TITLE: WINTER OF THE SENTINEL

AUTHORS: Mick'n'Star

RATING: R

WARNING: SLASH!!

DISCLAIMER: Right: Marvel owns the X-men. Whichever TV it is owns Jim and Blair. Everyone else and the story are ours. No amount whatsoever of money is involved, we in fact *lose* money because of labour and wear and tear on computer not to mention electricity and internet bills.

ARCHIVE: Please ask before archiving

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WINTER OF THE SENTINEL

LOGAN

The town is ancient, small and mean. Under the drizzle the narrow streets twist wetly in themselves like rivulets in which the glistening houses float lazily like moored barges.

It has an organic feel to it, as if stone was soft and sagging and slimy: a monster of the deeps come to die on land slowly sinking in mud.

Nice, huh? Poetic even. Symbolically reflecting my roseate humour and optimistic view of life at the moment. I am - but what's new about that? – approaching the point of no return in one of my homicidal rages and this arsehole of the universe Chuck has sent us isn't helping any.

The cause of my black humour and near rage is walking beside me, all hunched into that bloody greatcoat of his, shivering in the drizzle and with a face longer than my sodding claws.

"Why here?" he says pettishly. "What's to find in this cesspit?"

"How the fuck can I know that?" I growl back "I'm the grunt here. You are the bloody cultivated suave man of the world. So tell me."

"Je m'enfiche." my darling says vulgarly, then reverting to a language he happily mangled adds: "It was all your fault."

Oh-oh, no mangling means big trouble in the air, seemed the light of my life – HA! - is as pissed off as I was.

"Our fault, Gumbo, not mine." Notice how I refrain from saying 'your fault'. Go go go, Wolverine, always the gentleman, keep on being the right berk you know you are!

"You smoked that cigar in the mess hall. Cigars smell."

"You smoke *everywhere* and it's dining room."

"Mess hall. That place is a krotting barrack and we're krotting soldiers. I should never have come back."

"You are whingeing as usual, Gumbo. Whinge whinge whinge all day long. Why in hell you imagine this makes you endearing fuck only knows!"

 "And if you think your growling impresses me, you must be even stupider than I suppose."

Er… yes. Our wonderful virtual marriage is on the rocks. Or going there at an accelerating rate. All the quirks and traits we had considered funny and fascinating had become galling sores. It's sad, but there you are.

"You got us into this, Logan. You eat like an animal, you smoke smelly cigars, you *prowl*… and you get on everybody nerves, including mine."

"Listen Gumbo…"

"Will you krotting stop calling me Gumbo?!" he's practically yelling at this point and I hear a note I do not like at all behind that, but as he's elected to drench himself in perfume this morning, my nose can't pick up what it is exactly. Which is exactly why he has elected to drench himself in perfume.

"You are always calling people demeaning things! Chuck and bub and Gumbo and….! You could show a little respect!"

Ha! Listen who's talking! Mr Stormy-Woofie-chere! The stupid king of baby talk! But I don't say it out loud: I don't want to spark a fight that could end with me lying in bits all over this place and him sliced like a double length salami.

"Listen" I say as patiently as I can which is not very "they sent us here to get rid of us, not me."

"Weh." oh good, Remy's finally relenting – and why do I give a damn? – "Dey don't like us."

"No. And it's not only the smoking and the name calling. We're not nice and obedient, Gumbo" I sigh, same old story, whenever I go. Same ol', same ol'. "We ain't like them."

"Non, and dat's a mercy. Would 'splode mysel' if I were."

"Yeh" funny how easy it is to find a wavelength, "same here. Bloody stuckup bastards to a man."

"Ro ain't." hackles up in defence of his favourite.

"Duh… " He's right, you know, I sneer. Didn't use to, but I have an instant voice replay in my ears and that's definitely a sneer. Fuck, I sound like sodding stuckup Warren the Wanker. Okay, Logan, regroup and redo from start.

"I said 'to a man'. Ro and Red are alright." He gives me an odd look.

"Weh, dey are. De oders hate Remy 'cause he made you a…"

Something in him makes him stop. He's odd, is my love. The most brazen-faced creature on Earth and then he has these little pockets of bashfulness. Once that made me smile but today it irritates me no end and brings me back to my near-terminal rage state.

"Fag. Queer. Pouf. Brownnose. Cocksucker. Gay – HA Gay! We're gloomy as two damp tombs. – Fairy. Homo." I hammer at him testily "Say the word, it's what you are too. Are you ashamed?!"

His eyes flash fire, a thing nature equipped him far too well to do. "Fag." he spits through clenched teeth, no mean feat that. Then, still hissing he goes on

"Dey hate de fags, satisfied? Dat what you wanted to hear? We're fags fags fags!"

"Yeh, well, it's what we are, ain't it? And I don't give a flyin' fuck if the sight of us kissing gives that lot the pukes! They can go…. OH FUCK!!!"

Suddenly the narrow street is full of armed men who start shooting at us as soon as they see us. Something slams into my chest and sends me crashing into a wall, Remy in mother hen mode, I suppose. I see him roll off and start throwing cards.

I am dazed for a moment and just sit there enjoying the fizzle-bangs of a seriously pissed off Gambit. The I realise there's a sort of crossfire, someone coming from the corner on my right is shooting at the baddies.

"Don't shoot the redhead!" I rasp, alarmed "Who the fuck are you?!"

"Police." he says calmly, while calmly shooting "Lie still, you have been wounded."

Wounded? What the fuck he's blathering on now? I try to get up and find I cannot. Oh bloody hell, he's right, that was not Remy slamming in me, that was a sodding enemy gun! What have they shot me with? Felt like a cannon ball or a thoroughly protective Gambit.

"Blair!" he sings out, turning towards me and affording me an unobstructed view of his face, "Go get a doctor!"

He's not bad looking, actually. Tall bugger, lean and well muscled. I bet he has a nice rock-hard ass. Bald… no, hair so short it's no more than a shadow on his head, good face. So square jawed it hurts and grim enough, but he has nice clear eyes. He smells strange…

Ok, healing factor has not yet kicked in so my nose could be slightly off. By the wetness I now feel on me, I must be a right mess, so let's say my nose is off. Even thus he smells strange, not quite normal… different from normal but not a mutant. Intriguing.

"Your friend is mad." he says conversationally and makes me grin.

"Yeh," I croak "Freaking crazy. Let him deal with the baddies. Any idea of who they are?"

He finally turns to look at me and his nice clear eyes go wide. I grin at him toothily and lustily, can't help it, he's so cute. He grins fleetingly back at me, but says: "You are more seriously wounded than I thought. Lie still and don't talk, my partner's gone to fetch a doctor."

I grin even more widely and grate "I don't need no doctor, got me a healing factor." I am savouring his reaction to that when I hear an unearthly scream.

"Loooooogaaaaannn!!!!!" yodelling with utter despair my mad-cat love manages to produce a monstrous explosion – what's he energised? A house? – and flings himself at me making me spurt blood and oof mightily.

I see sparks for a moment and then his dear face is near mine. I see his mouth opening and shutting like a demented fish. Wonderful, my hearing's gone! No, now I can hear him, he's using his crisp action-stations voice, must have realised I couldn't hear him before.

"Heal, do you hear me, Wolvie? Heal NOW! Why is that wound not closing? Heal! Heal!"

He's fulminating at me out of his jewelled eyes and I would normally gaze fatuously into them, but am too curious to see Tall-and-Heroic's reaction.

I must say he gives good value, his chin is kissing his sternum and his eyes have gone round. His mouth's opening… wait for it… what will he say?

"Jim!!!!" Fuck, another actor on the set. Title "Heal, chere, heal". Remy sounds like a parrot with terminal iterative disease and I don't catch what the newcomer says next. C'mon whoever-you-are, lemmme see you.

Obligingly he enters my field of vision. Oh fucking fuck! He could be Rems brother, maybe he is for all I know. Only shorter, and real tight curly hair and has normal eyes…. Ah yes, doesn't smell quite human as well.

Nice: a family reunion in the armpit of the universe to chant the ever popular hymn "Heal, chere, heal" at the wake of Brother Remy's love-in Woof.

Ooops, getting light-headed here, must be loss of blood. C'mon healing factor, kick in or uncle Rems will be soooo angry, he'll prolly 'splode you.

Must have said that out loud: they're looking at me odd and leery. Leery beery… Hell, losing it. No sound, sight blurring, smell still strong and I smell fear pouring off Remy like torrential rain. Never fear, Ol' Healin's here. The smell of those other two is still very very intriguing though. I sniff mightily because I like it a lot.

Eheheh! Just when you thought human- well not quite human – eyes could go no wider, they do. Huuuuge eyes now, all round and full of… no idea, full of something not bad to see in eyes. Nice couple, do they know? Rems could have empathed it if he weren't so busy with his fucking chant will you stop alrea

REMY

When the baddies are on us I have no time to think, roll under their krottin' lasers, death rays, whatever an' fizzle and throw, expecting Wolvie to roar an' snickt and annihilate those stupid looking soldiers right and left.

But no Wolvie, only some connard firin' a gun thinkin' maybe this is a movie. It distracts me for a second an' the krottin' holes get me. It's only a glancin' blow, true, but that infernal blast is doing somethin' to me. Can feel it… What the… My power!

I feel it wanin' just when I need it most. Logs must have got hurt, 's not like him not to slash in mad abandon in situations like this, but if he's hit, then his powers have waned a'd without his healin' power he may be… No.

I grab the rifle off the hands of the connard I have just kicked in the nuts an' give it my all. The charge is pitifully weak, but I know the power pack is affected. I throw it at the baddies an' turn to Logan.

The sound of a satisfying explosion mixes with my scream when I see him.

He's sprawled like a broken doll, covered in blood, with what seems half his chest caved in. I throw myself at him like a fool an' he grunts at me. I can't help it, I know it's useless but I babble 'Heal chere heal'

I hate this stinkin' little town with its little misshapen houses like rotten teeth in a diseased mouth, I hate this drizzlin' cold that has penetrated all of me until I can't stop shiverin', but most of all I hate that megalomaniac Xavier for having sent us here to get rid of the disgustin'... fags, yes. I hate Logan when he's right but now he's maybe dyin' an' I'd give everythin' to save his life.

What is with this place? Why does it feel so hateful and hostile? Who the krot are these people shootin' at us on sight? And who the krottin' krot are these 2 fuckers hoverin' over my Logan an' lookin' at me as if they'd never seen a mutant in their krottin' life?

For a moment all goes dark, but I can't stop fightin', can't let the best thing that ever happened to me in my life go. Dieu, an' I thought I was fed up with Logs! We'd been fightin', I'd been bitchin'… But I love him! This wounded an' broken man, this short bad-tempered compassionate creature defines me because I define him, never had such a power, never gave such a power to another.

I have to do somethin', but what can I do? Think frantically while my mouth runs on autopilot an' then I have it.

I have lost the power to charge things, but I maybe can still see the dance of the atoms… maybe.

I look at my beloved and will myself to look deeper and deeper, to use what's left of my power an' suddenly I *see* it. I see that little biochemical-electromagnetic trigger that's there to release hordes of antibodies an' force the spleen an' the cells to work overtime an' make more blood an' more an' more cells.

I see it's dormant, inert.

I am lost to the world now, all of me focused on this oh so hard task: to charge the trigger so it will work again.

Dieu, but it's hard! I have only the trickle of a trickle of power an' it wants to fire up lots of molecules I don't want to touch.

Vaguely I can hear my voice chant an' Logs babble, I know he's sinkin' fast, I try to keep control but I'm terrified of doing even worse damage.

Suddenly I feel Logs go, a snuffed out candle, I hear shouts I can't decode, there are hands on my shoulders and there's no more time: now or never Gambit, live up to your krottin' stupid codename.

I hit the trigger with all I've got left just as somebody hits me on the head an' I feel darkness drown me.

A last wisp of thought in my blackenin' mind: 'the healing factor trigger. Did I feel it kick in or…

TBC