A/N: Special thanks to mela, enchantedlight, Star-of-Chaos, Episodic, Lady Zymergy, Lucas'sgirl, EvilWhiteRaven, Jean1, ishandahalf, & SperryDee for your reviews of the last chapter.

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On a night when the Lucky Pearl Bar was packed with patrons, even at such an early hour in the evening, the festive mood inside laid in stark contrast to the chaotic atmosphere outside. Those inside, who had been seeking a night of entertainment and enjoyment, stopped what they were doing when they heard a commotion outside. Some of the more curious patrons decided to go over to the entrance to see exactly what was going on. But when they looked outside…

"Looks like for dis hand, de Joker gonna be wild!"

…were the only words that those standing at the door of the bar heard, before a flurry of brightly flashing objects passed by and suddenly exploded nearby in the back alley in front of them. The observers quickly realized that this was no mere commotion or disturbance that they were witnessing; instead it appeared that a full-scale war had just broken out right outside in the less than stellar neighborhood.

"Eliminate the clawed one first! The Silver Samurai stated that he poses the greatest danger to us." The lead ninja of the Hand hit-squad shouted to the other ninjas below, as he stood on the edge of the roof that overlooked the alley.

"Danger? That don't even begin to cover it, bub!" Wolverine replied, as he Gambit, Rogue, and Mariko were in various parts of the alley with the Hand, fighting for their lives.

"There must be like a hundred of these ninja guys." Rogue said aloud. She was busy ducking and dodging two of the ninjas, as they swung their swords at her.

"Seems more like fourteen or fifteen, if ya ask me." Gambit responded to her.

"Ah didn't mean it literally." Rogue replied, as she continued avoiding her attackers.

Gambit then took notice of Rogue's current predicament, and proceeded to shout out to her…

"Rogue, jump back, quick-like!"

Without thinking, Rogue instinctively did as Gambit requested, and did a backwards somersault. Gambit then quickly tossed a kinetically charged card at one of the ninjas that Rogue had been avoiding. Gambit did it with such a swift and fluid motion, that the ninja didn't have enough time to react. As the card found its mark, it instantly created a sizable explosion in the alley. When the smoke started to clear, Gambit saw that the ninja was lying motionless on the ground, with his sword beside him. Gambit then quickly made his way over to where the ninja was.

"You t'ink you can handle one of these?" Gambit asked Rogue, as he tossed her the sword.

"Why don't you tell me?" Rogue replied, as she promptly used the sword to first block the attack of the second ninja who had been swinging his sword at her, right before she punched him in the face.

"On second thought, forget dat last question." Gambit smirked. But now it was his turn to dodge an aggressor, as a ninja archer that was standing on a nearby crate in the alley, fired an arrow at him.

While Rogue and Gambit were fighting at one end of the alley, Wolverine more than had his hands, well claws really, full as he sliced his way through a small group of ninjas gathering around him and Mariko.

"Logan, look out." Mariko warned him, as one of the ninjas lunged at him with a long spear.

"Mariko, stay behind me." Wolverine said to her as he cut the spear in two, before thrusting one set of his claws into the chest of the ninja. Wolverine then handed part of the broken spear to Mariko so that she could ward of any ninjas that got by him.

Another ninja wielding a sword then came up and swung at Wolverine, but the ninja was surprised when the sword shattered after Wolverine blocked it with his claws. Wolverine punched his clawed fist into the abdomen of the second ninja, and then he picked him up and tossed him a few feet away.

Wolverine and Mariko then started to make their way back towards where Rogue and Gambit were, after being separated from each other when all hell broke loose in the alley. As they did, the ninja archer standing over on top of the crate fired an arrow at them, with Mariko as the intended victim. But the arrow didn't get a chance to reach its target, as Wolverine grabbed it mid-air, just in the nick of time.

"Hey Cajun, why don't you use one of those fancy card tricks of yours to take care of the guy shootin' oversized toothpicks at us?" Wolverine said as he and Mariko continued walking towards Gambit, with Wolverine hacking and slashing at Hand ninjas along the way.

"Your wish, Monsieur, is my command." Gambit said, as he threw a charged card at the archer. But the archer quickly responded, as he shot an arrow of his own that hit the card in mid-air and created an explosion halfway between him and Gambit.

"Well, if one card don't do the trick, let's see how you handle a full house." Gambit announced as he jumped towards the ninja archer, doing a full front flip in the process. As he began his descent to the ground, Gambit began to throw a succession of cards at the archer, all at different angles. The archer managed to stop the first few cards, but he wasn't able to stop them all.

"And for my next request…" Gambit asked Wolverine sarcastically, as the archer had been knocked off of the crate in a blinding flash of light.

While the two men were talking, Rogue was busily fighting another member of the assassin squad a few feet away. As she kicked the ninja in the sternum and knocked the wind out of him, another member of the Hand snuck up behind her with a metal chain in his hand. Before Rogue could react, the ninja was able to wrap the chain around her right arm and violently jerk her to the ground, wrenching Rogue's arm as it put a tremendous strain on her shoulder socket.

"Owww!" Rogue yelled, as she hit the ground. She then got up to one knee and picked up her sword with her left hand. She tried in vain to cut the chain, but she was unable to accomplish the task. The ninja then fiercely pulled the chain again. He brought Rogue back down to the ground, and this time it caused her sword to go flying a few feet behind her.

When Wolverine and Gambit saw this, Wolverine immediately started off to go and help Rogue. But, Gambit stopped him.

"Gambit's got dis." Gambit said, as he pulled a card from his coat and charged it. He then threw the charged card at the chain and split it in two.

The ninja immediately dropped his half of the broken chain, and pulled out a medium-sized dagger. He began to charge at Rogue, who appeared weaponless after losing her sword. Rogue was forced to get creative, and use the only thing currently at her disposal.

"Ah hope you have a good dental plan." Rogue said, as she swung the other half of the broken chain that was still wrapped around her forearm, and hit the ninja running towards her square in the face.

"For someone that thought she didn't bring much to a fight, you managed to find some pretty interestin' ways of expressing yourself." Wolverine said as he, Mariko, and Gambit finally made it over to Rogue.

"Ah wasn't really thinking about it." Rogue replied as she rubbed her right shoulder, which was still sore.

"That's because you're startin' to develop a natural fighting instinct." Wolverine stated, as the madness around them seemed to finally be at an end.

The group then surveyed the alley around them. They realized that all of the ninjas that had attacked them were now lying defeated in the alley. As they took in the fact that they had survived against such incredible odds, one of them made a comment.

"I say we get out of here, while de gettin' is still good, non." Gambit said to the group.

As soon as Gambit made that suggestion, he was immediately informed that leaving would not be as easy of an option as he thought. That message was relayed to him in the form of multiple ninja throwing stars being hurled at the group. Gambit and Rogue managed to dodge most of stars, receiving only a few minor cuts. Meanwhile, Wolverine had been taken a direct hit by some of the throwing stars. He had been using his body as a shield to protect Mariko, since the majority of the stars were meant for her.

"We have been instructed that Lady Mariko must not be permitted to escape with her life!" The lead ninja called out. During the fight, he had disappeared from the edge of the roof, only to return with a dozen fresh Hand soldiers standing behind him, all of them wearing sashes on their hip similar to his."

"All of you are gonna have to go through me first!" Wolverine shouted, after he had yanked out the throwing stars that had embedded themselves in his back and in parts of arms and legs.

"As you wish, animal…" The lead ninja sneered.

"If you boys wanna seriously throw-down, then let's get to it." Wolverine said to the ninjas up above, as his infamous temper quickly throttled towards overdrive. As a result, adrenaline pumped through his system at an accelerated rate, in response to his highly agitated state. Wolverine then popped his claws back out of his hands, and closed his eyes for a few seconds. When he opened them, he turned and looked at Rogue.

"Marie, it's time for you to get out of here." Wolverine instructed her, "I can handle things from here on out. Just stick with what I taught you, you know how we'll meet up later."

"No--way!" Rogue loudly protested, "Ah ain't leavin' you here alone with these killers. We can take out these guys together, just like we did with the other ones."

"Just do as I say girl!" Wolverine snarled at her, as his demeanor became more and more intense by the second.

Rogue was taken aback, as she had never heard Logan talk to her like that before. What Rogue didn't realize was that something deep within Logan was about to erupt, something that even frightened him once it came out.

The scientists at the Weapon X project had sought to create the perfect killing machine, one that was cold, ruthless, and unrelenting. As a result of their psychological brainwashing and memory tampering on Logan, they had very nearly achieved that goal. The scientists had affectionately nick-named his particular mental state when he became engulfed in such a violent blur, as a 'Berserker Rage.'

Despite the fact that Rogue was in training and on her way to becoming a full-fledged X-Man (well, X-Woman actually), Logan still didn't want Rogue to ever have to see this particular part of his being, and he also wished that Mariko didn't have to either.

"Come on Chere, I t'ink we better listen to your friend." Gambit said, as he took hold of one of Rogue's gloved hand, "He got de look of a rabid dog in his eyes."

"More like a rabid Wolverine..." Rogue sighed, as her emotions were still stinging from the fact that Logan had essentially told her to get lost.

"Huh?" Gambit asked, as he didn't fully hear her comment.

"Nothin'." Rogue answered in a hushed tone, as she and Gambit took off down the alley.

"We can deal with them later, right now Mariko is of paramount concern." The lead ninja said, as he and the regrouped band of assassins jumped down from the rooftop, and landed a few feet from Wolverine and Mariko.

"Mariko I want you take cover over there, and don't come out until I say so." Wolverine said, as he pointed to a stack of crates behind them. Without debating the issue, Mariko did as he requested.

"So, who wants to be first up at bat?" Wolverine smiled, as he looked at the Hand ninjas that had surrounded him.

As soon as Mariko made it behind the crates, she could hear the fighting break out in earnest in the alley. But unlike the previous fight that she was involved in with Wolverine, Gambit, and Rogue, this one sounded completely different. With the screaming and growling that was audible in the nighttime air, it almost sounded like a slaughter was taking place in that back alley…

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After what seemed like an eternity, but was probably no more than ten minutes, Mariko heard complete silence in the alley. Despite Logan telling her to wait for his signal, Mariko wanted to be sure that the man that she loved was okay. When she peered from around the crates, what she saw was a somewhat mixed answer.

"Logan, are you all right?" Mariko asked, as she saw Wolverine crouched down on the ground. He had a couple of arrows sticking out of him and he was drenched in blood, both from the men that he had been fighting, as well as from his own wounds. But upon closer inspection, despite what Mariko might have previously believed, she soon realized that she wasn't quite as ready for the sight before her as she thought.

All around Wolverine were the severed and mutilated corpses of the Hand ninjas that he had killed during his rampage. As Mariko drew closer to him, she reached out to touch Logan.

"Don't." Logan said, as he drew away from her.

"Logan, you are hurt." Mariko said, as she could tell that he had been injured in the fight.

"It'll heal. This body of mine always heals." Logan said, as he continued looking down at the ground, "It's the rest that doesn't seem to get any better, the stuff deep down inside."

After that last sentence, Logan finally looked up and stared deep into Mariko's eyes.

"Guess you're probably agreein' with your brother right about now, with what he said about me bein' an animal and all." Logan said to her.

"My brother is the last person to be casting aspersions upon anyone else." Mariko told him.

"Maybe, but what kind of person does what I just did, if he isn't something inhuman?" Logan posed to her.

"The Hand gave you little choice, and regrettably, you did what had to be done." Mariko answered.

"It's one thing to kill another person to defend yourself, or to protect the people around you. But it's another to do it whole-scale, and enjoy every second of it. And as much as I'm ashamed to admit it, I actually took pleasure in rippin' these guys apart." Logan began to confess, "There's this part of me inside, a part that's wild and feral. I don't know if it was put in me by the monsters that gave me this fancy skeleton and claws, or if it's been there all along, but this 'thing' inside lives to do nothing but hunt, kill, and destroy. I thought I was learnin' to control it, that maybe I was gettin' better than 'It'. But, it looks to be just another in a long string of lies I've been tellin' myself. I'm just afraid that one of these days I'm gonna get pulled too close to that edge inside of me, and I ain't gonna come back."

At that point, Logan was pouring out his heart to Mariko. He was telling her some of the inner-most observations that he had about himself, things that he kept inside and had never uttered out loud to another living soul. Logan then stood up, and in a couple of quick motions, he painfully pulled out the two arrows that were lodged in his back and shoulder.

"Tell me Mariko, how can you honestly love someone like that?" Logan asked her, as he stood there and waited for her answer.

"If you are asking how I can love a man that is brave and noble enough that he would risk, and even sacrifice his own life for mine, then there is only one response that I can give. I would tell him that I would gladly do the same for him, were I asked to." Mariko replied, as she began to realize how much she had come to love Logan, despite the rather short amount of time they had known each other.

To the casual observer, Logan and Mariko may have seemed to be extraordinarily different from one another, raising doubts as to how a relationship between them could ever hope to last. But beneath Logan's tough and often brash exterior, laid a heart of gold that was buried deep inside. And behind Mariko's often quiet and reserved demeanor, was the fiery spirit of a true warrior. Essentially, they may have been different in a variety of ways, but their similarities far outnumbered whatever differences may have existed between them.

With that, both Mariko and Logan soon left the alley.

Together.

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Next Chapter: Finally, Rogue & Gambit …