*Disclaimer* I do not own X-Men or any part of it, but Elf is my own character! Steal her and I will hunt you down and hurt you! (Maybe I won't hurt you, but I will hunt you down nonetheless!)





ELFEN




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"That's enough for today, mutants. Back to your cells." The speaker buzzed into the training room. A young girl, hardly even five years old, glared at the catcher that came to fetch her. She allowed the catcher to put the metal ring around her neck, and followed them out the barred door to her cell. The catcher pushed her in, pulling the ring off of her neck, and locked the door.

The girl looked around her cell, and into the cell's of others. She saw the man that had intrigued her so much, sitting with his back to the bars of his cell door. He was the one they called Wolverine, one of their greatest. The girl wished he would save her, take ehr life, anything to get her out of this place. As though hearing her thoughts, Wolverine turned to her, staring maliciously at her with narrowed eyes. The girl turned away, and went to the darkest corner of her cell. She slid to the floor, rocking while hugging her knees, and thought of the world outside the steel inforceed walls of the institute.

The speaker crackled over the cries and howls and screams of all of the cellmates, giving out its last message of the night.

"Lights out!"

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As the years passed, the girl's hatred for the institute greatened. She longed to know what 'sunlight' was. She longed to smell a flower, which the women spoke of with such passion. Assunlight and flowers were mysteries to her, so was this 'love' that she heard when she was led to and from her cell. She would hear them talking in their offices, their voices ranging from dreamy to passionate with hate when they spoke of 'love'. The great mystery.

"Roll call!" The speaker crackled and buzzed.

The girl stood, tall for the age of sixteen now, as a catcher opened her cell door and snapped the ring onto her neck. "Come on!" He snarled as the girl stumbled along. A shock of electricity ran along her spine and she grit her teeth in pain.

"I said move!" Her catcher bellowed. The girl fell, exhausted and nauseated. Another shock from that electric whip and a kick in the stomach, and she was ready to shrivel up and die right there on that harsh cement floor.

Out of the corner of her eye, the girl saw Wolverine whipped for trying to move towards her. His cry echoed through the chamber, and the girl rose with her rage bubbling inside her.

"Faster!" Her catcher yelled, whipping her again. The girl fell, her rage hardly making up for her pain. The whip fell to her back again, sending jolts up and down her spine. The girl grit her teeth and tried to get up, but the whip was laid across her back again...and again...and again...

"You miserable little mutant!" Her catcher growled, giving her another whipping. The girl looked up at him, and a single tear ran down her cheek. Her catcher snarled.

"Don't cry! You have no feeling!" He shouted, enraged at a glimpse of emotion in the midst of all of these killing machines.

Wolverine bellowed as the whip went across his back for the second time, and wrenched it out of his catcher's hands with a tug. His catcher let out a strangeled cry as the claws that they put into him, popped out from between his knuckles and into his catcher's stomach. The girl lay on the ground, the back of her plain shirt torn open and covered with her blood. Whimpers escaped her throat without her knowing as Wolverine tore apart all of the catchers he could reach.

A siren went off, flooding the room with a blinking red light. The girl struggled to her feet, and stumbled to a window, fogged and dirty so that no light could penetrate the glass. She hardly knew what she was doing when she threw herself through it, and landed in a white powdery substance. Snow. Her mind had stopped controlling her, now. All she followed was instincts, her feet carrying her through the underbrush of the forest, away from the institute. More tears fell, and she was glad that her catcher couldn't see them.

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Another week passed, this one full of just as much horror as her life in the institute. She followed Wolverine, wondering why he always seemed to make her wonder at things, make her seem more curious then she usually was. She observed him as he hunted, watched how he cooked his food, made mental notes on how to make a shelter out of whatever she could find. And she guarded him while he slept. It felt strange, even to her, to ensure the safety of someone she could never speak to before. She knew he could guard himself, but her curiosity of him grew as time went on.

So did her illness.

The girl began shivering as soon as she had run for an hour through the forest. There seemed no end to the trees and bushes all around her. After a week had passed, she only gained warmth by sitting next to Wolverine's fire during the night and fleeing when he first began to stir. Her skin had gained a ghostly blue hue to it, which scared her more than anything else she had ever encountered in the institute.

The girl added a few pieces of wood to Wolverine's fire before she fled that morning. She didn't know why, since he would get suspicious. But the fire was burning so low, she just felt the urge to do it. Wolverine got up from beneath his shelter, swept away the snow that had fallen overnight, and went away to get food. The girl took advantage of this and warmed herself by the fire until she heard him coming back almost half an hour later. The girl scurried away to get her own meal, usually a small duck that had stayed behind or a rabbit. She ate the meat fresh, while the steam still rose from the animal's dead body, and then filled her mouth with snow to wash down the blood. Wolverine smelled the scent of a fresh kill on the wind, and knew that whatever hadcaught it was lucky to be alive right then.

The girl washed off her hands in the snow, and stumbled back to where Wolverine camped, a dribble of blood on her chin. She began shivering, uncontrollably. Wolverine heard her teeth chattering, and looked around with alert. His claws popped out, and the girl stumbled to her feet. She ran as best she could, nearly dragging her leg behind her, and leaned against a tree for a moment to catch her breath. She could hear Wolverine coming towards her, sniffing the wind and crunching throughthe underbrush. She pushed herself away and ran/limped along until she lost feeling in her legs. She collapsed in a heap beside a bush, nearly blending with the muddy brown branches and leftover leaves.

Wolverine stood over her uncertainly, his chest heaving from the rush of adrenaline and his eardrums pounding. He knew her from the institute, as a scared girl filled with natural stubborness and anger. She had the same looks as someone he had known many years before, but she still had that sense of anger in the air around her. Wolverine popped his claws back in and bent down low to check if she was still alive. The only movement for a few brief moments was the wind rustling her hair and Wolverine's chest moving up and down slowly. He sighed and lifted her, muttering about being in debt to the dear friend he had lost who had looked so much like her.

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The girl woke up with something wrapped around her, and warmth flooding over her in comforting waves. Wolverine slept peacefully on his pallet next to her, his breathing even. The girl sat up and noticed she had on Wolverine's shirt, with his serial number on the back. Her own shirt had been in near shreds before, barely staying on her. Wolverine didn't have a bluish hue, which only enraged the girl. She felt like pummeling Wolverine with her fists, which surprised even herself. The girl made fists until her nails bit into her palms, drawing blood. She doubted Wolverine would stay asleep if he smelled blood, so she fell back to her pallet in exhaustion.

Wolverine stirred, and woke up. He checked the girl's pulse, put the back of his hand to her forehead to see if her temperature was normal yet, and threw another piece of wood onto the fire. He rubbed his hands together, and to the girl's surprise, put a can of snow next to the fire. It melted after a while, and Wolverine left to get some meat. He let the water sit in hot embers until it began bubbling and boiling before he tossed in a few chunks of meat. The girl sat up, watching him silently, her golden yellow eyes taking in anything and everything. Wolverine coughed, cleared his throat, and poked at the fire with a long stick.

"Elf, can't you talk?" Elf sat silently still, taking in the fact he had called her by her institute name. The name that hung around her neck on those hated dogtags. Elf didn't respond. She had been silent so long, her mind had erased all memory of speech. Wolverine glanced back at her.

"I know you have a voice, Elf. I've heard you singing those little songs of yours late at night to the little ones." He said with a sigh, rubbing the back of his neck. "Elf, can you say my name?"

Elf sat still, her golden-yellow eyes fixed on him. "W-w-wol-vie." She stuttered. Wolverine turned away before she could see his faint smile.

"You just call me that, Elf." He mumbled. Elf heard him.

"Wolvie." She said again, listening to the syllables slip off her tongue as though they were liquid.

"Elf, what's your real name?" Wolverine asked. He poked the fire again, sending sparks and embers flying into the cloudy winter sky.

"E-ll-i." Elf stuttered, surprised she still remembered her name. She had hardly heard it for ten years. Wolverine smirked into the dancing flames.

"Elli..." He mumbled. "I'll call you Elf, though. You just keep calling me Wolvie, even though my real name is Logan. Alright?"

Elf nodded blankly, her smile fading quickly into a scowl. She couldn't explain her quick change of emotions, but the happiness had drained from her as soon as Wolverine had told her his real name.

Wolverine looked back at her curiously.

"Don't you want to get warm?" He asked, a smirk tugging at the corners of his mouth. Elf blushed a little and scotted up next to him by the fire.

As Elf sat next to Wolverine by the campfire, in their small shelter surrounded by innocent white snow, she felt such an emptiness deep inside that a lump jumped into her throat and her eyes got dewy. Something was missing...

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Elf and Wolverine travelled, Elf usuing a small branch as a walking stick. Wolverine didn't seem dainted by the cold, perhaps from his experience in the wild?

A humming noise made Elf's ears perk up and the soles of her bare feet tingle. A machine sped by ahead of them a good distance, making her jump and tremble with surprise and fear.

"W-what w-was th-th-that, Wolvie?" She asked in a tiny voice. Wolverine watched it go, and looked at her curiously.

"A car, Elf. People use them to go places quickly." He answered, not quite able to disguise the amusement in his voice. Elf looked up with wide eyes.

"People? What about mutants?" Her voice held complete confusion. Wolverine forgot she had been raised her whole life in the institute.

"Well, not everyone is a mutant, kid." He said gruffly. Elf hurried to catch up with him as he walked swiftly to the road.

"Elf, cover your ears." Elf pulled a cap she had found over her tall pointed ears and leaned on her walking stick. She watched Wolverine look from side to side on the road, and catch sight of a tanker. He tossed a sharp rock into the road and pulled Elf into the bushes. The tire on the truck popped, and they watched as the driver got out and began changing it, mumbling swears every few seconds. The driver got back into the truck, and as he began revving up the engine, Wolverine jumped onto the back of the truck, where there was a small space between the cab and the hold. He motioned for Elf to follow. Elf limped over quickly, but the truck began lumbering along. She sped up, and grabbed Wolverine's hand just as the truck gathered speed.

"Elf, be careful and don't make a lot of noise." Wolverine warned. Elf nodded blankly, as she mostly did, and sat back to enjoy her free ride.

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Elf fell asleep after a few hours of riding along in the back of the truck. Wolverine watched her sleep for a while, exhaustion making his eyelids heavier with each passing second. The driver also felt the effects of sleep coming upon him, his last cup of coffee being that morning. After Elf and Wolverine had been sleeping for a couple of hours, the driver slumped over onto his wheel and the tanker began to turn. Elf woke at the screeching of brakes as the driver woke with a start, and realized the truck was...tipping over!

"Wolvie!" Elf cried as she was flung off of the tanker and onto the road behind it. She rolled and tumbeld to a stop, feeling bruised and broken.

"Elf!" Wolverine yelled. He jumped from the tanker as it rolled over a few times, and then burst into flames. Wolverine ran to El's side, watching a small pool of blood form where her side had been pierced by a piece of metal from the tanker. He lifted her, and felt the warm sticky blood on his fingers.

"W-w-wolvie?" Elf stuttered, her eyes wide with fright when she saw his face. Wolverine carried her away from the fiery tanker.

"We have to get you help, Elf." Wolverine stated. His voice cracked. He didn't know why he was so upset. He had only cared for the girl for a month, maybe a bit more.

Elf whimpered as her ears picked up a loud sound, from far away. Wolverine growled deep in his throat, not trusting whatever was coming.

A sleek black jet appeared in a lare clearing before them, as though it had just landed. Wolverine growled again, his eyes narrowing with distrust. Elf struggled in Wolverine's grasp, and fell to the ground. Wolverine took a step away from her in surprise, and suddenly there was a blue, fuzzy thing next to her. Wolverine growled again, his claws popping out.

"Stay away from her..." he warned. The blue fuzzy thing got up, and Wolverine almost panicked. It was something demonic, with yellow eyes and fangs, and a spaded tail besides the fact that they were blue and fuzzy, and had tall pointed ears like Elf did.

"I am here to help you, Wolverine." He said, Wolverine supposed it was a he. What else would have a masculine stance, and voice? He stopepd growling, but didn't let his claws back in.

"I don't need help."

Elf whimpered again, and tried to escape her pain by twisting on the ground. The demon saw her there, pity and horror mingling in his eyes.

"You might not, but vhat about her?" Wolverine looekd down at Elf. The blood was spreading on the ground...so much blood...

"Don't hurt her." He demanded as the demon picked her up.

"I von't." It headed back to the jet. "But she vill vant to see you, vhen she is vell again." Wolverine's eyes widened at the statement, but he ran after the little blue demon anyway.

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What do you think? I'm not that great, so PLEASE! be kind! This is my very first posted fanfic, and to tell anyone who is reading this the truth, I am scared shitless that I'll get a bad review.