NEW YORK APARTMENT, OFFICE - EARLY EVENING
The door to the office is closed. Beast is on the phone.
"Whomever it is leading the Brotherhood... well, it seems Charles may have had dealings with him in the past."
X-MANSION, LIVING ROOM - EARLY EVENING
Cyclops, Jean, Angel and Iceman (human) are in attendance, looking towards a speakerphone on a table.
"If that's so, why didn't he tell us?" Jean asks, surprised.
"He may feel we're not ready to hear the full truth just yet. In the Battle of Britain, the Royal Air Force was very heavily outnumbered by the German Luftwaffe. I doubt each man flying for Britain truly comprehended the enormity of the odds against him. Yet, after three months of fighting, the RAF handed Hitler his first major defeat of world War Two. It was of this battle Churchill said, 'Never in the field of human conflict was so much owed by so many to so few.'"
"Man, where do you get all this stuff from?" Iceman said, as he chuckled.
"Churchill also said, 'It is a good thing for an uneducated man to read books of quotations.' "
"Where's Professor Xavier now?" Cyclops asked, trying to stay on topic.
NEW YORK CITY APARTMENT, OFFICE - NIGHT
Beast, still on the phone, looks towards the closed door.
"In the other room here. He's gone into some sort of deep, psionic trance."
"What?" Cyclops asks, confused.
"As far as I can tell, he's reaching out across the entire city with his mind... sorting through the millions of states of consciousness around us..."
NEW YORK CITY APARTMENT, LIVING ROOM - DAY
Xavier faces windows overlooking the city. He's motionless, Zen-like. His eyes are rolled up and bloodshot. Rather frightening.
"He's calling out the Brotherhood leader."
LOGAN'S LIVING QUARTERS, BALCONY - NIGHT
The balcony overlooks a lovely garden. Logan is on a bench, looking at his shoebox of photos. He senses someone coming and puts the pictures away. Across the room, Jean enters, knocking as she opens the door.
"Can I talk to you for a minute?" Logan nods. Jean comes to stand on the balcony with him.
"I've been thinking about you."
"Yeah? With or without clothing?" He smirks.
"Give it a rest for once, Logan. A little of that garbage goes a long way."
"Alright. What's up?"
"If I ask you a straight question, will you answer honestly?"
"Depends what the question is. Try me."
"Why are you still alive?"
"Want to run that by me again?" Logan stares at her, puzzled by the question.
"If the records Professor Xavier dug up from Department H are anywhere near accurate, you've been shot at least a hundred and twenty times in the line of duty. You've been stabbed over sixty times. You've been bludgeoned, burned... you even went over Niagara Falls. Yet there you sit, alive and well. But, what keeps you going? It can't all be because of your healing factor. Not all of it. To survive what you have, it would take this unbelievable rage to live."
"What are you getting at?"
"Well, like I said, I've been thinking about you, and there's something I don't get. I mean, what in the world could you possibly be living for? You don't care about anyone, and it's pretty clear you loath yourself. Most people have someone they care about. So, I wonder, what does Logan look forward to? Does he look forward to the next time he has the pleasure of digging his claws into someone? Is he just, in his heart of hearts, breathlessly anticipating his next victim's last gasp? Is that enough? It couldn't be... but, what else is there for him?"
Logan's getting a sour stomach. He walks into his room and puts the shoebox on his desk. Jean's not enjoying this anymore.
"Oh my, did I hurt your feelings?"
"Maybe you better leave." He says, the anger easily heard in his voice.
"It's interesting... I was about to say the same thing to you."
Logan stares down at the shoebox. He looks to Jean.
"You asked. Do you really want to know?" He pauses, and waits. Jean nods. Logan comes back, sits facing her.
"I'm here, sitting with you. Right? Okay. Before that, I worked for Department H a bunch of years, and just before that I was living in a forest in Canada, running around, killing and eating and howling at the moon. That's as far back as my memory goes, and its got some pretty rough edges as is. So, while you might have a recollection of some freckled faced brat pulling your pigtails in kindergarten, or the first time you rode a bike without training wheels, I have these..." He opens the box of photos.
"I've had them every single day of what little of my life I remember. I don't even know if they belong to me. There's not a single picture in here that has me in it, or that means anything when I look at it. But still... is this my mother? Is this my father, or my brother? And, that's the whole other thing. With my healing and all, it's a good bet I don't age too fast. So, I could be thirty years old, or a hundred, in which case my past is ancient history."
"Why are some of the corners bent?"
"Those are ones where I looked for that person, or went to that place. I ain't found nothing yet, but someday one of these pictures is going to tell me who I am. Other than that... I don't do a whole lot of looking forward."
X-MANSION, LIVING QUARTERS HALLWAY - NIGHT
Cyclops comes down the hall, notices Logan's door ajar. He stops, looking in. Ahead, he sees Logan and Jean on the balcony together, facing away, talking. Cyclops is a bit bothered by this. After a moment, he backs off, and then walks away.