Hey, everyone! First off, so sorry for the huge gap between updates! This comes from foolishly trying to write four stories at the same time! It also stems from the amount of illness my husband and I have suffered since the New Year! I am honestly fed up now and eagerly awaiting the onset of summer to blow the bugs away!

Logan's Wolverettes! Once again, I am in your debt, as you've all been busy with the little button at the bottom of the page! Many thanks to Frozen Voices, 12kirby12, Chandraleila - (I have promoted you instantly to the Wolverettes because you have left multiple reviews for my other stuff! Congratulations on also leaving the 100th review for Smoke!) - adelphe24, nileena and Laudine! And a big Hello! to new readers pinkskyline and Whispering Maiden!

And now, onward! Our adventure awaits!

ooXoo

15. The First Veil

The sky was just beginning to turn pink with the onset of dawn when the girl moved around the burnt out campfire, waking everyone from their slumber. She looked fresh and alert, and Kristi – curled up beside Wolverine on Gambit's duster – felt an instant pang of jealousy for the other, who could spend a night out in the open with no luxuries whatsoever and still manage to look as though she had just stepped from the pages of a fashion magazine. Her own bones felt sore from sleeping on the hard ground and something – a small pebble perhaps, or maybe an embellishment on Gambit's coat – had pressed into her hip and left a bruise. Her mood was as battered as her body – she would kill for a toothbrush! – and she huffed crossly as she sat up and tried to ease out the kinks in her neck.

Logan came to her rescue, sitting up behind her and massaging her aching shoulders with practised fingers. By the time everyone was awake and groaning sleepily, she felt slightly more human and was able to stretch her arms without experiencing any further pain. She flashed her mate a grateful smile.

Gambit, already annoyingly bright-eyed and perky despite his late watch, handed out the fruit and they ate a subdued breakfast, washing it down with cold water from the river. Afterwards, they stood and gathered around the girl, who pointed upstream.

"We go that way," she declared, simply.

As she moved off, the men picked up their packs, shouldering into them with varying degrees of anticipation for the trek ahead. Logan had his pack in his hand and was about to shrug into it when Kristi caught movement out of the corner of her eye. Turning, she saw her mother heading towards them and almost stepped in front of her mate – to protect him from her mother or to protect her from him? She didn't know, but she stopped herself before she actually completed the action, knowing he wouldn't appreciate the seemingly innocent gesture.

Her mother was smiling, but Kristi could see her top lip trembling nervously. Before her daughter could speak, however, Mrs Marsters held out her hand, in which she clutched Logan's black fighting jacket, almost as though hanging on to a lifeline.

"I just came to give your ….. to give Wolverine his jacket back." She turned her attention to the feral, wilting visibly under his intense scrutiny, yet seeming determined to go through with whatever she had started. "It was cold last night and I'm sorry you had to sleep in the ….. in your ….." She nodded towards Logan's bare chest in desperation. "Anyway, I just wanted to say ….. well ….. thank you."

"You're welcome." Logan reached for his jacket and Mrs Marsters immediately turned and scurried back to her husband, leaving the two mutants to stare after her with expressions of mixed surprise and confusion.

"What the hell was all that about?" demanded Logan, dropping the duffle at his feet and shrugging into his jacket.

"I don't know," replied Kristi honestly, already mourning the disappearance of her mate's fine chest – the very thing she had wantonly caressed with her hands only a few hours ago. She blushed at the memory and turned her head to hide the glow to her cheeks. When she chanced a glance at her mate through lowered lashes, he winked at her and left his jacket hanging open. Traitorous bond! She coughed to hide her embarrassment and looked away, as though the very thought of all that feral chest was simply a matter of give or take. "Maybe she's come to her senses and is trying to turn over a new leaf?"

"More likely she's trying to lull me into a false sense o' security before runnin' a knife between my shoulder blades," remarked Logan, sourly. He ignored his mate's indignant squeak and shouldered the duffle, resolutely. "Get a move on. Daylight's wastin'."

"I'm sure she hasn't got any ulterior motives, Logan," Kristi hurried to assure him as she jogged to catch up, his long strides already putting several paces between them. But as she fell into step at his side, even she had to doubt the truthfulness of her words …..

oooOOOooo

As before, once they were on the move, Logan re-initiated the link between him and his mate, allowing her to see the world from his unique perspective. At first, Kristi kept a tight rein on the rush of information being fed to her brain, filtering though it and concentrating on the strongest impulses. But gradually, as she became more accustomed to the sensory overload, she allowed more in, gasping in delight as each new discovery opened up a whole new world of meaning to her. Even the simplest of things – such as a small bug crawling over the back of her hand – brought her a previously unexplored range of sensations and she revelled in them, grinning in delight at her amused mate.

"Like it?" he asked, as she watched a flock of brightly coloured birds fly along the opposite bank. Concentrating hard, she could hear their feathers lifting – rustling – in the breeze of their passing.

"I love it," she whispered back, her eyes bright and almost seeming to glow with the intensity of her passion for her male. He had gifted her with something precious and personal – something that was so uniquely 'him' that she would never be able to respond in kind. She felt loved ….. and strangely humbled.

It wasn't long before he tossed her a jaunty salute and loped off into the distance. Kristi let him go without a word, knowing that he needed time away from the group – time to be himself without having to worry about the image he was projecting. Kristi knew he would never admit it, but her mother's hatred of him had affected her mate deeper than it appeared at face value. He claimed to be immune to people's opinions of him. "They either like me or they don't. It's no skin off my nose', he had once declared. But the bond betrayed the truth on this occasion. He had wanted Kristi's family to like him for her sake. And the fact that there were objections to the one thing he was powerless to change had cut him deeply.

Thank goodness he had friends around him to soften the blow. Jubilee could distract the feral's thoughts away from morbid musings as though born to it, and even her own sister seemed to be gaining some ground in that particular ability. Together, the two youngsters were more than a match for any number of surly feral bruisers.

With her mind only half aware of what she herself was doing, Kristi allowed herself to follow her mate, seeing through his eyes as he scouted the terrain ahead. His spirits soared – despite the danger, he was doing what he did best and that feeling of running free and of being truly alive transmitted down the bond to Kristi, filling her up until she wanted to spread her arms, take off into the air and follow him wherever he may lead…

"Kristi, are you alright?" The gentle touch of her mother's hand on her arm reinstated her hold on reality with a suddenness that had her tripping over her own feet. She berated her clumsiness with a muttered curse and glanced sideways to gift her mother with a shaky smile.

"I'm okay. I'm ….." She paused, unease briefly ghosting through her mind, but reluctant to hold back the truth any longer. "I'm linked, mom."

Her mother's jaw tightened. "Linked? With Wolverine?"

Kristi nodded, allowing her face to morph into a frown. "I won't apologise for it," she challenged. "I can't stop what I do any more than a bird can resist flying or ….."

"Kristi, stop! There's no need for this." Her mother sighed, the pause allowing them both to calm somewhat. "I didn't come over to fight with you again. You seemed … distant, so ….." She let the sentence hang, choosing instead to change track. "Why can't everything be as before, Kristi? Why is everything so different?"

"It's different because you hate my mate." Kristi saw no reason to pull the punches any longer and allowed the fury in her heart to taint the words. Her voice was rough with the influence of the feral leaking through the link. She kicked angrily at a stone that dared to put itself in her path. "I didn't want this, mom. Any of it. But you forced my hand."

They walked in silence for a moment, Kristi tense and bristling like an angry alley-cat, and her mother with her head bowed, her fingers playing agitatedly with the hem of her blouse. Logan, sensing his mate's sudden mood swing, sent an image of him returning to her side, but Kristi fended him off with an image of him heading in the opposite direction. She couldn't rely on her mate always coming to her rescue – if she didn't start standing up to her mother soon, by herself, she would always treat her like a child.

Kristi knew what she wanted – what she needed – to say, but was at a loss as to how to say it. Time and again, she opened her mouth only for the words to be stolen away by her own indecision and feelings of inadequacy. Glancing around at her team-mates and family as they all walked together in a loose group did nothing to ease her discomfort.

"We had such high hopes of a white wedding for you, your father and I." Her mother's low voice intruded into Kristi's troubled thoughts and she glanced sideways in surprise. Her mother smiled, shakily. "Well, perhaps the dream was more mine than your father's, but that's all water under the bridge now. Mothers always yearn to see their daughters walk down the aisle with a handsome man on their arm."

"Is that what all this is about?" asked Kristi, incredulously. "Just a wedding?"

"Not any wedding, Kristi. Yours," came the reply.

Kristi couldn't stop the growl that ghosted past her lips. "I don't believe this. I can't believe you've put me through two days of hell over a damn wedding!"

"There's more to it than that, Kristi ….."

The young mutant cut the other woman off with a sharp wave of her hand. "This is ridiculous! It's not as though me and Logan plan to live together."

As soon as she'd said the words, Kristi clamped her mouth shut, biting angrily at her lower lip, desperate to call back the lie. Her mate was already sleeping in her bed. How near was she to taking the next inevitable step?

Her mother breathed a soft sigh. "With all due respect, Kristi, Wolverine doesn't strike me as the marrying kind."

As much as she wanted to, Kristi couldn't dispute her mother's words. She knew Logan now – knew his inner most feelings and the instincts that flowed from his feral nature. He was a creature of the wild – he would never allow himself to be tied down to marriage.

Once more, silence draped mother and daughter in its soft shroud. Kristi walked with her eyes fixed to the ground, unable to look at her mother who remained steadfastly at her side. The other woman seemed to have something further to say and Kristi waited, almost dreading the continuance of their conversation. She had no desire to fight with her mother, but if she persisted in tormenting her mate, she would have no choice but to retaliate.

"Do you remember that programme we watched?" her mother finally asked. "The one about Wolverine?"

"Yes." How could she ever forget it?

"Is he …..? Was there any truth to it? Is he as dangerous as they say?"

Kristi paused, trying to appear unconcerned as she watched Jubilee demonstrate a handful of low-level fireworks for her sister and brother. Her father was up front, talking softly to the girl, so only her mother would be privy to the fatal answer. "Yes, he is," she replied, softly. "But only to those who have reason to fear him."

She felt her mother take her hand, but didn't look around. "He ….. he scares me, Kristi. He's wild ….. unpredictable. How can you love a man like that?"

"Because I can see the man that he is inside." Kristi finally turned her head and looked her mother straight in the eye, willing her to understand. She had tried to tell her mother this very thing the morning she and her mate had been discovered in bed together, but the situation had rapidly gone downhill and nothing had been resolved. Now, her mother seemed willing to listen and Kristi hoped with all her heart that she could finally make her see reason. "He's dangerous, yes. I'll even admit to him being unpredictable. But he's not evil. He's just a man trying to come to terms with the results of other men's evil designs."

Mrs Marsters frowned. "That's the second time you've mentioned this, Kristi. What do you mean?"

Kristi hesitated, torn between her desire to make her mother finally understand that Logan wasn't the madman she suspected him of being, and her loyalty to her mate. But this was the first time her mother had actually spoken to her without malice and Kristi desperately needed to heal the rift that had grown between them once and for all.

"Logan possesses a healing factor, mom," she began slowly, turning away once more to look straight ahead. She couldn't bear to see the disgust in her mother's eyes if her plea failed. "It means he heals at an accelerated rate. And because of this, men were able to pump his body full of hot metal – to turn him into a living weapon."

She heard her mother gasp and braced herself.

"My god! You mean …? Those claws of his ….. they're not natural, are they?"

Kristi chanced a quick sideways glance. Her mother's face had drained of all colour. "Not entirely," she admitted, slowly. "He has natural bone claws, but they were enhanced by the metal during the bonding process."

"This procedure ….. it must have been painful …..?"

Kristi couldn't even bring herself to admit how much pain her mate had had to endure. She'd experienced his nightmares for herself on several occasions – could still remember the awful feeling of being suffocated by the suspension fluid, the blinding agony of the hot metal coursing into 'her' body as plainly as if the experiences were her own.

She nodded. "Now do you understand why he is so …." She tensed and broke off as an image from her mate flooded into her mind.

"Kristi? What's wrong?"

"It's Logan. He's coming back. He thinks he's sighted the first veil ….."

oooOOOooo

Another two hours of steady walking brought the group to the exact location Kristi had seen through the eyes of her mate before he had backtracked and rejoined them. The vista was wholly unremarkable – the same rolling green grassland cut by the gently flowing river against the backdrop of majestic mountains. Nothing they could immediately discern made this stretch of grassland stand out from the similar landscape that lay behind them – except for the shifting, seemingly empty patch of ….. something ….. that now barred their way.

If they hadn't been looking for it, they could have walked right by it and never known it was there. There was no physical doorway, no sign of anything that hinted that passage to another plane of existence lay just before them. The air in front of them simply shimmered …. like a heat haze on a hot day.

Logan was in full-on protective mode, making everyone stand back while he approached the veil alone. Kristi could feel him reaching out with his enhanced senses – sight, smell, hearing – searching for any signs that the anomaly could pose any kind of threat to him, his team or those under his protection. The girl had assured them that the veil was safe – that danger came from what lay beyond the doorway and not from the anomaly itself, but Logan would not be satisfied until he had checked for himself. Being cautious was the reason he had stayed alive for so long when faced with overwhelming odds and he saw no reason to betray those instincts just on someone else's say so.

Kristi tensed as he passed behind the anomaly, expecting … well, she wasn't really sure what to expect, but her short history with the X-Men had taught her that if anything could go wrong then it usually would – and with a vengeance. Chaos theory, her sister called it and, since joining the team and experiencing said chaos first hand, she was a firm believer. But despite holding her breath, nothing untoward happened as her mate prowled the veil's boundary – his body, as he passed behind it, simply appeared to shimmer, like an image viewed through water.

Finally convinced of its benign nature, he gestured the others forward, reluctantly stepping back to allow the girl to take charge, although his stance was anything but submissive.

The girl allowed her eyes to rove around the little group, as if gauging their likelihood to continue without panicking. "I will go first," she announced at length, moving to stand just in front of the gently rippling portal. "You will all follow in single file. The crossover is instantaneous, but can be a little unsettling, so you may wish to hold hands. Also, if you have brought warm clothing, now would be a good time to make use of it."

"Why?" asked David, curiously.

"Because it's going to be cold on the other side."

"Cold?" David glanced around at the others in obvious confusion and then dropped his duffle at his feet. "Why do I even ask? I really don't want to know, do I?"

"It's probably for the best, son," his father agreed, and helped him to hand out sweaters to his family.

Logan zipped up his fighting jacket, making Kristi jump at the sudden harsh sound. "Let's get this over with," he growled.

Jubilee and Nikki immediately stepped in behind him, high-fiving each other in their excitement to be off. Kristi followed, knowing that her mate would want to be the first of the X-Men through the veil and needing to be immediately behind her sister should anything untoward occur on the other side. Her eyes sought and found those of her mother, noting the fear being held barely in check, and she smiled encouragingly. After a slight pause, her mother smiled shakily back and Kristi found her hopes raising, hoping – no, praying – that the rift between them was finally beginning to heal.

Her mother and father held hands, ushering David in beside them. With Gambit bringing up the rear they were ready to go.

Without further ado, the girl turned and walked calmly through the portal, disappearing immediately into its shimmering embrace. One by one, the others followed. Kristi held her breath as she passed through. Her skin tingled as the veil flowed around her …. and then chilled instantly as the icy force of a blizzard slammed into her on the other side, stealing her breath away. She staggered sideways and would have fallen but for Logan's strong arm suddenly snaking around her waist and pulling her close to his body.

"Jesus …!"As her family came through behind her, David's expletive was torn away by the wind. "What the hell …..?"

Gambit was close on her brother's heels, his breath instantly clouding as the frigid air hit him. He looked about, seemingly unconcerned as the biting wind flung snow into his face, with the ends of his duster flapping around him. "T'is a mite chilly here, non?"

Logan whirled angrily to face the girl, dragging Kristi around with him. "Christ, woman, what the hell were ya thinkin' by bringin' us here? The civilians won't be able to last long without proper clothin'. They'll freeze!"

Indeed, Nikki's teeth were already chattering audibly and her arms were wrapped tightly around her body for warmth. Kristi detached herself from Logan's embrace and moved to her sister, drawing her into a hug and powering up her corona to give some illusion of warmth.

The girl moved closer, completely unaffected by the cold despite the flimsiness of her gown. She gestured around her at the storm. "We will not be here long," she assured them. "The next veil lies just a few short hours away in that direction."

"But the cold ….." objected Gordon. He was holding his wife close, and she was shivering uncontrollably in spite of her sweater. "Is there no other way? Maybe we could go back and wait for another anomaly to open?"

"We cannot go back. The anomalies allow passage one way only." The girl sighed and spread her arms, pleadingly. "I'm sorry, but we have no choice but to go forward."

Gambit strode closer, tilting his shoulder into the wind. "Dis little squall not so bad, mes ami. We move quickly, we be out of it in no time, non?" He flashed Wolverine a pointed glance. "De walk will warm us all up."

Wolverine growled – clearly his anger was not assuaged – but he saw the sense in the Cajun's words. If they stood around for much longer the biting cold would begin to settle into their bodies and the journey would be that much more difficult to make. "Alright, let's get movin'. But you ….." He pointed an accusing finger at the girl. "Next time, you'd better warn us what to expect the next time we pass through one o' these damn things."

"She did say it was gonna be cold," objected Nikki, around chattering teeth.

"This ain't cold – it's a flamin' white-out." Wolverine glared pointedly at the girl and she tilted her head in acknowledgement.

"You're right and I'm sorry. I ….. I sometimes forget that mortals are susceptible to the elements."

Logan snorted and swung his arm in a 'move-out' gesture. With determined steps, the little group began to push in the direction indicated by the girl, bowing their heads against the wind and biting snow. It quickly became apparent that the journey was not going to be an easy one – the wind threw stinging snow in their faces and the ground underfoot was icy and treacherous. Deceptively flat snow hid uneven ground that caused stumbles and the terrain around them was so glaringly white that they were forced to protect their eyes from more than just the wind-flung icy shards. Being shorter, Nikki and Jubilee had the worst of it, the almost knee-deep snow causing them to flounder and stumble often. Wolverine eventually pushed the two girls behind him in an effort to shield them from the worst of the wind, and also to forge a path for them to follow. Kristi's sister was uncharacteristically silent, saving her energy for the torturous process of putting one foot in front of the other. The pace he had set was obviously too much for the youngsters, but he daren't slow – they needed to reach the next portal and get out of the white-out before night fell. Falling temperatures and no shelter would be disastrous for them all.

Unfortunately, the further they travelled, the more a sense of unease grew in Logan's chest. His very skin tingled and the heavy weight of unseen eyes pressed into the back of his neck. Scanning the surrounding terrain under the guise of helping Nikki through a particularly deep snowdrift revealed nothing but a frozen landscape under the relentless grip of winter.

Even his usually flawless senses were useless to him in these conditions – his sense of smell was overwhelmed by the frigid scent of snow, and his ears could hear nothing past the howl of the wind and his own laboured breathing. But still the sense of being watched continued.

"What's the matter, Logan?" Kristi had edged closer and was studying him with concern in her eyes. "You seem edgy."

"We're being followed. No, don't turn around." He grabbed her arm to stop her, not wanting to alert their mysterious shadow to the fact that his – or her – cover was blown.

Kristi nodded in understanding, although she ached to look behind her. "Do you think it's Deathstrike?"

Logan's grunt by way of reply was barely audible above the gusting of the wind. "I don't know who it is, darlin'. My senses are useless to me in these conditions." The dark cast to his features hinted that he was less than enthralled by this prospect. "All I know is that something's followin' us an' has been doing since we passed through that flamin' veil."

Kristi's shoulders hunched as she tried to ignore the prickling sensation between her shoulder blades. For all she knew, someone could be training a weapon on her right this very moment ….. She coughed and schooled her voice to sound normal as she asked "What do you plan?"

Logan huffed a breath, its steamy vapour being snatched away instantly by the wind. "Gonna backtrack a bit – try an' work my way behind whoever's followin' us an' turn the tables."

"That sounds plausible." Kristi smiled at her mate, although her lips and jaw felt frozen. "You want some help?"

"No. Best if I go alone. Our shadow probably won't notice one of us slippin' away from the group, but two …. ….. or three?"

"Understood. I won't tell you to be careful, 'cause you'll think I'm fussing, but if you need help I'll be right here, okay?" Kristi tapped the side of her head, meaningfully.

Logan nodded, absently, already eyeing up the landscape ahead for the best possible place to slip away from the group. To their left, the terrain stretched away in an unbroken vista of white, dotted by the occasional wind-blasted tree. To their right flowed the river, partially covered by ice now as it creaked sluggishly to its eventual destination. But up ahead, the ground rose steadily, creating a steep bank before levelling out once more.

"Keep going an' don't stop until you reach the portal. I'll catch up later." Logan waited for his mate to nod her understanding and then ducked immediately to the right, sliding down the bank and rolling into the cover provided by a shallow overhang. Those who noticed his abrupt departure said nothing, accustomed to his comings and goings.

For a long time he waited, hearing nothing but the howling wind and the sluggish slap of ice-laden water against the bank. His limbs grew heavy and numb with the cold, but the patience of a hunter held him in place, allowing time for their shadow to pass him by, unaware that their roles had now reversed. Logan took the unspoken threat seriously. It was now time to even the odds.

Grunting slightly at the stiffness in his limbs, he rolled out from his place of concealment and crouched, preparing to climb the bank and track the footprints of the one stalking the group.

A low growl halted his movements and caused the hair at the back of his neck to prickle …..

Slowly, fearing the worst, he tilted his head to look towards the top of the embankment. Crouched there was a creature that could only be described as a cross between a tiger and a leopard, its fur as white as the snow surrounding it and its blue-green eyes whirling angrily.

Logan's heart sank. Somehow, the creature had realised his ploy and had simply waited for him to show himself.

Which hinted at unusual behaviour for an animal with supposedly limited intelligence. It also held the higher ground, another case for speculation. Grimly, Logan muted the link to his mate, maintaining the connection so that she wouldn't become suspicious but limiting the amount of information she received. He had no desire for her to come racing to his rescue and find herself in danger. Now he only had the creature to deal with …

"Nice kitty." Logan inched sideways to put more ground between them, but the creature kept pace above him. With the river at his back, he was boxed in. He could only go sideways or up. And with that thought in mind, he flung himself forward with a fierce battle-cry, counting on the creature's surprise at finding itself under attack from prey to stun it into immobility.

With a roar to match Wolverine's, the creature hurled itself at the feral mutant, its claws reaching for his throat.

Logan had time only for a single fleeting thought …..

… oh shit ….

NEXT: Will Wolverine survive the encounter?