Marvel owns the X-men, no profit is to be made from this work.

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Seeing him hadn't done anything for her mood, let alone that he hadn't answered a single question she had thrust at him right along with the promise of an ass kicking. How a man could be so irritating and annoying at the same time having her wanting to just grab his hair in her fists and work out all her frustrations in a kiss that could turn savage she just didn't know. Stalking down the street and finding the first alley, it stunk as if someone had just taken a piss leaving her loath to tread on down its seedy way.

The first block had her just seeing people catching a smoke break from restaurants or throwing trash in the dumpsters, the sushi having her wretch in the corner at the rotting stink in the humid air. Spitting out chucks and hacking as she raced on ahead of the smell, until the aromatic aroma of garbage rotting turned out to be a perfume to what she had just suffered.

"If he's fucking with me I am gonna..." Jubilee started, a groan having her grow quiet wondering if there was some homeless junkie lurking about.

What she saw had the fire from her belly snuffed out instead filled with fear and worry, rushing up to see a man who had been the first to treat her as more than a loud mouthed teen that didn't have the fight to back up her bravado. His hair was matted in blood while his eyes were sightless orbs of sadness staring into the shadows cast by garbage bags and broken down boxes waiting for their prehistoric garbage trucks to trample down the hidden arteries of the monolithic city of New York.

"Logan?" Jubilee asked with a hand to her lips.

Stepping closer to him and trembling that he didn't notice her, he was the Wolverine, the man who heard you have a piss three floors away which had her struggling for a squirt after that fact had been passed around. It had taken her time to get use to the fact that he heard everything, right down to a few private matters that had her blushing red when he'd hinted at just who she was crushing on one week to another. That he just sat there with red rimmed eyes full of defeat and a pain she had only known watching the caskets of her parents be laid six feet low had her crying even if she just wanted to yell at him.

"Logan?" Jubilee asked once again, still after all the years unable to take her eyes off his balled fists knowing just how fast those claws burst free.

She hated herself for it but she couldn't step any closer than the time it'd take to slam him against the first wall to break his fall, she wasn't like Rogue who could just steal the thing that made him damn near indestructible, not that she could pull that trick anymore. The fresh batch of kids that thought The Wolverine a hero hadn't seen him run three claws right through the girl that had given him her heart, it was a mistake she wasn't about to make.

"Wolvie?" Jubilee asked trying the nickname Kitty always used.

It got nothing from him even if he hated it, breathing deep trying to fight the sob that longed to break free with a shaky breath. Pursing her lips until she was chewing on her bottom one, she had to sniffle and close her eyes willing herself to be strong as she sat down with her back to the dumpster.

The three of them had been there the night he had finally found the strength to visit Jean's grave, her real grave that her parents had cried at and every family member of hers had said kind sorrow-filled words at. Kitty had found out from a back hack on his computer, Marie had known just because her heart was aching seeing his haunted eyes, and as for herself she had been the one that already had dibs on a car for a shopping trip that was just an excuse to be alone.

"I killed her..." Logan croaked, slumped against the brick with his silhouette cast in blood and shattered clay.

The tears fell down her cheeks thinking just who he meant, but wondering if he wasn't just out of his mind and thinking he'd killed Rogue that night. There had been a few times over the years that he'd woken up to nightmares and had to walk down the hall to the girls dorm to just make sure it was all a bad dream, ever a light sleeper she'd woken to see him kneeling at Roguey's bedside to ghost a caress to her cheek and brush a few stray hairs from her eyes. All he'd ever said in leaving was to go back to sleep, a bit of trust between them earned then.

"Killed who...?" Jubilee asked dreading the answer, his maddened eyes terrifying her.

"I killed her." Logan whispered again in a tortured voice.

Hearing the awful 'snickt' that no matter how long she lived she thought she could ever get used to, Jubilee watched as he looked to his claws and thought of the blood that likely lay on them. Feeling her stomach twist painfully and long to spill the few drinks she had enjoyed so far, she spit the fresh chunks on the filthy asphalt and dug for her phone.

The phone rang painfully long, her hands trembling and dreading that click that would tell her she had been ignored but just before it came a line had been thrown to pull her from those crushing depths of despair.

"Jubes?" Rogue asked fearfully, her dread easy to pick out.

"Roguey?" Jubilee whispered with a tear falling down her cheek, hot and fast.

"Is..." Rogue asked with an awful pause, "everything okay?"

Shaking her head, Jubilee took some hard breaths remembering that the unseen gesture hadn't carried and let go with a gasp. Staring at Logan the whole while made it all the worse, but she just hoped somehow Rogue would come prepared.

"Can you come get us Roguey?" Jubilee found the strength to ask even as she hiccuped and clenched her eyes tightly shut.

"I'll be there as the crow flies." Rogue promised, a beep from the phone telling of the gps location snooped and logged.

Trying to find the words to tell just how thankful and relieved she was, the phone cut off with just the duration flashing with a red receiver. It saved her that awful goodbye but left her alone with him in the alley, left alone with the words a stranger had said to her in answer to her question.

"Who the fuck are you to him?" Jubilee asked anew, this time to Logan longing to know who Victor was.

The only answer she'd been given so far had her heart ache, 'You wouldn't believe me if I fucking told ya babe.'

"Don't you fucking patronize me you limp dicked sack of shit..." Jubilee growled, directing her anger to the man who laid at the core of suffering she was sharing with the few people she trusted in the whole world.

Curling in on herself until she had her knees pressed to her chest with her face buried against them, she struggled to breath against the pressure building in her chest and the fire that burned in her clenched fists. She didn't have any reasons to be afraid anymore, she wasn't a scared girl who had yet to bury her parents, she wasn't the one that had to be brave for the rest of the kids telling them the same lie over and over just so she'd believe it herself. She was an X-man, and she wouldn't let anyone hurt her again.

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