“How long has he been in there?” The ruby glassed Scott stopped at the glass partition, his hand automatically going around the waist of them woman standing next to him.
“He’s never left.” Jean sighed tiredly, resting her head against her lover’s shoulder. It had been a long day and an equally long night for all of them. “Neither has she.”
That got Scott to lean slightly forward, looking towards a slightly shaded corner of the room, where, on the floor, sat a sleeping X23, her arms stretched out on her bent legs. Even in her fitful slumber, her hands were subconsciously twitching, as if wanting to let the claws out.
“He knows Ororo, and so does the girl, X.” Jean whispered. “It seemed the Professor was right.”
‘He sure was,’ was something Scott wasn’t going to…wasn’t ready to say out aloud, not even after seeing what was before his eyes…..and what he had seen few hours ago.
----
**X-Men, we are under attack**
Xavier’s mental call had coincided with the newly installed gates of the mansion twisting and bursting open, a telltale sign of a magnetic manipulation, a power that only one of the enemies had….Magneto.
Within seconds, they had gotten into a full-fledged conflict, with the X-Men, Cyclops, Jean, Storm, Iceman, Angel, Psylocke and Cannonball going against the Brotherhood consisting of Magneto, Quicksilver, Scarlet Witch, Blob, Toad, Forge and Mastermind.
Taking advantage of the slim element of surprise they had, Wanda flashed off Xavier to an empty parking lot…in New Jersey, thus giving Mastermind the upper hand.
Too bad, she didn’t take into account the four guests the X-Men were entertaining for the past few days, and their immunity to telepathic manipulations. His mind in chaos at the revelation from his daughter, his worries only added on by impending arrival of his two daughter’s from Japan, Wolverine and consequently X23, Jubilee and Remy also jumped into the fray, throwing the balance of power back into the X-Men’s favor.
In the sky, her eyes blazing white with electric power, Storm reigned down, a mixture of freezing rain and golf ball sized hail onto the impromptu battlefield, her wind currents easily supporting her.
-
“AAAaaagghh,” Logan’s cry drew her attention. He was hovering three feet in the air, his body stretched tight backwards, like a bow ready to let go, a helmet clad Magneto only a few feet away from him.
“Where is the girl Wolverine?” Magneto’s voice was cold and threatening. “Where did you take her? Where did you take MY weapon?”
“Fuck yo….Aaagggh,” Logan’s claws started bending in an unnatural direction. Inside the metal casing that covered them, he could sense the bone straining to splinter.
“Hmm. What do we have here?” The raging X23, who right then was battling it out with three of Forge’s mechanical constructs, caught the Master of Magnetism’s eye. “Another one. A different one. I think, I’ll just take her.”
“Nnnnn….” Logan grunted deep in his throat, unable to move even his jaw anymore.
-
“Let. Him. GO.” Ororo swooped down from the sky, using a gust of gale force wind to knock Magneto off his aerial position and into the ground. His momentary loss of concentration freed Logan from his magnetic prison, he too falling onto the hard earth, his healing factor taking over full force to heal the internal injuries caused by all the stretching, not to mention the four metal poles sticking in gut. They were the remains of the mansion’s gates, which guided by Magneto had found a perfect target in the super healing mutant.
“Oh, no you don’t,” a lump of green slimy goop striking her face, a long tongue lashing out and curling itself at her right ankle, Ororo was yanked down with such a force that she went slam bang into the metal boned Wolverine, their head to head collision, injuring her, knocking her out.
-
Toad’s retaliatory move against the weather witch literally blew up in his face, as the next instant all hell seemed to break loose, with both Wolverine and X23 going into a berserker rage that had hem slashing at everything and anything that came within their arm’s reach. It was Jubilee, Remy and a newly arrived Kirika’s presence of mind that saved a few of the X-Men themselves, especially Scott and Bobby.
Te Brotherhood finally making a break or it, fleeing with their injured leader, Scott had turned towards his teammates and made the mistake of approaching a still unconscious Ororo. Bobby, who had tried it already, only to have a bloodshot eyed X take a swipe at him, tried to warn him, but being the leader that he was, Scott tried to talk down the father-daughter pair, both of them hovering protectively around Ororo’s prone body.
His efforts to sound like the alpha male; he had got him a nice slash across his chest, with Jean’s timely telekinesis saving him from having his heart sliced into two, ending with only a surface wound, one that would heal within a couple of days.
Once again, it had been Jean, whom Wolverine and X allowed to get close enough to Ororo for conducting a preliminary scan and then to transport telekinetically to the infirmary, with both feral mutants accompanying her, one on either side of the unconscious Ororo.
---
Now, in the Present,
“How are you feeling?” Jean laid a gentle hand at Scott’s chest, smirking slightly at the mock wince the X-Man put forward.
“I’ll live,” he supplied with a mischievous but tired smirk of his own, his eyes once again turning to the view inside the room. “What about Ororo?”
“She should be coming out of it soon,” the redhead went into doctor mode. “Luckily, there weren’t any major injuries, just a mild concussion. The sedative I gave her was to help her sleep the pain out. Another hour and she should be up, and if everything checks out fine, ready to go to her room and get some sleep.
“Sure, like that’s going to happen,” Scott pointed towards the clock. It was almost dawn. “She’ll go to the greenhouse.”
“Not if I have anything to say about it.” The doctor spoke again. “She will have to take it easy for at least a couple of days….not that it is going to happen, not now anyway.”
“Why?” Scott asked, his gaze narrowing at Logan leaned forward and moved a strand of silky white hair from the dusky beauty’s face.
“Scott, we…you also heard what the girl…what X said to him just before the attack,” Jean noticed the throbbing nerve along the side of Scott’s face tick at her words. “And now this,” she gestured towards the room. “Just look at them. They are not even leaving her side. Whatever it is that they knew, it is a sure lot more than any of us do….”
“I know,” Scott’s tight words cut of Jean. “I just don’t like it.”
----
A few stories up, Jubilee was sitting with her other friend-cum-sister Kirika, the younger Amiko asleep on the newly installed third bed in the room.
Seeing her father and sister’s berserker rage, Kirika had immediately taken over. First requesting and with whom it did not work, threatening, she got all the men to step back, an act not liked by either Scott or Warren.
After that, she had taken Jean and slowly brought her near the growling mutants, talking with them to get through to them. It was Logan she got through to, his higher brain functions returning….just enough to make him understand the severity of the situation, and that the female he was guarding needed help and the redhead would be able to do just that.
Once they were able to do that and send them off to the infirmary, she had turned to the remaining x-men, out of whom Warren and Betsy had left to retrieve Professor Xavier.
----
“Who are you?” Scott asked angrily. “And what are you doing here?” He knew why the newcomer was here. She had told him as much during their initial conversation.
“As I told you,” Kirika composed herself, hoping to avoid a confrontation with the already on edge X-Men. “I am here to see Wolverine. I came here to warn him, but it seems that I was too late in arriving.”
“What do you mean?” Scott didn’t let up. Ever since they had got involved with Wolverine, the school had been attacked twice, once by Wolverine and his *gang* and the second time by Magneto’s Brotherhood of Mutants, an attack which according to the woman standing before him was somehow related to Wolverine. Then there was the thing with Ororo. Three years after her return, they finally found a link to her time away from the X-Men, and surprise of surprises, it was once again Wolverine.
“The people who attacked you, Magneto,” Kirika spat out the name. “He came here to get me.”
“WHAT!” Bobby piped up from his position behind Scott, with Cannonball standing a few feet away from him.
“Magneto came here for me, and for that I apologize,” Kirika repeated with a bow.
“What do you mean he came here for you?” Even Scott was confused now. From what he had heard, Magneto had been after X23. “Who are you?”
“My name is Kirika Yashida,” Kirika finally introduced herself. “With me, is my younger sister, Amiko,” she gestured towards the aircraft currently standing on the mansion grounds. “I came here to warn my father.”
“Father?” Scott repeated. “You mean Wolverine.”
“Yes.”
“Pardon my suspicion,” Scott wasn’t taking anymore chances. First the two girls who were already with Wolverine, one Chinese, Jubilee and the other Caucasian, X23….and now this, two more. How many children did this man have? “How do we know for sure that you are who you say…?”
-SNIKT-
By now all the X-Men were this particular sound, and what it brought along with it.
“Yup, that will do,” Bobby snickered at Scott’s stunned silence. “She’s his, alright.”
----
**X-Men, to the infirmary**
The mental hail jarred the purple haired Betsy out of her peaceful slumber, also waking up the blonde haired man lying next to her, his super-sized wings protectively draped around both of them.
**Coming Professor** Angel answered back before opening his eyes and seeing two blue ones staring at him. “The Professor’s….”
“I know luv’,” Psylocke crooned softly, stretching and rubbing her lithe supermodel body along his muscular one. “Told ‘im, we’ll be there in a jiffy.”
“In a jiffy?” Angel smirked amused at the difference in their usage of the English language.
“You got something against the Queen’s English?” Betsy caught his thought and lobbed it back at him.
“Hey, no fair,” Warren’s wings once again closed around them.
Even though comparatively new to the X-Men, Betsy and Warren had hooked up quite soon and although not in a ‘relationhip’, they were taking the teammates-with-benefits-with-a-possibility-for-a-relation route, taking it one day at a time.
“We should go,” Betsy sighed at his chest. “Storm’s woken up.”
“How do you….?” Warren started only to stop as he remembered who the woman alongside him was, a telepath.
“Yup, got it from the Professor,” Psylocke supplied as she eased out of the arms and wings embrace and sat up. “He says he’s got an announcement to make.”
-----
Elsewhere in Canada,
“So ven is Logan coming?” The teenager asked of the man in charge.
“He just said soon,” answered Henry McCoy, Beast. He had just received a communicate from Logan stating the same and that they should expect some outsiders along with him. That was a cryptic way of saying, get ready for anything.
“Oh,” Kurt Wagner aka Nightcrawler sighed.
At the first glance anyone would confuse the two blue furred mutants as family, too close to be father and son, but possibly brothers. It was only on paying closer attention that the differences started becoming clear. While sharing the same basic skin color, slightly elongated canines and modified ears, leonine in Henry’s case and Elf like in Kurt’s, there were differences that set them clearly apart, the least of which were their mutant powers. While Kurt had three digits on both hands and feet, Henry had all five. Also unique for Kurt was his arrowhead tail and his bright yellow eyes, both of which the long nailed i.e. clawed Henry lacked.
“Yes,” Henry nodded. He knew the reason for Kurt’s excitement and at the mention of guests his dejection. It was Kurt’s turn to accompany Logan on his next ‘trip’. In an effort to keep their location secret and yet give the children a normal life, a schedule had been set up in which every time Logan left for a trip, one or sometimes two of the younger residents would accompany him. This time it was Jubilee who had gone with him, and the next was supposed to be Kurt.
Also adding to his impatience was the new watch that Henry had finally been able to make for him….a watch that apart from telling the time would for short time periods, would make him look like a normal human, masking his unique mutancy with a hard light hologram around him. Presently the time was around three hours per charge, something that Henry was working hard to improve upon. That meant, unless someone got close enough to touch him, there would be no guessing that he was a mutant.
“Don’t worry Kurt; we can have a trial run when Logan arrives,” Beast smirked at the whoo hoo, and, oh yeah, that the spunky teenager gave him.
“I’ll go tell everyone,” he leapt up, leaving Henry to resume his work.
*BAMPF*
----
Back in New York,
Ororo had woken to find two faces staring at her, faces she knew but did not expect to be there…or did she?
‘Wolverine and X23,’ her mind told her. She had heard the girl’s frantic voice. “She doesn’t remember it….she doesn’t remember any of it,” That is what X had said over and over again, her voice cracking with emotion.
‘She was talking about me….’ Jean’s entry ended that line of thoughts as well as any chance of her talking to either Wolverine or to the girl. Thankfully Jean accepted her request not to let anyone know about her recovery, not until she had talked to her vigil keepers.
The Professor, who had been maintaining a close telepathic eye on her, agreed with that and gave her the appropriate time.
----
“You don’t remember anything?” Logan asked after she finished telling her side of the story.
“No,” Ororo answered frankly, the look on both Logan and X23’s, no, on Laura's face, she reminded herself….the look on their faces making her wish it were otherwise.
“I-I thought you…..” Logan started to say something, choking up mid-sentence. “You wanna know about it? About us?”
“Us?” Ororo echoed, gulping as her nervousness jumped a couple of notches at which us this man was talking about. Him and his daughter….or him and Ororo.
“Yeah. You, me, the kid….us,” Logan nodded hesitantly having caught the change in her behavior. Maybe she was better this way? Maybe she just wanted to just know and not go back? Would she?
“Y-Yes…” Ororo’s answer brought some hope in those hazel eyes.
“You sure?” He had to question. He had to be sure. He couldn’t go through this….not again.
“Yes.” This time around, her answer held no hesitation, only firm confidence.
“You’ll have to come with me…with us for that,” Logan corrected himself, back pedaling on the *me* factor. He knew what it meant to lose your memories and how it affected your behavior with people, especially anyone who says that they are trying to help us and that you will have to accompany them for it.
“Where?” And true enough, suspicion raised its head in Ororo’s voice. There was something in the back of her mind that said, she could trust this time….the same feeling that had been having ever since she had met this stranger. Having that feeling had unsettled her, a fact made clear when she lost her cool against him.
“Canada,” Logan answered promptly. “You can bring your friends with you….if you want,” he supplied rather reluctantly, but only to prove that he did not mean any harm or pose any danger to her.
“Where in Canada?” Her suspicion slightly dissipated, Ororo still had to question.
“That I can’t tell,” Logan sensed her instant withdrawal and fumbled to find the correct words to get her back. “Not that I don’t want to…Its not for me, I can take care of myself an of you…its for the kids. Someone might follow us….” Finally giving up, he sighed. “We will go to Calgary, Alberta. Its near that….that’s all I can tell you for now.”
Taking her ensuing silence as further withdrawal, he leaned forward and grasped her hands.
“Please ‘Ro, trust me….please. Just once, just one day…twenty-four hours. That’s all I ask….Please.”
Shocked more than surprised at the sudden change in the man, who until yesterday would have just as easily have killed her as he would have talked to her, Ororo’s eyes danced from him to an equally hopeful Laura and back to him again.
Gently squeezing his hands with her free one, she nodded, smiling uneasily. “Yes.”
“Yes?”
“I’ll go with you.”
----
A few hours later,
“No. No way,” Scott shook his head vigorously, as he marched up and down on the plush carpet lining the floor of Xavier’s office. “No way are we going to send Ororo with that maniac.”
“Scott…” Jean started.
“No Jean,” Scott’s face had gone as red as the ruby quartz of his visor. “How can she even think we’d allow something like this?”
“Ororo is a grown woman Scott,” Xavier spoke from behind his desk. Although he himself had some reservations regarding Ororo’s decision and would liked to have been consulted in it, he was going support it, both because he had confidence in Storm’s abilities at being able to handle herself and because he knew, even if he said no, Ororo would leave. He did not need his telepathy to realize that. She was getting a chance to get answers about the two lost years of her life, answers she might not get a chance to get again. “And Wolverine had offered to allow two people to accompany her. With Jean, Samuel and Kitty accompanying her, she will not be alone.”
“Jean, Sam and KITTY?” The look Scott gave his mentor clearly said, have you lost your fucking mind?
“Yes,” Once again the choice had been Ororo’s. “Its Ororo’s decision, one with which I agree completely. It’s a strategically sound one.”
“What do you mean?” Scott huffed at not being included the three member team that would be accompanying Ororo. After all, he was the team leader. Not only should he have been on that team, he should have been consulted with who the other two members would be. For crying out, Kitty, what was Ororo thinking?
“From what we have seen, Wolverine’s technological support is as strong, if not stronger than ours. This is clear by his truck and by the psychic inhibitors, he and his companions seem to possess. Therefore if there is some problem and if they use the same gadgets on us, Shadowcat would be the best choice in breaking free from it. By phasing, she could not only get rid of the inhibitor, but also destroy their systems, thus giving Jean a chance to use her telepathy on them, or, if the need arose to contact me.”
“Hmm,” a frowning Scott nodded reluctantly. “What about Sam? Why send him? He hasn’t been an X-Men for all that long. Why not send someone more experienced, like Angel or even me. Why not me? We are better prepared at handling serious situations.”
“I agree Scott,” Xavier nodded. “But with both Ororo and Jean away, you and Angel will be needed here. The recent attacks have left us with a very precarious situation. We need to rebuild and strengthen our defenses. We cannot afford to send all the senior team members.”
“Why Sam?” Scott questioned.
“For in case a speedy escape is required.” Propelling literally like a rocket, Cannonball was the best choice. There was no one on the team who could overtake him, not even Ororo, who although able to fly farther and for longer durations, lacked the sudden burst that an emergency escape would require. “Besides, Samuel Guthrie has something that none of us have….not where it comes to Wolverine.”
“What?” Scott scowled at the mere mention of Wolverine.
“He is not found irritating by either Wolverine or his daughter,” Jean chuckled at the Professor’s explanation, her giggle become a full-fledged laugh at the lost puppy look on Scott’s face.
“How long will this mission be?” Scott finally relented. As far as he was concerned it was a mission, one that should be completed as soon as possible.
“Wolverine has asked for a day,” Xavier answered, silently adding. ‘….after that its Ororo’s decision.’ He knew that it would take longer than that. The expressions on Logan and Laura’s faces had told him so. They were sure of it.
“So they will be away for a day,” Scott mused. “Is that from time of leaving to the time they get back or from when they reach wherever he is taking them?”
“Oh god. Stop it Scott,” Jean slapped her forehead. ‘Why did I have to fall in love with such a man?’ She asked herself. ‘Because the rest of him overcomes this…his habit of anal-lyzing everything.’
“What!” Scott caught the frustration flowing off her, it telling him that if he didn’t stop, he was in for it.
“Then we are agreed?” Xavier neglected the lovers’ bickering, his question getting the same answer from both.
“Yes Professor.”
-----
About eight hours later,
“We’re here,” Logan’s guttural voice roused the sleeping group.
After being dropped off in Calgary by a still grumbling Scott, they had gotten into Logan’s truck to drive the rest of the way. Before starting, X23 had given all four of them what they initially thought were hearing aids. In reality, it was the telepathic inhibitors the Professor had wondered about.
As soon as put them on, they fell off Cerebro’s grid, thus becoming invisible to the Professor and any other telepath monitoring them. Logan had also asked them to leave behind any electronic gadget, including their cell phones and watches, saying that either they leave them with Scott, or they would have to throw them away….he would make them throw them away.
Once everything had been done to his liking and once he ensured that there was no one following them, he drove to the outskirts of city, leaving his truck to take a SUV. That would ensure that anyone tracking the truck would find it parked in an empty warehouse with no Logan or anyone from his party in sight. It was standard practice for him, something that both Jubilee and X23 were used to….even if the X-Men weren’t.
----
“Oh good,” Jubilee practically stumbled out of the vehicle, feeling lethargic from the long trip back home. “Now to finally get something good chow. Really missed Jake’s cooking.”
Ororo and the X-Men picked up their overnight bags and joined Wolverine to find themselves standing in front of a large palatial house, which, although not as large as the X-Mansion was quite a sight to behold.
“You live here?” Jean couldn’t contain herself from asking. She had thought that they would be going to some broken down cabin deep in the Canadian Rockies.
“Yeah,” Logan answered as if it wasn’t any big deal.
“Who owns this place?” The redhead was all questions. Unable to use her telepathy, she would have to rely on her other investigative skills.
“Someone,” was all Logan gave as an answer.
---
“Someone? What do you….?” Jean’s next question was lost as a growling snarling form of white and black fur appeared from nowhere and launched itself at Logan.
“What the…” She was instantly on her guard, Sam and Kitty adopting the same pose….all except Ororo, who was staring wide eyed at the fight….at the PLAY fight-taking place between Logan and the now giggling bundle.
“Goddess…” Ororo stepped back in shock, almost falling over.
Standing before her, firmly held in Logan’s arms was a child….a girl child, with soft snowy hair….just like her mother.
“This is Kendall,” Logan broke the silence. “Kendall Logan…Our daughter.”
Note: Hope you liked the new addition. As you might already have guessed, thing start RoLo-ing from here.
Stay tuned for next update….And so REVIEW!!
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