Title: Razors and Dying Roses
Genre: Logan POV, L/R, drama/my dark sense of humour
Author: Shana Nolan
Email: aericura@micron.net
Rating: PG-14; language, some violence and a bit of self-mutilation, but nothing worth calling a shrink over.
Archive: the usual suspects, and others will ask first please
Summary: Logan goes back to Canada to find his past, and finds a little more than he bargained for.
Continuity: this is right after the movie, for once ;-)
Disclaimers: Fox and Marvel Entertainment Group have the X-Men and their movie. Stan Lee, I worship at your feet. I don't own anyone and I don't intend to sell this. no money, no sue, no powers. but my CB handle was Phoenix (great, date yourself, why don't you). the song "Touched" is by Vast, whose first CD is one of the best albums I've heard in a while.
Comments: are welcome. Flames, however, are only accepted from a mutant named Pyro and even he knows better.
Notes: unlike most of my stuff, this is pretty pure movieverse. it's also fairly angst free. this is for Nacey and Diebin, who were cheering this on and threatening Logan as he went along in the little journey that is this fic.--------------------------------------------------------
"touched, you say that i am too
so much, of what you say is true
i'll never find someone quite like you again
i'll never find someone quite like you, like you
the razors and the dying roses
plead i don't leave you alone
the demi-gods and hungry ghosts
oh god, god knows i'm not at home"--------------------------------------------------------
Most of the people in the world got it wrong. Life ain't about what you own, or what your name is written on.
It's about what courses in the grit of your soul, and drives you to do the stupid things that mark the passage of your life.
Not that I got many proud things in my own life.
See, I'm a mutant. One of those freaks the kiddies hide under their bed from, and hey I even got the temper to match the reputation. The claws, too. These fuckers can rip through a steel door like it's butter, and despite the fact that every time I use 'em I can't help but hate the people who gave 'em to me, I love it.
Love to hate it. Hate to love it. It's one of those vicious cycles that love to rip apart our lives like we ain't got nothing but the reaper and his big sharp scythe waiting for us at the end of the hall.
And, back "home," though you won't catch me calling it that when they're around, there's this girl. Worships the ground I walk on. Has part of me in her head.
Wonder if she's got the sane part.
Even if she does, I'm still myself. Fuckin' amnesia-- it strips reality away 'cause you just don't KNOW who you are or what you've been doing, so even the flashes of memory you get when Fate decides to kick you don't make a lot of sense.
When I got to Alkali Lake a few weeks ago, I thought I had figured it out. Go track down some government lab where they strapped my ass down and pumped me full of metal that makes me a walking fridge magnet. What I found however, was ruins and assholes.
Maybe they recognised me. Something about my face or body that rang familiar in their little pea-brains. Or maybe they thought I was another tourist in search of a real life X-File.
Fuck them, I AM an X-File. There's even an "X" in front of the group that wants me playing superhero with them.
But whether or not I go back and slide on that black leather depends greatly on the thing standing in front of me.
It fills my seedy motel room, this stack of shit. I found it in a clearing that looked like a bombsite, kinda covered with dirt and debris, the glint of metal and stench of laboratory stinging my nose.
Is it insanity to try and find your life in a razor blade and a couple ruined sheets of paper?
Don't ask me what the razor blade is for. Damned if I know, but if they used it on me, there aren't any scars to show thanks to my healin' ability. Some people, like Fearless Dickhead Cyke, have scars. I've seen them on him even though he does his damnedest to look perfect.
Half-crescent scar, right shoulder, jagged, angry and old.
A razor blade wouldn't do that kind of work.
But why I'm wondering about him, I'll never know. He ain't a hero to me, and put in my place he'd be just as fuckin' miserable.
Only difference is that he'd have scars where the razor blades sliced him up.
Three weeks. Three weeks I've been away. New York is one of those places you can visit, maybe even live, and it leaves a stain on you. A smell. A smell that I've been tryin' to wash off for three weeks.
I've got her smell on me too, and the longer it lingers while I act like some piecemeal monster searching for his creator, the more it drives me nuts.
Don't get me wrong. The girl's great. She's gonna become a woman that parents just hate for their sons to bring home.
But she ain't mine, and the longer I stay away, the more I want it that way.
Canada is not good for me. I probably should have realised that, considering the last time I was here I was a cage fighter beating the shit out of lost motherfuckers intent on a little violence to soothe their souls.
And before that, I was Frankenstein's creation.
Maybe I never had sanity. Maybe I've just been touched by something that craves the shadows that eat up goodness. That destroys the roses in the Garden that she lives in.
Not that Westchester is anywhere near an Eden.
God damn this place. I wasn't thinking about this on the road. I wasn't ruminating on stupid little fantasies with an underage girl. I didn't have urges to go back to some happy little world where changing the world isn't considered an impossible task.
I don't think that world exists anyways.
The razor blade taunts me, rusty and pocked, and I wonder that if I drag it across my skin, it'll bring back memories with the copper smell of my own blood. I really don't have any idea how long I've been walking this earth, or who brought me into it... and maybe I shouldn't.
One thing I do know, and it's been trying to burn me up since I first set eyes on the Southern lily, is that she's not the first woman I've caught myself thinking about in a less than proper way.
Why the hell should that bother me? I'm a man. Flawed and beyond the grace of God. Why else would I be sitting in a shithole staring at objects that should mean something to me, but don't? It sure ain't for my health.
And it ain't for her either.
A tortured man don't need reasons. He's touched. By Him. By madness. By pain. By revenge.
By a girl with deadly skin.
Something about one of the papers catches my attention. Picking it up, wondering if it's about the claws laying just below the surface of my skin, I curse when I notice that the dot matrix letters are marred beyond reading. There are some numbers, most of which could be that scientific bullshit doctors get off on, but something about them....
If I had Jeannie here she could tell me. I could mail it to her, but then they'd know where I was, and I'd get nothin' but questions and interrogations.
And that's not the point of this focused wandering.
A touched man hates being left alone with his thoughts. A lonely man despises being away from what-- or who-- he needs the most.
What sucks is that I'm both of those men. What personal hell I bought myself into with the return to Canada on a borrowed bike I'll never know, but here I am.
A shudder runs through me as I pick up a blank dogtag. No name or number is imprinted on the flat bit of metal, and I can't help but wonder who this was meant for-- and if the only reason their name isn't on it is 'cause they didn't survive the torture.
And then I recall who has mine. I'm a name, a number, and the ID that bears it is in the hands of the girl who's got part of my mind.
It's rather fitting, I s'pose.
So I play with the blank tag, examining it. The chain's surprisingly intact, and even though the front's scratched and beaten by the weather, it's still got that same gloss mine has. A gloss that defies the gore of an opponent's broken nose or eating road after a nasty spill on the bike.
A gloss that beats out the lifetime of the poor bastard it was meant for.
She'd hate me thinking about this. Hell, she must hate that I'm gone, 'cause she knows as well as I do that I came here to find my answers, and those answers are far from joyous.
God damned scientists and their God complexes.
Tucking the dogtag in a jeans pocket, I push the razorblade further towards the middle of the table and leave the motel room.
I need some air.
------------------
Well, okay, so maybe the local pub isn't most people's version of "air," but since it don't smell like the scents I dragged along on my stuff and definitely don't smell like her, it's what I need.
And my second boilermaker tonight is burning away my earlier thoughts nicely. If I really wanted to ruminate over that shit, I'd still be sitting in that motel room wondering when the phone was going to ring.
I know, it's pretty lame and stupid to expect her to call me even though she don't know where I am.
But the thought is still there, reminding me of her and that nice comfy school she's settled into. I wish I knew why she just won't go away. God-- presuming he ain't laughing at me in the first place-- knows I've been trying.
The guy next to me smiles and starts talkin' to me like I'm a long lost chum. Shit. This is not what I'm lookin' for. If I wanted friends I wouldn't be in this freezin' hellhole backwater.
Apparently he doesn't understand that, and claws, though wholly effective, are a bad way to tell him to get pissed elsewhere.
So rather than guttin' him and ruining the bar's lacquer, I change the subject. Ask him if he's ever heard of some lab where they experiment on people. He looks at me like I just smacked him in the face, then downs his drink real fast. Points at the door.
No way. This is how ya get hurt. It's a helluva lot easier to beat someone to death when you don't have an audience.
Shaking my head, I pull out the blank dogtag, set it on the bar and level a stare.
His face drains of blood and he grabs a napkin, fumbling around for a pen in his jacket. Handing the piece of paper over to me, he slips out of the bar before I can say another word.
On the napkin an address is scrawled.
-----------------------
Sometimes I have these moments of inspiration. They're rare, and most people don't credit me for even having the capability for them, but the most recent one involves a thirty five mile drive to the middle of nowhere.
I have no idea what I'm looking for, but it should be interesting. The name of the road the guy scrawled on the napkin is one of those county -maintained ones, and if it's seen any recent care, I'd be very surprised about it.
But if the building at the end of this drive is the Addams Family house, I'm gonna give that guy a few piercings.
Catching sight of the first driveway in a good while, I shake my head and turn down it, having to slow down when I hit the uneven gravel and patches of weeds. Clearly this place, whatever it is, ain't seen a gardener for a while. I hop off my bike, stalk up to the windowless grey building and swear.
I'm not sure if I should be pissed about this. It's almost like I thought an infernal chamber of well-funded pain should look like, but not quite.
Maybe it's the lack of foreboding music in the background.
So I cross the distance to a wall and stare. Buildings, even windowless boxes like this, have doors. Hell, even coffins have an entrance. Stripping off the gloves and running hands along the weathered steel, I walk along for a good fifteen minutes before I hit a seam.
Well, this is the best chance to see if all their little pokes and prods paid off. Popping a set of claws and slicing it through the wall, I let myself laugh, the heat from metal cutting metal going up my arm.
Oh yeah, these bastards had it coming.
The new "door" falls inside and I'm struck with this image-- it's almost comedic. I WANT these people-- these scientists-- to be standin' there inside so I can wave a bladed hand at them and tell them the endless fucking joy that is a metal skeleton, and then let them taste just how much the damn adamantium hurts.
However, after that nice set of fantasies, I'm greeted with an abandoned warehouse. Great.
But there is a table across the way, and I can't smell anything besides dust and rodents, so it's probably not something fresh and ready to play with.
My loss.
This is one of those moments, however, that I get to ponder it all. Is this THE room? Was I here? Was I strapped down and turned into a pin cushion somewhere inside these walls? Or is this just one of many nameless facilities, and the only way I'm ever gonna get any information about myself is a miracle?
It's also in that same moment that I just don't care. I am who I am right here and now. I've got a pretty girl in New York willing to indulge me despite my personality, the survival skills and healing ability to make it anywhere, and everything I own can be stuffed into the saddlebags of a motorcycle. The road is mine and no one owns me.
However, for some reason, that's not a good enough motivation to turn around and head back the motel.
The table is covered with an inch of dust, but I can spot the various items under it. Slipping on a glove and sweeping it away in a grey cloud, I can't help but expect what I see sitting there: another blank dogtag-- this one a bit dirty but otherwise flawless, a set of latex gloves, a stack of yellowing papers and a disk.
The papers are toast, flimsy and falling apart at the first touch, but the disk... it's one of those big floppy jobs-- 5.25 or something-- but there might be a way to see what's on there. It's tempting. Who knows what got saved on the antiquated piece of plastic; it could be about the jack-offs that worked here, or it could be about the "patients."
Or it could be the recipe for zucchini bread.
But... the information could be useful. It's worth a shot anyways, even if it is someone's electronic cookbook.
---------------------
When I get back to the room, the bed's made again and the towels are replaced. Sitting on the desk is a little vase of flowers-- four or five little red roses.
Not exactly me, but it does remind me some of the Southern lily I'm not supposed to be missing.
So I shower and wash off all that dust and grime, pondering. What the fuck am I going to do with an old computer disk? Not like I got a laptop sittin' next to my bed with a cell modem or something... especially one with one of those old disk drives.
Down the road and in the next town is a library where I could probably access it, but if there's one thing I don't know, it's modern technology, and I'm bettin' this disk ain't for public consumption, therefore cutting out my option of asking for help.
Asking for help... fuck, I guess I could call them. Not like I left on bad terms, I just don't want...
I don't think I want to hear her voice. I just know I'll hear part of me-- that part of me she took inside herself-- on the phone when she says my name. And if I DON'T talk to her, the others will tell her that I was on the phone, and then she'll be all disappointed.
Damn but I hate living up to someone else's expectations.
I spend an hour watching old Nick at Nite shows on the little television set before I give up and pick up the phone. Digging out the number to the mansion and preparing myself for the ribbing of a lifetime, I stare at the roses again.
They're dying from the second they're cut off the rest of the plant. Pretty but withering with each passing moment.
Aren't we all.
So I call New York, already wincing at how much the asshole at the front desk is gonna collect from me for this. Phone rings four times before I get a breathless voice on the other end.
Oh fuck me, it's Jean. The only way this could be worse is if Rogue answered. Either way, it's one of the women I can't bring myself to yell at.
But I called for a reason, not to kick myself about this shit. I explain, and by the time I've hit the point where I mention that I've got an old computer disk and two dogtags like mine, the redhead on the other end is real quiet.
Some people swear in the face of difficulty, I guess she chooses to greet it with silence.
But when she asks me if I want to mail the disk so I don't have to come back there, my jaw 'bout hits the floor.
Maybe I missed something.
"You're kiddin', right, Red?" is my most intelligent response to her offer, and what practically knocks me out of the chair is her response. "No, Logan," she says in a voice that ain't telling me that I'm the anti-Christ, "if you're more comfortable in just sending it here, do that. I'm not going to force you to come home."
Home. So it IS home. I don't know if I've ever had one of those, or people that weren't trying to keep me from it.
But for some stupid reason, I don't like it. If only I could remember why I'm such an unrepentant bastard. So I get the address from her, tell her I'll get it to her one way or the other, and tell her to stay intact while she-- they-- keep savin' the world.
And I wonder if she'll tell Rogue that I called there.
-------------------
A week passes before I get a hold of a box to ship out my little treasure. I can't help but wrap it real good in paper, finally snagging one of the room's towels to protect it against the Canadian postal service.
I also toss one of the roses in there. I dumped them out of the water a few days ago and laid 'em on the table to dry, so the fragile little thing is flat and dark red like blood now.
I'm not sure if my message is a grim "everything dies, just like this," or sappy "a dried flower for my lily."
But one of the blank dogtags tossed alongside it kinda reduces the romanticism of it all.
When I get back from the post office, I sit in my motel room for a few hours and stare, once more, at the pile of shit-- souvenirs-- I've collected since I got here. The gloves and useless paper I can live without, but on the table next to the dried roses is the rusty razor blade, the other blank dogtag--the first one I found-- and a half mangled patch with some guy's name on it.
All they smell like is dirt and dust, but I know they mean something to me. Wish I knew what.
I pick up the razor again and run the flat side along my fingers, feeling the cool surface against my skin. It's one of those things that remind ya you're alive, the tickle of steel hitting nerves just below the surface.
Right now though, it's not good enough. So with a growl and a quick gesture I push the corner of the sharp edge into my thumb, biting through layers of skin and watching the blood well up and flow down my finger. It's hot and thick, and when it pools in my palm, I turn my hand to let the sticky crimson fall to the table in drops.
No, I'm not into self-mutilation. But when your past ain't nothing but shattered memories and rusted metal, ya need the blood to prove you're alive, that you're not just some walkin' mistake of the universe waiting to be blinked out of existence.
Tossing the blade next to the rest of the stuff, I lean back and sigh as the wound knits shut. Yeah, there's proof that I'm still kickin'. I could slice off my thumb and probably be able to re-attach it with no scars.
As if the vitality of life ain't captured in the body; or, if it is, I've got an overabundance.
Five minutes pass before I give up and dial the phone again.
---------------------
Sadly, I knew from the start that I would eventually cave in to the voice in my head and listen to it. It's probably my conscience whispering to me from the little bit of civilising I have, but it's nothing like you'd expect. No Jiminy Cricket here.
It's more like the Denis Leary of morals. "Go home and stop whining, you ponce. If they hate you, so what. Just fuckin' do it."
Sadly, the voice is right most of the time. It's what told me to stop that rig just outside Laughlin City and take a pretty girl out of the snow...
And permanently into a part of my life. How the hell do I get myself into these things?
But, listening once more to the cutting voice of "logic," I pack my stuff, sling it into the saddlebags and pay motel man. Four hundred dollars Canadian and fifteen "eh"s later, I'm on the way back to Westchester.
Sometimes I love the road. The wind whips through my hair and up my nose, making me feel more alive than that razor or the little treasures somewhere in the mail system. Spotting a cop ahead about a kilometre, I swing around and avoid him by cutting across a half-made dirt path, avoiding the inevitable problem with the lack of helmet protecting my already unbreakable skull.
I hate the things. If they could actually prevent less damage to my body, I'd consider 'em, but what's the point? I could crash and burn and get up ten minutes later without a scratch to show. So I take the road like the old Pony Express boys and let the environment fly by on the back of an iron horse with my head hangin' out like great, fuzzy target.
A bunch of pit stops and refueling breaks later, I hit the New York border. That's when the apprehension grips my stomach.
And here I thought I was ready for this.
----------------
It seems like the closer I get to that school, the more I think about her. About what she's doing, thinking, wanting, needing.
Having chosen a motel just down the road to crash and clean up so I can show up on their doorstep a little less haggard and smelly, I force myself away from the window and shake my head.
It's proximity, it's gotta be. I can't see us getting all gooey romantic-- well, I can't see myself-- but the thoughts are playing around and that damn voice is mocking me. Telling me to act on my inclinations.
It's really too bad she didn't take him away too.
So once more I'm staring at my reflection in a motel mirror. I'm half tempted to cut off the beard and go clean cut for as long as I can take it, but then I recall that the shaver that coulda done the job didn't make the saddlebags. Shit, that just makes the urge worse. I've been told--I'm not sure by who thanks to the shattered memories-- that I look different, sometimes better with a clean face, but it might be too much a shock to the main person I'm showing up for.
And then I wonder if I should have waited for the box to arrive first. That way they would know what I was playing with these last few days-- hell, weeks-- and be prepared for the worst. Pulling the other blank dogtag out of a little side pouch to the saddlebag and staring at it, I'm halfway convinced I should be putting it on before I stop.
Now THIS could be construed as "the worst." Like I've cracked and let myself fall into the quagmire of this Frankenstein tragedy.
I snarl as a finger catches along the edge of the rusty razorblade. Dammit, I thought I had wrapped that thing up so I wouldn't bleed all over perfectly good leather. Yanking back my finger and holding it up, the crimson trail sluggishly playing down a knuckle, I wait for skin to heal to wash it off.
And then I'm reminded of the rose I stuck in the box. Fuck. Maybe I shouldn't have done that. Too much shit Canadian beer and hours alone warped my judgment.
The only way to fix this is to jump the gun and call again. With luck I'll nail our favourite lady doctor and she'll still be the voice of reason, all too willing to listen to the lousy explanation I'll offer and tell me "don't worry."
Or she'll be pissed that I'm toying with the feelings of a girl I'm trying my damnedest not to be drawn to.
She has every right to be. I would be too, if the guy doing it wasn't the mug in the mirror.
------------------
"So it's abandoned?"
"Yeah. Rubble." Clearly, I have no resistance left in my metal bones. We'll blame the road for that: shortly after calling Chuck's mansion, I had two women-- both of which I've spared very long stares at-- talking to me like I'm the witness to some great historical event.
"Except for the building where you found the disk," Storm comments, watching me intently. She's been doing that since she first walked in the door. I'd be flattered if she would stop talking business.
"Yeah."
Leaning back and crossing her arms comfortably over her chest-- so I was watching, sue me-- Jean looks around the motel room and tries for a smile. She fails. "Could you find it again if needed?"
"Why? So I can turn it into one of the stops at Logan's Lost Personal Life tour?" Snappy, I know, but this is my life we're talkin' about.
"No," she reprimands. Hmm, she's not exactly happy either. Wonder why. "But if there's more there that's evidence to experimentation, we need to find it. It'll clear up your past and possibly bring to light some of the governmental crimes against mutants."
Ladies and gents, the voice for Amnesty International, Mutant Branch. "Or it could get our asses busted for sneakin' around where we don't belong."
The resident weather controller nods. "He has a point."
"I'm not the bad guy here, " Jean tries again, "I--we just need to be sure--"
I interrupt. "That's why the disk is on its way. If I had known I woulda caved and headed back myself, I woulda handed it to you here and now. Pain is shit for anyone, and if there's one thing I recall about that place, its pain that makes breakin' limbs comparable to a paper cut."
"True." There's a pause. "When did you send that box?"
"Couple days ago, so it should be here in under a week, assuming they choose to actually shove it across the border."
"Was it insured?"
Funny girl. Somehow I forgot how damn practical that redhead is. "Nah, didn't have the cash for it anyways. Gasoline and things like that."
"That's okay, as long as we get a chance to take a look at it. I think there's a couple old PCs in storage with the right disk drive."
Joyous. "Think there's a chance they got dirt on me?"
The women look at each other and hesitate, not quite sure how to answer a double-edged question like that. I don't blame them; I spent six hours on a major highway arguing with myself over the benefits of having some clue about myself. "If it's the right lab, there could very well be."
Storm nods.
"So who knows I'm here?"
Red points at her dark complexioned teammate. "Just us. Since you didn't say what was going on, we thought it was better to keep it quiet."
This is rich. If any of the guys find out that their two leggy heroines snuck out to meet me at a motel, people would be making ménage comments for weeks. "And what about--?"
"Busy. Life doesn't cease when you're not here, Logan."
I'm sensing a potential lecture here about responsibility. Heh, forget that. Standing up and making a beeline for the stuff tossed on the edge of the bed, I pull out the dogtag and walk it over to them. "Don't quit for me either, or anyone else unfortunate enough to be handed things like this," I savour their initial reactions and shrug, dropping the metal tag on the table next to them and take my seat back on the bed.
Unrepentant bastard. That's me.
"Logan..."
I really wish Storm would talk a bit more here. As much as I know I don't stand a chance against the likes of Roadblock Cyke, that voice of hers is enough to stir me up, especially when it involves my name. When I meet pale skin and dark eyes, she's gently holding the dogtags and lookin' at them like a grail. "Wha?"
"Do you want to come back, Logan?"
For fuck's sake, make her stop using my NAME. A few more times and I'll be like some genie, pledging loyalty because of a feminine voice. What do you want, mastah? Would you like me to summon the eunuchs, mastah?
If they only knew what they do to men. Then again, they probably do.
"I've thought about it, Jeannie, but I'll tell you straight up that I don't do well in one place for long."
"If you want to stay, there's a place for you."
So simply offered. Too bad the post-acceptance reality ain't as peachy. "And Marie?"
"She's becoming a beautiful young woman, Logan." Storm smiles at me, like she knows what the southern girl thinks of me, and I fight the smile down, instead giving her a cryptic stare.
"I'm not goin' back if it'll upset her. Damn girl already has part of me in her head and from experience I can tell ya that I'm not easy to live with."
There's a nod from both of them, but then Storm-- who I now firmly believe knows a helluva lot more about Rogue than I do now--holds out a hand in one of those peaceful gestures. "She misses you."
And there goes the rest of the resolve that would have booked my ass back to the Canadian wilds for some quality lycanthrope impressions.
-----------------
Explain, in less than five words, how a man accidentally wraps himself around the finger of a Southern lily with a white streak the colour of the full moon.
Yeah, I think it's impossible too. At this point, if some Death figure came and asked me to sum up my life, I'd probably laugh and tell him to come back another day.
It's just too fuckin' complex a request.
Four days since I took up residence in the disturbingly clean mansion. Four days since I've been eating good food and sleeping in a real bed.
Four days since I've been avoiding her. Occasionally I wander forth-- typically in the middle of the night when it's just insomniacs and kids pulling allnighters-- and find out that, no the box hasn't come here yet, and no, she hasn't made it a point to come and look for me.
This is how I discovered that Storm-- 'Roro-- is one of those people that doesn't seem to sleep more than five hours a night.
Sometimes I don't give people enough credit. First impressions are not something I excel at. To all appearance, and I actually believed it until this week, she's pretty quiet, kinda conservative and very comfortable in her role as the exotic African goddess.
And then you get her talking about music. Accent or not, she seems to know more about techno than most of the teens here. Webster Hall is apparently her favourite.
Yeah, yeah, I thought it was an orchestra thing initially. I'm definitely not with the times.
It started two nights ago. Sitting in the lounge, watching CNN on the big screen TV, I stroll in and settle in next to her, tryin' to look interested. She smiles at me and offers to change the channel, but I give her a shrug. Again, not with the times.
After the stifling silence, however, we don't stop talking until sunrise. Canada, New York, this place, various people, bein' mutants, what happened at the Statue of Liberty, powers, theories on life. I think we covered it all, milkin' the chance to share with another living being.
Fortunately, we didn't cover much about Marie that night. I asked a few general questions, got a few general answers and we left it there.
The next night, however, I think she was all we talked about. I was right when I figured 'Roro for knowin' more about the girl. Women bond. It's somethin' they do outta instinct.
This is where I eat blame. She took part of me inside her, and according to the snow haired mutant, it's a part I don't know a lot about. Seems some of those foggy memories are trapped in her pretty head, along with those bits of personality she borrowed while I was layin' on Jean's table and healin'. She's got names and faces floating in her mind, most of which I don't know.
Given the choice, I'd like to take 'em back so I can see if they fit into my little search for the past. That, and I hate seein' her unhappy.
"She's not unhappy, Logan, she's frustrated. There is a difference."
'Roro's words stick in my head. "How do I help?"
"I think she'll come to you when she's ready," is the response I get. It's an honest one anyway, and I understand the reasonin' behind it finally.
But still. "Or until the box arrives."
"Yes, your rose will certainly guarantee that."
I manage the barest of smiles and mentally kick myself. Best laid plans...
------------------------
So I don't always think ahead. No one will deny that. I sent the box before I had realised I had fully intended to come back here as soon as I found the stuff, and I stuck the rose in-- still ruminating about the whole dying aspect-- forgetting that no matter what its original meaning was, if Rogue had any feelings about me, positive or otherwise, it was still a ROSE. Rose by any other name, yadda, yadda.
"Awry" is a light way of putting it.
Jean's the one who calls me when the box is brought into the mansion, apparently shuttled to the Danger Room-- I guess the name is fitting-- as soon as it landed in her doctorly hands. What she didn't tell me, however, is that there'd be a few more than just her an' me digging through that disk.
'Roro and Cyke sit at the table in the middle of the room, discussin' something about the plane. When I walk in, they both glance up to acknowledge me, Chuck reading the expression on my face as I settle in next to Storm, my look drawn to this antiquated machine that looks like it should be gatherin' dust in a basement.
"Where's Rogue?"
Jean, or her hand anyways, appears from behind the old disk drive. "Out with friends."
It figures. "Any luck yet with it?"
Chuck smiles one of those wise little I-can-see-what's-coming smiles. "Considering the age of the disk, it's in remarkably good condition. Our ability to de-crypt the information, however, will be the challenge."
There's a feminine snort from under the table. "I'm not that young, Professor."
I raise an eyebrow. Sometimes you just don't expect scenes like this from people that come across as perfectly utopian. Then the leggy Bond girl type makes a snide comment at the figurehead and blows the image. Good for her.
"I realise that... and in the interim, Logan, why don't you tell us about your experiences there."
For the record, I'm not a storyteller. Things happen around me, I remember what they are, and sometimes I sum 'em up for others. That's it. "Not much to say."
"Do you still have the address to the location?"
Score one for Xavier figuring out some of it himself. Or he's rootin' around my head and I can't detect it. "Yeah. The guy at the bar wrote it down, and I stuffed it in a pocket after I got to the lab. You doctor types supposed to be into the whole big metal coffin look?"
Jean's voice travels up from the floor again as she closes something-- probably a wire casing. "Medical experiments are hardly condoned, but yes, they would want the privacy to work unnoticed, considering."
So not only are my former captors sadists, but secretive ones at that. Happy joy. "And?"
"Do I look like a Josef Mengele type to you, Logan?"
Cyke's head straightens up for this edged question. I swear his eyes are narrowing.
"No."
"Right then," standing up and brushing dust off the black shirt, Jean reaches around to turn on the old computer, waiting for it to boot up, or explode. "Let's find out what's on here."
---------------------
There's a brutal honesty about my life, even if it is in fragments of memory and information. I know my name, and the codename they gave me. I know how old I look, and what colour my hair and eyes are. I know I've got enough adamantium in my body to set off every metal detector in the world.
I also know I have the training and personality that comes across as rough and animalistic, even if that's not really my goal.
Funny how that is.
But now I know something else about myself: I'm a number.
Magneto pegged me pretty good, despite the fact that he's more of a zealot about this being a mutant thing than Xavier. I'm a number, an entry in a file, notes about me reduced to entries that have all the respect and dignity of a livestock listing.
I really should be more bitter about this. Then again, if I was, I might be locked up in a plastic prison too.
So, here I am sitting in one of the lounges-- an empty one thankfully-- staring at a TV with some awful program about a Senator on, and pondering.
That disk yielded a list of procedures that were given to their guinea pigs, a couple reports about post-op survival rates, and a summation of the victims of it.
All numbers. Mine, the one on the dogtag, was there.
Unfortunately, now I gotta wait for the encrypted information to be revealed. There's dates and shit, but no mark of who did what, when it was done and what they did in the first place. Jeannie thinks there's a hidden directory.
Personally, I think it's the digital version of doctor's notes. You can't read 'em unless the person who wrote them translates. As I understand, Red is no better, 'cept she don't write down half the stuff in the first place. Must be nice to be a telepath.
"This seat taken?"
This grabs my attention. I've been thinkin' too hard again, I missed the entrance of a woma--
Fuck me, it's Rogue. "Hey, kid."
The angelic smile warms me up better than an insulated jacket. "Hey, Logan."
"Ain't seen you much since I got back."
She nods, almost shamefully. What the hell is in her head, and how much of it is my fault? "Sorry. I knew 'bout you comin' home a few days ago, but didn' know how to do.... do this."
Join the club. "Then sit down and we can bond over bad TV."
She laughs a little and sits down, the many layers of clothes covering her billowing a bit. Is she allowed to look this alluring when she's trying to be noble?
"So what you been up to?"
"Classes mostly," she holds up a gloved hand helplessly, like it's about to be chained. "I've been studyin' more here in the last month than my entire time in Meridian."
"That's school for ya. Do you hate it?" So maybe it should have been "do you like it," big deal.
"No, but it's keepin' me so busy I hardly have time to do anythin' but study, eat and sleep."
"And watch TV with me."
She blushes a bit and looks down. "I'm skippin' out on physics study group."
"Tough gig."
She drawls her accent intentionally. "Tell me about it. So what have you been doin'?"
"Canada's not as great as it's made out to be."
"Biased?"
"No kiddin'. You were there, ya know."
"It was cold," she shivers a little and I resist the urge to set a hand on her. Not so fast, boy.
"Worked out though."
"New York is still colder than Mississippi."
There's an edge of sarcasm, something I'm not entirely used to from her. Naturally it makes me wonder what she took from me. My sardonic "conscious" has that kind of sense of humour. "Hmph. Don't smell like beer and blood here. And the women here aren't as tough as nails, or whores."
The look I get tells me she didn't realise that about Laughlin City. Oops. In a place like that it just seems like a staple to me, drinkin', fightin' and women who somewhere lost their soul to sell their body. Don't mean I like it, but I bet I'm more apathetic than she is.
"So are you stayin' around this time?"
Blunt and to the point. That's my Southern lily. "Thinkin' about it. Got a sales pitch, kid?"
"They don't throw stones or insults here for havin' powers?"
Good one if I ever heard it. "You happy?"
There's a pause. I think we've hit the point where it's now a discussion about the two of us. "Yeah, but it woul' help if my friends wouldn' be so apt to leave for so long."
Yeah, that was aimed at me. "Can ya forgive them for it if they ask nice?"
"I coul' be convinced to."
Make a move or walk away. "Rog-- Marie, I'm sorry. It's not fair of me to treat ya this way."
Only her eyes betray the joy over hearin' those words from me. A little more crow to eat...
"And I wish you didn't have me rattlin' around there inside your head. If I could take it back, I would."
She nods, a teeny smile curling her lip. "Doesn' let me forget about you very easily."
"I bet."
"Anythin' else?"
I hate admitting to my own emotions sometimes. "And I missed you."
The calm that was holding her down on the couch dissipates and she leaps up, hopping on my lap, throws her scarf right on my face and kisses me through it. Pulling it away, my shocked expression making her giggle, she cocks her head. "Now I can forgive you. But--"
"But what?"
"You ever do this to me again and I'll kick your sorry ass."
Deal. "I can handle that. You didn't hear anything about that box, now did ya...?"
She arches an eyebrow at me just like Jeannie does. Dammit, it figures she'd pick up that trait. "The blank dogtag was creepy, and last time I saw one of those disks I was real young."
"And the rest?"
"Cute rose. Is it from Canada?"
Tell me I should have expected this. "Yeah. I kinda thought of you, but didn't want to say anything if the rest of the stuff with it was too morbid."
"It was, but I still like it. Ororo gave it to me, warned me that you were bein' weird about it."
And now I owe the storm goddess another favour. "Nice of her. Ya keep it?"
"In a box with some of my other valuables. Don' want to crush it by accident."
Shiftin' under her, I let the smile show. Why the hell not? She's just all but said that despite how much more complex I make her life, she likes it. Maybe frustrated was about being stuck with part of me in her head and the rest of me not in her life. Not that I could ever calm down enough to stay still for good. I won't lie to myself with that. "So what next, Marie?"
She pauses, stares into my eyes and pokes me in the chest with a gloved finger. "Who's Nagiko?"
Well, maybe I'm not out of trouble with her yet.
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"i'll never find someone quite like you again
i'll never find someone quite like you again
i, i looked into your eyes and saw - a world that does not exist
i looked into your eyes and saw
a world i wish i was in
i'll never find someone quite as touched as you
i'll never love someone quite the way
that I loved you"--"Touched," Vast
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END :)