Author's note: After saying I've dispensed with the Summers comic book fates, I do have a curtsy to the comics in this chapter. It's easy to spot. :-)

Standard disclaimer: I don't own them; I'm just borrowing them for our entertainment.

Pasts Imperfect

Chapter 3

Logan was in the mountains. It was cold, icy. They had picked up the bodies some time ago. The man had been literally cut in two, but the woman -- the woman looked like she had simply fallen asleep among the wreckage. Her neck had been broken in the crash. The children had been found alive, miraculously, far from the crash site. The survivors were too young to be inconvenient -- besides, they weren't his job.

Wreckage littered the landscape. He picked up part of the debris. There was writing on it.

"Corsair."

Logan woke with a start, drenched in sweat. Nightmares weren't anything new for him. But this was a different -- and he had no idea what it was about. He got out of bed and pulled on a pair of jeans. Perhaps a little patrolling would clear his mind.

x x x x x

Officially, Logan was head of security for the school. After walking around the halls and checking on a few doors and windows, he headed for the kitchen. He was only mildly surprised to find the light on. The kids were given a lot of leeway at the school and were notorious for wandering around late at night.

But it wasn't a student. It was Scott, nursing a mug of cocoa.

"Surprised to see you here," Logan remarked as he went to get a soda. He couldn't be bothered to go back to his room for a beer.

Once upon a time, when Jean was believed to be dead, the two men had spent a surprising number of evenings in the kitchen, working through their respective demons. And while they hadn't actually come out of it as friends, they at least had a fairly decent understanding of each other. And a mutual respect.

"I couldn't sleep," Scott replied. He waited for Logan to join him at the table before continuing. "It's been such a surprise -- finding someone who knew my parents. And we still don't know who sent the photograph. I don't know, it's just -- weird."

"I'm not sure I trust this Nick Fury," Logan stated. He had kept out of their visitor's way since his arrival. There was something about the way Nick looked at him that made him realize he might not want to know what he had done while working for the other man. Some things were best left buried.

"He seemed genuinely surprised that someone had sent me the photograph," Scott said slowly. "And I asked him outright what you did for him. He didn't tell me, of course."

"Of course."

"But still, if he was surprised to see me, he was really surprised to see you," Scott finished.

"What do you remember about the plane crash?" Logan asked suddenly, remembering his nightmare. Scott and his brother had survived the accident -- two children had survived the one in his dream. Were they linked?

Scott concentrated for a moment and then shook his head. "Nothing. It's gone -- all gone."

Logan understood the emptiness that came with memory loss only too well. "See you and raise you," he said as he lifted his soda bottle in a mock salute.

The younger man said nothing.

"You lost ten years," Logan continued. "But at least you know it's ten. I have no idea how many years I lost -- twenty, thirty, who knows, maybe a hundred."

"Do you think Nick Fury was a part of it?" Scott asked, referring to the experiments that had wiped out Logan's memory.

"No," Logan replied. "But he might know something about it."

The two men lapsed into silence as they sipped their drinks.

x x x x x

The next morning, both Nick and Shelley left. Shelley cheerfully allowed Scott to keep the postcards and photograph albums for as long as he wanted, and to make copies of anything. He assured the older woman that he would return them promptly.

Nick also agreed to send whatever employment information he had on Katherine Summers. That afternoon, the first pages arrived via fax.

x x x x x

Jean waved the papers in front of Scott's face.

"See," she said triumphantly. "Nick sent a copy of your mother's Standard Form 171 from when she applied to work as his project manager. Her whole life is on four sheets of paper."

As Jean said, the SF-171 was a gold mine of information. Katherine Anne O'Hanlon had been born in Baltimore and attended a Catholic high school in that city. She had gotten her engineering degree at the University of Maryland and had gone to work for NASA and was still there at the time Nick Fury hired her (Nick had called it poaching). She was young, but Jean gathered everyone on the project were young all-stars. Even Nick Fury had been under forty at the time. They were all the best of the best in their fields.

Jean also went online and found Scott's mother had co-authored two articles for engineering journals. Jean began to feel a certain kinship to the woman who would have been her mother-in-law. She felt a pang when she realized Katherine Summers had only been forty-one at the time of her death. She placed a hand on her stomach in a gesture of protection. Her life was far more dangerous than Scott's mother's had been.

Jean shook these thoughts from her mind and began to work her notes into a brief biography. She wasn't sure how much information they would eventually gather on Scott's mother, but this was a start.

x x x x x

Meanwhile, Logan couldn't shake the memory of his dreams. In the end, he went to the one person who might be able to help him make sense of it all.

He found Professor Xavier in his study. "What do you know about the accident that killed Scott's parents?" he asked without preamble.

"Not a great deal," the Professor admitted. "Why?"

"I don't know," Logan admitted. "I -- I had a dream."

"And?" the other man prompted calmly.

"I was in the mountains, I think. I don't know where," Logan said slowly. "There had been a plane crash. I picked up a piece of wreckage off the ground. There was writing on it -- Corsair."

Professor Xavier went pale. "Logan -- Corsair was the name of the plane Scott and his family were on at the time of the accident."

Logan wasn't that surprised. It was just proof of what he suspected. He thought about his dream for a moment. "Where did the plane come from?" he asked suddenly.

"I'm afraid I don't understand."

"Where did the plane come from?" Logan repeated. "Scott's father was, what, a Major in the Air Force? He was a married man with two small children. Do you really think he had the money for a private plane?"

"Perhaps he chartered it," the Professor offered.

"Maybe," Logan acknowledged. "But I think we need to find out about that plane. The plane is the focal point in the dream -- I have a feeling it's going to be the key to everything. The key to why I'm having these dreams -- and what they mean."

"Very well," Professor Xavier said. "I have contacts outside of Nick Fury. I'll see what I can find out. And Logan --?"

"Yes?"

"Don't say anything to Scott yet. I don't want to upset him unnecessarily."

Logan nodded. He wouldn't have admitted it publically, but neither did he.

x x x x x

That night, Logan's nightmare returned.

He was back on the mountain top. Again, it was cold. Again, wreckage surrounded him. Again, the piece that said "Corsair."

This time he picked up another piece. A stray thought darted through his mind.

"Sabotage."

Logan woke with a start, the terrible word still on his lips.

x x x x x

The next day, he went in search of Scott. He had some questions he had to ask -- and he had to figure out a way to do it without having the younger man ask too many questions in return.

He found Scott in the gym, practicing kendo. He was almost as good as Logan at the Japanese fencing style. Today he was blindfolded; he like to practice like that in case his eyes were or had to be covered. Logan understood the need to make a possible liability into an asset. They had used Scott's ability to "see in the dark" on more than one occasion.

"Good morning, Logan," Scott called out.

"'Morning," Logan replied. He wasn't surprised Scott knew it was him. The younger man's senses were almost as good as his own.

Scott turned his head away as he removed his blindfold and restored his glasses to their place. "Want to join me in some practice?"

"Sure," Logan replied. He went to get a fencing staff. "How's the search going for information about your mother?"

"Not bad," he responded. "Jean knows how to track down the academic stuff. My mother was from Baltimore, of all places."

"Were you born there?"

"No," Scott replied. "I was born in Alaska."

Logan decided he'd have to ask outright to get the answers he needed. "I suppose your father is buried in Arlington."

"No," Scott said. "My parents are buried together, in Alaska. I've seen the grave site."

Logan nodded with false nonchalance. "Have you been to the crash site?"

"The crash site was never found," the younger man explained. "The wreckage is probably still up in the mountains, somewhere."

Logan had to hide his surprise. "Your parents weren't found at the crash site?" he repeated slowly.

"No," Scott said patiently. "They were apparently found just a couple miles from us. The plane probably broke up in the air and scattered. They found us, they found my parents' bodies -- the plane wreckage wasn't important and they gave up. Why?"

"No reason."

"Oh, there's a reason," Scott remarked knowingly. "Am I going to find out what it is?"

"Maybe." Logan grinned. "Think you can beat it out of me, Cyclops?"

"No," Scott replied as he tossed the other man a face mask. "But I can try."

x x x x x

After sparring with Scott, Logan returned to the Professor's study and reported on the conversation.

"The plane's the key, I'm sure of it," he repeated. "In my dream, Scott's parents were at the crash site. And I'm willing to bet that dream is a memory. But why lie about where the remains were found? Why make a secret over the crash site of an ordinary plane -- unless the plane wasn't ordinary at all." He made up his mind. "I need you to read my mind again."

"Logan, we've discussed this before ..."

He held up his hand to stop the other man. "I had another dream last night. I picked up the wreckage and thought sabotage. Is that it? Is that what I did for Fury? Was I an assassin? Was it really an accident or was the plane sabotaged -- and did I do it? I've got to know, Chuck. You've got to help me."

"Very well," the Profess sighed. "Lie down and clear your mind."

x x x x x