It's been a long time, dear followers! I intended to post this yesterday, but I had to bake all kinds of good stuff, so I had no time to finish this little baby. However, I did manage to finish this today, so your prayers to the goddess Muse must have worked! Keep up the good work! Enjoy, and see you after the new year!
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Blood was so red, a color so very deep that it was almost hypnotizing. It was such a fascinating substance. Having too little of it could kill you and so could having too much of it. She had had a lot of time to analyze that substance. And had come to the conclusion that it really outshone everything when seeping in white hospital sheets. Somehow, that only made her more depressed.
In his bed, Logan was utterly still and paler than she had ever seen him. His strong hands, instead of holding his usual cigar, rested on the bed limply, weighing too much for him to move them even if he been awake.
She had been here before, waiting for him to wake up. Except at that time, she had been more worried about when he would wake up than if he would.
Wake up, Logan…You've got to…Don't leave me here, not alone…Not without you…
But she would not cry. Crying was reserved for mourning and she would not mourn as long as his heart beat in his chest.
She curled into a smaller ball in her chair and rocked back and forth, eyes never leaving Logan's prone body. When would he wake up and tell her she was stupid for worrying about him?
Jean entered the medical bay, looking right at ease in the sterile environment.
"Anything changed while I was gone?" she asked the younger female.
Rogue shook her head negatively; Jean sighed heavily.
"I've run some tests on the blood samples I took. Some of the bullets he was shot with contained some substance that neutralizes his mutation."
"But…You do have an antidote or something, right?" she asked cautiously. "Right?" she repeated desperately, not even bothering to hide her despair.
"I'm trying, Rogue, but…I don't know how long it'll be…and…"
No. No. Nonononono!
"No. No. He's not gonna die. He's strong, he's a fighter. He won't die that easily. He won't."
She had to find some way to reverse the effects of the drug before Logan's body stopped functioning. She had to.
"Would…would it help if you analyzed my blood? When I was…back there…they gave me something…and since then, I can turn my mutation on and off. Maybe…maybe it could help?"
Jean smiled wanly and nodded.
"Maybe," she agreed quietly. "Maybe."
-:-
His limbs felt heavy. His eyelids weighed more than lead. He could not open them even if he wished to. Whispers came to his ears. Frantic whispers.
"It's not working! It's not working! Oh God, there's so much blood!"
Strange. Those whispers seemed to get more and more filtered, as though his head was underwater. And he had rarely seen people whisper when they were that frantic.
"He needs a blood transfusion! Now!"
Hm. That sounded a lot like Red. She sure seemed agitated. But what for? Who for?
"Then take mine! I've got an idea!"
And suddenly, something pricked his arm and he felt something warm pour in his veins, something that felt warmer than warm and a little reminiscent of home.
And suddenly, his head felt clearer and his limbs lighter, and he could breathe easier. His eyelids fluttered open; his eyes fell on the girl in the chair next to him. A small smile stretched his lips for the first time in days.
"Hey. I made it."
His voice sounded weak and rougher than he had ever heard it sound, even after nights of drinking beer and chain-smoking cigars.
"Yeah. You made it."
Her voice was small too, but the smile in her eyes couldn't be mistaken. And suddenly she was launching herself at him and the tube in their arms wasn't the only thing connecting them. Bodies pressed flush, their tongues tangled together with a desperation only those who had come to the brink of losing their world could know. He could feel her slender fingers tangle in his hair like they would never let go and in a small part of his mind that could still think, he wished they didn't ever let go. But more than that, he wished he could move his arms and wrap them around her.
-:-
"Damn it, Red, tell me when I'll be able to leave this fucking place."
He sounded grouchy even to his own ears, but the medical bay was giving him the chills. It seemed every time he ended up there, it got creepier and creepier. Or maybe that was just him.
Jean sighed, knowing that she would have to be perfectly clear with him if she wanted him to stop grouching.
At times, I really wish you could not move your lips like the rest of your body, thought the doctor. It would be much more peaceful around here, for one.
"Look, giving you a transfusion of Rogue's blood helped to stabilize you, but it didn't cure you. We're still working on finding something to counteract the drug in your system. Fortunately, it seems that Rogue can recall every mutation she absorbed, so she turned yours on when we did the transfusion. It saturated her blood, entered your body, and had some time to act and disperse through your body before the drug did its thing and nullified the mutation. Fortunately, the mutation had enough time to heal some of the damage you suffered to your internal organs. Since then, we've transfused some of her blood to you 3 times in smaller doses, healing more and more your internal organs. You aren't completely healed yet, but we can't take more blood from Rogue, even if she wants us to. It would be dangerous."
Logan grunted.
"I know that."
"Look, Logan," sighed the doctor, "just be patient. It's only a matter of time before we find a cure. I know it's not easy for you to remain on that bed without being able to move, but we're analyzing your blood and Rogue's, so it's only a matter of time before we find a cure."
He wished he could get out sooner, see Rogue's bright smile and warm eyes and smell that uniquely amazing scent of hers. He missed her. It was strange, when he thought about it. He did not mind being tied down if it was by her.
In a way, though, he had to wonder whether he had responded to Marie's kiss for a good reason. He knew that adrenalin could cause people to confuse their high with sexual attraction, but had that been the case with him and Marie? Had he really answered her desperate kiss out of love? He couldn't be sure anymore.
Jean looked at his silently for a long moment, seeing him lost in thoughts. Only one person had ever managed to make him that silent and introspective. It was thus not hard to guess what, or rather who, he had been thinking about. Especially since she had seen the scene between him and Rogue. At least, the beginning, for she had tiptoed out of the room to leave them alone to express their raw emotions.
"Stop thinking so much, Logan, it doesn't suit you. Why don't you just go with the flow? Just do what feels right."
She felt like she was channeling her inner Ororo, but hopefully she didn't sound fake, for she had truly meant every word.
"Huh?" asked Logan, brought out of his thoughts brutally.
"I hate to say that, and God knows Scott would rather die than admit it, but everyone already sees you like a couple without the sex part. You do everything together! You are always together, you eat together, you get dressed together, you sleep together without sleeping together…what's so different about being with her?"
He didn't care about social conventions; hell, he didn't even know how old he was so he could be labeled as a cradle-robber for sleeping with just about anybody. But Marie…his little Marie was different from those women he used to sleep with. She was good and kind and she was more than a warm body to satisfy his sexual urges. She was the only person he could bear to be around for more than a few minutes without having the urge of strangling them. But could he see himself loving her as all girls want to be, to bring her flowers and chocolate and be all romantic?
The thought nearly made him gag. That wasn't him. He was the "beer-cigar-leather" type of guy, not the prince-like sissies teenage girls seemed to like nowadays.
"That can't be me…" he murmured in a defeated manner, closing his eyes.
"I know…" answered a tender whisper.
His eyes snapped open. Jean had surreptitiously disappeared, leaving the young girl he had been thinking about to enter alone and, more importantly, to stay alone with him in the medical ward. He mentally cursed the drug for keeping him from turning on his mutation. With it, he would have heard and smelled her coming a long time ago–before she ever left the elevator's doors, really. Damn that Red for disappearing so easily when it was convenient to her. And just how much had Marie heard?
The teenager sat down on a chair next to his bed that he had mentally dubbed hers and remained silent for a while.
"My…"
She stopped, wetted her lips nervously, and glanced at him before staring at her hands and forcing them by sheer strength of will to stop from twisting the hem of her shirt.
"I was so…confused…so…uncertain of me…of my feelings…of everything…I don't have any friends here…nobody I could ask for help to understand myself…so I asked my inner Logan…I…I allowed him to get out of the part of my mind where I seclude every personality that I was forced to absorb to help me understand myself. I spent some time locked in my mind with him–you–and we…we talked…Well, I talked, mostly…and I began analyzing my life from the moment we met…everything I did…everything I did…every single moment…and I realized…I realized that the moments I've spent with you ever since I left that…that place…are the happiest ones of my life. I've never been so content before. Even worrying about you when you go on missions cannot bring down my spirits. My soul feels at peace when you're with me, Logan. I don't care about anything else."
She finally looked at him beseechingly, and he found his eyes couldn't leave her face.
"I'm not so nice as you may think," he finally uttered in a low but sincere voice.
"I know. You're Logan. I've got you in my head, remember?" she said with a small chuckle. "I know your quirks and bad habits, and I know you've got a hot temper, but I also know you wouldn't hurt me. I don't regret anything I did, I after thinking hard about it, I'm convinced that my feelings for you are real. I can't and won't force my feelings on you." She took a fortifying breath and finally murmured, "But know that I love you."
She made to get up, but a large hand grabbed onto her forearm, trembling with the strain it had taken the feral man to make his body move. Her eyes locked onto his, barely daring to hope.
"I know I desire you. I know I want to feel your body hot and supple against mine. I want to devour you whole again and again and again. Does that make you afraid?"
The young girl's face flushed brightly under the mature man's intense gaze. His words aroused sensations inside her that almost frightened her with their intensity. This man, even immobilized as he was, was more man than any of the other males she had ever encountered. He made her head swim with his very existence.
"It does. A little bit," she admitted. The world he could bring her in was so very unknown to her that it was frightening. However, she did believe in him. If all was dark around her, he would be the light to bring her home.
And then the very man she had been thinking about whispered in her ear, "I desire more than just your body, little girl…"
Cheeks crimson, Rogue answered shyly, looking at him through her eyelashes, that she would never run from the big, bad wolverine.
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Gosh, that was hard to write! Did I make this too sappy or unrealistic? Give me some feedback.
Now, did any of you abduct Santa for Christmas? 'Cause I couldn't find him yesterday to do it myself and use his sleigh to visit every home on Christmas Eve to sprinkle Rogan everywhere. Hm…I'll have to hunt down the culprit…See ya then!
