Chapter 14

Logan looked aroung the circle of people silently.

"So you think she's at Alkali."

Xavier sighed. "Not think. Know. Striker, for whatever reason, seems to be after her, and is willing to risk anything to get to her." Logan distrusted that 'whatever' for some reason. Because to Logan, it seemed to him that Xavier seemed to know the reason.

Magneto sat up.

" And it seems that the only way to get her back is to simply...go to the base. She hasn't been gone long. Striker wouldn't have been able to do anything too serious..."

He exchanged a look with Xavier. "Of course it won't be easy getting in the base. Striker isn't too much in the president's favor, what with more mutant exeptance around the country. He won't have the men or money he used to have. But that doesn't mean he's completely alone. There will be people guarding and ready to fight. And it won't be easy."

Logan watched Magneto and Xavier in silence.

"But you have a plan." he said.

Magneto met his eyes, the still intrigued look on his face.

"Of course."

I groaned.

Wherever I was, it was cold. I could smell metal, more sterilizing alcohol, a little bit of peroxide. There were some unfamiliar scents too, but they carried with them the unmistakable aroma of a hospital.

Every part of me seemed to ache. It was like all of my limbs wanted to fall off at the same time. Still, I couldn't just lay here. Shakily, I lifted my head off the ground. I felt a stab of pain at moving, but not moving seemed worse. My eyes adjusteda little to the dim light.

Four walls, each cushioned with cloth, surrounded me. It was like in movies, when you see a room in an asylum. The ground, however, was hard cement. Kind of defeating the purpose of padding, if you thought about it.

"She's awake."

I froze. The voice that had said it echoed slightly, like on a megaphone or speaker system. I was sure it was a speaker system. It had sounded rough and scratchy. I looked up, my eyes still having trouble adjusting to the dimness of the room.

Above me, there was a square of light. It was small, but it was there, high up on the wall. A figure, a black sillhoutte, stood in the small light square. A window.

"Well, we thought we'd find you." the manspeaking seemed to have that southern accent I remembered from when I blanked out. "Of course, we also thought you'd have our little project with you," there was a humorless chuckle. "But at least now we know where he is."

I looked up, propped up on one elbow, ignoring the biting pain in my arm. What was he talking about? I tried to listen closer, even if the booming speaker system meant I didn't have to. There was another chuckle.

"My dear, when we made you, we thought you'd find our Wolverine a little quicker." He seemed to shake his head. "Took you long enough. Fourteen years..." His voice seem to waver as the speaker system crackled.

My mind was stuck though. He'd said I would find...the Wolverine. Logan? And what was he talking about, making me? Was this guy my dad or something? Yeah, right.

"Of course, we knew you'd need your time. We knew your tracking powers could, and would, find him. After all. We gave them to you."

I froze. My tracking powers...I looked around. This was getting to much. I struggled to get up, but my aching body shrieked in protest. I looked up at the square of light. There was a small chuckle coming from the speaker.

"You don't remember, do you? Of course." there was a pause. "You didn't think that you were simply born with those marvelous claws, did you?" there was another chuckle. "We- no I gave them to you. A revolutionary invention. Pure adamantium. Indestructible."

He seemed to pause again, lost in thought. But that was alright with me. I was long gone. So this really is where I was from? A...hospital. I don't know why, but from nowhere I cried out;

"But how could you give me my tracking power!"

I immediatly felt stupid and angry. But still, it was a question that needed to be answered. At least to me it was. I looked up again. The window was so high up that I doubted he had heard me. But he had.

"My dear, you seem to underestimate the power of science and government funding. DNA is easily changed, mutant genes capable of being copied. Your instincts wereyours. But we managed to give you an ability to track." he paused once again.

"After all, we needed someone to find our Wolverine. That operation was costly, and his powers rare. To let our project simply escape...it would be madness.

"So why not make another to find him? Someone that could not only find him, but bring him back? And while we were at it, why not try another innovation; we hadn't done the operation on a female. At least not then." He smiled at some joke that only he seemed to know.

"So, my dear, we created you. And to make sure you were finding our Wolverine, a little more DNA tampering was needed. Make his scent attract you. And we could do it too, with what little of his DNA we had left. And we changed you to be attractive to him. There; you were both more likely to find each other. And we would have our Wolverine back. Plus, a new Cougar."

So this was it. Logan and I weren't a match made in heaven. Or the bar were we met. We were a match made in a lab.

Suddenly, I was caught off guard. Again. He'd said Cougar. And Logan...Logan was the Wolverine. So I...I was...Cougar? I glanced down at my ankle. My tags were gone. I looked up at the window.He chuckled again, and I saw his sillhoutte hold up two slivers of black against the light. My tags.

It was like that one action affirmed the idea that had formed in my mind. I wasn't human. Or even a mutant. I was an invention.

And for that one moment, I was resigned.