Wreckage
by Thyme In Her Eyes
Author's Note: A quick and brief X3 'fic from me now, focusing on the movie's immediate aftermath and its impact on Logan. And to disclaim, neither the characters of franchise belong to me! Enjoy the story, and please remember that all feedback is deeply appreciated.
-- WRECKAGE --
Fighting for the Alcatraz Cure and delivering Jean Grey to her final fate traumatized them all, and tore away all that remained of the team's innocence. Not one of them can deny it any more. The bitterness of their victory choked them all through the hours remaining of that night, and the same cold bitterness still grips and wrings them now. Everyone bled that night, but it was Logan who bled most and deepest and straight from the heart, and who still tries and fails to pull himself free from the memories and the pain, and his closest friends and most trusted team-mates will never let themselves forget it.
They remember his silence when they found him and his total lack of reaction to their presence, their grief for Jean, or even their deep sympathy for him. Each of them still recalls how not one of them could bear to look at either him or the dead body in his arms. But they looked all the same, and will never forget the raw agony they found written on his face or the strange and sweet peace radiating from hers.
Most of all, they remember Logan as a government transport escorted all of them back to Westchester, to where they could all find rest and the privacy to truly grieve. It was a quiet and awful journey, and almost every minute of remains burned in their memories far deeper than the fleeting thrills, dangers and terrors of the battle. Those noisy battle-won memories are the kind so quick to slip away, but the image of Logan holding Jean's body as they all made their way home refuses to let go. They still remember how he sat, so still and painfully tense and restrained, as he cradled Jean's body in his arms with a ferociously tight grip. His hands and arms were like steel, or certain harder metals, they all remember thinking. His body was a mess of bars caging him and Jean together, and no-one wanted to break them apart; not yet. His eyes were dry and fierce, fixed dead ahead in quiet and agonized concentration. He never once looked at her. Incomprehensible pain and loss burned dark and heavy in his gaze, and the the terrible image still haunts each friend brave enough to have glimpsed it.
They still vividly remember the feeling of hesitation and something very close to fear when they looked at him and the pain he hid so badly. If a reaction was ever going to take place, they all worried about it. Each of them had a comforting word in mind, and still remember desperately wanting to try to talk to him and break him from his thoughts, whatever those thoughts were, but none of them could make those words real. And they certainly weren't daring enough to try and take Jean's body from him, or even suggest it.
But more than anything else; they remember how the almost terrifying image of Logan lost, wounded, viciously protective and angry at the world was contrasted the moment they each noticed his free hand absently and gently smoothing Jean's hair. It's the one unforgettable detail. Now, whenever her dearest friends remember Jean and how much she was loved, they can't help but think of how Logan's hand moved over her tangled hair with such incredible care and tenderness in a touch she could never feel, as if she was a sleeping child he was afraid of waking and whose dreams he'd never dare disturb.
-- FIN --