Logan (doesn't yet know his name so I'm playing pronouns) - Canada - start of first X-Men film
The infant was crying, again, had been non-stop for over half an hour. He had no idea why, still no idea about anything. He knew how the world worked well enough, how to drive a car and bike, use money, how to fight.
It had been more than a month now, weeks with no memory or any self-knowledge. Resorting to fighting and a little theft to feed himself and the baby.
His mind was empty of everything except what came to him as he dreamed, being pulled apart and metal poured onto his bones. That almost definitely had something to do with the claws he had discovered when he escaped.
He had discovered the baby then too, in a clear crib in a room not far from where he had been imprisoned. The lone nurse had fled when she saw him coming.
The chart had designated the girl X-23, bred from samples taken from Weapon X, born only a few hours before he had stumbled across her. He was Weapon X, and Wolverine according to the dog tags that hung around his neck, he had adopted the latter name but had not named the baby. He was trying hard to forget that 23 implied there had been another 22.
It had been unthinkable to leave a new-born in that place. Regardless of what awful methods had been used to bring her into the world she was innocent, so he had picked her up and taken her with him when he ran.
He did not know how to care for a child, but some people had been kind enough to help. All assuming that she was his daughter, which he supposed she was.
The crying was grating with super senses, but there was no smell requiring action, and he had fed her some of the stuff the woman at the last truck stop said you fed to infants.
No, he was wrong, there was a smell, but it didn't come from the girl. It came from the trailer. The smell of a person, young and female. Either someone had been snooping around in his things or was hiding in them.
He stopped the engine and got out, leaving the baby to cry. Sure enough there was a girl huddled under the tarp that covered his bike, shivering.
"Get out." He demanded of her and she did, stumbling to stand by the side of the road.
"Are ya just gonna leave me here? I only need to get to the next town." She was only perhaps seventeen and didn't look like a threat but he wasn't taking chances or running a taxi service. No one hitched a ride without his permission.
"That's your problem, not mine." He walked away from her and got back into the camper, the baby was still screaming in her basket on the front seat. Practice told him to just let her cry herself out. He had no clue how to be a father or properly care for her. It might be best to find somewhere he could leave her and people could find her. The kid was cute enough that someone would snatch her up.
He drove off, but the look on the girl's face, the terror at being left on the side of the cold road, made him stop. Maybe she could at least stop the crying. He sighed and stopped again, opening the door.
"Get in!" He shouted to the girl and she did, looking with surprise at the baby. Everyone he had yet met reacted the same way that he had a child with him.
"If you can make her shut up I'll drive you wherever you want." He told the girl. She nodded and slid into the camper, holding the basket on her lap. He really needed to get a child seat.
Looking at a new, more friendly face seemed to catch the infant's attention and the squalling stopped entirely when the girl started to rock her.
It had been that easy the whole damned time?
"I'm Rogue." The girl offered as if he was going to care. "Who are you?"
"Wolverine," he replied, soon he would have to create a real fake identity, but that might allow those people to find him again. "What sort of a name is Rogue?"
"What sort of a name is Wolverine?" She shot back and he snorted in surprise and amusement. This girl – Rogue – was completely unafraid of him, he'd give her that. She looked like she'd been on the run a long time, likely involving rides from shadier people.
"Does she have a name?" Rogue asked, indicating the baby who was now smiling up at her. It was a better question than 'Is she yours?' or 'Where's her mother?'
"No, but she needs one. If it makes you feel better you can call her something." Several people had suggested names for the girl, but none had seemed to fit. He didn't know why he said it, but he could smell that this 'Rogue' was a mutant, just like himself and the baby. He had read about mutants on a coffee shop computer a week since, learning that they were different from regular humans in many ways excluding the obvious. They were said to be a little stronger, smarter, more beautiful than most, had a strange undeniable attractiveness regardless of physical mutation. That they usually felt some odd draw towards each other.
Theoretically that was supposed to allow them to 'survive and proliferate' as a subspecies.
He felt that draw towards Rogue, and she fit the bill, even if there was no mutation visible. He wondered what she could do, she had to know what she was, what he was.
"Hmmm. I think she looks like a Laura." Rogue said. "What do you think of that?"
He was about to say that that did sound decent, rather than the silly common names like Olivia or Jessica everyone kept suggesting.
Then a huge tree fell into the road, and the car smashed right into it.
Not wearing a seatbelt, he flew straight out of the windshield, tumbling onto the road. Wasn't that just wonderful?
He pulled himself to his feet and began to walk back towards the camper, deep gashes healing shut instantly. Rogue was staring at him, shocked that he was still alive. The girl looked fine holding the, once again screaming, baby tight to her chest.
She couldn't be hurt if she was screaming that loud.
He moved to look at the tree, some way to move it off the road. It had to have fallen off the cliff due to the heavy snow.
Rogue - Canada
Her leg was trapped under the dashboard, freeing it was going to be very difficult. Near impossible as she was holding the baby and had nowhere to put her down.
She was glad of her thick gloves as she tried to move, her touch could almost kill adults, so would be deadly to a small baby. Rogue was about to yell for the man to come and help her when a snow covered monster appeared and lunged for him.
No, not a monster, a man wearing animal hides, the ugliest she had ever seen.
The two men began to fight as Rogue struggled to free her leg, the baby screaming loud enough that her ears hurt.
Then she smelt the smoke, heard crackling and turned. The camper was on fire, and she was trapped in it.
The monster-man picked up the one who had been helping her, who called himself Wolverine, and threw him back at the vehicle, smashing what was left of the windshield. This time he was completely unconscious, and the monster-man began to walk towards the camper.
Two other people appeared, and Rogue wondered if the smoke was making her hallucinate. A young man and woman in tight leather, the man shooting red beams from his eyes and the woman making the snow part for her.
They must be like me, like the Wolverine. Rogue thought. Strange powers. Mutants. Were they here to help them or the monster?
One beam from the new man's eyes threw the monster into the trees. So they were here to help them. Both of the newcomers ran over to where Rogue was trapped, pulling the door open.
"Don't touch me." She warned the woman when she reached out to her and handed the baby over.
A blast from the man's eyes dislodged the seat behind Rogue and she quickly clambered out. The woman pulled the Wolverine free and a sudden wind blasted them away from the camper seconds before it exploded.
"Thanks." Rogue breathed, trying to process just how close she had come to death. The woman, who had completely white hair but looked young, passed Laura back to her. Helping her partner to pull the unconscious man upright.
"I'm Storm, this is Cyclops. You'll come with us, but don't worry, we're only gonna help, and no one will make you stay." The woman said. "We're from a safe place for mutants."
"Okay." Rogue was still reeling from the last few minutes. She'd been in a car crash, nearly died in a fire, apparently now had to deal with the baby and was to accompany these strange people. Somehow, however, she did feel that she could trust them.
They were mutants, so of course there was that odd draw, she had felt it towards the Wolverine and it was even present in Laura. She had made some use of it herself since her ability had manifested.
It could also be a dangerous thing. She would feel that draw towards any mutant, even one with a knife to her throat.
The man led them all to a small plane, black metal without paint or symbols anywhere. The sort of craft used by people who did not want to be detected. Not belonging to any government organisation, to one that had to be secretive.
Rogue let the pair lead her onto the jet and sat on a bench, automatically doing the straps. She'd already learned one lesson about seatbelts and safety. It was either go with them or freeze to death in the snow.
Laura was quiet again in her lap. It was odd to process that she had named the child and had to care for her for now. Storm and Cyclops had dragged the man aboard and strapped him to a seat, then started a take-off procedure.
Neither of them were older than their early-twenties, Rogue had noticed, but how long did mutants last? How long could anyone last when the world hated them just for daring to exist.
The jet rose into the air, a feeling very different to the few times she had been on a normal airplane.
"Okay back there? You'd best go to sleep, it's a long flight to the mansion." Storm called. Rogue decided to obey.
Notes:
This is where I'm starting the X-Men, I do intend for them to be different to the films but things will be different to add more characters and be a bit closer to the comics for character origins. The movies are great but the comics did better there. Remember, all canon is dead.