AN: I'm back! I'm back in school yet again. Man it sucks. All my classes are useless except for my AA, but I can't remember how to do any of it from A2. I've had a lot of homework and I've been a little busy, so I'm sorry for not uploading this sooner. But please enjoy! Disclaimer: I don't own Marvel or any of it's products. All I own is a small headache and a new name thanks to my Spanish 1 class.

Chapter 16

Cleanin' Out My Closet

Time had passed on since the Juggernaut incident, and as a whole, the mansion seemed the better for it. The team was at a new high, trying harder simulations than they normally would've dared to attempt. Xavier had rebuilt Cerebro and it was functioning better than ever, allowing him to track large mutant movement as far away as Cancun. The news had stated that it was merely mob mentality that had set the city into a panic, but Xavier seemed unsatisfied. He had taken a personal trip down South America with Storm, only to return without anything to say.

Luke wasn't happy about Xavier's little vacation, because he knew what the man was looking for. He was looking for traces of psychic altering in the minds of the city's residents. He had more than likely found some, but not enough to unveil what had been removed. Luke didn't like the idea of Xavier poking his nose into shady business like that. There was a very good chance of something biting them all for his inquiries. Whomever Xavier was looking into Network business for, they weren't worth having to deal with any heat from the Network. It was bad enough they had busted up the exhibition ring in Denver.

Luke's arms had healed back after his week of relaxing on the couch. He had been forced to make another trip to see that ridiculous doctor again. The mustached man had pushed Luke into the X-ray room, taken his photo, then pushed him back out again. After a few moments, he told Luke that his arms were fine and that they had calcified even harder than before. Luke didn't even bother to thank the man, he just left and drove himself to the nearest burger joint to meet up with Kurt.

He had eased back into training sessions after the week was over and had been surprised to find himself taking what was left of his pain medication afterwards. It wasn't that he felt that he was dependent on the medication. He knew that he wasn't addicted. But the pain his powers caused him was getting worse, especially in his arms. He didn't know if it had something to do with the Juggernaut breaking them, or it was just his powers developing. He certainly hoped it didn't get any worse than what it was. He was running out of pills and there was no way Dr. Masters would prescribe more.

Sighing, Luke sat up on his bed and quit his contemplating of the ceiling design. He looked at his alarm clock, which told him to get up and get ready for the day. He really didn't want to. Maybe if he told the Professor about the stronger pain he was feeling…

With yet another sigh, the teen got off his bed and wandered to the nearest open shower to get ready. He didn't want to worry the man with any of his personal problems. The pain had always been there and he would deal with it like he always did.

The shower was enough to wake Luke fully and reminded him of how hungry he was. It was earlier than normal for him to eat breakfast, but he didn't think anyone would care. He walked down to the kitchen and found it disturbingly quiet. So when he walked into the room, he was surprised to see that there were actually people in the room with him.

Logan was sitting by a large windowsill, reading the newspaper. It almost made Luke laugh at the man pretending to be literate. Kitty was sitting at the table, typing on her computer. She looked up at Luke an he could've sworn a look of exasperation crossed her face before settling on her normal cheery smile. She didn't say anything and merely returned to her computer, more interested in it than making small talk.

Luke shrugged and returned to his main objective. Food. He lifted the lid off of a dish filled with bacon and sausages and grabbed a plate that he began to fill up. He moved onto the eggs, but the lid for that container slipped out of his hands and landed on the floor with a loud clatter that jarred everyone in the room. Logan glared at him after looking up from his newspaper and Kitty threw her hands into the air, complaining about not having any privacy. She fled the room as soon as everyone else piled in, making all kinds of noise as they got their own breakfast. Luke took Kitty's empty chair and began to scarf it all down, making a note to himself to apologize to Kitty. If he didn't she'd probably hold a grudge for the next month.

Logan looked up when Scott cut on the news for background noise as the youths all talked over breakfast. The Canadian took interest in the report of some Canadian mountain park getting trashed. Go figure. He turned the volume up incredibly loud in order to drown out the teens chatter. The man snarled before cutting the TV off and storming out of the room.

All of the X-men just shrugged at their teacher's moodiness. Luke finished off his second plate of breakfast before setting it in the sink. He left the room amidst a new conversation about Logan, chiming in "I didn't know wolverines' had that time of the month. That explains why DR sessions are always bad every third Wednesday."

Everyone laughed at that, but Luke ducked out of the room and decided to track down the mansion's kitty cat. The girl had managed to climb into a tree with her laptop, in order to get some 'privacy', Luke assumed. The girl was completely oblivious to the teen's presence, so he decided he'd have a little fun before asking for forgiveness. Luke slipped behind her and crept up to the tree. From there, he began to climb it as quietly as he could, reaching her height without the girl knowing.

Holding onto the tree with his powers, he reached out with his hand in order to poke at the brunette's exposed sides. Right when he was going to, Scott revved up his car and tore off down the driveway, making Kitty nearly fall out of the tree. The girl rebalanced and was about to climb down in order to find a quieter place when Luke struck. With a squeal, the girl toppled off of the branch and screamed as she fell towards the earth, her laptop not much farther behind. Luke forgot to laugh as his expression quickly changed to one of horror ass he fell out of the tree after the girl, using a 'come' motion to draw the laptop back into safe hands. With a small push from his foot, he slowed his fall and landed on the ground, where Kitty was rising back out of, looking cross.

Maybe he should've gotten forgiveness and just left the girl alone?

"What is wrong with you! You could've killed me or even worse, broke my laptop! I swear, it's like you guys have no respect for my privacy. Just give me my laptop and stay away from me!"

Luke was a little put off at all the anger Kitty was flaring. Making her fall out of a tree was hardly warrant enough to get screamed at, even if her laptop could've broke. He'd just get her another. So in return for the earful of loud words, he held the laptop above his head, which was well above Kitty's. She couldn't touch it if she tried. So instead she began peppering Luke with slaps and light hits, getting more and more irritated at her teammates childishness. In order to protected his face from angry hands, Luke turned and held the laptop at arm's length, making sure Kitty couldn't reach around him to get it. Instead, the girl went through him.

Luke nearly freaked out himself as he saw hands, then arms, shoulders, then finally the head of Katherine Pryde sprout out of his chest, grab the laptop out of his hands, then vanish. The feeling was completely disturbing and caused Luke to shudder. He looked back to see a still angry Kitty storming off towards the mansion, phasing through the door instead of opening it.

He still hadn't apologized, so he took off after her, running inside the house only to see her turn a corner. He followed, only to see her to turn and phase through her room's door. Luke opened it moments later and saw the room completely empty.

"Where'd she go?" Luke looked the room over and checked the hallway again. No one was there. Luke stomped his foot on the floor in defeat, only for a look to cross his face. Immediately he started running for the elevator. He rode it down to the bottom floor and checked inside the Danger Room. Storm was inside, flying through an obstacle course to stay sharp with her skills. Kitty wouldn't be in there if she wanted solitude. He continued down the hall and entered into the hangar for the Blackbird. It was closed and he didn't have a way to get in asides the loading bay door. Kitty would definitely hear that and probably run off again. What to do?

Kurt ported into the room, dressed for school but without his watch activated, wiping his head around looking for something, before settling on Luke. "Have you seen Kitty? She's gonna be late for school and Scott's offering us a ride."

Luke pointed to the Blackbird. "I think she's in there. Port us in and we can check."

Kurt complied and grabbed a hold of Luke's shoulder before the two disappeared into a cloud of dark smoke. They reappeared inside the Blackbird, with Luke's stumbling a bit at reentry. Kitty jerked her head up at the loud sound of Kurt's port and snapped her laptop shut, groaning and pressing her palms into her face.

Kurt told the girl about them being late for school and Scott's ride but she blew that off.

"All I wanted was some peace and quiet in this stupid mansion! Is that so much to ask?"

"That's what I'm here for, to apologize for earlier. I didn't mean to drop that dish lid in the kitchen and make so much noise. I'm sorry." Luke rubbed the back of his head as he apologized at the still upset girl.

"That's what you're apologizing for? You nearly gave me a heart attack and made me fall out of a tree. Forget it!" Apparently, Kitty was still cross. She was about to phase out of the plane when it jerked forward suddenly, causing all three students to stumble to the floor, where they stayed until the plane leveled off and they could move steadily.

The three pulled themselves off the floor and opened the hatch door, spotting the orange jumpsuit of Wolverine in the pilot's seat. Luke and Kurt were about to question the man when Kitty pulled them back, whispering "I wouldn't if I were you. He's been acting weird all morning."

Kurt waved the warning off, stating how silly Kitty was being. Kurt walked to the man while Luke asked "How weird do you have to be to be weird for Logan?"

Kurt's shout was the answer as the two turned and saw Wolverine's claws extended and inches away from Kurt's head. Barely able to breathe, Kurt exhaled some joke about the seat being taken, before teleporting away from the man.

"Still think I'm being silly?" Kitty provoked, giving Kurt a look. Kurt just backed away from the pilot and said "No, I don't think so."

Logan engaged the autopilot and walked back to the three, struggling with some kind of head pain. "Why…are you following me?" The man strained out.

"We aren't. I was just-" Kitty stopped as her eyes caught glimpse of shiny metal. Logan's claws had slipped back out again and the man seemed to have lost it. Kurt ported all three of them back as the Canadian sliced at the doorway.

"I gotta take you back. There's something in my head. I can't control it! Can't be trusted." With that, the door was shut and the three looked at each other, pale in the face.

"He locked us out." Luke noted, finaly regaining the courage to speak.

"He locked himself in." Kitty corrected. Was she still holding a grudge or was she always that smug about correcting him?

"We gotta get out of here! There's a crazy person flying the plane." Kurt wailed, thinking of how much danger they were in.

"Can you teleport us to the ground?" Luke asked.

Kurt began to make hand motions to explain the situation. "Think of it this way. Bumpity bumpity bumpity splat. Way too high, way too fast."

"Man you suck." Luke complained, now worried about the flight's safety. Kurt gave him a look, before they all settled themselves to waiting the flight out. They all sat down and stared at the walls until Luke finally grabbed Kitty's laptop from where it was on the floor and opened it up.

"Where's that letter you were typing to your parents? I wanna see what you put about me."

Kitty immediately responded with "Gimme that! You have no right to look through my personal stuff! I don't do that to you guys."

Luke snapped the laptop shut and gave the girl a hard look before asking "Really? Cause I'm pretty sure that it was small skinny brunette from the valley that can phase through walls that went through my drawers when I was kidnapped. And you're the only one around that fits that bill."

Kitty paled at this. She didn't know that Luke knew about that. But how did he..?

"How do you know I did it? And why were you hiding those pictures in the first place? That little girl is-"

"None of your business." Luke interrupted. "The real question here is why you in my room in the first place when I was gone. Xavier must've thought I ditched the school so why did you go snooping through my stuff, hoping for a reason to prove him wrong? What's your deal with trying to figure me out? Is that even the only time you've been snooping through my stuff?"

Kitty didn't answer at first and Kurt was completely out of the conversation, confused as to what the two were talking about.

"I'm sorry. I was just worried, you know? I didn't know what had happened to you and you had been so helpful at that party when Storm was knocked out. I don't know what would've happened if you hadn't of been there. The Professor had all but given up on you and no one else was worried at all. And I just knew you hadn't run away. I only looked at that one picture, if that matters any."

"Really? You swear?" Luke questioned. If she only saw that first one…

Kitty nodded before continuing "I'm sorry for not respecting your privacy while you were gone. I guess I'm kinda a hypocrite for wanting you to leave me and my stuff alone when I went through yours. But I swear I was only doing it so I could know if you were coming back or not. If you have secrets you want to keep, then that's fine. I think we all do."

Kurt nodded and the three settled down to wait out the flight, their destination unknown. After a while, the trio began to notice that the plane was getting colder and colder. One at a time, they went into the small closet that stored spare suits for the team and changed. The suits were much better suited to the cold than normal school clothes.

After much waiting without anything to pass the time, the three felt the plane jerk as it began to descend towards the ground. It must've caught turbulence or something. The plane finally touched down and stopped, but before the three could check on Logan again, they heard the sound of a hatch opening, then closing. Kurt popped into the front to check the radio in order to get in touch with Xavier, while Kitty phased Luke through the floor of the plane. The two saw a set of footprints heading off towards the mountains and began to follow them, spotting the bright orange jumpsuit of Wolverine that stuck out in all of the white surrounding them.

Kurt teleported besides them, informing them of the bad news. "Something is jamming the radio signal out here. I can't get in touch with the institute."

"Looks like we're on our own then." Kitty supplied, before turning towards the only option they had. Following Logan. It seemed to be a pretty bad idea, since he had nearly killed Kurt, then attacked all three of them. But it was obvious that something was wrong with their mentor, so they had to try and help. They owed him that much.

They followed his tracks in the snow as best they could, but eventually, they lost the trail that seemed to disappear into thin air. So from there, the trio of mutants had to resort to blindly searching around for the man. They searched for an uncertain amount of time. No one could really tell what time it was out in the wilderness with the sun's position blocked by clouds.

Luke was ready to tell them to give up and to return to the jet, so they wouldn't be left, when Kitty spotted the man on a large rock formation.

"Mr. Logan! Hey, we're down here." Kitty shouted, waving her hand to attract the Canadian's attention. Her look of joy at finding them man shifted to one of confusion, then horror as a large, bulky man appeared beside Logan.

"Uh oh. Looks like he brought a friend." Kurt warned, looking equally horrified by the man beside Logan. What was the big deal? The two acted like they knew him or something.

"Sabretooth! But they're, like, mortal enemies!" Kitty questioned to nobody in particular. The name stuck a bell in Luke's head. 'Sabretooth? Isn't that the guy who trashed the institute gate a while back? What's he doing all the way out here with Wolverine?'

Luke didn't have time to ask questions as the two men jumped from the rock formation in obvious pursuit of the tree with less than pleasant intentions. The three teens turned and began to run uphill on a cliff, trying to put distance between them and the two savage mutants behind them.

Wolverine caught up first, unsheathing his claws and lunging at Kitty, who leapt out of the way. The ground cracked where Logan stabbed down at and the ice that Kitty landed on at the edge of the cliff broke off, causing the girl to go tumbling down the hill.

"Kitty!" Kurt shouted in despair.

"I'll get her. Stay alive!" Luke hollered at his furry friend before bailing off the cliff in a downward slide. Kurt didn't have time to respond as he teleported out of Sabretooth's way. Luke tried to stay on his feet as he slid downwards, but couldn't for very long and ended up rolling down the Cliffside just like Kitty had. Kitty roll to her feet at the bottom, only for Luke to collide into her when he hit the bottom. While the two were a tangled mess of limbs, Wolverine landed next to them, claws out and ready to hack them into pieces.

He lunged, but a quick kick caused an invisible force catch Wolverine in the air and fling him back. Luke quickly pulled Kitty to her feet while hissing in pain. The two turned to watch Logan approach them, claws still out, but something was wrong.

"Mr. Logan, what's the matter with you?" Kitty pleaded. The man began to clutch his head, suffering from some sort of pain that the two couldn't see. "Kitty…" Was hashed out through the man's gritted teeth as he struggled to hold back from dicing the two teens. "I know you're not yourself, but at least you recognize us. We've always been friends right? Maybe not friends, but close enough." Kitty broke off as the man began to clutch his head again in pain.

"If this is one of your training exercises or whatever to prepare us if you ever go insane, then you doing a really good job! But we've learned our lesson so snap out of it and lets go." Luke pleaded. Kitty elbowed him in the stomach lightly over making such a stupid statement, but hey. Whatever worked.

Logan let out a bellow of pain before his claws reemerged from hiding, making it clear he had lost interest in what Kitty was saying. By then, Luke's leg had recovered and he pulled Kitty's hand to get her to run. He kept a firm grip on her and when she slipped, he tugged her to her feet before Wolverine could get to them. The two ran again, rounding trees to throw him off course, but he merely sliced through them.

The two kept running, hand in hand, until the ran into a large over looming cliff. Wolverine had gained on them and if Kitty hadn't turned the two intangible and phased them through the cliff, they would've been skewered.

They reemerged on the other side and managed to stop from plummeting off into a river below. Luke plopped down on the ground and asked "What are we supposed to do? You tried talking to him and that didn't work. I don't think I can beat him and we're no where near the Blackbird."

Kitty let her breathing rate slow down some before answering "I can get to him. I know it. Didn't you see him when I was talking. Something is making him act this way and he can fight it! We just have to get through to him."

"Kitty do you really want to risk your life to try and talk some sense into him? He's like an animal right now. If you don't get him back to normal, he'll try to dice you. So please stay intangible when you talk to him." The request was neither confirmed nor denied by the brunette, so Luke would only assume she wouldn't. He'd have to be ready to protect her if Logan snapped again.

After a moment, the two joined hands again and Kitty began phasing them towards the top of the cliff. They rose out of the ground right behind Wolverine and Kitty silently stepped forward, arms outstretched to comfort the man. Wolverine sensed them and before Luke could do anything, turned with claws outstretched to attack. He stopped at seeing Kitty's face looking at him.

Kurt ported in and grabbed a hold of the girl and his tail wrapped around Luke's arm. "We're getting out of here."

Kitty pulled out of Nightcrawler's grasp and used her free hands to push Wolverine's mask off, saying "No, I'm reaching him! It's me! Kitty, remember? Half pint? Please, try! We had breakfast together just this morning. Kinda. Look, whatever they did to you, you're fighting it. You can win. Don't give up. Do you really want to hurt me, Mr. Logan?"

Luke wasn't sure if it was a fitting moment to or not, but he felt two urges then and there. One was to throw up after hearing such gushy talk. The second was to smack Kitty for saying that to a guy who had six sharp pointy knives pointed at her. But he couldn't do either because it was obviously working. Wolverine was fighting whatever it was inside his head.

His claws slipped away and he fell to his knee, where Kitty had enough height to hug him around his neck. How sweet. Luke would never let Logan live this down.

"Wrong move." Without warning, Sabretooth came flying in and tackled Wolverine off the side of the cliff. The two landed hard on the ground, but Logan kicked the larger man off and sent him through a tree. Wolverine then took off running, while Sabretooth recovered and took pursuit.

"He's taking control!" Kitty shouted, happy that her teacher was back to normal. And it was almost single-handedly because of her, Luke had to admit.

"That seems to be Sabretooth's plan as well." Kurt replied, sounding worried.

"Not if we have anything to say about it" Kitty shot back, before charging forward after the two mutants.

"Why can't things ever be simple around Logan? He just has to go out of his way to make things complicated, doesn't he? And that big cat man doesn't help much either." Luke complained, before grabbing onto Kurt's shoulder with Kitty before he teleported, leaving nothing but smoke behind.

They reappeared after a few ports right in front of the hulking man that had been trying to kill Kurt earlier. With a brisk arm movement, the man was sent flying back down the hallway while Kitty ran deeper into the labs to help Logan.

Luke's arm hung loosely by his side, useless for the moment as Sabretooth picked himself back up. He growled at the two but Kurt held him back from lunging by saying "Touch us and you'll be sitting two miles out from here in the woods."

The man backed off a little from that, but Luke didn't lower his guard for a moment. He couldn't teleport the man after all, so there was reason to believe that he was still in danger. Taunting the man only proved that point, because when Luke stuck his tongue out at the man, he howled and leapt forward, his nails stabbing straight into the metal floor where Luke had been. An invisible force slammed into the man again, knocking him back a few feet as Luke felt his other arm droop down to his side, now burning and useless as well.

A chain of explosions were heard farther into the lab, where Kitty had gone. Kurt flipped acrobatically over to Luke and grabbed him before they were gone in another puff of smoke. They reappeared by Kitty who was telling Wolverine that she wasn't leaving without him, even though the room was on fire. Kurt grabbed her by the wrist and said "No arguing!" before they were gone again.

Nightcrawler ported them well outside of the lab and close to the Blackbird when an explosions went off with such a force that Luke weighed them all down so they wouldn't be blown off by it. The sheer intensity of it was enough to level giant trees, leaving plenty strewn about where a forest used to be.

Dejected, the three sat down on a fallen tree and began to think to themselves. There was no way that anyone could've survived that. Not even Logan. So the three were left with their thoughts, not a single one of them daring to speak up and say the man was gone. If they did, then they would all have started crying. So they sat there, waiting on something. Anything.

The faint crunching of footsteps in the snow eventually caught their ears. To each teen's amazement, before them stood a man in a ratted orange jumpsuit, barely standing. Parts of the man's flesh were missing, but closing back before their very eyes, giving birth to new, pink tissue that covered the man's wounds. Wolverine was alive! The three jumped off of the tree just as the man collapsed. Luke pulled them man up and slung him on his shoulder, nearly buckling under the weight. Logan weighed a lot to be so small.

With a nod, Kurt touched him and al four of them were back in the Blackbird. Wordlessly, they began to prep it for flight, ready to head back home while Logan recovered. They were all just thankful to be alive and that Logan was too.

It was mid afternoon when they got back to the mansion and as soon as they landed, the rest of the team was waiting on them, with a wheelchair for Logan. How they knew what had happened was a mystery to Luke, but he didn't question it. He just helped get the man down to the med bay so he could rest in bed. He wanted to crawl into the one right beside Logan, but his stomach growled, reminding him that he had skipped lunch and was about to miss diner.

Luke made his way to the kitchen, but found it blocked off by Kurt, who was holding all of the other students back from entering.

"What's the deal, Blue? We gotta eat." Luke asked, getting a chorus of agreement from everyone else. Kurt just kept his position and said "Just relax. Give her a minute to herself. No one's gonna starve to death."

Luke huffed under his breath "Have you seen how skinny I am? I weight 130 on a good day and I need to eat. Kitty needs to pick better spots to write letters to her parents. It would save us all a lot of trouble."

Kurt just laughed, because finding Kitty's secluded spot was what got them all in that plane with Logan earlier. None the less, he gave Kitty a few more minutes before barging in with the others and loudly began to eat as much food as he could lay his hands on.

Man it was good to be home. And even better, he was home and he didn't have to do any DR sessions until Logan recovered. Life was sweet.

AN: This was kinda short. Didn't have much to add. Most of it was regurgitated from the episode itself, which was annoying to write. I kinda rushed through it all because the episode, yet again, didn't leave me much to work with. Sorry if you're picking up on it. I'm gonna throw some new stuff in for the next few chapters to help spice things up. The Cauldron is next and it is time for things to diverge. How are the Brotherhood gonna be involved if they don't listen to Mystique? What is Luke gonna do when he meets Magneto? But one important question that I've never had answered is how the heck did Sabretooth go from trying to be a Canadian mutant slayer with Wolverine to working for Magneto, the mutant savior, in one episode? How did that happen? Does anybody know? Review if you have any interesting ideas on that.

Chapter title goes to Eminem song off of his cd The Eminem Show. Here's till next time, Big Willis, out.