"And in breaking news, in upper state New York a massive thunderstorm has suddenly developed in the last hour. Locals say that earlier this afternoon they had light showers, but nothing to suggest a storm of this magnitude. The governor has advised all residents of the Thousand Islands area to remain indoors as a flood watch takes effect. We can't stress this enough, this is a thunderstorm of surprising power and intensity. We'll continue to bring you updates throughout the night."

"Hey Professor, didn't Storm take Rogue upstate?" Kitty muted the sound and turned to Professor Xavier. "Professor? What's wrong?"

"Nothing, Kitty, I'm sure they are well on their way back. Would you do me a favor?"

"Sure, what?"

"Would you mind calling Lance, and asking if Magneto has been by since Wanda returned yesterday?"

"Okay." Kitty was clearly intrigued by the Professor's strange request, but dialed the phone anyway. "Hi Lance! I wanted to ask you something. Has Magneto been there this week? Really? That's weird. Hey listen, you wanna get together later today? Ok, see you then. What? It's nothing, really. No!" Kitty laughed. "You're so paranoid!" Then she hung up the phone. "Lance said he was there yesterday and he and Wanda got into a fight, he waited around for her outside after she left."

"Did they meet when she returned?"

"Lance says they couldn't have 'cause she wasn't in a 'towering rage'. What's wrong?"

"I'm not sure anything is yet, Kitty. Thank you." With that, the professor rolled off to find Logan.

Logan was in the danger room.

"There's a massive thunderstorm up where Ororo took Rogue. It's been raging for almost an hour and there's a flood watch in effect."

"You think Rogue lost control and hit Storm with too much lighting and knocked her out?" Logan said, toweling off his face.

"I've been tracking Erik in the area since earlier this week. Apparently he and Wanda were fighting yesterday. He waited around for her but either left or didn't let her know he was there."

"And?"

"He's up near Thousand Islands."

"They took the jet? I'll go on the bike."

"You should take someone with you."

"Who, Scott? I'll be traveling way over the limit; he can't survive an accident like that."

"You're useless against Erik."

"You got another jet to take, I'll be happy to baby-sit the munchkins on a picnic up to the river." Before Xavier could respond, Logan was already out the door.

New Scene

Shit, this was a lot of rain. Logan's bike had slipped and crashed four times already and if he hadn't had his mutation he would have died from the first. But finally, he had made it to the park were Storm had planned to practice. All he had to do was find the clearing.

A magnetic pulse greedily seized hold of both him and the bike and sailed him over the trees. Before he landed, the bike had been ripped and smelted into its base materials. The magnetic forces tried to stretch him in a similar way. The pain was incredible; before he could do more than begin his scream, his brain forced unconsciousness.

However long later, Logan jerked back into awareness. He was lying on a rock up off of the swamp of a field. Storm lay beside him. She had been there so long that the sections of blood protected from the rain by her hair, had started to scab over.

"Logan!" Storm flew towards him through the rain. "Logan, stay on the rock!" She settled to sit on the bare area next to him.

Who wouldn't look twice? Yes, Storm was out cold next to him on the left, and warm and angry on the right. "Rogue?"

"Hi." StormRogue on the right morphed into JeanRogue, who put up a telekinesis shield around the three of them. The rain slowed to a drizzle. "Rogue, well the rest of Rogue, is out there fighting Magneto."

"How long has this been going on?"

"I don't know. He got his fourth wind back when you showed up, and he started attacking us again. He's been doing hit and fade tactics since the first time Rogue beat him. He killed the Blackbird. First he almost crushed us with it, and then he ripped it to shreds."

"Why have you been keeping the storm up? You're not good enough with Storm's power to keep it going like this."

"Storm is, though. Magneto hit Rogue, so she split off into copies. She let Storm take over one to keep the air so charged with electricity that there was a limit to how much metal Magneto would draw to him. He won't survive electrocution. She was also hoping the Professor would see the weather and send help."

Another magnetic hum filled the air. JeanRogue stopped talking and tightened her shield.

The fact that the copies of Rogue who had assumed the shape and personalities of Jean and Storm were talking of Rogue as another person, was not good. She had to be extremely tired. They had to get out of there.

"Rogue, try using the Elf's trick to get us out."

"She did, he was the other copy she made. Magneto gutted him with a piece of the Blackbird."

"She can still use it right? He was just a copy."

"Magneto said he could have killed Storm while Kurt was holding her. She's been too scared to try again."

"Rogue!" Logan shouted to be heard. "Rogue get over here!"

A flash of brilliant red lit the night. The magnetic forces being blocked by JeanRogue's TK died out.

Rogue appeared with a gust of sound. She spent a moment concentrating and JeanRogue morphed into KurtRogue who lightly gathered Storm into his arms and disappeared. For three minutes after they disappeared, she continued to concentrate intensely. "Come on, we'll go. I – I think I finally got him. I'll have to stop every three miles. That's Kurt's limit."

Rogue was so tired, she had to hug Logan tightly to make sure that she took him with her when she teleported. Though the first six ports went off well, after the first twenty miles, after the energy she had expended getting Storm home, there was little she could use to get them back to the Institute. When they were less than eight miles from town, Rogue collapsed.

Luckily, the Professor had managed to keep in contact with Logan and sent Hank with the van to pick them up.

KurtRogue had safely delivered Storm to the medlab, startling Jean and Hank, who were studying for a pre-med class. Storm would need to rest for a couple of days from the concussion Magneto had given her. But otherwise, she would be fine.

Rogue would take a little more recovery. Physically, she was merely worn out. Extra sleep would care of that. Xavier thought her control over her other mentalities could be only strengthened by the experience. The fact that she could force the other personalities to act on their own and still maintain control over them and their powers, despite being near the end of her own strength, to Xavier at least, was a good sign.

"It means that she is less likely to lose control over them when she is in better straits."

"I don't know, Chuck. She seemed to be sticking to members of the team. She knew she could control them. They don't fight her the way Magneto and the rest of the Acolytes do." While Logan was impressed with all the Rogue had done, he knew how Charles could get when he discovered a new aspect of mutations. Control this potentially powerful, Charles could lose his normally excellent restraint, which would not be good for Rogue.

"She can work up to controlling them. Logan, do you realize what this could mean? She could in fact be the most powerful mutant living. It-."

"Charles, hold it. She's sleeping off the feat in the medlab, so don't get too excited. I want to know why Magneto attacked Rogue. Hank said Storm was awake for a few minutes, did she say anything?"

"No. She just asked if Rogue was okay, and fell back asleep when Hank said yes. I have tracked Magneto to southern Montana. He did not seem inclined towards staying around New York."

Logan snorted into a smirk. "She hurt him pretty good."

"It would seem so." Xavier was lost in thought. Almost to himself he remarked, "Why did you come?"

Evan, Jean and Scott came running into Xavier's office. A flurry of shadows and scuffles across the door betrayed the fact that most of the school's students were clustered outside the door.

"Professor! What's going on? Is Storm okay?"

"She'll be fine, Toothpick. She and Rogue got into a fight with Magneto, but they'll both be okay."

"Does this have something to do with Wanda and Pietro?" Jean asked, still worried, but able to piece scenarios together.

At this turn, Xavier's head came up sharply. "Yes Jean. That very well could have something to do with all of this. We shall ask them both once they awaken."