In Westchester, New York, a young girl sat in the library of her school and tried to do her homework. She kept tapping her pen against her notebook while resting her head on her hand. The blonde teenaged boy next to her gave her a dirty look, sighed, and finally slammed his hand down on her irritating pen.

"What's with you, Rogue?" he hissed. "We're supposed to be studying, and all you've been doing is staring out the window and driving me nuts with that rotten tapping."

"I'm sorry Bobby. I can't help it," she shifted in her seat and began twirling her pen in both of her velvet-gloved hands. "It's been six months today since Logan left. I can't help but think about him. Wonder if he's okay or if he needs help."

"If there's one person in the world who can take care of himself, it's the Wolverine," Bobby reassured her. "He's the last one I'd picture needing help. I'm sure wherever he is, he's doing fine. Besides, you said he was looking for answers to his past, right?"

At Rogue's nod, Bobby continued, "Then if he found what he was looking for, he'd need time to sort it out in his head before he came back wouldn't he? Give him some more time. I'm sure he's having fun just being out there right now."

"I guess you're right Bobby. I'm sorry for being such a pain," she told him.

"That's okay. Being a pain is what Rogues do best anyhow."

Rogue stuck her tongue out at him and bent back over her books.

A black motorcycle with sleek red racing lines purred to a halt in the parking lot of a highway rest-stop diner. The driver, a broad man in a brown leather jacket, kicked the stand into place and cut the engine. His passenger slowly unwound herself from him and pulled back, straightening her hair.

"You are to never do that again without warning me!" Glow got off the motorcycle and slapped Wolverine on the back of his head.

"Hey! I didn't do anything," he protested, grinning ear-to-ear. "You were the one who asked for more speed."

"But on those curves? That road was so damned steep I thought you were going to run us clear off into the forest. or worse, off the side of that mountain."

Glow put her sunglasses back on and pushed her duffel bag behind her again.

Wolverine gave her a mock bow. "I do apologize to my lady for upsetting her delicate constitution. I vow to not let such a thing happen again. well, maybe not often anyway."

Glow growled at him and muttered as she walked past him and into the diner. Wolverine was sure he caught the tail end of a phrase, "Local wildlife indeed."

He followed her into the building and to the booth she'd already claimed. A waitress in a black and white uniform walked up and handed them their menus. She asked for drinks and then walked away snapping her gum.

She was back in a minute with coffee for the both of them, took their orders and then disappeared into the kitchen. Glow looked around the diner. It was decorated in chrome with pink accents. Pink cushions on the chairs and in the booths. Pink napkins, pink tablecloths, and pink hued paintings adorned the walls.

"What's the matter? You look queasy," Wolverine asked her.

"How can anyone stand to look at so much pink and chrome in one place?" she whispered. "It's nauseating."

He laughed. "At least you have a good sense of decor."

She furrowed her brows and frowned at him in an effort not to laugh. "Décor matters to a guy like you?"

"Define 'guy like me'," he bantered.

"I thought I already did," she said with an affected look of surprise. Putting her mug down after a sip of coffee, she continued, ticking off the list on her fingertips. "Uncouth, unwashed, and unshaven."

"Awful lot of 'uns,'" he told her. "I do like to clean up once in a while you know. Depends on whether or not the company is worth it."

"And?" she baited.

"The jury's still out," Wolverine answered seriously.

The waitress appeared and delivered his omelet with bacon and her French toast. After leaving a small pitcher of syrup, the woman popped her gum and drifted away again.

Glow paused in cutting up her breakfast to ask him a question. "So, where's this computer you think we can use to decipher the rest of the info I gleaned from F.T.L.'s CPU?"

"With friends," he answered around a mouth full of bacon.

"Still don't trust me?" she asked.

"To be honest, I don't know why you trust me," he told her, leaning closer to avoid being heard by the new customers walking past them to a table. "For all you know, I could be a sociopath."

"I've had no indication that you aren't," she teased. She took a bite of her toast, chewed, and swallowed before resuming. "But I have sympathy for anyone who lived through being in an F.T.L. lab, even if it was run by an affiliate."

"So, how old were you when you were taken by the creeps?" he asked, trying to make his question sound casual.

She raised an eyebrow over her sunglasses at him. "Twelve. They held me for twenty-three years."

"Holy shit."

He stopped eating and stared at her in amazement. "How'd you survive?"

"Very nearly didn't," Glow whispered as she wiped her mouth with a pink napkin and shuddered. "Almost lost my mind in there. Fortunately, I had some good friends that pulled me through. We got out while I still had something of a mind left. Constantly channeling that much energy through me almost fried my brain - literally. Took a long time to heal."

"And you?" Glow asked, putting her napkin down on the table. "How long were you in there?"

"Don't know. That's what I came to find out," he answered, pushing a piece of omelet around on his plate with his fork. "I can't remember anything prior to fifteen years ago. Once and a while I get these flashes but."

Glow reached across the table and took his hand. "You don't have to tell me. We just need to get these disks somewhere where we can read and analyze them. The answers we're both looking for have to be here somewhere."

"Right," Wolverine answered. He covered her hand with his and rubbed the back of it softly. "I'm going to have to make a phone call. Gotta let my friends know we're coming."

"Friends?"

She wrinkled her brows in uncertainty.

"Good people. Weird names," he grinned at her.

"Weirder than Glow and Wolverine?" she asked as they stood. She left a tip and frowned as Wolverine grabbed the check before her.

"Not by much. They run a school for people like us." He paid for their meal and they left.

He sat astride his bike and kicked the engine to life. "Come on, I got to find a payphone."

She climbed on behind him and encircled his waist with her arms. "No turbo speed this time, okay? I need to digest first."

"Whatever you say darlin', whatever you say."