"Do you think there will be big bats, like real life vampires?" Little Ayotunde asked, his older brother Evan rolled his eyes at the question, knowing just how to shut him up.

"We're not going to see any if you scare them away with your questions."

"Vampires aren't scared of anything, least of all people. They drink blood, remember?"

"Yeah, but we're not normal people. They're scared of mutants, you never know what kind of powers they have." Evan replied, still trying to get his younger brother to be quiet.

"No way!" He said exuberant, liking the idea that vampires wouldn't want anything to do with him because he's a mutant.

"But since you're still too young to have them they're probably going to want your blood because it's more potent than human blood… so you might actually attract them to you. Don't make too much noise, or you'll tell them your exact location." Jessie threw in.

Her baby brothers blood ran cold as the thought of the monsters suddenly wanting specifically him because of his being a mutant, but not having powers yet nearly petrified him where he stood.

"Haha, don't worry kids, there's no actual vampires down here, but we might see some rare species if we're lucky." The man leading this expedition informed them.

Valencia, one of the girls in the group saw her friend crumple. His older siblings didn't have to be mean to him, but they were in times like this. He hated it and so did she…

"Don't be mean to him." She stated not too far away from where Jessica was. The older girl rolled her eyes.

From the moment they'd left that morning it was nothing but question, question, question, blah blah blah. One after another. She couldn't even hear herself think. She tried to be kind to her little brother, but sometimes it was nearly impossible. She needed to do something that would shut him up, and so she did.

"He's not your little brother Val." She stated. The girl opened her mouth to respond when she was interrupted.

"Now here's what we're going to do. Half of you are going to go with me, and half of you are going to go with Hawthorn. The group that goes with me are going to see the stalegtites and glow worms, the group that goes with Haw are going to see the bats and the pools. Whoever wants to come with me come form a circle where I am. And the kids who want to go with Haw form a circle near him. After this there will be minimum to no talking, is that understood? Too many vibrations in a cave can make the walls come loose and fall in on us… we get caved in down here and there's no way out… it's a nasty way to go."

The groups formed, Jessica, Evan, Ayotunde and a bunch of other kids went with Hawthorn to go see the bats, while Kendall and the others went to see the natural beauty of the cave…

Jessica was getting tired of the typical youngest sibling behavior of her two youngest siblings. Mostly Kendall, but Ayotunde was there to. He was a little bundle of sweetness and cuteness, but he could act the part of youngest… she figured that it was probably because of the fact that he and Kendall were born so close together… their birthdays weren't that far apart, she was born 11 months after he was. Maybe it was because of the fact that it wasn't a whole year between them… that's all she could figure anyway. They heard the distant noises of the bats chirping as they got closer.

Meanwhile at the house:

It was an unusual day. Ororo was walking in the forest, the wildlife was happily dancing around her. They all greeted her with the joy that she had been lacking the previous day. Almost as if to check on her and see if she was OK. She was delighted every time a little bird or bug fluttered by. As strange as it would sound to many she could hear what they were saying.

"She's in the forest." A high pitched voice cheered to her right, a glance told her that it was the gray squirrel facing down with an almost happy expression on it's cute little face.

"Hello!" Another small voice said happily. She couldn't see the source of that voice. But she was assuming that it was hiding in the brush.

"The queen is here!" She could hear the voices from two small Birds flying overhead as they did a cute little dance in the air. A display of joy she knew it was.

She always knew there was joy in the forest. But she didn't know that it was to this degree. She didn't know why she was experiencing this now. Maybe her powers were developing. Maybe it was something else. Her powers linked her to the weather it wasn't really something where she could hear nature, not the animals. Not like Logan could.

Maybe it was a marriage thing. After all, they do say some strange things happen with couples. They start to look alike. Talk alike, act alike. She'd experienced this several times before. On a couple occasions it was even slightly embarrassing to her… Being worshipped as a goddess, put on a pedestal above everyone else and expected to act like it. Then all of a sudden, adapt the slang and occasionally the attitude of a rough little mountain man. A man's man. It ruined her image for some but she didn't care.

She always stayed true to herself. And this was her now, she had not changed in any way that she would not approve of and that was no one else's concern but her own. She didn't care about opinions like many others did, after all when she first came to the mansion the one thing she didn't like that much was wearing clothes… and Jean and a couple others promptly told her of the taboo that was to Americans, but she still didn't care much, she wore clothes for the comfort of others, but for herself she didn't care about covering herself like everyone else did. She was lucky to find a man who felt the same about himself as well.

It was funny to think that they were playing each other's roles today. Usually it was him that was up early in the forest and her that was sleeping in or at least in the greenhouse. She remembered when Nerumbo had told her about the trade off she'd be making for whomever she'd let be her mate.

That man was always right, his position in her life had redirected her and calmed her in times of need. And when she left for America one of the things she thought about besides leaving her homeland, people, and position was that she was not going to be around him anymore… at least not for a while. She'd grown to see him as an uncle. A keeper of secrets, a wise old sage. Of course since that time she'd found a family in the USA. She always was hit with warmth when the memory of him giving her signals that her now husband who could not have been more different from her was her match.

Her thoughts shifted as she saw the sun peeking through the pine needles and branches. It was a glorious golden color, and the sky was violet blue, like her eyes when they transitioned between colors. She took a breath of fresh Canadian air, then seeing a spot that had a perfectly positioned boulder and a window to watch the sunrise.

She giggled as she thought of how many animals she was seeing and were gathering around her that she was the new Disney princess… except she was a misplaced, unique looking, mysterious mutated ex-goddess who left home to train her skills, and then bagged her "Disney prince" who had generously loaned her his gift of being a forest royal for the day… she laughed even harder as the image of her gruff take no crap mate being in a princess gown and high heels pranced into her mind. She had to keep this one to herself. Logan would never let her near the others again if he knew her sharing that thought with anyone else was a possibility… especially the men.

The creatures seemed to share her laughter, she wasn't sure if they could see the same thing as she could, but the thought that they were all laughing at the same thing made it even better. She keened with laughter bowling over as she imagined him singing sound of music and dancing with makeup in a gown and heels.

He woke up to the sound of the birds… he turned over reaching for her. Feeling a cold spot where she was laying he rose up, eyes blinking trying to clear the mist in his eyes left by sleep. Looking at the window he saw that the curtains were still drawn, even though it was clearly day. He laid back once more letting his full body stretch again.

The kids were at the camp with their school, so he wasn't that worried about them. The older ones knew to take care of the younger and they were good at it. He was more curious than anything as to the whereabouts of his wife… he often let her sleep in while he'd wake up early and take a walk just to greet the dawn. Maybe that's what she was doing… he didn't know.

Going out of their room he sniffed the air. Her scent was everywhere… she'd been self conscious about her smell sometimes when she didn't shower for a day or two. But he loved her smell… to her it was flawed, to him it was perfect. The fleshy, rich, pure scent of his mate, right now. Sweat and all. Once when he said this she looked him like he had three eyes instead of two…

He followed her scent to the door. Leaving the house he followed it to the woods that he would usually walk in. He wondered what drew her there. There were a few brambles that had caught on the hair on his legs, he didn't care. It wasn't like that was a big deal to him. He and Ororo had both slept naked the previous night and the cool morning air felt crisp on his skin.

Truly, who needed a shower every day when you could just go outside and pick up the mist of the morning and use it to give you a fresh layer of dew refreshing yourself. Ororo felt the same to the degree, but she would always use her powers to make a little shower above her whenever she felt the need to get cleaned.

All the animals were very active today. They weren't usually this giddy in the morning… then again he wasn't the only one there. When it was just him in the woods, a lot of the animals would be quiet and hide because they knew he was the top predator there, but apparently that wasn't the same when Ororo was in the woods. What was he thinking? Of course it wasn't the same when she was in the woods. She was the opposite of him, a life bringer where he was a life taker.

His body would usually go into stalking mode when he was around others, just the way he was naturally… thankfully for both of them she had become immune to his sneaking antics. It didn't take long for him to get to where she was. She was sitting on a rock above the hill that he was walking up.

He was about to walk up to her, when she greeted him.

"Good morning love." He wanted to jump because of not being used to anyone knowing he was there.

"Morning darlin." He walked up to her, closing the distance, his hands then went to her sides. She leaned back into him and he took her weight to his chest like a pillow.

"Seems I beat you to your walk." His smile widened.

"Mhm." He responded singularly. The silence swallowed them, the sunlight became the flavor to their interlude.

A pair of ravens flew In the distance, Ororo looked to her side, seeing a deer approach from the trees. He yawned, filling his chest with cool air. She loved feeling his body move like that.

The doe stepped closer until Ororo could reach out her hand to it. She sniffed and then looked to the woman and man. She stepped closer once more and sniffed her face, she then started licking it gently. Ororo had to chuckle at the tickle it gave her.

When her husband started to tremble as well she had to look back and found herself pleasantly surprised to see him laughing as another deer had started licking his side.

"OK, that's enough." He said softly to her, she turned her attention to the dew on the grass and started eating the foliage.

"You should really laugh more often baby." He looked down and was shocked to see her blue eyes so vibrant.

He put both hands on the sides of her face and looked deeply into them, it would always entrance her when he did this. It was no longer a unique thing for him to show affection and love, not to their family anyway, but it never got old.

When she abruptly closed them and tilted her head back to normal he was caught off guard.

"Ro?" He had no idea of the effect of him saying her name had on her in that moment.

She raised her face back to him, but this time she place her hands on his face, in his hair. It was hypnotic when she ran her fingers through his hair. She pulled him down kissing his lips, after a moment his arms went around her and he held her tightly to himself as their passion grew.

An hour later:

They were taking advantage of the downpour that had been a result of their lovemaking to clean each other off of the sweat and juices of one another. It would of course help if that didn't often stir more heat between them, making them have to start the entire process all over again.

2 hours after that:

The couple laid in the meadow, the rain had finally subsided, and they were at last fully sated. Listening to his peaceful breathing and heartbeat as he slept beside her lulled her into slumber herself.

Back with the kids —

"You're being ridiculous, there are no bats that big!" Evan said exasperated to his little brother who insisted he saw a five foot tall bat in the cave.

"I saw it Evan, and I don't care what you say!" He snapped back at him, attitude written all over his his features.

It was a moment later when Tim, the Heath's middle son walked into this.

"You saw a five foot tall bat?" He asked, Ayotunde nodded, his brother sighed and shrugged waking away.

"You know, there are stories about some creatures that can disguise themselves as other creatures if they're in danger."

"A bat? Five feet? I'm not stupid Mister Heath." The man looked at him understanding.

"I'm not saying you are…" He would've questioned him, but it looked like he was about to tell a story.

"When my dad lived in Kentucky he would see these shapes… it was like birds, but it was off. It was too big… way too big."

"There are big birds everywhere… what about an eagle, or maybe a condor." Jessica put in.

"Not these… normal birds don't just leave ripped up carcasses in trees without eating them."

"They do that all the time."

"Not without coming back to eat it, even if it's not right then. Whatever these things were they didn't come back for anything… I remember my dad and I going out several times, once to take the decomposed body of a fawn off the top branch of one of our trees. It stunk up the whole property, almost like it was trying to claim that as it's territory." The kids watched and listened intrigued.

"When it fell to the ground all that looked to be eaten was a little bit of skin. The rest was left alone."

"Why wouldn't it eat the rest of it?" Kendall asked. Darien shrugged shaking his head.

"I don't know. But what my dad told me was that it didn't want us there. He wanted to tough it out, scare whatever it was away. But mom didn't have it and had us leave because of me and the kids."

"What did your dad think it was?"

"He thought it was some kind of forest demon… but who knows, it could've been a mutant, like you guys."

"Hm…" Jessica added a thoughtful hum to the conversation.

"So, Ayo… your could've seen a mutant."

"Aw, so it was just another mutant?"

"It was Dracula!" Darien's youngest son said enthusiastically.

Ayotunde turned to see him with his upper lips pulled back revealing his top teeth. His hands were up in an attempted claw like position. Ayotunde then ran from his friend in mock fear. The two boys chased each other like young boys do.

—At Logan and Ororo's cabin—

Thud – thud – thud – thud

He woke to the sound of stomps. Looking around he saw an elk that was walking into the meadow where they were, he realized that though animals were usually fine with him this one was being protective of his heard.

He understood and sat up, then made a couple indications in the ground with his hands signifying that this small area was his for the moment. Normally he would just leave, letting the animals have the area, but for now his wife was still asleep and he didn't want to have to wake her up.

He laid back letting her rest and watching the rest of the creatures around them do their things. The buck was still wary of the man in the field, but was not completely insisting that he leave now.

Later:

He'd drifted off again, he woke to the sound of flapping, opening his eyes he saw a hawk, in its talons was a ground hog. It was panting like the trek it had made was very tiring. He could hear the tiny chirps of baby birds not too far away… they had to be pretty close by.

The bird turned her head to him, her eyes bored into his two predators making eye contact. But it was broken a moment later. Predators are no fan of eye contact, and knowing this Logan respected it. This hawk had enough problems… she would not have one more today.

She readied herself for the final trip. She took off and then found herself carried to her nest, like the wind and sky were no longer fighting her, but had seen her struggle and decided to help her. After landing on the nest she looked to him for a moment and then picked at the body in her claws to feed her young.

He smiled watching the little ones eat. It wasn't until a minute later when he looked to his side and saw he wasn't the only one watching. Ororo had her face angled to watch the little family as well.

"Hey." He said to her warmly, she gazed back at him and smiled.

"Hey baby." She said seductively. She seemed to glow, there was no way for her to become more radiant than she already was, but here she was, right in front of him. Bright as the dawn itself.

"You look like you are looking into the sunrise."

"I am." His response made her chuckle.

"I am not that wonderful."

"I'm not so sure. I got the best remember?" She shook her head once loving him and his antics.

"You're glowing darlin."

"Me?" She examined her skin, but found it normal as ever. She then gave him a look, knowing he probably just wanted to have her again. (Which she was not at all opposed to)

"Really, you're glowing, did you do something different?" She wasn't sure how to answer that.

"I… am?"

"Yes you are." She blushed at the look he was giving her. He'd done it more than she could count, but every time it got to that one point she always had to look away… this man had such a hold on her heart it was crazy.

"I guess I can thank you for that baby." His smile was proud and feral.

"You wanna glow some more?" He asked, her reaction tickled him as she laughed at his antics.

"Or… what about after breakfast?" He looked like he was thinking for a moment.

"I like that idea." He then got up and reached down to help her, she took his hand, he then surprised her by hoisting her up and over his shoulders, then planting his hands firmly on her cheeks and walking in an off march to their cabin. She didn't care about stopping the laughter that spilled out of her at this, he was too good.

'Indeed you are the best at what you do… at everything.' She thought as she rode his shoulders.

Getting back to the house he got a pan and a couple other things ready as she went to empty her bladder. When she got into the kitchen she was greeted with an unusually pleasant sight…

The Wolverine, her husband. All 5' 3" of his sexy burly form standing shamelessly naked in front of the stove melting the butter in the pan. The smile on his face was peaceful, and his muscles were relaxed. She almost didn't see it when he side eyed her.

"Do you always make breakfast while showing off?" She knew she had to be careful with her words, otherwise they'd stay hungry until the next couple rounds of sex were over.

"Only for a certain goddess who loves drainin' me all the chances she gets." She walked over to him seductively coming up behind him and wrapping her arms around him.

In that moment their roles were reversed… he was at the stove and she was behind him, running her hands up and down his body, all those delicious curves she loved taking in. His libido was getting harder to ignore, she always turned him on ALWAYS. No matter what they did, ever since they were married he couldn't ignore her ways. Her body, her heart, that little look she gave him when her thoughts about him were practically audible and erotic. At the mansion when this happened he'd always find a way to slip away from responsibility and they'd find somewhere unoccupied and as she put it in front of her students "have some private time with her husband…"

Once when she'd come back from one of these times and she'd used that excuse one of the children blurted out "You guys are just fucking aren't you." The whole room became silent. He was not too far away when he heard that, but he now had to hear her recovery…

"If you must know we were engaging in extra curricular activities for our children. And Julien… cussing is not allowed in this classroom young man."

"I'm a mutant, remember?! I ain't no human." He bit back, she smiled to him.

"In that case you might get into extra trouble, you know that mutants are supposed to show humans how to be… you are supposed to be better, next time we might have to put you into detention for that…" He tried to stop himself from giggling at her response. "Extra curricular activities for their children…" well that was true as that kind of activity does make children.

She knew she was pushing him to the edge again, so she took that moment and pulled herself away, going to the fridge she opened it, getting some sausage, bacon, and eggs out.

"What kind of eggs you want darlin'?"

"How about over easy…"

"Still runnin' away from ya huh."

"Hmhm, yes, I guess you are not the only hunter in this family." His laughter lit up the room, temporarily dissipating the sexual tension between them. They worked in a comfortable silence side by side until breakfast was made. There were eggs, bacon, sausage, fruit and whipped cream.

"You feeling OK darlin?" Ororo didn't usually have whipped cream with her sausage… but unless he was going blind he was sure he just saw her dip the frank into the cream.

"Yes." She answered as she swallowed the pieces of meat. He watched as she finished her plate. A strawberry and bacon, a bit of yolk with a grape.

"Did you just… grape with egg yolk?..."

"I said I was hungry."

"That hungry?"

"Yes!" He looked away, his thoughts were running away with him, though he knew he always had a weird food combo every now and then to.

He let the strangeness dissipate then got up stretching his body over the space between them, seeing this she raised her face to his. His lips swallowed hers. His tongue moving to caress and clean her lips of the yolk that she'd spread there. He pulled away a second later.

"Must you make everything seductive love?" She whispered staring up at him

"Yes." He whispered back making her chuckle. He sat back down remembering what she'd said about after breakfast.