Chapter One
Rogue had a secret even Logan didn't know; the cave where she currently huddled wouldn't feature in this story. Yes, this story, the one you're reading. Do you like it? The story that is, not the cave. Life's strange, isn't it? Sometimes you wonder if the small victories are worth the hassle. Maybe you're just starting out, studying and stressing, or maybe you're dating, married or expecting. What if you have babies, kids, or teens? Perhaps you're lonely, Rogue was lonely sometimes when the voices didn't speak to her. Life seemed claustrophobic, just like the cave. Months ago, she watched a documentary about a man who died in a cave. After it finished, Logan looked at her and said, 'You call that uplifting?' The X-Men's theme for that week had been uplifting stories of overcoming hardship or adversity and she shouldn't have trusted the girl at Busterblock who recommended the movie to her.
How did you sleep last night? She couldn't, not here, after falling and hitting her head. Sleeping was danger, a primary colour, part of an art installation. Wait for chapter three and you'll understand. Eight weeks ago, she found her powers, then lost them again. Ten minutes of exhilaration had ended on a train. Then came the cave, but she thought the beginning of this story needed to be told first. Sometimes her memories would run off in a tangent, break, shatter, fade, and shuffle into the distance. She always felt like a spare part, with no home, no family, and friends who were afraid of her.
She didn't trust Logan; he couldn't be trusted. He'd broken her trust and still wouldn't find cave deaths uplifting if this one became her tomb. Even she didn't find the thought of death uplifting. Her mind wandered to a date five months before her fall into the cave, back when the X-Men insisted she add bullet points to documents and avoid stress or fights with her boyfriend. Life seemed simple then, when Logan gave her dimes to use on jukeboxes even though she always picked the same sad song.
Was she going to die here? She thought she liked Bobby again, maybe even loved him. They had run across country, it was almost fun. Then came the cave. Life's funny, isn't it? She knew she sucked as a notetaker and chief bullet pointer, but she didn't mind. Now she was tired, so roll up and come see the past. Point dot of her unravelling started months before the head injury. It all began with her complaining in a men's locker room, and most stories didn't begin that way.
"If I'm asked to add bullet points to one more confidential field report I'll scream," Rogue complained, leaning against the silver lockers, and watching Bobby tug his X-Men suit up. "Why can't I go on this mission instead of you?"
"Probably because you always die," Bobby said with a laugh. She glared at him when he tapped each one of his fingers while he counted all the times she nearly perished during a mission. "You fell through the floor into the lair of mutant killers."
"It wasn't a lair; it was a teenage boy's bedroom. And they weren't killers either, they posted some hoaxes online, and how was I meant to know about the trapdoor?" she argued.
"You fell off the roof at Westchester Mall."
"I didn't fall, the cord snapped, and Angel saved me," she shot back angrily. "And it wasn't my job to check the equipment before we left."
"Okay, but you can't get out of this one," Bobby told her with a smile. "Last month you jumped into a swamp full of crocodiles."
"Did you swallow Jubilee or something? I didn't jump, I slipped. I don't remember kidnapping myself. Do you think I went to the mall and said, 'Hi Gambit, do you feel like kidnapping me today?' He took me all the way to New Orleans, and I slipped off that boat into the Bayou while he was driving like the crazy Cajun he is. I swear the mall hates me. And Bobby, they have gators in Louisiana, not crocodiles."
"You were lucky Jean was there to levitate you out the water,' he said, checking off the last of the imaginary list he affectionately called Rogue's Death Mission Mistakes. "Magneto kidnapped you and made a mess of the Statue of Liberty."
"That isn't funny, Bobby. I really died that time."
He shrugged and dragged the zipper to rest under his chin. "How do I look?"
She tilted her head to the side a little. "Tight," she muttered, dragging her gaze lazily up one side of his body before repeating the action. "Can your body breathe in that suit?"
Bobby nodded but missed his chance to answer. The door swung open and Logan walked in, already wearing his uniform. "You're gonna make Storm late for her first mission."
"First mission?" Rogue said, glancing at Logan.
"She's leading this one," Logan answered, frowning at her. "You lose your way to your new office?"
Clearing her throat, she used her favourite business-like tone. "I'm really glad you want to discuss that, Logan," she told him, smiling as she followed him out of the locker room. "Can you talk to the Professor, Storm, Scott and Jean and tell them I'm ready to become a full-time X-Man?" He didn't answer and her newfound cheeriness took a steep nosedive. She quickened her steps, keeping up with his pace while they walked through the barren, chrome laced corridor towards the X-Jet. "You don't think I'm ready either."
"You're just a kid," he told her gruffly, his thoughts on the upcoming mission. He absentmindedly rubbed at his knuckles and popped his claws a few times, his way of breaking in his new uniform.
"I'm the same age as Bobby," she reminded him, reaching the hangar first. "Hey Storm, can I -?"
A growling Logan hauled her back to stand beside him. He then waved Storm's inquisitive look away and steered Rogue back to the entrance of the hangar. "Storm's nervous enough without us having to babysit you," he told her, patting her shoulder in solidarity when they reached the door.
Bobby jogged past them just as Logan pressed the switch and the door glided shut on Rogue. Her last glance inside the hangar gave her enough time to flip Logan off. He smirked at her and returned to the X-Jet, leaving her to walk the lonely steps back to the elevator. When she reached the upper levels, she felt the familiar rumble of the jet leaving the grounds.
Pyro noticed her walking by the rec room door. He lazed on the couch and waved at her. "Welcome to the club, Rogue. They've never trusted me either."
She rolled her eyes and kept him company for a while. "They trust me," she muttered quietly, perched on the arm of a battered chair.
He shrugged and skipped through the TV channels, his thumb thumping the remote several times.
"Did you hear why Storm's leading this mission?" Jubilee asked from the doorway.
Rogue glanced over her shoulder and shook her head. She was always the last to hear the gossip at the mansion, mostly because it usually centered on her almost dying on a mission.
"Katie told Mary, so Mary told Kim. Then Kim told me that Scott and Logan nearly got into a fight after the mission at the mall," Jubilee explained, causing Rogue to turn round and listen properly. "Angel had to pull Scott away. Jean stayed with Logan, but we could hear their voices across the lower levels. They were really screaming, and Logan had his claws out. Katie said she thought Logan was going to kill Scott. Then Mary placed a bet against Logan. She said there was no way Logan could beat Scott in a fight. Most of the students are placing bets." She took a wad of cash from her fluorescent yellow jacket pocket. "Look what I've earned so far."
Rogue sat up a little straighter. "Logan to win and he'll throw the first punch," she smiled, taking a twenty-dollar bill from her coat pocket and slipping it to Jubilee.
Logan popped his claws a few more times, cracking his knuckles and listening to Storm do a rundown of the mission targets. "Why Canada?" he said.
Storm searched through the bullet points littered on the screen of the tablet she cradled. "We don't know."
"I doubt it's for the warm welcomes, poor hockey teams and flat beer," Scott muttered from the pilot's seat.
One of Logan's eyebrows arched, and he growled lowly. "You really want to stand on your record of coming from a country with watered down beers and guns in every Happy Meal?"
Scott smiled to himself, and Jean placed a gentle hand on his arm to quieten his stirring thoughts. They had almost reached the border and needed to glide through without being seen on radar.
Storm studied the mission objectives quietly. "This is a mission against an unknown enemy," she addressed them in her own soothing tone. "We need to work as a team. I know this is a worn phrase, but this could be an ambush."
"If it could be an ambush, why don't we turn back and go home?" Bobby asked. "Am I the only one who thinks this is crazy?"
Storm hushed him. "We're thirty miles from the site of interest. ETA, Scott?"
"Seven minutes," he answered, nodding to Jean in a silent agreement and increasing the speed of travel.
Bobby looked over at Logan. "I hope this won't drag on too long because I'm planning to take Rogue on a date tonight. I think I'm finally going to get lucky," he mouthed eagerly, not wanting their talk to be overheard. "It's taken me a while to wear her down."
A set of claws tore through Logan's knuckles, and he eyed Bobby with a scowl. "You want to repeat that?"
A panicked Bobby spilled his thoughts, confusing Logan's seat in the X-Jet with the confession box back in his hometown. "I've tried for months to get her to agree. I have it all planned, Logan. Whoa! Whoa! Watch the claws! We love each other, and I've even promised we'll use protection," he squeaked, shuffling himself back in his seat anxiously when the second set of Logan's claws swiped at his neck. "I thought you liked bar talk?!"
Inches away from slicing Bobby's skin, only Storm's sharp look kept Logan from shedding both his temper and Bobby's blood. "Get him out of my sight or I'm drop kicking him out of his jet without his cock for company," he snarled.
Bobby hurriedly unbuckled his seatbelt and Storm shooed him two rows ahead of her. She looked at Logan with concern. "Anything I should know?"
"The number of a good funeral director," he seethed, sheathing his claws.
He figured he needed to have another talk with Rogue, wanting to guide her into fixing her life and focus on taming her powers. They had all worried about her since she encountered another asshole mutant that added an extra personality to her head. Those voices wouldn't hold much longer and he had done his best to talk her into typing reports and keeping herself busy with her duties as the worst secretary he had ever come across. Her thoughts strayed too much, and he struck down his options. Maybe she would make a decent enough assistant in his classes? She could update the sims and input the codes, keeping her out of trouble.
With tensions rising further, Storm felt nothing but relief once the jet landed in a clearing circled by centuries old oak trees. The X-Men clambered wearily down the steps and were greeted by birdsong and a light spring breeze. Logan took two steps toward a giddy Bobby again, ready to kick his ass, when he suddenly snapped his gaze to the west of them. He signalled to Storm he could detect voices, footsteps, and a major threat less than a third of a mile away. The more Logan took in his surroundings, he became overfamiliar with the landscape. "I've been here before," he muttered.
"Are you certain?" Storm asked, nervously surveying their position in the field.
Logan didn't answer. Now on high alert, he scanned the treeline a further three times. He looked north, counted the trees, and made his way across the shaggy grass to a grizzled trunk with branches that hugged and crisscrossed the bark. He traced his hand across claws marks in the tree.
Bobby moved a little closer still fearful of Logan's outbursts. He read the letters out loud. "J-A-M-E-S." He looked confused and glanced at the others. "What's a James?"
"It's not a what, it's a who," Jean said softly, her eyes never breaking with Logan's.
Logan was the first to look away, and he ignored the second word brutally carved in the bark. His nostrils flared and he breathed in the surrounding scents. "We need to head back to the jet."
Bobby once again spelled the letters out, his eyes fixated on the other piece of scruffy graffiti. "V-I-C-T-O-R," he said. "I've heard that name before. What's the connection between Victor, James and this mission?"
"Nothing, they're just scars on an old tree," Logan grumbled, not wanting to stay here longer than necessary.
Storm and Jean had already realised the mission was most likely compromised, but Scott pointed at Logan, blaming him for leading them into a trap. "This is your fault," he said, raising his voice when he heard a small army storming their way. "This is your doing, Logan. You've led us into an ambush."
"Led you here? This wasn't my intel!" Logan snarled, closing in on Scott.
"Stop this," Storm ordered impatiently. "We're not fighting each other. Do you all understand? We won't win this war if we turn on each other."
Logan scowled at Scott and his hardened eyes softened when he looked at Storm and Jean. He nodded to Storm, shared a longer glance with Jean, then unsheathed his claws. "Get ready," he told them, his head snapping in each direction, his senses overwhelmed with the sights, sounds and smells of at least forty armed and dangerous vigilantes.
Bobby paused, hands clasped tightly together, and whispered to the sky in a half-muttered prayer, "I hope I don't die here; I really want to get laid tonight."