Rogue rolled the window up. Rolled the window down. Rolled the window up. Rolled the window down. Rolled the window up. Rolled the window down. Rolled the window up. Rolled the window down. Rolled the window up. Rolled the window down. She frowned and pressed the button. Nothing happened. She pressed the button again and the window rolled halfway to the top. It stopped dead and she scowled until she could scowl no more.

"Something on your mind, Stripes?" Logan asked from the front seat of the jeep, a cigar lit and ready to be smoked.

The heat of the late afternoon seemed to suit their current issues. Hot and bothered, their tempers were frayed, and Logan would have killed for an ice-cold beer. He currently suffered from some deep regrets, most of them centred on the little brat who sat slumped behind him in a sulk.

She mulled over his question and wanted to unload every angry thought that hissed and kicked in her tiny head. Yeah, she could cuss and spit and kick and thump. But when she figured out right from wrong, she settled on small talk wrapped in a tiny confession instead. "The window broke," she answered with a slight shrug, her finger still pressed against the button.

He looked over his shoulder at her and puffed on his cigar. Twenty-four hours now and he cursed the day he'd gone all bootcamp on her ass and ordered her to crawl under a rocked crevice military-style. "What's really on your mind, Stripes?"

"Do ya know, nearly twenty thousand kids go to the hospital every year 'cause of second-hand smoke," she said, a smirk tugged on her know-it-all lips and her fingers curled around the handle of the door.

His eyes narrowed. "I ain't giving up smoking, and even if I have to hogtie you, you're staying put until she's back," he warned her, his temper ready to implode.

Rogue left the door alone and rolled her eyes. "And ya say Ah'm always in a bad mood."

He grouched at that and dialled the air con down a few further degrees when he noticed her teeth start to chatter. While he exhaled a thick wall of smoke, he made a deal with her. This time he would take the easy route and not nail down any goddamn rules. "Go do what you want kid, but don't come running to me when the shit hits the fan."

She left the jeep in a rage and slammed the door shut with a shout. "Remember back when we met?! Ah wish ya'd gone and thrown meh out that jet and saved meh the trouble of wreckin' mah life!"

Logan muttered under his breath and cursed himself out for his asshole behavior. Why the hell did he make her do those extra sessions in that desolate hellhole? At his age, he should know the difference between a rock and a damn decoy.

#

One week ago, on the wild plains of an X-Men-certified landscape, Logan's voice had roared across a valley. Pissed was an understatement, and did she realize he would've murdered other students for eighty percent less backchat? "Get your ass back here, Rogue. You're doing an extra session, you hear me? Get your ass back here now and give me fifty reps!"

Rogue smirked at him. She always smirked at him because it pissed him off. She waved in his direction, hopped down from the broken fence, and made no attempt to follow his orders. It figured that the rotten black bear carcass they passed several days ago showed more respect to him than Rogue had this whole trip.

"Make that eighty," he snarled. When her smirk failed to fade, his roar sounded like thunder. "One. Hundred. Reps!"

"Logan, it's too warm for exercise," Jean scolded him from the shack where they stored the water. Just the three of them, they had bickered constantly since their arrival. Now even Jean regretted their camping trip. The heat was like hell, the drinking water was too warm, the food was stale, and Logan kept snarling. Rogue hated life, and Jean had college assignments to mark.

He growled; his finger pointed at Rogue. "Get over to those boulders instead and let me see your mountaineering skills."

Rogue made her way to the spot where Logan had pointed. "They're rocks. How can Ah hike up a rock? Shouldn't we find a mountain?"

Logan grabbed a cigar and a lighter. If there had been a mountain, he would have thrown Rogue off it. He settled on his infamous glare instead of an answer.

Rogue decided maybe she had pushed him too far this time. She climbed the first boulder with little effort and jumped off it. When she sized up the second boulder, she followed Logan's barked instructions and slid under it instead. It had a narrow crevice underneath and she could inch herself forward, dark but cool, cold but spooky. She heard voices, and a laugh, and started to move a little quicker. She had to be dehydrated or something because rocks never talked let alone laughed. She wondered what had taken her so long to reach daylight again and when she crawled out, Logan stared at her with suspicious eyes.

"Stripes, what did you do under there?" he asked her, closing the distance between them, and putting his hand on her head. He moved his hand to his chest, checking her height against his. "Goddamn it," he said, turning towards the shack. "Jean, get out here!"

"Ah did what ya told me to do," an irritated Rogue answered. "Don't ya go starting again."

Annoyed by another interruption, Jean left the shack and went to check on the two of them. "I hope you didn't make her jump in this heat." Her voice trailed off when she spotted Rogue. "What happened to her?"

"Quit worrying meh," Rogue said, putting her hands to her face to check if everything was still there. "Ah won't be a pain in the ass again if ya stop worrying meh."

"She went under that boulder and came out like this," Logan explained, gesturing to the kid. "She's gone and shaved several years off her height."

Rogue ran for the tent and started to tear through the belongings in her rucksack. She found her mirror, popped it open and scowled at her reflection. "What the hell's happened to meh?"

"I need you to tell me exactly what you did today. We can't blame a boulder for you losing three or four years off your current age," Jean explained while she attempted to remain calm.

She ignored Jean, marched to the boulder, and pushed past Logan who had busied himself checking the rock for suspicious activity. "Ah want those years back and this rock's goin' to give them to meh," she shouted, crawling back under it before Logan could grab her.

"Damn it," Logan said with a scowl and walked back around the boulder to wait for her to reappear.

Jean waited beside him. "Surely, we can't blame a rock for this, Logan. It's ridiculous."

"She went under there looking normal and came out younger. It has to be some mutant interference," he said with a chomp on his cigar.

"Can you sense anyone?" Jean asked him, looking around them at the sparse landscape.

"Just a giant pain in the ass," he grumbled and crouched down to yell inside the rock. "Hurry it up, Rogue!"

Rogue had spent the two minutes praying, pleading, and begging whatever had done this to her to undo it. "Ah swear Ah can be a better teen. Ah'm sixteen and Ah can scrub up and become a geek and volunteer at a soup kitchen and do stuff that geeks do if ya change meh back," she rambled. "Ya and meh understand each other don't we, Rock?" Logan's yell ripped through her words and she scowled. "Ya better give meh a minute, Wolverine!" she yelled straight back.

Logan scowled at both the tone of her voice and the sound of it. "What have you done now? You sound younger than you did before!"

"Ah do?" Rogue whispered with a gulp deep inside the crevice when she heard Logan. "Ah prayed and everything, ya dumb rock! Ah'm getting out of here and taking ya down. This rock ain't staying here for long. Ah hope ya heard meh, Rock. Ah'm taking ya down."

"Quit whining and get out here," Logan ordered, certain the kid would be responsible for his first, second and third heart attacks.

Rogue crawled out to the bright sunshine that darkened once she saw the looks on the faces of Jean and Logan. "Why are ya lookin' at meh like that?"

Logan wanted to kill her. He pulled her to her feet, reached over, grabbed her chin with his bare hand and waited for the familiar draw of her powers. He wanted to heal her to normality before he killed her, but nothing happened. "Jean," he growled.

Jean placed her hand on Rogue's forehead and shared a worried glance with Logan. Rogue had no powers and a rock had created three enemies out of the X-Men. She looked concerned and stopped the girl from attacking the rock. "You need to come inside with me," she said, leading her to the shack.

"Ah feel smaller than before," Rogue muttered, looking up at Jean.

The redhead walked Rogue into the shack where she had been marking papers all afternoon. She guided her to a pillow and sat her down. "You need to stay here and stay calm, Rogue. I'm hoping this will wear off in a few hours."

Rogue's nose scrunched up and she scowled. "Wait a minute, ya both touched mah face and mah powers didn't zap ya!"

Jean nodded while she collected the paperwork and sat beside Rogue. "Unfortunately, you've lost more than four years from your age."

Rogue raised her hands centimetres from her face and studied them. "How many years?"

"Without a thorough examination and a bone scan I wouldn't know for certain, but I would estimate seven or eight years," she replied, marking another paper with a red pen.

Seven or eight years? Seven or eight years! Caught between a cry, a cuss, and a scream., Rogue jumped to her feet and was ready to beat that rock into submission. She ran from the shack and straight into Logan's arms. He had scooped her up as soon as she flew through the doorway.

He carried her inside and ignored her scowl. "You really know how to wreck a camping trip, Stripes," he said and sat her down beside Jean.

"I'm glad Ah could finally do somethin' right," she muttered and folded her arms.

He heaved a heavy sigh and settled opposite them with another cigar. "You're taking this too well, Red."

Jean glanced at him. "There is more stress associated with these pages than an active boulder deciding to deage one of our students," she replied.

"Deage ain't even a word," Rogue muttered under her breath.

"And you say she don't pay attention in her English class," Logan snorted.

Jean frowned at them both. "That's because she doesn't pay attention in her English classes."

#

Six hours later a storm raged outside, and Logan had pitched the tent inside the shack. While he grumbled over a pot of cold stew, Jean finished marking the last assignment. "She doesn't listen," Jean complained.

Logan balanced his pot of stew on the fire. "And it's taken you all this time to work that out?"

"No, I've noticed it before," she said and shuffled the papers neatly and returned them to her briefcase. "I'm worried about her."

"Welcome to my world," he grumbled and stopped to check on his stew while it bubbled.

A tearful Rogue stood by the doorway without a door and watched the thunder, rain, and lightning. She watched the rock, watched the weather, and watched for any sign her body would return to normal. Logan's hand on her shoulder made her jump. "Dinner's nearly ready, Stripes," he said. Studying her face, he brushed her fresh tears away and pulled her into a hug. "My food ain't that bad, darlin'."

"Ah don't want to be stuck like this," she whispered, more tears than words.

He lifted her up without loosening the hug and carried her back to her pillow. "You won't be. Me and Jean are already working on it."

Jean gave Logan a sharp look. "We're trying, Logan. We can't make promises."

He grunted at that and dished up the stew. "That's what I said, now eat up."

#

Several hours later, Logan, Jean and Rogue were in the same tent. Almost midnight, Rogue had fallen asleep between them and almost looked sweet as she slept. Jean tucked Rogue in and gathered the sheets around the sleeping girl. "She hasn't changed back," she told Logan quietly.

"You really thought she would? This ain't a Disney movie," he pointed out and itched for a smoke. "If she's stuck like this, she's stuck like it. She'll grow out of it eventually. Don't give me that look, I'm trying, okay?"

"Try harder," Jean replied, listening to the awful weather outside and calculating their next move. "If she doesn't change back by tomorrow morning we need to return to the mansion."

"Yeah, we do. This trip sucked," Rogued muttered, half asleep.

"Stop eavesdropping," Logan and Jean scolded her at the same time.

#

In the present day, Rogue's foul mood spread until her feet took her all the way to the steps of the college. She could see Logan still resting in his jeep. Part of her wondered how long Jean would be, while the other part of her wondered why that cop kept staring her way.

"Are you lost, little girl?" the cop asked, reaching for his radio. "Don't worry, we can find your parents."

"Ah'm not lost, Ah don't have any parents and Ah'm out here because Ah don't want to get cancer from second-hand smoke," Rogue answered, only being honest.

"You don't have any parents?" the cop questioned, confused.

"No," she answered, sitting down on the steps in the sunny weather. "Can ya leave meh alone? Ah haven't showered in four days and it sucks. And Ah'm hungry. Ah hated the stew last night, that sucked too. Everythin' sucks right now."

Jean left the Dean's office and carried her briefcase to the exit. She wanted to run a long, hot bath and soak the stress away. At least the Dean seemed happy with the papers despite the food stains littered on the pages. She reached the doors at the end of the long corridor and walked into a mess. "Can I help you, Officer?" she asked, giving Rogue a stern look, and tempering her gaze when she looked at the police officer.

"Do you know this girl?" he asked her, pointing to Rogue.

Glancing in the direction of Logan's jeep, Jean gave the smoking feral a heavy psychic push. She thought about her answer for a moment. "Yes, I do know her. What has she told you?"

Suspicious of their strange behavior, the officer called for backup at his current location and cited a lost child to his colleagues.

"Ah'm not a kid, Ah'm sixteen," Rogue complained, glaring at the cop. "And who told ya to call anybody? Ah'm fine sitting here."

After a psychic shove that almost severed his spinal cord, Logan scrambled out of the jeep and could smell Jean's despair. He swore under his breath, grabbed his phone, and made a call to one of his contacts while his narrowed eyes remained on the scene at the steps. By the time he walked over, a second and third cop car had arrived, and Jean struggled to keep Rogue quiet. Before he could kill Rogue, the police officer made an announcement. He pointed to Jean and Logan. "You two are under arrest."

#

Logan and Jean were sitting beside each other in the lobby of a large police station in the town of Bayville. They both wore looks of tiredness and held a secretive psychic talk while two officers watched over them. "At least he didn't arrest, Rogue," Jean sighed. "He only placed her under protective custody after you threatened to murder her."

"I'm gonna murder her," Logan promised Jean.

She nudged him gently. "Threats like that won't help our case, Logan. What happens if they suspect Rogue's a mutant?"

"I'll murder them after I murder her," he answered with a scowl.

Jean nudged Logan again and smiled at the two officers who looked their way. "Do we know how long this will take, Officers? My fiancé will be wondering where I am, and I don't want him to worry."

Logan turned his scowl on her. "Shut up, Jean," he said out loud and looked at the cops. "Ignore my wife, she's let the sun go to her head again."

A puzzled Jean returned to their psychic talk. "Is there something you haven't shared with me, Logan?"

He joined her in their private chat. "I made a call to one of my contacts after I saw the trouble brewing outside the college. He owed me a favor and filed some papers for me."

Jean moved her chair slightly, wanting to look Logan in the eyes. "What kind of papers?"

"Mr and Mrs Logan?" a voice called from the doorway of an office.

Logan stood up and tugged Jean with him. Jean looked at Logan, sighed and glanced at the police sergeant, ready to lie without a second's notice. "Yes, I'm Jean Logan and this is my husband, Logan."

Logan snorted at that. "James Logan," he corrected her and nodded to the sergeant. "You'll have to ignore my wife; she's let the sun get to her. Five days camping out in the middle of nowhere can do that to you."

"You've got nothing to complain about, you should meet my wife. It's my unlucky day because she's at home burning my dinner while she burns through my paychecks," the sergeant said, taking them to his office. "This is the head of Bayville Child Services."

A man with a potbelly and a slick of greased black hair greeted them. Only Jean shook his hand out of politeness. Logan glared at him instead. "I'm John Hargreaves," he said, noting Logan's scowl. "Your daughter looks remarkably like you when she's unhappy."

"Thanks," Logan said without missing a beat. "Where is she? We have a home to go to and I need a smoke."

Jean placed her briefcase down beside her chair and motioned for Logan to sit down too. She recognized the importance of the meeting, smoothed the wrinkles from her crumpled skirt and felt uncomfortable in the silence.

"How old were you when you gave birth to Anna, Mrs Logan?" Hargreaves asked.

Jean glanced at Logan, they spoke psychically for a moment, and she smiled. "I like the name Anna," she said aloud, glancing at Hargreaves. "I had her when I turned twenty-two. Yes, I was a young mom, but I also had my husband James by my side. He was a very good father. I mean, he's still a very good father. He was only joking when he said he would murder her. You know what kids are like especially girls. They're often able to twist their father around their little fingers but Anna isn't able to do that with Logan, I mean James, his name is James, but we often call him Logan. Even Anna calls him Logan just to annoy him."

"She annoys me alright," Logan growled, looking at Jean. "You both do."

John Hargreaves scribbled down notes in his folder. "And you're now engaged, Mrs Logan?"

"Engaged?" Jean said, glancing down at the engagement ring on her finger and thinking fast. "We're having marital problems and Logan proposed to me again. I said yes, of course, and isn't the ring beautiful?"

Logan still wore his scowl. "It's a cheap knock-off," he told them. "Where's our kid?"

Jean frowned at Logan and Hargreaves looked up from the folder he held to answer the question. "Anna is talking to one of my colleagues," he explained. "She's an articulate girl when she's not threatened with murder, and she appears happy to talk about you both in positive terms."

Jean breathed a sigh of relief. "So, we can take her home?" she said, reaching for her briefcase. "It's been a long five days and I desperately need a hot bath and a glass of wine."

"Not so fast, Mrs Logan," the Police Sergeant said, and Jean worried their lies had been discovered. The sergeant looked at them both "Why, Mr Logan, did you threaten to hogtie your daughter in the truck?"

#

Logan lit his cigar and leaned against the wall of the police station. It was almost midnight and he still wanted to murder Rogue. He checked his watch and waited for them to appear through the double doors of the building. He soon heard Jean's heels and Rogue's tears. "Is she crying?" Logan asked Jean, walking over to them.

"She's crying and she won't stop," Jean told him, holding the girl's hand while they walked to the jeep. "I don't know what happened to her, Logan. I waited in the lobby as we discussed and when child services released her into my custody she cried."

Logan reached the jeep first, pulled Rogue over to him and crouched down to look square in her eyes. He searched for the kid he knew. "Stripes?" The girl continued to cry until it turned into a wail. "Quit bawling before I give you something to cry about."

"Stop threatening her," Jean snapped at him, throwing her briefcase inside the jeep. She crouched down beside him and talked to the girl in a gentle tone. "Anna, you need to tell us what's wrong. I know this must be confusing to you but we're your parents, we have the paperwork to prove it."

"She doesn't care about paperwork, Jean," he grumbled, standing up and almost snapping his cigar in two. "Just get her in the jeep and we'll go for a drive."

"A drive to where? We both know we can't return home until the investigation's over," she said, guiding the crying girl to the back seat and strapping her in.

"I'll think of something," Logan reassured Jean and looked at the police station.

#

Thankful the crying had stopped, Jean tucked Anna into bed and crept out of the room. It had taken almost an hour to calm Anna's tears until Jean had used her powers to hush them. She closed the bedroom door and continued to creep through the hotel suite. She switched the TV off, put her cell phone on charge and retired to the master bedroom. It was almost five o'clock in the morning and sleep knew her name. She took off her bathrobe, fiddled with the straps of her nightdress and climbed into bed. She looked at the ceiling and thought about the past twenty-four hours.

"Are you going to talk any time this century?" Logan asked her, watching the same ceiling.

"I wasn't planning to," she replied. "You should have booked your own room with your own bed."

"They think we're married," he reminded her. "I booked the family suite at a decent hotel by the ocean, and you're pissed. No wonder this marriage has hit the dirt."

She sat up and slapped him across the chest with her pillow. "What do I tell Scott?"

"The truth," he said, scowling at her.

"That we're married and raising a daughter together?" she scoffed at his stupidity. "He's going to hit the roof."

"This ain't my fault," he said, trying to sleep. "We're blaming the boulder, remember?"

"Yes, the magical boulder that disappeared during a rainstorm," she replied sarcastically, leaving the bed again to check her phone. "We both know you're to blame."

"Me?" he growled, getting up to follow her. "Where'd you get an idea like that?"

"You wanted to go camping. You forced Rogue to go with you. You asked me to tag along. You argued with Rogue. You decided to yell at her. You forced her to crawl under that boulder," Jean said, breaking it down for him as she snatched her phone off the table in the lounge. "What's taking Scott so long to reply?"

"It's five in the goddamn morning," Logan said, taking the phone and switching it off. "We need to play this straight, Jean. If we put a foot wrong those assholes at child services are gonna swoop right in and snatch her from us."

"I know," Jean replied, worried too. She looked at Logan. "Can we really make our fake marriage work?"

"It can't fail," he said with a shrug, looking right back at her.

Jean smiled at him, Logan smirked at her, and Jean would later blame their overtiredness for what happened next. They had kissed and stripped out of their nightclothes by the time they reached their bedroom. He dragged her closer to him and suddenly she had zero inhibitions. In her head, all she could think was, 'This is my husband. There's nothing wrong with kissing my husband.' When they fell into bed together, all she could think was, 'He's my husband. There's nothing wrong with falling into bed with my husband." When the headboard started to slam against the wall, all she could think was, 'Scott who?'