She woke with a start… she's never had a dream like that before… like she was fighting a monster. She knew what it was, part of her recognized it as death itself… She wasn't sure how she did, but she did, nonetheless.

She had fought the dark creature for her husband... her late husband. She was confused by the dream, maybe it was her psyche trying to sum up everything, making a movie out of what happened to him. Telling her she fought, but not hard enough... She did her best to push that to the back of her mind, knowing where it would lead her if she dwelled on it.

The reality of waking up by herself at one time in her life had been something she never thought would change. But now she didn't know how she'd ever be able to get reaccustomed to it. There was an extra pillow where her husband's empty space was, sometimes it helped her to cope with the fact that the man was gone now. Though it wasn't the same as feeling his strong body next to hers, his arms wrapping around her in the morning, and his groggy voice greeting her, which was like a coat of perfectly warmed butter on freshly made bread to her ears.

She did her best to take her mind off it, it stung like nothing else, and she knew it wasn't going away anytime soon which was the hardest thing to deal with. She turned her head away from the empty space, steadying her breath and swallowing down the agony in her chest hard, trying to focus on the here and now. She got off the bed going into their bathroom.

Jessica woke with a start, there was the sound of knocking on her door, she knew it was Rahne at the door, she could smell her. It sounded like she was about ready to knock but she stopped. Maybe she sensed she was awake.

"Jessie?" The younger girl asked, she didn't want to respond.

"What." The formerly sleeping girl asked dryly.

"You need anything?" She asked.

"No, thanks." At this the girl outside the door turned looking back to the door then to a couple others.

"Alright… you ok in there?"

"What do you think?" Jessie bit back not in the mood for conversation.

"Sorry." The lupine mutant answered apologetically, then left the door.

'Alright, phbhbphbt. I'll never be alright again!' She wanted to yell, but the part of her that kept her sanity stopped the words from escaping.

Later Downstairs:

Everyone was getting breakfast, the cooks of the day were Forge and Hank, who surprisingly made a very nice breakfast for everyone. No one except for a select few even had the notion that the two knew how to cook. (The two exceptions being Xavier and Jean who'd both found a memory Xavier on purpose and Jean by accident where one or the other were fixing a deluxe meal for what they assumed was a date.)

Evan was talking to Ray who was across the table from him when Ayotunde, his little brother sat right beside him with his plate of food. It was more than he could eat.

"Got a big plate of food there huh Ayo?" Evan asked him entertained by the idea of watching his little brother stuff his face.

"It's not for me Ev." He said happily as he started eating, this made him and Ray as well as a couple others in earshot curious.

"Who's it for?" Ray beat Evan to the question.

"Daddy." The youngest one there stated as if expected to say those exact words. His older brother's face drooped at the word out of his mouth.

"Oh…" Ray and another boy looked at each other knowing that the younger boy didn't understand that it was over for his dad.

Jessie clenched her eyes shut silently cursing her senses. She didn't need to hear her brother's proclamation.

"You ok Jessie?" Kitty asked, she didn't respond knowing her mom didn't need the information she just got. She nodded trying not to show any reaction on her features though it was so hard.

LATER:

Jessica was in her room, she'd gotten one of the coats out of her mom's closet and was snuggling it, or more like trying to restrain herself from tearing it apart because of the anger that was behind her pain. She knew the truth…

Her father didn't die… he was murdered. What was it that made his systems start self-destructing? It wasn't normal or natural, not the way it happened. She knew he aged, he'd been aging on and off since her and her siblings were born and he'd told them about it before. But THAT, didn't happen.

She'd heard her Uncle Hank say that he was poisoned, as if it was something that happened every day. This pissed her off, and for a moment she knew who was responsible for his death…

It was Hank.

If he knew her father was poisoned and didn't do anything about it being the doctor, that would make him responsible. Her logic made sense to her,

'But why?' she asked herself.

'The bounty, duh!' she came to her own conclusion, it made her very angry when she found out that there was a legitimate bounty on his head just because he was the "best there was" as he would say all the time.

Suddenly she found herself fuming, logic was not something she'd listen to at the moment. She got up exiting the room walking like her father would on a bad day but in her moms style. On her way she passed the redhead Jean, who looked at her concerned.

"You ok Jess?" She asked but her question fell of deaf ears as the younger girls focus never wavered.

Marching now almost exactly like her father she took the elevator to one of the sublevels where the blue doctor's lab was. Finding the room, she went in. He had a petri dish that he was currently examining.

The blue mutant could sense that it was the oldest of the Howlett children behind him, he was about to greet her when the hackles on the back of his neck went up, something was wrong. He sniffed quietly, it was her, but her scent was off. It was like one of the ways that Wolverine would smell when he was on a mission to elliminate an enemy, then a horrible thought crossed his mind. He dismissed it, but it was sadly confirmed a moment later.

"You." Was the only word that came out of her mouth, it was almost a growl.

He turned his head to look out of the corner of his eye at her, she was pissed, He knew what about. Knowing his project couldn't be messed with he slowly moved to the fridge in the room and put it in there.

"What seems to be the problem Jess?" He asked, she took a step toward him.

"Now hold on. If you have a problem with me it's best to have this conversation outside the lab, not in." He said to her bravely walking up to and past her softly grabbing her hand and pulling her by it taking her from the room.

"Now, what seems to be amiss?" He asked calmly, she couldn't help but be calmed by his gentle nudges and demeanor.

"Did…" She was going to ask, but the rage came flooding back as the words almost came of her mouth.

"YOU, you killed him didn't you?!" She asked loudly, he was taken aback by her question, not expecting to hear her utter those words. He turned his head for a moment, running his hand down his face he sighed then looked back at her.

"No." He said calmly.

"Than why didn't you save him?!" She raised her voice for the question.

"I tried." He stated,

"Not hard enough!" She yelled this time, he understood her anger so he did his best to stay docile even though it was painful to be accused of killing one of your good friends.

"I am sorry that I could not save him." He replied head bowed.

"Why couldn't you?"

"I don't know."

"LIAR!" She yelled again this time taking a swipe at the older mutant who dodged her blow with embarrassingly little effort to her dismay. Like a fish dodging a hand in the water.

"I am not lying."

"You ARE!" She insisted, trying again to swipe him but missing again.

"Your father was poisoned with something that science has never seen before."

"There's no such thing!" She shouted this time jumping to his position, he dodged again, but this time she scratched him slightly on his side. There were three claw marks with a tiny fourth one.

"There are new things being discovered every day little one."

"Rooaaaachh!" She shouted as she jumped toward him but instead landed on a table that was just in the wrong place, ramming herself into furniture and wall she didn't anticipate the pain that would be greeting her as she rose.

"Oh no." The blue mutant responded to her pain coming close to her and examining her.

Her collar bone had been snapped as it was the main point of impact, but he watched as she made some pained moans and it went back into place healing itself immediately.

"Amazing. Your healing is faster than your father's." He said in amazement.

"Tell me the truth!"

"The truth is that your father died of a poison that made his systems attack themselves!" He told her again.

She could smell that he was telling her the truth, but the angry little girl in her didn't want to listen… She wanted her daddy back.

"JESSICA!" She heard from her side, looking to the voice she was lifted off her feet and dangled in the air.

"PUT ME DOWN!" She yelled to the telepath who was using her telekinesis to hold her there.

"What are you doing?" The redhead asked concerned.

"Making him admit it!"

"Admit what?"

"That he killed my dad!" She responded.

"That's ridiculous!"

"Haaa!" Jessica sent a small lighting bold at Jean zapping her off her feet making her lose hold of her telekinetic bindings.

What Jessica didn't see coming was being grabbed by two big strong arms upon landing. Her Uncle held onto her strategically holding her hands in one of his hands and using his other arm to hold her legs still so even if she did kick it couldn't be very hard.

"Noohahoo!" She said emotionally.

"Jessie, you've known me ever since you were born, why would I hurt your father?"

"I don't know!"

"I wouldn't. I loved you dad like he was a brother. Seeing him suffer like that hurt me more than you know." He spoke calmly, sensing that she was starting to understand his words deeper than she had been before.

"You know, when your parents were pregnant with you, he came to me to ask how to be a dad." At this she perked up curious more than angry.

"Aaahhaaahaaaa!" She cried out, knowing that he was right, he'd never hurt her or her family.

"Yo! What's goin' on here!?" Evan asked confused at the sight before him.

He'd heard some of the commotion from the upper levels and wasn't sure whether his sister was ok, so he went down to check, and was greeted with this scene before him.

"Everything's ok Evan, Jessie just got a little confused that's all."

Jessie didn't ever realize that she'd been loosed from the arms around her as she cried, not only was she angry, she'd just accused her uncle, a close member of her family of killing her dad… The shame was coming down on her hard. And the only thing she could do was own up to it.

"I – I'm so sorry!" She said back to the blue man who looked at her with compassionate eyes understanding her anger.

"You are alright Jessica. You're alright."

He reassured her getting down to her level which was currently the floor and putting his hands on her shoulders. The others joined in a moment later surrounding and hugging the repentant girl.

I'm sorry if this is a lousy chapter, I'll try and do better on the ones following.