Chapter 4

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The Blackbird's engines gave off a drone that pulled the students at the school out of their Saturday morning routines of cartoons, artificially flavored/sweetened cereal, or just sleeping in late. They crowded to the windows to watch the sleek black jet sink into the basketball court...or where the ball court had been.

Rogue could barely keep the smile off of her face, causing a bit of jealousy to enter Bobby's mind, but he kept it at bay, not wanting to make her mad at him.

The team exited the jet and was met by the Professor in the adjoining hallway. The Professor was relieved to see that none of them were hurt despite their claims to be fine on the phone earlier. And though his worries were relieved, the situation had a long ways to go before it could share the same situation. The group paused in stride as Xavier wheeled up to them.

"I am to assume that everything I was told on the telephone was accurate?" he asked, not being fully aware of the situation.

"Yes, Professor," Ororo supplied, "They let us speak freely; you know the entire situation."
The professor audibly sighed and the tension seemed to leave his body.

"I still think this is a bad idea." Logan said, his arms crossed over his chest.

"Well if you hadn't...." Scott began, before the professor interceded.

"What's done is done. Now we have to try to avert another catastrophe that I fear is brewing." Charles leaned back in his wheel chair and clasped one wrist with the other hand. "What I need to know now are all the details...after, of course, you have had time to rest a bit."

To this, the group nodded, feeling the strain of the last 24 hours hitting them at once. Logan paused and turned back to the Professor as the rest of the group headed for the elevator.

"I still think it's a bad idea to go into this half blind."

"Going into it is inevitable, but who said anything about doing it blind?" Xavier said, giving Logan a smile before powering his wheelchair down the hallway towards Cerebro.

Logan looked after the man, then shrugged his shoulders and headed up stairs for a shower and a cigar....

'...somethin' to get my mind offa this,' he thought as his brain conjured up a picture of black hair and blue eyes. Logan shook his head to clear the image.

Bobby and Rogue waited until Piotr had finished his shower but interrupted him while he grabbed a bit to eat before he went to bed.

The tall Russian looked up at his two friends as they sat down on either side of him. Piotr couldn't help to shake the feeling of an animal being cornered, '...and by my friends no less'. Piotr hid a smile as he took a sip of water.

"So how did it go?" Rogue asked, putting her hands on the table in front of her.

"It went ok...no one got hurt." Piotr's mind brought up the image of the dead man on the floor with a knife in his chest. "Not permanently." He left that statement open, knowing Rogue would think of Logan with his healing abilities.

He wasn't sure how much he should talk about what happened out there. They were both his friends but Piotr knew the next few days would be important. Suddenly he thought back to the smaller young lady at the bar....with her head resting on her knees...in pain. He took another bite of his sandwich.

"How was Paris?" Bobby asked, knowing his friend had an affinity for art.

"I will have to go back someday." Piotr's eyes brightened in spite of being about to fall asleep. "The buildings were amazing...the architecture....and a few artists on the sidewalks....but we weren't there to see the museums."

Bobby nodded, smiling.

"So that's it?" Rogue asked.

"Pretty much." Piotr replied.

"But..." Before Rogue could drill him even more, Nightcrawler flashed into the room, startling the group of them!

Even thought he had been with them for over a year, Kurt had the tendency to surprise with his sudden entrances, let alone his appearance. The blue-skinned man swished his pointed tail a bit as he turned to see the trio. Kurt smiled and waived a three-fingered hand at them then approached, hesitant to interrupt their conversation.

Piotr took the opportunity to distract some of the conversation from off of him.

"Allo, Kurt. How are you?"

"I am vine. Danka, Piotr. How vas your trip? You must be tired, yah?" Kurt said as he grabbed some orange juice form the refrigerator.

"Yes, Kurt, I am exhausted." Piotr looked to his friends and smiled. "I will see you all tomorrow. Good night!" He then rose and put his dishes into the sink and left the room.

"Well, that told us absolutely nothing!" Rogue said, leaning back into her chair in failure.

Bobby laughed.

Kurt looked at the both of them perplexed, before vanishing in another puff of brimstone smoke.

Professor Xavier sat in the stillness that pervaded the heart of Cerebro. His breaths echoed back at him as did his thoughts at them moment. He had just been in touch with a mutant friend of his in Washington D.C. A mutant with some very classified access within the FBI. His rise within the ranks had been partly due to his own psychic powers. He and Charles went back a ways. He had no problem running some background checks for Charles on short notice. So the only thing plaguing Xavier at the moment was uncertainty about the future.
Not that he hadn't had to deal with that for years.

'Hard enough to have the majority of the world afraid of you....or worse. No, the last thing we need is another enemy.' Charles placed the helmet back down on the console and turned around and left Cerebro. He would need a good night's rest if he were to handle tomorrow properly.

Talia had driven back to the villa later on that night after stopping by Nadya's house for a few needed things. Copies of Nadya's work mainly, even though she kept some clothes at Talia's for impromptu visits in the summer; the countryside was always so lovely then. It still was. Talia honestly didn't think the younger woman would be in any condition to work for a while but didn't feel like stating the obvious.

She could smell the moisture in the air and hoped it would hold off a little longer, at least. As interesting as the modern conveniences she had awakened to find practically at her fingertips all were, driving in the rain was not enjoyable. She turned off the highway, slowing to accommodate the smaller curved roads that preceded the villa. She turned her head and found her friend asleep in the passenger seat.

'Good,' she thought. Nadya had been through a lot in the past few hours; rest would do her a world of good. The last hour to the villa was spent with her eyes on the road and her mind on the people she had met today, mostly on the tall, bad-mannered one with the claws.

Part of her wanted to spar with him. 'He is bound to be a challenge in a battle.' she thought, and she was craving a challenge, a new experience. Well, actually an old one, but her old sparring partner was…well…

"Stop it!' she chastised herself. Pushing the thoughts and memories from her head, she focused instead on what the next day might bring.

Logan hadn't slept well all night. Parts of his dreams kept waking him forcing his body to stay awake before giving into exhaustion only to be awoken by another dream.

The first one had been twisted versions about his encounters with Mystique...then another skewed one involving the battle at Alkali Lake. The last one--the one that was dancing in his conscious mind now--had been a conglomerate of the two, plus a new face. A pair of blue eyes staring at him from the darkness, drilling into his soul while a voice said, "Logan....Logan."

"Logan!" Charles voice joined the softer feminine one in his head, causing him to start out of his strange reverie.

"Huh...wha...?" Logan looked about before realizing that the Professor had spoken telepathically.

"We are to leave in two hours, but I need all of you to come to my office a moment."

"Ok."

"And Logan..."

"Yeah?"

"Put out the cigar. This is a school...positive examples." The Professor's presence left his mind.

Logan mumbled something before taking another long drawl on the cigar and then putting it out on the stone bench he was sitting on.

"These are from a friend of mine in the Capitol." Xavier said as the computer flashed up pictures on a screen, which were of some familiar faces.

Logan came in and took up his usual place, leaning against a wall, as the Professor started.

"He was not able to come up with much on such short notice, at least in the way of pictures." The screen changed to show the face of the man named Duncan MacLeod, clearly a driver's license picture.

"This one is about 15 years old."

Storm sat up straighter and let out a gasp. "He looks exactly the same...only the hair is shorter now."

Charles nodded.

"It holds up the truth of what they said then...about being immortal." Scott added.

"Only partly immortal, they can die." Logan added just at the picture of the other one came up. "Adam Pierson" it said underneath and was clearly a passport photo.

"That's him." Logan grunted.

"They said his real name was Methos," Piotr added.

"Five thousand," Scott said softly.

"I would have guessed around 27 myself." Charles said as he looked at the picture. He handed the others the histories of the people in question. Both went back about 15 years and, before that, their pasts were sketchy. "Duncan MacLeod is currently a teacher at a university Stateside, and before that he owned a dojo and an antique store. The one called Adam is a graduate student in perpetua at the Sorbonne with sporadic attendance; he was also employed as a researcher."

"What about the others?" Scott asked.

"Their histories were more straightforward. According to my friend, Joseph Dawson was decorated major who lost both his legs in Vietnam." Xavier paused here a moment, perhaps out of respect or sympathy...or mutual loss. "He owns two bars, one here in the States and the one you went to in Paris."

"Nadya Jamesson, the adopted daughter of Elen and Michael Jamesson, is an honors graduate of NYU, now employed as an editor with Coopers and Hills Publishing House, currently assigned with the Paris office by request. Her parents died around 4 years ago."

Piotr found himself musing, "Nadya's adopted?" It stirred something inside him that was curious.

Ororo leaned back into her chair, "What about the other one?"

Logan's nostrils flared. He had been thinking the same thing.

"Nothing." Charles replied. "The only thing we have about the woman is that she bought a villa--apparently the one we will be staying at--a little over three years ago. Before that there is nothing."

"That's not good." Scott muttered.

"Nadya said she spent the better part of her life frozen." Piotr added, bringing everyone's eyes directly to him.

"Really? Why didn't ya tell us that before?" Logan groused.

"You didn't ask," Piotr defended.

"What else did Nadya tell you?" Charles asked.

The Russian shrugged and continued, "She said that Talia was very old...36,000 years, I think. And that she had been frozen......um, also that the immortals are born with the ability to be mortal and normal if they are not killed before their time. They cannot have children, and if an Immortal cuts off another's head, they get, um...their soul...I think." Piotr finished weakly.
What he had been most concerned about had been that Nadya had seemed so sad at the moment; he had wanted her to talk to get her mind off her problems. He hadn't really focused on her conversation...just watched her as she talked. And then, of course, she had touched him....that had broken his concentration completely.

The others were very silent, mostly from shock that the young man had found out so much and so easily, too.

Charles broke the moment. "We leave in an hour, and be sure to pack for a few days....no telling how long this will last. And, Piotr....good job."

The tall Russian smiled at the Professor but Charles could tell it was half-hearted. 'This is going to be a very interesting trip indeed.'