Prologue 3:

            Logan staggered across the darkening laboratory, grinding his teeth in pain as his multiple wounds began to heal.  He breathed heavily, forcing his legs to move forward, away from the water-filled tank that had so frequently invaded his dreams.

After so many years, he found himself in that nightmare world, not a vague memory, but a reality he could no longer deny.

            Each step was easier, quicker as the wounds on his back and his chest disappeared, the fading pain replaced by a powerful, unforgiving rage.

            With an effort, Logan looked back at the tank viciously.  It was the same in his memories, identical in every way, except for the body that now lay below the surface of the water.  It did not float, as the human body naturally would.  Instead, the body had sunk, due to the excess adamantium Logan had injected into her abdomen.

            From where he stood, Logan could still see the silvery tears running down her cheeks, now solidified, the end of a life permanently stained by the indestructible metal.

            Logan forced his eyes away from the dead woman, a sickening guilt threatening to overwhelm him.  He knew he would regret her death until the day he died.

            No matter how vicious an opponent she had been, her motives had not been her own.  Her eyes had been blank as she attacked him, lifeless, a slave to the man who had made her what she was.  The same man who had stolen Logan life; he had made both of them into killers.

            Damn you, Striker, Logan thought, an involuntary growl rising from his throat, This time you didn't steal a life... this time you had me to take it from her...

            Logan clenched his fists and marched forward, grinding the adamantium blades inside his hands against the metal-plated bones of his fingers.  He silently cursed his 'claws', his mind filled with the many lives that had fallen at their edges, and he knew he regretted more than the death of the woman behind him.

            Yet now, he stood in ready anticipation to take one more life.

            Logan sniffed the lab's dank air...and caught Striker's scent.

***     

            Logan marched forward briskly, until a blinding pain exploded in this mind.  He stumbled and cried out, the unexpected attack tearing through him violently.

            The pain was unlike anything he had ever experienced.  No blade or bullet had ever rendered him so completely helpless. 

            He gripped his head, grinding his fingers against his skull, an instinctive attempt to defend himself against his unseen attacker.  The adamantium that lined his bones strained against his body's powerful ability to heal, his natural gifts suddenly fighting to push the unnatural metal out.

            Logan's claws extended and retracted, tearing the soft flesh between his fingers.  The wounds did not heal, and blood ran down his hands and along the blades.

His senses fluxuated, strengthening and weakening, as his mind was torn apart.

            His eyes were wide, suddenly seeing everything around him with a strange new clarity.  The light was unbearable, colors roaring to life, shadows fading away...

After a moment, his vision faded, and he realized he could smell everything in the world around him.  He smelled the lab, the old metal and dank water.  He could smell the water of the lake, the snow outside, the panic and fear of those in the base...

Then that sense also faded, and he began to hear beyond any level he had before.  The strain of the old dam against the water, the hum of machinery, the pounding of his heart... and the cries of children rising above it all...

Logan clenched his eyes shut, thinking of Rogue, thinking of Jean, thinking of the dozens of children Striker forced out into the night.  Were they all suffering the same way he was?

Then, through the haze of pain, one last thought rang clearly in his head.

The Professor...oh, Christ, it's the Professor...Jean, where are you?