Interlude

Deep beneath a restricted area of a regular military base, the Director looked over the last report he'd received from his operative inside the not-so-secret Bureau for Constitutional Integrity. There was nothing in the report to indicate that anyone was on to him, including that bastard Bennington. Had it not been for that meddling mutant's threat, he could have taken care of the mutant problem once and for all while he was in office. But the attack by Magneto and the fact that these "X-Men" had risked their own worthless mutant lives to protect him, public opinion on mutants had begun to slowly but steadily change to the positive. What had shocked him to the core was the appearance of Wolverine during the DC Metro incident. The man he knew as "James Logan" had shown the most promise in the Weapon X program until the day they actually put him through the bonding process. Underestimating the effectiveness of his healing factor, the anesthesiologist had given him too little anesthetic and Wolverine had awakened during the end phase of the procedure. Driven berserk by the pain, he'd broken out of the augmentation tank and started slicing his way through doctors, technicians, anyone in the room that he could reach. They may have been able to regain control of the subject, except that Hellcat had leapt into the fray and the two of them vanished into the teeth of the worst blizzard seen in the Alkali Lake region for twenty years, never to return.

So to see his finest creation return in the guise of a so-called "superhero" had surprised the Director into speechlessness until the creature had spoken to him. He felt that he'd recovered nicely, masking any possible recognition that had crossed his face with the obvious statement of "You're a mutant!" In the end, he was confident that Wolverine had never realized that the Director knew who and what he was. In fact, he was pretty sure that Wolverine still didn't know everything there was to know about the truth behind his "recruitment" into Weapon X. That was a secret known only by the Director and William Stryker. With the latter gone, well…better to keep it to himself.

Once the cleanup following the attack was finished, the President had returned to the Oval Office to begin work on his official statement regarding the incident. However, that was not to happen, due to the presence of a previously unknown man who had obviously been waiting for him. After a rather heated discussion, which ended with that bastard Bennington threatening him, the Director had no choice but to obey what the man had told him to do. Reluctantly, he had made the changes that Bennington had asked for, while secretly using his position as the Director for Weapon X to continue his work to eliminate mutants.

After that meeting, it had not been easy to find out who this man was. In the end, help had come from the most unlikely of places. He'd come into the Oval Office early one morning only to find a man sitting there calmly, much the same as Bennington had weeks before. The man introduced himself as Timothy Maxwell of the BCI, which immediately put the Director on guard. Mr. Maxwell had gone on to explain what the BCI was, how it was the most hidden government agency and what his function was within it. He'd been recruited fresh out of college by Bennington himself due to his Master's degree in political science and his unwavering support of anything relating to civil rights. What Bennington hadn't known was that Maxwell's support of civil rights did not and never had extended to mutants.

In the space of a few years, Maxwell had moved up through the ranks quickly, finally finding himself in the department in charge of the most sensitive of the BCI archives. Included in those archives were the hard copy files on Weapon X and Project Wideawake. At the time, the Director had not been the President. In fact, he hadn't even been Speaker of the House. He'd merely been a representative for the state of Texas, elected on the strengths of his military record. By that time, he'd been the Director of Weapon X for three years, appointed at the tender age of thirty-two. It was through those files that Maxwell had discovered the Director's identity. However, Maxwell was also a patient man and sensed that if he waited long enough, this mere representative would be much more before the decade was out. His patience was unexpectedly rewarded, which brought him to the Oval Office that day.

Maxwell went on to explain how he found the Director and how he agreed wholeheartedly with his agenda of ridding the world of mutants once and for all. He told the then-President that he would be willing to make certain that his name never appeared in connection with Weapon X or Project Wideawake in return for being eventually brought in on both projects. He also said he'd report any unusual mutant activity that was recorded to the Director's attention. After mulling it over for a few minutes, he stood and shook Maxwell's hand and the bargain was set.

From that point on, reports came to him about once a week. However, he had not had a report from his operative in over a month, which was highly unusual. Normally, he received one every week, twice if there was anything interesting to report. The first time that had happened was when the Weapon X main file and the individual files on Wolverine, Hellcat and Totem had inexplicably gone missing. A few days later, he received another report about an addendum to the X-Men file that gave them official government sanction to operate openly. When he confronted the head of the NSA about this, the man simply shrugged and said "If the official sanction is on it, there must have been a reason for it".

Frustrated, the Director had sent one of his most trusted men to see if he could find a way for this sanction to be revoked. The man came back a few weeks later with the news that it could be, but not without alerting everyone to the fact. It seemed that only the Joint Sub-Committee for Special Sanctions During World Conflicts could revoke this type of sanction after intensive study. Since that particular committee had been dissolved shortly after World War II and there was currently no official world conflict, it was impossible to reconvene that specific body without raising the alarm. The Director's hands were tied and the X-Men carried on with everything from search and rescue after a disaster to defending normal humans from attacks by their own kind. Mutant hysteria was slowly but surely becoming mutant acceptance.

And now, nothing but silence from his operative inside the BCI. He was confident that Maxwell had managed to purge his name from every Weapon X and Project Wideawake files the BCI might have, so rather than spend too much time worrying about a man that had always been ultimately expendable, he turned to the second report in front him. In the past few years, Wolverine and Hellcat along with another disappointment, Totem, had successfully infiltrated and destroyed almost two dozen active Weapon X facilities. The only good news about this was that they weren't even trying to hide what they were doing, leaving the word "vengeance" painted in blood at every scene save one. The downside was that they were systematically eliminating the doctors, scientists and other specialists that had knowledge of the bonding process. Given enough time – and God knows the three of them have more than most – they would eventually bring the entire project to its knees. Since mutants with the feral gifts necessary to be included in the project were not very common, he had to be careful with the handful he had left. So that made the report in front of him all the more important.

Four more feral mutants had been bagged over the past six months, two of which had healing factors almost as good as Wolverine's. They were currently at the testing facility underneath Area 51, undergoing a rigorous process that would test their strength, agility, stamina and the effectiveness of their healing factors. Those who survived the latter test would be immediately conditioned and brainwashed by the Director's pet telepaths and augmented. Then, if all went well, they would be trained in infiltration and assassination and sent into the field. Eventually, the Director's vision would be realized and he would control the most powerful army on the planet, an army designed to use mutants to eliminate their own kind.

His mood now improved, the Director picked up the last report on his desk. He scanned it quickly, taking in the most important parts at a glance. "…the twenty-second attempt to clone subject 458-25-243, code name Wolverine, has also failed. Dr. Jurski speculates that attempting to force the gender of the zygote may be at fault and has suggested that we allow nature to take its course at least through that part of the process and to save any other genetic manipulation until the last trimester of development. Having tried all other avenues, we agreed and have proceeded with the insemination of the subject 458-25-497, code name Minx. We have great hopes that X-23 will be a success."

Xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

Chapter 10

(Logan)

Two years later

"Twenty-one down, way too fuckin' many to go." I said as a flopped down on our bed. Angela stretched out beside me with a sigh and I rolled over to face her. "Between this an' our regular jobs, I'm amazed we have time to breathe."

"Hey, it's not our fault those Friend of Humanity assholes don't know when it's better to give up." She replied as she slid her arm around me. "Not to mention Magneto's band of psychopaths going around and wreaking havoc in his name. Almost makes me wish he'd gotten away that night. At least he understood the effectiveness of one big gesture as opposed to dozens of little ones."

"I almost hate to agree with you, darlin'. But you're right, he was definitely the brains of that crew." I closed my eyes for a moment and felt myself drifting off, only to be shaken awake again a few minutes later. "Cut it out, I'm tryin' to sleep."

"Not without a shower, lover. I adore every inch of you, but I adore it even more when it's not covered in someone else's blood." She pointed to the bathroom and gave me a stern look. "Go, now."

"Hey, I ain't 'covered'." I grumbled but complied with her wishes. Not that I'll ever say it to her face but, she's the boss.

I came out half an hour later to find her sprawled over the comforter, sleeping peacefully. It struck me for the first time in years just how tiny she really is. Even with her arms and legs askew, she didn't even come close to taking up the entire king sized bed. When she's awake and teaching the kids or fighting on a mission, she seems larger than life. She certainly doesn't seem like she's over a foot shorter than me and if not for her metal bones, would probably not weigh a hundred pounds. I could have easily slid under the covers next to her and she'd never know the difference. But if I wasn't allowed to sleep with blood on my hands, neither was she. Creeping softly to the bed, I grabbed the blanket and flipped her onto the floor.

She landed in an undignified heap with a yelp but immediately sprang up in a defensive crouch, claws out. A heartbeat later, she scowled at me and her claws slid back into her fingers. "Logan, I'm going to kill you now." She grumbled.

"Sorry to disappoint you, darlin', but bigger an' badder than you have tried." I replied with a smirk.

"Oh yeah? Name one."

"Well, Sabretooth comes to mind."

She snorted. "I'll give you 'bigger' on that one, but not 'badder'. Before he was augmented, he was a right pansy."

"Excuse me?" I raised an eyebrow, not believing what I was hearing.

"You heard me. He was a right pansy. Sure, he's strong and quick, but his idea of a plan of attack was to blunder in and use his size to intimidate. At least, attempt to intimidate. I'd already been in the field for months by the time he showed up. I must say, for a big guy, he sure didn't know how to deal with a broken arm. Or two." She ran her fingers through her hair and started straightening the comforter. "Sure, they healed in about a day, but he still avoided me whenever he could."

"You broke Sabretooth's arms?" She nodded. "Both of them?" Another nod. "At the same time?"

"Logan, you're being dense. Yes, I broke both of his arms at the same time. He came lumbering towards me, I rolled out of the way, kicked him and snapped one. He turned to grab with the good arm and I snapped that one too. He always swore he'd get back at me for it, but so far he's never tried to make good on it."

"You know that he's never been seen since Liberty Island, right?"

"I know. But I also know he was the only operative who had a better healing factor than you." She finished righting the blanket and looked up. I was staring at her, a little shocked. "What?"

"How much better?"

She shrugged. "Remember that mission we did in Moscow?" I nodded. "Well, if you recall, you broke your arm and it took about thirty-six hours before it was fully healed. Sabretooth's arms healed in just under a day." She went to the dresser and pulled out some nightclothes. "And don't forget, Buzz found that file where they classified the healing factors. A factor one heals about twice as fast as a normal human and it doubles as it goes up. I'm a 4.9, which means I heal eight times faster than a normal human. The point nine is because of my nine lives. You're rated a nine. Sabretooth was rated a 9.5, just so you know."

Great, just what I needed to hear. "So was he always a major asshole or was that a side effect of the process?"

"No, he's always been an asshole. About the only favor Stryker ever did for me was making sure I was never partnered with him on a mission." She came over and gave me a quick kiss. "Ok, I'll be out in a bit." She slinked over to the bathroom door, then looked at me over her shoulder. "Don't get too comfy." She purred with a wink and a smile of promise.

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A few hours later, I woke to the sound of whimpering coming from Evie's room. Angela was still asleep, so I eased myself out of bed and padded across the room. I pushed the door open and saw my daughter clutching Bosko and thrashing about a little. I went to her bedside and knelt down, shaking her a gently. "Hey princess, wake up. Daddy's here."

"No, don't go mommy." She mumbled, her face screwed up in fear. "Don't go!"

"C'mon Evie, wake up. It's just a dream." I shook her again and her eyes flew open. She looked over at me then threw herself into my arms, crying. "Shh, sweetheart, it's all right. Just a dream."

"N-no, Daddy, it wasn't!" She said forcefully, gulping back a sob. "It was real, I know it was!"

I cursed silently to myself as I comforted her, thinking back to that day when Xavier had offered to temporarily block Evie's power. Ultimately, Angela and I had decided not to do it, not because we didn't trust the Professor, but because we didn't think it was right to meddle with her mind in that way. Now I was wondering if we'd made that decision in haste. "Do ya wanna tell me 'bout it?"

She nodded and pulled away a bit, but kept hold of my hand. "You and Mommy were goin' somewhere, but it wasn't with the X-Men cuz you weren't in your uniforms. You had Uncle Kyro with you too. Mommy told me it was a special mission, an' that's why you were in regular clothes, but I knew she wasn't telling the truth. Then I saw you guys in a place where it was full of snow, but the snow was red and there were people after you. And when you were leaving, there was one man that was still after you that you didn't see and he shot Mommy and she died!"

She leaned back into my chest and I stroked her hair. "Ah princess, it was just a dream, ok?"

"No it's not! It's a real one, I know it is!"

Now she had my curiosity piqued. "You can tell the difference?"

"Yeah, I can. Pretend dreams are like when I'm a real princess with a castle and everything. But the real dreams feel like I'm right there in them."

"How many real ones have you had?"

She shrugged and looked up at me. "I dunno. A lot. Like I dreamed that Uncle Kurt was gonna hurt his tail and then the next day it got broken in the Danger Room. And I once dreamed that Mommy was gonna buy me the 'Cinderella' DVD and she came home with it that weekend."

I didn't know what to say. I knew my daughter was probably going to have this power; we both did. But I had never expected it to be this full-blown while she was still so young. Was it too late to take Chuck up on his offer? "Honey, can I ask you somethin'?"

"What?"

"Would you like it better if we did somethin' so you don't have to see all this stuff right now?"

"I don't get it."

I sighed. "Uncle Charlie said that he could do somethin' to make it so you wouldn't have true dreams til you were older. Would you like that?"

She thought about it for a minute, then shrugged. "I don't know. I mean, not all of them are bad stuff, like you guys goin' away and bad stuff happening."

"I know princess. But you might see things that are really scary an' sometimes me an' Mommy might be in those. All your aunts an' uncles too."

"Would it hurt like when Uncle Hank gave me my shots?"

"No, nothin' like that." I said with a smile. "He'll just think at ya for a little bit an' the dreams will stop for awhile."

"Maybe. I'll hafta think about it."

I chuckled and kissed her forehead. "All right then, I'll talk to him when you decide." I helped her get settled back into her bed. "Now get back to sleep, punkin'. You got a busy day tomorrow."

She rolled her eyes. "Yeah, I know. First day of school. " She settled in and closed her eyes and I stood up. "Daddy, I love you." She whispered.

"Love you too, Evie. Sweet dreams."

I left her room and closed the door softly behind me, then crossed back over to the bed. I slipped in next to Angela and she rolled over sleepily, tossing an arm around me. I pulled her in close and kissed the top of her head, but I knew I'd never get back to sleep. My little girl was dreaming things we'd already planned to do and it sounded like at least one mission was gonna go tits up. What else was her mind trying to tell her? Was it too late to stop Weapon X from coming for her? I thought about what Angela had said a couple years ago about sending Evie away and wondered if she might not have been right all along. I lay there, staring at the ceiling for the rest of the night, listening to my two best girls as they slept peacefully.

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The next few weeks passed in a blur. It wasn't uncommon for almost half of Alpha team to be off on one mission or another as Magneto's followers continued their attacks on civilians. However, since the X-Men had become more or less public figures, normal people were finally getting it through their thick skulls that mutants and humans had a lot more in common than they thought, most just wanting to live their lives in peace. If only the Friends of Humanity could have figured that out, our lives would have been far less interesting. It was because of that organization that Xavier had Alpha team meet with the civilian authorities at the mansion in early October.

Alpha team had swollen to sixteen members by then, with Sage, Medusa and Phantom moving up through the ranks quickly. Jamie, Jesse and Julian had all gone off to college, but had all promised to return to teach and rejoin the team in the future. Because there were so many of us, we decided to have the meeting outside on the patio, partly so we could enjoy the weather while it lasted. When Angela and I arrived, the Professor was already chatting with several men and women who each represented a different law enforcement entity. There were representatives from Interpol, the FBI and the RCMP as well as the Fraternal Order of Police (the American policeman's union), amongst others. I raised an eyebrow when I saw the Mountie sitting there; they pride themselves on their motto, "We always get our man", but I can think of more than a few times that I had slipped through their fingers. An incident in Montreal just before Weapon X had captured me comes to mind.

At any rate, we made small talk with the group as we waited for the others to join us. Sam, Kurt, Chasca and Phantom were off on a rescue mission in South America after an earthquake and wouldn't be here for this, along with Sarah, Sage, Warren and Kyro, who were off in the South Pacific assisting with the aftermath of a hurricane. The other eight arrived about fifteen minutes later with Rogue coming in last. She smiled apologetically at everyone as she took her seat. "Sorry, I'm late. Had to give out a little cleanin' detail to a couple kids after class." She glanced over at Angela and me, nodding as she caught my eye. Shit, what had Evie done to get a punishment detail? I nodded back to indicate that we'd discuss this later and we turned our attention to the meeting.

The so-called "Friends of Humanity" had sprung up a few months after the Presidential election, but had gained worldwide support in the years following. These guys make white supremacists look like the Ladies Auxiliary, only without the charm. I'm not trying to say that what white supremacists do is ok, but for the most part they're content to harass and beat up anyone who's not white. At least they confined their crimes to those old enough to have at least a chance of defending themselves. The FOH liked to kidnap mutants, the younger the better, and torture them before shooting them execution style. Of course, whenever the founders of this group were interviewed, they played it off as the "extremists" in their ranks, that their actions were not the norm for the group. The Professor, Scott, Kurt and myself all believed otherwise.

Anyway, hate crimes against mutants were on the rise again and the FOH seemed to be at the center of it. The X-Men wanted nothing more than to assist law enforcement in catching these assholes and putting a stop to their crimes, hopefully before anyone got hurt. We already had the government sanction to hunt down mutant criminals, complete with diplomatic immunity if we were in another country, but these were humans and I was pretty sure our sanction would disappear like it had never been there if we tried anything without going through the motions first. That was the focus of the meeting and in the end, no one was very happy with the outcome.

We had to make a compromise. The X-Men could go in and attempt to save any mutants the FOH currently had in their custody, but we were to avoid any confrontation with the actual humans unless they took a shot at us. The human officers would deal with the humans. I'm sure it goes without saying that Angela and I were less than happy about this, along with Bobby, Storm, Rogue and Remy. The others simply accepted it as the best we were gonna get. I scowled as the representatives left, then turned to Xavier. "Chuck, I'm sure I don't have to tell ya that I don't like this one bit."

"No, Logan, you don't." He replied, rubbing his forehead. "But we have to accept this compromise for the time being."

"What if we promise not to kill any of them?" Angela added. "I mean, they can still go to trial if they're maimed, right?"

The Professor chuckled softly. "Yes, I'm sure they could Angela, but no we can't maim them either."

"Suddenly, I wish John was back." Bobby said softly. "With that mouth of his, he could have gotten them to attack us inside the first ten seconds."

"Hell, five seconds if there was a fire anywhere nearby." Rogue replied. "Well, I don't care what anyone says, I'm with Logan on this one. Anyone pointin' a gun at me or one of my kind ain't gettin' the benefit of any doubt."

"Trust me kid, they'll be pointin' guns all over the place." I growled. "An' especially at us, since we ain't the most inconspicuous bunch o' mutants."

"Still, it's a start." Xavier said as he thumbed the control on his chair. "It will take more than a few years for the entire world to accept us."

He glided back into the mansion and everyone followed him except me, Angela and Rogue. I lit up a cigar and took a deep drag, still trying to come to grips with the situation. I was most definitely with Angela on this one. These FOH bastards weren't going to cut us any slack, so I didn't see any reason why I should hold back on them. After a few minutes, I turned and joined the girls at the table where they'd settled down. "So Rogue, why'd you give Evie a cleanin' detail anyway?"

"I think she's gettin' more control of power than she's been lettin' on." Marie said. "Her class had a spellin' test today and she finished it before everyone else did."

"And this is a problem because?"

"She finished before I was done readin' off half the words. I saw her sittin' there, neat as you please, with her hands folded on top of her paper. When I asked her what she was doin', she told me she was already done. I looked at her paper and sure enough, she had them all there, spelled correctly."

"So what does that have to do with her power?" Angela asked.

"When I asked her how she got done before I was even halfway through, she said she saw her paper already graded sittin' on my desk and they were all spelled right, so she just copied what she saw."

"Ah, I see." I said and took another pull on my cigar. "I take it you explained to her that it was cheatin'?"

"You bet, but she tried to argue with me, sayin' that it's not cheatin' if you copy off your own paper, even if it's a future paper. Then her little friend Wendy jumped in to defend her and well…the rest is history."

I shook my head and sighed, then looked over to Angela. "She's your daughter, darlin'."

"And yours, unless that scowl she's developing skips a generation too." She replied with a half-smile. "I take it you don't want to have the ethics conversation with her?"

"Hell no. Most o' my ethics go right out the window every mission we've been on. You should know that."

"Not really, Logan. You don't just kill everyone in sight. Well, as long as we're not on a Weapon X base, that is." I scowled at her and she laughed. "All right, I'll talk to her tomorrow at breakfast. But you lover," she whispered as she leaned forward, "you get to have the sex talk with her when the time comes."

I stared at her in terror while she and Marie laughed their asses off. Women.

AN: Sorry this is a little bit late!! Only 15 minutes by my clock...my computer's been wonky lately and to make matter worse, a very close friend of mine died Monday afternoon...so everyone please forgive me for not putting in my usual thanks and stuff, but i'm just not feeling up to it right now...but i still love you all for reading, reviewing and having fun with me and this insane saga that won't let me go...