Matt lingered by the nurse’s station, contemplating the plate of fresh sugar cookies with red sprinkles that were rapidly disappearing and feeling his mouth water. He didn’t particularly have a sweet tooth, but the treats presented an opportunity he decided not to pass up. He grabbed two of the cookies and purloined one of the wadded up, white paper napkins nudged beneath the plate and wrapped them up in it before he padded down the hall in his quiet, rubber-soled shoes. He’d made his rounds, and there were no lights flashing above any of the doorways on the ward for the moment. The activities aide was conducting the exercise hour in the lounge; Matt noted a wide circle of wheelchairs and walkers out of the corner of his eye as he strode past.
He smelled the residual scent of tobacco before he walked all the way into the suite. Mr. Howlett was taking up bed ‘B’ these days, closest to the window. Bed ‘A’ was surprisingly empty, the mattress rolled forward on the old iron frame. Lemon-scented cleanser battled with the other aromas in the room.
Matt could have sworn he smelled the lingering haze of death.
Mr. Howlett took his time greeting him; he was engrossed in a hardcover book with a dilapidated, forest green cover. His luncheon tray was empty, he was relieved to see, easing his mind that he at least still had some semblance of an appetite. It was difficult, watching the residents leave more of their meals behind, or untouched, as the weeks crept by.
“What’s that you’ve got there, sir?”
“Told ya it’s Logan, kid.” He inserted a laminated bookmark into the spine and clapped it shut, pinning Matt with his customary stare. “Just expandin’ my horizons, if ya wanna call it that. One of the nurses brought this back with her from the library, thinkin’ I might like it.” Matt eyed the cover; Edgar Allen Poe’s name was barely visible where the embossed print had begun to fade. He nodded to the packet Matt had clutched against his chest. “Whatcha got?”
“Goodies.” He unfolded the napkin and laid the cookies on the small side table. Logan grunted and allowed the corner of his mouth to quirk up.
“Nice little change from the slop they force down yer throat here,” he muttered, turning the cookie this way and that between finger and thumb, sniffing it thoughtfully before he took a hearty, savage bite. The pastry crunched loudly between his teeth as he flicked away a crumb from the corner of his mouth. “Tastes like they used real butter.”
“My mom swears by it.”
“So did ‘Ro.” Logan dispatched the rest of the cookie, then patted his shirt pocket, feeling for his lighter. “They ain’t keepin’ ya busy enough, kid?”
“I’ve been on my feet all day,” Matt countered. “You don’t have a new roommate yet,” he observed.
“Marko was all right, I guess; snored like dueling buzzsaws. Smelled like his pappy. Could always smell Cain comin’ from a mile away.” Matt stared at him incredulously.
“You knew Mister Marko’s father?’
“Yep. Abel didn’t take after him so much in looks; his dad was wide as a treestump. Never was one fer finesse.” Logan leaned back in his chair, letting out a leonine yawn and lazy stretch, allowing all of his limbs and joints to pop. “Think I need a smoke.”
“You’re worse than Jay,” Matt remarked, thinking back to Jayse’s long, starving drags on his cigarettes during their morning break. Day shift was killing him.
“Ain’t like I’ll be running any marathons any time soon.” Logan reached down to adjust the pedals of his wheelchair before Matt could reach them, letting up the brakes. “I felt him leave, y’know.”
“Felt him leave-?”
“Marko. Ya can feel it. When someone’s soul leaves the room. Feel it brushin’ over ya, like a cold fog. Almost whispers in yer ear.” Those dark brown eyes were never rheumy or bloodshot like so many of the residents Matt cared for; the lucidity in their depths pinned Matt and held him immobile, his hands hovering over the handgrips of the chair.
“That’s…that’s never happened to me yet,” he admitted.
“Thank God fer that, kid, when ya go home ta say yer prayers tonight. Don’t mean it never will, in yer line of work, or at some point in yer life.” His tone became slightly wistful as he waved Matt ahead to wheel him from the suite. “S’happened ta me more times than I can remember. Ain’t sorry that my memories ain’t what they used ta be. Such as they are.” Matt’s ears perked up when he muttered “Some of the damned things ain’t even mine, near as I can tell…”
“Come again?”
“Take us outside, under that big magnolia tree. Should still have the last of the blooms on it.” Matt obeyed, once again enjoying the brisk air washing away the scent of disinfectants that seemed to cling to his clothes. The pall and pong of the clinic choked him.
Mr. Howlett blew a thick cloud of cigar smoke that wafted up and burned Matt’s nostrils, but his voice was a soothing rasp. “First met ‘Ro at the school right when I was in the middle of cussing out Scooter.”
“Which school?”
“Mutant High,” he scoffed, choking slightly when he swallowed too much saliva. He made ragged, gagging sounds as he recovered, and Matt winced when he saw his eyes watering with the effort. He rubbed his back and grasped his arm, bringing it up to help waylay the full-bodied, wracking cough. It helped. “The Institute,” he amended. “Called it the School for Gifted Youngsters, back in the day.”
“No shit?” Matt muttered, before excusing himself. “Sorry…”
“S’okay. That’s about what I said, back then, when Chuck recruited me.”
“Recruited you? To go to school?”
“Uh-uh. Fer a retrieval. Had a crisis. Some of his best and brightest were missing. He needed me ta help bring ‘em back.”
“Whoa…you mean some of the kids at the school were kidnapped?”
“Not quite, kid. Chuck was always concerned about the squirts. Kept a close eye on all of ‘em. Heard ‘em comin’ and goin’ every minute o’ the day. He needed his graduates ta help him keep things runnin’ like a top.”
“So, kids actually ‘graduated’ from that school?” Matt squinted at Logan and rubbed his nape.
“Whaddya think? It was a friggin’ school, Einstein,” he carped, craning his grizzled head up to stare at him like he just grew a third eye. ‘Course kids graduated.”
“Yeah, but…what, do you have to ‘learn’ how to be a mutant?” Mr. Howlett sighed, giving him a look that admitted that he had him there.
“Yeah. Every now an’ again, ya do. Ya don’t just wake up one day, knowin’ how ta fly without fallin’ a few times.”
“So…what did you do, sir?”
“Whatever the hell I pleased.” He puffed on his stogie and impressed Matt with a set of three impeccable smoke rings. He gave Matt a harsh laugh, and Matt grinned back, knowing every bit of it was at his expense.
“More’n anything, I was lookin’ fer an out from what I was doin’. Chuck made me an offer I was about ta refuse. Scooter was makin’ it easier fer me ta say no. Already played soldier. Had folks tellin’ me what t’do. Showed ‘em why that was a mistake. I wasn’t ready ta try on a different hat and play Boy Scout. Or hero.”
“What made you say yes?” A chorus of voices in Matt’s head screamed for answers. Who was ‘Scooter?’ Who was ‘Chuck?’ How did you learn to be a mutant?
“My reason fer living. My sweet ‘Ro. ‘Cept back then, she didn’t know she was mine yet.” Matt chuckled under his breath, enjoying his spunk. He leaned back in this chair and draped his arm over the back of it, twisting his body to face Matt. His stare was intense and canny, and as usual, it unnerved Matt. “Either of yer parents drink tea, kid?”
“Once in a while.” Matt’s mom liked that Celestial Seasonings herbal crap in the artsy-fartsy box. Orange Zinger, or some such nonsense.
“I smelled Chuck’s tea before I even walked into his study. Guy tried ta convince me it was the good kind.” Logan chewed his cigar thoughtfully. “Never really was big on tea. Wasn’t big on anything that ya couldn’t pump outta the tap that had Molson written on the label.”
“You don’t look like you drink much tea,” Matt considered. Logan shook his head ruefully, sighing.
“Everybody’s got their own special scent that sets ‘em apart from everyone else. Ya can tell a lot from scent, an’ from how they move. Chuck was in a wheelchair, but he still moved like someone who was used ta bein’ in charge. Didn’t waste his energy on broad gestures. Guess ya could call him meticulous. Smelled a little like that damned tea…Earl Grey, I wanna think. Yeah. That and old-fashioned black licorice. Stood on decorum, too. Never left his room in anything but a damned suit. Always had ta look the part of a professor.”
“And he went by Chuck?”
“Nope. Pissed him off when I took ta callin’ him that, though.” Mr. Howlett’s cigar was nearly burned down the last mangled stub, dying embers threatening to blow loose and leave holes in his soft flannel shirt. “Scooter didn’t like his nickname all that much either. Henh.”
“Man…bet he didn’t.” Scooter?
“Even the guy’s scent was uptight. Could barely tell he owned pheromone number one from all the shit he tried to cover it up with. Had that sterile smell, like when ya open up a new box of Band-Aids. Think folks that spout off all that psycho babble call it ‘obsessive compulsive’ when ya wash yer hands every time ya walk past the tap?”
“Eh.”
“That was Scooter. Used ta love gettin’ his goat, too. He made it easy. ‘Ro let me know right off the bat that wouldn’t wash while she was around.”
“She liked him?”
“She was protective of him. Had this thing about loyalty. I came ta love that about her, but she threw that up like a big brick wall when we first met. Wasn’t all she threw at me…’Ro had spunk. Gotta love spunk.
I was halfway out the door when she asked me where I thought I was goin’. Not where was I goin’, but where I thought I was goin’. I ain’t the kinda guy ya wanna hold up if I look like I’m in a hurry. But ‘Ro wasn’t the kinda woman ya just walked away from, either.
She smelled like sandalwood and almonds…”
Fifty years ago; Westchester County, New York:
“Can I offer you anything to drink, Logan?”
“Ya can’t offer me anything I want, bub. Knew that the moment ya called me here,” he grumbled back, scratching at a callous on his palm with his blunt fingernails.
“Then why did you come?” Logan craned his body around toward the steady baritone that sounded older than its owner. “Since you have stuff to do that’s so much more important? Don’t you?” Logan barely discerned the silhouette of intelligent, sharp eyes mostly obscured by the thick, crimson lenses of a pair of Oakley sunglasses that he knew must have cost a mint.
“Short list of what I hafta do doesn’t include kissin’ his ass, or yers, Boy Wonder,” Logan smirked back. Charles Xavier sighed heavily as he retrieved his cooling up of tea by its delicate handle and took a fortifying sip
“We contacted you because everything in our records indicated you were the man for the job, Logan,” he continued, appealing to his ego.
“Who’d ya hafta kill, fuck, or blackmail ta get those records?”
“I employ methods far more subtle than that, I can assure you.”
“In the meantime, watch your mouth,” Scott snapped, folding his arms over his chest. He was tall and athletically built, broad in the shoulder and long in the leg. His walnut brown hair gleamed in the sunlight filtering through the sheers of the study’s large picture window, trimmed neatly and nudged obediently into place with hair gel that tickled Logan’s nostrils, even standing ten feet away.
“Your associate, Mr. McKenzie, is a former colleague of mine.”
“Mack ain’t the type ta go offering anything he knows about me on a silver platter ta some snake oil salesman like you, bub.”
“He didn’t. He merely returned my voice mail message.” Charles leaned forward and pressed the message button on his phone keypad without further prompting. Mack’s familiar voice rumbled clearly into the study, easing the scowl on Logan’s face into less mutinous lines.
Charles, it’s James McKenzie. Got your message about Logan. Not sure what want me to tell you about him, except that even if you manage to track him down, don’t be surprised if he gives you hell. What you do, once you get in touch with him, is out of my court.”
“He sent me a medical report of tests that Department H ran shortly after you entered their contract,” Charles explained. His voice held no artifice. “I didn’t ask for personnel records above and beyond that, nor any other character assessments that I normally request when I recruit individuals to teach at the school or work on my staff.”
“What, is that s’posed ta make me feel all warm and fuzzy that ya didn’t go pryin’ into shit that don’t concern ya, anyway, Chuckles? Yer playin’ a fool’s game.”
“I like to think that it would foster more trust between us if you volunteered things about yourself, dependent on whether you feel you’d be willing to stay. Prior to contacting Mr. McKenzie, I located you myself.” Logan didn’t hold back the snarl that clawed its way up from his throat. His pupils were dilated, nostrils flaring as he sized up Xavier with a scowl meant to make him piss himself.
Charles had the nerve to chuckle softly. Logan’s knuckles itched.
“We used Cerebro. It helps us locate mutant power signatures,” Scott explained behind him, leaning against a cherrywood side table.
“I don’t care if ya used a metal detector held together with chewing gum and paper clips. Ya ain’t convincin’ me why I shouldn’t gut both of ya fer pryin’ into my affairs.” He heard Scott lean away from the table, making it creak slightly before he crossed the study, flanking the professor’s desk like a sentinel.
“We wouldn’t have contacted you if we didn’t need you. Trust me, Logan, we don’t want to need you.”
Logan grunted. “This is a friggin’ school fer mutants. Try livin’ up to that name some time.” Logan lifted his hand to swat at an errant gnat that was buzzing around his hair. “What’s the point of bein’ a so-called ‘gifted youngster’ if ya aren’t gonna use those gifts?”
“We lost six of our alumni and staff while we were scouting out a mutant power signature in the Mediterranean,” Charles murmured.
“Boo-freakin’-hoo.” The gnat was wearing on his last nerve, stubbornly dive-bombing the sharp, shaggy peaks of his hair. He swatted at it again, picking his moment.
“Your enhanced senses would come in handy,” Charles suggested.
“Great. So ya need me ta be a bloodhound.” He nodded to Scott, who was watching him silently, a blank expression on his face. He peered back at his own reflection, distorted by the red lenses of his glasses. “Why dontcha send Scooter here ta do it, with yer fancy mutant signature-tracking thingamabob?”
“I’m not the one who knows how to use it. Oh, by the way, Logan?”
“Yeah?”
“Hold still.” VRAAAAAAMMPPPPFFTT! Scott’s fingers flew up to his glasses, lifting them by the stem before Logan could utter “Holy shit!” and his eyes narrowed, glowing scarlet before emitting a needle-fine laser beam that nearly parted his hair. He dropped his glasses back into place and reached up to scratch his chin.
The buzzing stopped. The gnat’s body dropped from mid-air, landing almost silently on the Oriental rug by Logan’s feet. Almost silently. Logan could have sworn the gnat uttered “wtf?” before meeting its demise.
SNIKT…
“Try that again with a movin’ target, Bright Eyes,” Logan offered, lunging up from his chair, claws extended and baring his fangs. Scott’s feet were already bringing him close enough to smell Logan’s breath, nose to nose with the compact, scrappy Canadian, never flinching at the sight that sent men bigger than him home to stubborn, pissed-bed inducing nightmares.
“Keep talking like a target,” Scott hissed back.
“Scott!” Charles barked. “Remember yourself. Logan, calm down.”
“Who’s gonna make me, bub?”
There are ladies present, Xavier’s liquid voice intoned, except that his lips weren’t moving. Logan sneered.
“A friggin’ telepath. Great. Just great.” SNAKT. He sheathed his claws, then growled, lunging forward a little and stamping his foot at Scott just because he could, as though shooing off an errant puppy. Scott made a disgusted sound before standing down, leaning back on the edge of the professor’s desk. “And I don’t see no ladies…” Soft footsteps padded down the hall before Logan had the chance to focus on the incoming guest.
Sandalwood, almonds and a fragrance that he could only define as the warmth of her skin and the natural pheromones of her hair toyed with his senses, teasing him fleetingly as he turned toward the doorway of the study. No one could look as good as she smelled.
He was proven wrong again.
“I thought you all might like some cookies,” she offered. Her voice was rich and dark as maple syrup, with a faint accent that intrigued him. “Moira sent them up, and asked if you needed any more tea, Professor.” She set the platter down on the side table, laden with a plate of sugar cookies and a small candy dish of mints. The good kind, Logan noticed, pastel-colored crèmes dotted with white nonpareils. She helped herself to one briefly, smiling in satisfaction as she popped a pink one into her mouth and savored it.
“Ororo, I’d like you to meet Logan, our guest. We’ve requested his assistance in retrieving our First Year graduates.” She hastily covered her mouth, attempting to swallow the mint so that she could greet him without talking around a lump of mint crème. She fluttered her hand errantly, as if coaxing it down her throat before extending it to greet him properly.
“I apologize. I’m Ororo. Ororo Munroe.” He stared at her hand a moment, and she wavered slightly, wondering if he would take it, or if her arm would fall off in the process.
His hand felt warm, strong and solid cupped in hers, seeming to hold her captive. “No need ta apologize, darlin’. Name’s Logan.” Then as soon as he’d greeted her, he dropped her hand and retreated, turning back to Charles. “And I ain’t accepted that request yet, Chuck.” Logan heard the faint sound of disapproval she emitted over his familiarity with the Professor.
“I see.” He turned back to face her, smirking over the defensive posture she had, so much like Scott’s. “So you will not help us?”
“I don’t know you people from Adam,” he shrugged. “Wouldn’t mind gettin’ ta know YOU better, Sunshine, but it looks like ya’ve got yer mind on one thing that ya need from me.” One delicately winged white brow “ white, Logan marveled “ cocked itself in the air as her hands settled on her hips. They were nice hips.
“I do not particularly need anything from you, sir,” she huffed. “The Professor told Scott and I that you have special gifts that would help us track down our friends. Cerebro located a powerful mutant signature.”
“They told me that already.”
“We lost the power signatures of all six of our alumni shortly after they departed the school. Scott was the only one to return.” She pinned him with eyes that seemed to scold him, even though her voice was soft. “My best friend is missing,” she informed him. “You could help us get her back.”
“Is yer friend hot, too?”
“I said it once; I’ll say it again. Watch your mouth,” Scott growled behind him. Logan’s laugh was brittle, rumbling through a chest that was broad as a tree trunk.
“Guess that’s a yes. Guess she’s taken, too?”
“In a manner of speaking, yes. Jean is Scott’s fiancée,” Ororo replied smoothly. “Think about that, then, when you consider whether to refuse help to someone trying to save the woman he loves.”
“Wouldn’t know what that’s like, darlin’.” It was a boldfaced lie.
Her face refuted it as such. And oh, what a face it was.
Eyes clear and blue as tourmalines glowed out from a face imagined by an Egyptian sculptor of old, her skin dewy and glowing, a rich shade of cinnamon. High, proud cheekbones and a pert chin challenged him to walk out that door, or better yet, to risk remaining in their company to assume their shared burden. If she smiled, she’d have dimples, Logan pondered. He’d bet anything on it. Those large eyes were slanted and fringed with dark, curling lashes, and she stared down a nose that was narrow and straight, haughty in her bearing as she measured him. She was also miles tall, easily standing eye to eye with Scooter, but much easier on the eyes. Her curves were never-ending, and a rippling, gleaming cascade of lustrous white hair waved down her back.
Lips shaped like a cupid’s bow, full and ripe as strawberries then proceeded to tear him a new one.
“I do not think I have ever had the displeasure of meeting someone so cocky and selfish!” she hissed. “Do you have even one conscionable bone in your body, Logan? The Professor contacted you, asked for assistance in finding you, because he needed help he felt only you could give! We have lost telepathic contact with all six members of our team! We cannot reach them by radio, satellite, or radar! Scott came back to this house barely alive! His powers were temporarily stripped from him when he got back! We have been fretting, sleepless, and struggling for clues, for any means of getting back in there and bringing them out! We are mutants, Logan. That automatically makes us targets, if you like. It also makes us expendable. The military would never help us. The government would show a round of applause if their bodies were found drifting in the sea, if they knew who and what they were. We are each all that we have.” During her discourse, she’d slowly advanced, broadly gesticulating, her hands flying like thrashing falcons. He’d actually BACKED UP as she pled her case on the Professor’s behalf.
Behind him, Scott suppressed a smile.
“Ororo, that’s enough. This is Logan’s decision, whether or not to stay.” Ororo peered down at him in frustration, her back still stiff, bristling at being interrupted.
“Fine, then. Do as you will,” she shot back, directing her parting words at Logan as she swept from the study. Her loose cotton pants and tunic swished out behind her with her angry stride. “Do not let the door hit you on your way out.” Logan grew flushed with the heady shock of her rant, bursting forth from her lips when she’d seemed so calm and cool. Over her parting footsteps, he heard her grumbling words under her breath in a foreign tongue.
It was only then that he’d noticed that the study had grown slightly dark as the clouds outside blocked out the sun, rolling in from nowhere. Thunder rumbled overhead, sending a shiver through him. There was nothing he loved more than a good storm, even if the forecast said it was gonna be sunny today…
“Any idea what she’s sayin’?”
“You don’t wanna know,” Scott quipped coolly behind him. Logan turned to face him, and his chiseled mouth was twisted into a wry grin beneath his flamboyant spectacles.
“No. You don’t,” Charles agreed affably. “Cookie?” He nodded to the plate on the table.
Logan made a thoughtful noise, scratching an itch behind his ear before taking one from the tray. The pastry crumbled onto his tongue, rich with butter and cinnamon. Snickerdoodles; his favorite.
“Ororo’s English is coming along nicely,” Charles pointed out.
“Coming along?” Logan’s expression begged him, Are ya shittin’ me?
“It isn’t her native tongue. Ororo hails from Cairo. She came here six weeks ago. I’ve been teaching her English telepathically. She’s a quick study.”
“Wait a minute…so, she ain’t one of yer alumni?”
“No. She’s accepted my offer, much as I had hoped you had. She has been recruited for the recovery mission. She and Scott shall be leaving in forty-eight hours. I was hoping you’d join them.” Charles eyed him carefully, trying not to color his words with futile hope.
Logan polished off the cookie before brushing the crumbs from his hands against his worn denims.
“So, how do ya figure we get to this island o’ yers? In a friggin’ rowboat?”
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