This idea came to me - well actually it's been with me a while now, I just haven't been stuffed writing it. Anyway, it came to me after a culmination of watching a car crash show, the idea of a young Logan, reading too many feral stories, and just my plain imagination. A warning for all those who read this - don't expect updates on my stories for a while, cos I got my final year of school coming up this year and I board. Sorry about the lack of updates on Prince of Wolves and Family Ties ( if anyone has remembered they still exist). Am rebooting Prince of Wolves, and I will be rewriting it some time because on a reread, there were so many forgotten pieces of info and loose ends there was no way of tying up.
In this story, some backgrounds may differ, as I haven't read the origins comics and the local newsagents is taking their time delivering it. In this, Elisabeth Howlett is French-Canadian just cos I can make her so.
Anyway, I don't own these characters, if I did, well, I wouldn't need a Super Hero Squad Wolverine plushie to keep me company at night. This is for fun, not profit and all characters belong to Marvel, as well as anything you recognise. The plot, well, I guess that can't belong to me either, being an idea... Hey, didn't know I remembered that from school!... but I'll just say it does.
Logan/Ororo story coming right up, featuring an ensemble cast from everyone's favourite Avengers and X-Men.
Enjoy and review, and I have a fire extinguisher, (and cookies), so constructive criticism only.
"WE'RE ON A HIIIIIGH-WAAAY TO HELL! WE'RE ON A HIIIIIIGH-WAAAY TO HELL! DUU DUM DUM – Hey! Turn it back on! Dad!"
"No, Junior. Your brother's trying to sleep."
A scowl settling on his handsome face, John Howlett Jnr cast a dark look at the quiet lump seated next to him in the back seat of the expensive Mercades. "No he's not."
A sigh echoed from the front, and a moment later, Elisabeth Howlett, John's second wife and John Jnr's step mother, looked round, eyeing her step-son before peering at her own natural son. "James?"
The lump under the blanket didn't stir. With a slightly exasperated sigh, Elisabeth reached round and tapped the knee she could see. "James? Mon petit?"
The blanket stirred and a few folds shifted enough for both Junior and Elisabeth to see a dull hazel eye staring at her. "...Maman."
Elisabeth looked concerned as she rested her hand on her son's knee, her own hazel eyes narrowing. "Mon petit, are you okay?"
"'M fine."
A small huff fell from Elisabeth's lips, before she pulled back to sit straight and look at her husband. "John," she murmured quietly, "perhaps this isn't the best time for a family holiday." She cast a worried look back at the now unmoving lump that was her son. "He's ill again."
John Howlett gripped the steering wheel a little tighter as he inhaled deeply, before letting his body relax. "'Beth, we'll stop as soon as we can and get some medicine down him. It's the best I can do right now."
Elisabeth's eyes narrowed in momentary anger before she pursed her lips and nodded. Out of the corner of his eye, John took a moment to admire his wife in the waning light of the afternoon sun they were driving into.
Elisabeth's dark hair was pulled into an elegant chignon, her tanned skin dusting gold in the light that shone on her through the window. Striking hazel eyes, so like her son's, were reflected in the passengers window by the sun, mottled only slightly from a distant glimmer of another car behind them and momentarily John forgot to breathe as he met them before yanking himself back to the task of driving.
He never regretted marrying Elisabeth. Couldn't regret it. The death of his beloved first wife and Junior's mother, Lindsay, had struck him and his son hard, and for many years the ancestral mansion they lived in had been silent with ghosts of his wife.
Then along came Elisabeth.
He met her when she came looking for work, having recently moved into Alberta looking for a fresh start to life. She was French-Canadian, and assured him that her great-great grandparents had been Italian, which justified her dark as night hair. He'd asked her to go out with him almost immediately, and to his great surprise she accepted. Six months and many dates later, he proposed.
In answer, she took him home.
And at home, laying bundled up in bed, was her six year old son James. Little James, with eyes and hair so like his mothers, but with a look to him that led John to believe he would be tall and well built in the future.
Little James, who was near terminally ill.
He fell for both of them then, and swore to love James as his own.
Now James had just turned fourteen and Junior was seventeen, and Elisabeth his wife, and they were going off to the Vancouver National Airport to fly to England, then Rome, then Japan for a three month family holiday with no one but them. James had been excused from Xavier's School For Gifted Youngsters for three months with no work to complete and Elisabeth from her job.
It was going to be perfect. Just he and his family.
It was his last thought before his eyes widened at the sight of the SUV slamming into the driver's door of his car and then he knew no more.
The ambulance careened to a sudden halt past the beacons which signalled their arrival at their destination. Pushing open the door, the husband and wife medic team, Heather and James Hudson, got out of the van.
"What are the injuries?" Heather heard her husband call out as he approached the man in charge of the crash site, as she reached in for the first aid kit.
Her blood chilled and her hand froze when she heard the reply. "You're too late." The voice was sorrowful and full of choked pain. "Husband's gone, as is the eldest boy, the woman is critical, can't move her. Think she's got spinal injuries."
Taking a deep breath to still her trembling hands, Heather picked up the kit and moved round the back, picking her way over shattered glass and twisted metal, her eyes wide as she took in the scene of destruction which greeted her.
The once pristine, expensive Mercades was a wreck. The driver's side of the vehicle was nothing but twisted metal, and on the remnants of the glass window, she could see splatters of blood. The man's body was slumped sideways, a dark shape amongst the ruins of the car. The woman was still in her seat, her eyes closed and skin pale. Blood stained her once white blouse, and as Heather approached, she saw a piece of jagged metal cutting into her side.
She stopped, and inhaled. It was too late but to be a comfort for her in her final moments.
Heather opened her eyes to find herself kneeling among the glass, one hand holding the woman's, trying to get a response.
After a few minutes of trying, the woman's eyes opened, and hazel eyes dark with pain focused on her, strangely clear and knowing. Heather schooled her face into a calming smile. "Hey," she greeted, squeezing the hand she held gently, "I'm Heather."
The woman closed her eyes, and after a long moment opened them again to stare at her. "J-James..." she gasped out, words mangled beyond belief but legible. "J-James... mon petit... mon chere..." She coughed, her already pale skin paling beyond Heather thought was possible. "... t-the back... J-James... Je t'aime..."
Heather swallowed. "Y-Your son?"
The woman nodded, her movements slowing as did her pulse beneath Heather's fingertips.
"H-He's..."
Her patient shook her head, then clumsily dragged Heather's fingers to point to the relatively undamaged passengers seat behind her. "J-James," she mangled out again, "Help hi-im." The hand grew limp and her eyes misted over. "Je t'aime James..."
Her pulse stopped.
Heather found herself crying, as she gently disengaged her hand, barely noticing the efforts to free the bodies from the other side of the car or her husband's cry of horror as the tangled mess opposite her was torn free.
Getting to her feet, Heather gritted her teeth and waved one of the fire crew over to help her. The man looked at her helplessly, going for the woman before she corrected him. "No..." she muttered. "There's another boy in the back. Need you to remove the door."
Understanding blossomed, and Heather stood back to watch the jaws of life remove the crinkled metal of the back passenger door.
There was a lump on the seat, covered by a blanket stained with deep black blood.
Taking a breath, Heather donned a fresh pair of gloves, kneeling down in shattered glass, and gently tugged the tattered blanket away, revealing a small, curled up figure on the remains of the seat.
Swallowing, she reached out a hand to brush the boy's shoulder, squeezing to try and get a reaction. Receiving a low, pained moan as a reply, she inhaled dazedly as it clicked that the boy – James – was alive.
"James!"
Her husband came running over, freezing when he saw the boy and her face.
"He's alive. Get the stretcher."
He nodded, and raced off as Heather turned back to her charge – only to freeze in shock.
Beneath coal black bangs of long dark hair matted with blood, feral golden eyes stared at her in fear and anger. Lowering her hand, she was rewarded with a gleam of sharp fangs and a low, long whine.
Mutant. He's a mutant.
Inhaling, she reached out a hand, slowly and gently placing it on the boy's tin shoulder again. "We're going to help you."
The boy sniffed, before the tense muscles underneath her hand relaxed, and he whined again, a whine full of pain.
Her husband returned with the stretcher then, dropping down beside her to stare at the golden eyes and the long white fangs. "Mutant?" he asked, voice pitched low and quiet.
She nodded. "I think it just activated." She looked at her husband, green eyes pleading. "We can't let them know." She gestured towards the ambulance. "We'll get him on the stretcher and then to the hospital."
He nodded, and she turned back to the boy. Holding out a hand, she started in surprise at the fact that the boy – James – was almost right in front of her, his pale, blood streaked face a mask of confusion.
The boy whined, cocking his head to the right, looking towards the still form of his mother, a shadow behind the seat, as if he was wondering why she hadn't stirred.
Heather could only shake her head.
He showed no signs of understanding, and she choked back tears before holding out her arms, inviting him nearer, her fingertips curling round his shoulders as she eased him out of the seat.
A low, keening whine broke from his throat as she curled her arms around him, fingers exploring gently to find a piece of metal and some leftover shrapnel from the crash embedded in his back. At her touch, he keened again, and shifted, one hand reaching out towards his mother.
Inhaling, she held him a little tighter as she got to her feet, his hand still reaching for what he could never have again. "James," she murmured, not sure who she was talking to, "James."
"Yes?" her husband answered, even as the boy in her arms turned his head at the name, golden eyes surveying her in confusion, almost as if he was wondering why she was holding him instead of his mother and calling him that.
Shaking herself, she dismissed the stretcher, instead letting her husband pack it away as she walked the boy towards the ambulance.