Author's Note- I still have fav's and follow's coming in, so thank you all! I'm glad to see there's still interest here! This is the second to last chapter and this time I promise, the last chapter is mostly written and will be out within the next day or two! So if anyone wants to drop me a review I'd love it! Second to last chance and I'd really love to have some feedback to thoughts on this stories progress! :)

Chapter 24

Lost Attack

The growl vibrating in his chest almost seemed to echo at an odd pitch as he recognized the ringing in his right ear was heightened by the lack of hearing in his left. A strike had split his ear in half, taking part of his hearing with it. He could almost feel the deep gash inside his head stitching back together as sounds funneled in strikingly through his right ear.

But like most things… they were gone before he got to really figure it out. With a shake of his head and a defense block, his hearing kicked back in. The stream of blood running down to his shoulder slowed and he lunged up off the cement he'd fallen to when his equilibrium was unbalanced.

The growl was audible this time and savage as red seemed to crawl across his vision… through his thoughts. It pounded in the veins in his wrists and he could hear the deep thrum of it in his still sensitive ear canal.

He'd never wanted to kill a man more than in this moment, and he had such a long list.

Logan growled as he spun up off the floor. SNIKT, his claws were out and he hunched low, eyes narrowing in on the scathing laugh of the unfazed man across from him. The one man he couldn't kill… and oh how he would try anyways.

"That's right, go on Runt!" Sabretooth's laughter spurred him on as he threw his claws forward into a vicious plunge for Creed's chest. "Go ahead an' try!"

He swung, he missed, anger throttling his every sense, blinding his movements into something inexperienced.

"Yer so god damn gullible! It's unbelievable, actually. Ya never fails ta surprise me neither!"

"RARRRR!" The anger reached a crescendo beating unevenly in his head. It wasn't sated by the tearing of Creed's flank. The heavy bleeding and the way he stumbled back for just a moment did nothing to dampen the hot fury that tormented Logan.

"Brothers?!" The other man roared with a deep laughter as he stood back up. He had to gall to stay uncannily loose, not bothered with the series of feral attacks Logan was spurred into. "Lil' Logan always lookin' for somethin'. Even if we were ya think that I'da cared! HA!"

The snarl ripped through the air the same way his claws did Sabretooth's arm. It actually did echo in the warehouse that was now abandoned. Creed played them all! Kayla had gone in unaware, they had tried to…

"Save me! Arhahaha! Ya're that hair brained!? Ya think anybody could lock me up!" Creed's mocking tone crooned to Logan now, as he finally gave Logan the satisfaction of fighting back. "That I wouldn' kill anyone who tried! Yer a fool like always Runt!"

He swung viciously, caught by surprise at the ache that produced. He was a fool. Ferro was gone, never actually caught in their trap. Kayla was… she was lying dead across the room. But this time Victor had actually killed her, torn her body apart and waited for Logan to find him. To torment him, because Logan's choppy, incoherent memories were so easy to manipulate. A weakness. But how was it so easy? How could he be so wrong, believe himself so earnestly that he'd trick himself into seeing Sabertooth as anything but the tyrannical psychopath that haunted Logan's every step? Why would he want anything like that? He hadn't wanted that, was repulsed by the idea, but he bought into it somehow.

Creed started to say her name and Logan let out an inhuman howl and slashed at his opponent's throat. He connected just barely, but the nick was enough to ruin Creed's ability to speak. The gushing liquid spraying Logan's face and chest yet it barely paused Creed.

At least it finally made him fight back!

Every swipe of his claws, every bit of resistance he felt as his claws hacked away at the meaty flesh of the devil in front of him did nothing. Nothing could quell the hate, the unrecognizable betrayal and the white searing iron that it branded him with. This rage nothing could pause.

Nothing… and he could hear her. "Logan!" Hear her ghost in his mind as he fought harder than he could even realize. Logan wasn't sure he'd ever stop loving his Silverfox, but he'd certainly loved her less with time, with distance. It had become less powerful, but that didn't stop the crippling pain it sent through him.

"Logan please!"

Her ghost was begging him to finally end Creed. The ghost in his head, the one that knew. That knew this pain in him, hadn't forgotten them. But even as he saw Creed's very bones break away and his hand fly away, detached from their savage brawl, it didn't stop this hatred. Once started, Logan never could stop it.

How could he stop it this time though? Logan had been stupid enough to believe him. How could he believe such a monster in the first place? What could possible make him think that. It was his own broken memories, leaving a vulnerability….

"No!" Kayla screamed to him…. Creed was still alive! He needed to avenge her once and for all, avenge all the people that fell to Creed's sick little games! His need to torture Logan for some unknown slight had to end. One of them had to die here.

/

"I need to touch him!" Silverfox shouted.

"Yeah, there's a real good ideal. Moron," He grunted, arms threatening to give out on him. His throat had finally patched back together but the brutal assault was slowing it down considerably. Why was he even doing this? It would be so easy to let Jimmy out of the deadlock they were in. Just release his brother from Victor's headlock and let his brother's claws swing somewhere else.

Hell, he couldn't lie. It would be satisfying to watch Jimmy carve up his little frail into itty bitty pieces. Hell, it'd be good for the runt! That might finally be the thing that showed James what he truly was. Being forced to kill something he'd gotten attached to, Victor certainly knew it was effective. Then he'd realize he was an animal like Victor, so he might finally embrace that he wasn't the weak human as he kept trying and failing to be.

Yet, here Victor was, letting James's claws have open season on Victor's insides as he slipped out of the headlock. Faster than he could heal it, really. It was only a matter of time before his healing factor slowed too far and quit without Victor striking back. That was inevitable at James' feral pace.

"Raaa," Victor snarled as his side was reopened, Jimmy's claws sliced through his partly healed stomach like a hot knife through butter.

God dammit!

He just wanted to tear into the runt and put him down! The pain and the whining little wench behind him was nearly enough for him to give up on his idea to save his brother from killing his girl and anyone else that got in his possessed way.

"Please Creed, it's the only way to stop him!"

She just would not shut the fuck up!

"Ya wanna stops him?! Then gets the fuck out of here so I can put him down!"

"No," She bellowed and if Victor's intestines weren't already threatening to come out from the new gaping hole James added to the cluster on his side he might have gagged.

"Yer little powers don' fuckin' work on him ya fuckin' twit," He snarled, pain mingling with the anger as James' claws dragged up his ribs. With a roar, Victor finally tossed him away and staggered backwards. His body couldn't take many more attacks to his midsection. Her brother's instincts knew that.

"GET FERRO NOW!" He bellowed, turning to swipe a threatening set of claws her way. She sneered back on him and Victor was exactly two fucking seconds from wiping the expression -and her face- permanently off! Did he have to hold off his hallucinating brother and make the fucking obvious known too?

Ferro got in Jimmy's head, like he'd gotten in all their heads- and now Jimmy was trying to kill everyone. Simple solution? Put him down, ice Ferro, ice the psychic's control on James. If Victor could just focus on putting James down for the five minutes it would take for him to wake back up and not containing him he'd already have Ferro's blood rushing deliciously down his arm instead of trying to wait for his side to patch enough he could move.

The sound of footsteps dancing out of the room meant Victor could finally fucking focus. The fuckin' half wit squaw had apparently pieced enough grey matter together to think to hit the button for the warehouse door. Victor heard it click shut with a satisfying roll of his shoulders.

"Good, now it's just you an' me, brother," He growled low in his throat as Jimmy rounded on him again.

He ran forward, James did the same and their bodies clashed against the others in a frenzy of claws and blood, growls and snarls as they both tried to kill the other. Not really kill, of course, Victor couldn't do that anymore than James could. They were indestructible, unkillable. But for James' own good he needed to go down and he needed to go down now, so Ferro's clock could finally stop ticking.

/ / / /

/

Her breathes echoed in her ears, the halls streaked by her and Kayla begged the spirits to let her get there in time. If they lost Ferro now… then it was all over, their element of surprise gone and the tatters of them just waiting to be picked off.

How had it all gone so wrong? They'd lured Ferro here, Maverick, Kestral, Creed and Logan ambushed him in the hanger as she waited with Professor Cornelius to play puppet puller once they took the man down. He'd gotten into Logan and Creed's minds too easily… got out of the room, and left them to kill each other.

He must not have had enough time to set it, because Creed and Kayla came out of it too quickly, Logan though. She glanced back worried, who knew what Creed would do in the name of the cause to her former lover. But there was still hope that Kestral and Maverick had caught up to him. That was more important.

She'd forced Cornellious to put the facility into a lockdown, so there was no possible way for him to have left unless he lifted the lockdown. The red lights blaring overhead in the hallways she ran past confirmed that hadn't happened yet.

Kayla reached the corridor leading to the control room finally and skidded to a stop as she rounded the doorway. Maverick…

The man was on his hands and knees, grasping the floor like someone lay there. "Bradley… hey Bradely, wake up," He begged, making Kayla wince as she glanced around the room. "Christopher, what's happening to you? Please, your like a brother to me… no it's not too late! They can't do this!" Maverick howled and Kayla crossed the room around him, knowing she couldn't wake him.

But her noise drew his attention, or more likely changed whatever scenario Ferro had left his mind in. The manipulator seemed to get to them no matter how many times they tried to outmaneuver him, how could they battle thoughts? If only she could get close enough to touch him.

"Lies!" Maverick suddenly shouted and darted for her. She tried to get out of his path but he was quicker, grabbing ahold of her and slamming her into the wall.

"My brother didn't just die, he was never enlisted in the army!"

"Snap out of it Nord!" Kayla called, desperately searching for open skin. But his battle armor hid all of him, and the metal plating covered his head entirely. Cursing she felt his grip shift and took the moment to aim a kick upward, shaking his grip on her. Dropping her weight to the ground and darting back up around him she twisted behind him.

Him not being in this world right now, really seemed to be in her benefit in some way. Kayla was able to knock the mask off his face and grasped his neck. "Wake up! Come to your senses!"

She was shocked as he spun, arms shot up to find her neck and tossed her against the wall. Kayla's world was blurred as she pushed herself up from the floor. It hadn't worked… her powers couldn't touch Ferro's apparently.

"Where is his body then?! I WILL FIND HIM!" Nord screamed in a fit of passion. He picked Kayla up off the floor and slammed her against the wall with incredible strength. Her head bounced on the concrete, dazing her. But the stiff feeling of his hands grasping hard around her neck shook her back.

Gurgling for air Kayla forced all her strength into her arm, inched it towards his neck. She gasped for words, she just needed… needed to… to speak… one more inch, there!

"I know there's more," The man shook her loosely, and she finally spit out rasped words.

"Let me go!" Deja vu. But his hands obeyed, although he kept screaming about his brother. She slapped her hand against his cheek still pushing air through her bruised throat.

"Bang your head against the wall hard, as hard as you can, " She spluttered, and felt relief wash over her as Maverick turned and rammed his head against the wall. She stumbled away from him as he dropped to the ground. Dazed or unconscious she didn't have time to consider it, instead she darted off through the next doorway. Time was of the uptmost importance, their only hope.

She could hear two voices, one a cold methodical laugh as she came into view. There he was, Aldo Ferro.

"Interesting recovery time Mr. Wraith," The man snickered, and a sickening crack signaled the man breaking Kestral's already damaged arm. The man howled in pain and fell to the floor, and she saw Ferro's hadn't hover over Kestral again.

"A little pain is just distracting enough you can't save yourself, though, what should it be this time? The end of the world perhaps? All those dark paranoia's of yours make it so easy for me!"

She snuck around the room, and John who was falling into Ferro's trap was just enough for her to sneak up and surprise him. She felt triumph rush through her as her hand made contact with the large man's wrist.

"Do nothing," She spoke cooly, eyes narrowing as the man tensed and then automatically his body loosened. She could feel the pull of control she had over him.

"Well, well, well, Cornelius wasn't wrong about everything," Ferro spoke.

"I said, nothing!," She snarled, gripping his hand tighter for more control.

"Oh you don't have that much power," The man laughed and a chill rushed up her spine. "I'm honestly surprised you had this much."

"Incapacitate yourself," She ordered, mustering as much strength as she could into the command.

"You're hardly a match for my psionic powers," He bolstered and suddenly he turned and grasped her head in his large hand. "Now how about you do nothing," He laughed and she struggled as a sudden drowning feeling rushed over her mind.

Kayla struggled against it, no, it couldn't end this way… they couldn't let it end like this. They had been so close… but she just felt the memories rush instead.

"Mmm," She hummed, shifting to lay her weight on her side. Her eyes peered open, resisting the daylight that was filtered softly through the foggy mountains outside. "Coffee smells good," She muttered, hearing a soft chuckle next to her. She wiggle under the sheets until she found his body, wrapping her arm around his chest and ducking her head against his shoulder.

He moved sluggishly to set his hand over hers and Kayla drowned in the peace of this little room, their little home. Tucked away from the town, from all his terrors, from the secrets she had hidden against the bravely open man she'd fallen into.

"You started it?" She hummed sleepily.

"Had to. Damn birds got me again," Logan chuckled good naturedly.

"Oh yes, of course," She teased, the chirping he claimed he could hear so loudly it woke him up. It was a nicer version of the truth, that what woke him most nights wasn't from outside his mind. But Kayla liked the lie, she liked all their lies… she liked them as long as it meant she got to stay here, like this with him, for a little longer...

After all, it was all built on that.

The serene memory turned to anguish and tears streaked down her face as Ferro's manipulation shifted and she threw her hands out to the same loving man being strapped down to some machine.

It always went this way, the peace filled room turned into him leaving her, crushing her and giving her away to Stryker. Or it was this, and some terrified part of Kayla knew this was the truth. The loyal stubborn man wouldn't betray her, no… it had always been so much more likely that she, cunningly betrayed him. Excuses aside, she led him to this place. She took his trust and whatever good necessities to do it, however she was forced, Kayla still led him to destruction.

Three gunshots banged in her head every time, and her screams never stopped. He always wanted to carry her off into the sunset, and it was her who led him to his fate each time.

"Logan, I'm sorry!" She cried, choking out a sob as Ferro snickered overtop her. "All I wanted was to love you," She sobbed as the memories tormented her, forcing her to her knees as she clutched her breaking chest.

Her cries registered, and put a soft pang deep down in him, but it didn't take Logan's focus. No, the man who just shut off the override and was turning towards the doorway took it all.

Ferro. At last they had him, and Logan was done dancing around it all. This ended. Now.

Logan was leaned against the doorway, settled just inside of it, head cocked to the side. Victor leaned forward against the outside the other side of the doorway, both ferals watching their prey inside the small room.

"Goin' somewhere Bub?" He prompted.

"Don' look like it from here," Victor bit behind him. "Seems ta me this is the only exit. A damn shame."

"As surprising it is to see you escaped my mental prisons, you'll simply be put back in them!" The man bolstered.

"Take a seat, why don' ya Ferro," Victor mocked the words Ferro had fed him after he realized the collar could actually take him down.

Logan watched Ferro carefully, considering who would try and make a move first. But they were in position, it didn't matter, he wasn't getting out of it this time. Victor had hit Logan hard enough in the head to reset what Ferro had done. The two had nearly torn the other to pieces but he'd come out of the makeshift reality Ferro put in his head. Just in time to end this.

Logan pushed off the doorway, claws sliding from between his knuckles. That was when he felt the attack start in his mind again.

"Cute," Victor growled, leaping from the doorway and knocking Ferro across the head with his arm. It set the man off balance and broke his small connection to Logan's mind. That was the plan, he could only focus on one of them at the time, and jump to the next. But the two of them weren't going to give him that chance.

Ferro clearly tried Victor but Logan had gotten close enough to steal his attention again. His fist collided with Ferro's chest dead center, and he used the force to toss Ferro across the room. The man yelped as he crashed into the control panels with a shower of sparks.

"See here's the thing," Logan started, grabbing the man's jacket lapels and crushing him into the machinery again. "Ya can' get to us both at once."

"An' yer lookin' a little worn out there Aldo," Victor leered from over Logan's shoulder, fangs exposed.

"You pigs have no idea of my power!" The man sang throwing his hands out and Logan felt the snag in his head. Victor's claws shot out past Logan's shoulder to slash at Ferro's face. The man shrieked and the pressure left him.

Logan threw him to the ground and Victor leapt down around the man, crouched over him, with a hand around the man's face. Vic's claws left angry red welts along Ferro's cheek.

"Suit yerself," Victor purred, as he turned his hand to grab Ferro's face and grind the man's head into the pavement. Howling in pain Ferro tried to beg, listing off facts, last desperate ploys. "If you kill me they'll never come out of it!"

Logan paused, Victor didn't.

"Now innit that just so sad, yer just breakin' my heart here!" Victor laughed and Logan could see the pressure he was applying to the man's skull couldn't last much longer. "Where's all yer games now lil man?" Victor roared, but Logan pushed him off him, as the man's face turned a nasty shade of purple.

"Not yet," Logan stoped him receiving a deep snarl from his brother in protest.

"What's the deactivation codes?" Logan demanded. Victor sent him a questioning look.

When he got silence he barked it out again. "The codes the robots, now," He cleared up, Logan wrapped his hand around Ferro's neck.

"Wraith didn't get them from me either," Ferro spat out, trying to speak despite his reddened face.

"Fine, I wanted to lock ya up, but it's too dangerous. Have at him Victor," Logan said tossing him towards Victor. With a sinister snarl Victor launched forward claws grasped around Ferro's neck. He made a show of lengthening them into Ferro's skin and for a minute Logan worried he would forget the plan too caught up in his revenge.

"5475AFShiv!" Ferro suddenly cried as the blood began to pour from beneath Victor's hands. Logan stared crudely and reached down to his belt. "You pick that up Maverick?"

"Received, hold for confirmation," Nord called through the comm. They'd found him two rooms back on their way to Ferro's scent and the man had barely recovered from his own attack it looked like. Moments later he heard the confirmation come through and he looked over to Victor who lifted Ferro up over his head. The man looked panicked between them as Logan's claws emerged again and he walked towards the bastard suspended mid-air.

That cold smile spread across Victor's face.

"Look," Victor laughed cooly. "He actually thought we'd let'im live."

Logan snarled at Victor's taunts but ignored them. Facts were what they were, Ferro was too dangerous to let live. He operated too much, he was just another Stryker and some people just weren't redeemable. He'd never stop coming for them and Logan wasn't sure they hadn't just gotten lucky here.

With a scowl at himself, Logan's claws released up through Ferro's chest and the man squirmed in Victor's grasp as his throat was crushed by his brother. Logan yanked his claws back out to a spray of blood.

Ferro's body dropped to the ground, and although Logan took no pleasure in it… the threat was over.