calm her nerves and cravings. When she first tried explaining these cravings to him he laughed. Then one night, while he was outside smoking a cigar, she was at his side with such a pleasurable look on her face, that he could tell that the smoke was calming and indeed it was like a graving. He chuckled at her again and consented to take her to a calm non-threatening bar.
****************************************************
“Logan, please. I have been studying and going to school for fifteen years of my life, I want to live a little.”
“No.” He said gruffly.
“Why?” Rogue asked in a huff. He just looked at her with this ‘did you just seriously question me?’ look. “If you are going to be so quick to shoot down my dreams of road tripping to Alaska, I sure as hell want to know why?”
Logan grunted, but answered. “Your schooling is more important.”
“I will start taking classes next year, I just want one year off.”
“No.”
“Will you stop that, I want reasons, a debate, an argument, give me something to work with here.”
“You went road tripping once look how that turned out.”
“I met you didn’t I?” Marie said with a flirtatious smile. Logan looked at her, grunted again, then took a drink of his beer.
“That might not have been the best thing that has ever happened to you.” Logan said with a small smirk. She was older no. He had just yesterday seen her walk across the stage to take her diploma from the professor. She had grown up to one fine looking women and Logan was not completely afraid to admit his attraction to her anymore.
“Oh I would not say the best, but it ranks right up there with discovering double-fudge chocolate chip cookies.” Marie knew she was flirting and she could only hope that the signs that Logan were giving her meant that he knew how much she was flirting.
Logan grunted again.
“Will you stop that, I still want answers.”
“And I want to know what else is ranked as high as discovering your favorite cookies.” Marie smirked and went silent at Logan’s blunt statement of understanding the fact that she was teasing him. Logan put down his beer, and lend over toward Marie. Her heart started racing and she sat still waiting for his next move. “That’s our song, would you please dance with me.” Marie smiled, bit her lip slightly and put her hand in his offered hand.
Logan maneuvered them on the dance floor as “Amazed” played over the jukebox.
“Please Logan.” She whispered softly into his chest.
“I was hoping you would forget.” He said while pulling her slightly closer.
It was her turn to grunt quietly. “I don’t forget things that easily.”
“You don’t need to train to be a full fledge X-men yet.” Marie started to interrupt him, but he continued. “We can travel this summer, anywhere you like, together, so I can keep on eye on...”
“If you say me I’m going to knee you.”
Logan chuckled. “…On the boys that will be trying to jump your bones.” Marie nodded in understand. “Then in the fall you can start classes and some training. Work your way up to being an X-men Marie, don’t start fighting now and loose the chance to be a..” Marie glared up at him as if daring him to call her a kid. “a typical college student.”
Marie nodded in understanding to his reasons but stayed quite as the song ended.
When the last notes played over the speakers, Marie prepared herself for her response to Logan’s reasoning behind not “allowing” her to take a year off from school. Logan watched her waiting for her reaction to his demand for her to not join the X-men and continue with school.
“Alright, I want to go Canada again since there won’t be so much snow this time. And hit Alaska if we have time. Oh don’t you have a cabin up there somewhere.” She continued retailing off a list of places she wanted Logan to take her too over the summer.
It took Logan a few moments to formulate a response. “Wait a minute Marie, are you Okay with that decision?”
“Well yeah, I don’t know why you just did not come out and say ‘I don’t want you out in the battle field yet and I want you to spend the summer with me.’ It would have saved us a lot of time in arguing.”
Logan grunted, but then started chucking at Marie’s mirth. Their relationship of more than guardian and girl changed a great deal that day in the ‘Lonely Grill’.
*******************************************************
Upon remembering that conversation in the bar, Logan remembered their trip had started by going up to Canada and traveling thru the country until reaching his cabin. Once they reached the cabin, they had no real desire to leave. They shared their first kiss that first night in front of the fire, while sitting on the bear skin rug drinking hot chocolate and talking about absolutely nothing important. Marie was just learning to control her mutation for small amounts of time, and well they used that to their advantaged that summer. By the time August started they were a couple, and heading back to the mansion. They did not come out and tell everyone what transpired between them, but frankly no one really bothered to ask them either. At the beginning of September the professor had found a few leads to Logan’s past, and Logan was ready to leave for a few weeks to check them out. The summer away was great, but the school was beginning to suffocate him and Marie understood. They did not come out and agree that his need to seek out his past was okay, but it was something Marie could deal with. She knew that he would come back to her at a drop of a hat, but she also knew that he really wanted and needed to know about his past, if he could ever find information out there in the great unknown.
Logan smiled at his memory and let out a silent prayer to anyone that might hear his prayers, “Please let her survive. I need her more than I need to breath.”
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Author's Chapter Notes:
It’s like seven pages, man these chapters just keep getting longer. And it was going to be longer, but I thought I would save that stuff for the chapter so I would have a jump on it and hopefully get chapter ten done sooner. I guess we will have to wait and see! There is not much more to this, about two or three chapters left.