She was aware of being followed. They shadowed her, black-clad figures in a sea of brightly dressed New Orleans shoppers. She tried to ignore the fear that made her chest painfully tight. After all, it was kin to another sort of fear she’d sworn to defeat, no matter what the cost.

The sun glinted off of the sunglasses of one of the men in the group. She almost turned, almost looked curiously at him. Not that she needed actual sight, of course. It was simply a reflex. That’s what her husband would have said, anyway, had he been there.

She kept up a steady pace, trying not to let it be known that she realized that they were following her. The apartment where she lived was only another block or two away. It wouldn’t be too long before she could block them out, forget about them. If they were her husband’s associates, angry with him or merely sent to protect her, they wouldn’t come into her home, by force or otherwise. She knew that from too many years of experience.

---

“She’s aware of us,” the redheaded woman in black said to the man wearing the red-lensed sunglasses who walked casually beside her.

While they weren’t wearing the uniforms of the X-Men, the three men and four women were dressed in black shirts and pants, each suited to his or her own style. The Professor had asked that they be as circumspect as possible in this city where humans outnumbered mutants four thousand to one. After having seen what had happened to some of the less fortunate mutants from this area, the X-Men were all forced to agree.

“I can smell the fear on her. We’re going to have to tread lightly with this one,” the other dark-haired man said. His mouth was twisted up in what was perhaps a habitual sneer, but his eyes held only wariness and determination to catch their prey.

“I’m amazed to hear the Wolverine talk about treading lightly in anything,” the blond man said lightly, a small smile playing across his lips at the glare he received for that one.

“When you’ve hunted the way I’ve had to hunt, Icy, for as many years, then you’ll know that there is always a time to tread lightly when dealing with skittish prey,” the Wolverine replied with a low growl.

“She thinks we’re in league with her husband somehow, and this alone seems to comfort her, for her husband’s acquaintances have never approached her home closely before. She lives mostly alone because her husband is away a lot of the time. I can’t quite read what it is her husband does, but whatever it is, I believe she has no part in it,” the redhead said.

“Are you sure about that? We may not have any definite answers about the guy, but we’ve got plenty of rumor and speculation to go on,” the Wolverine said darkly, glaring at the back of the woman now entering a very neat, modern apartment building.

“Rumor and speculation aren’t enough for us to use against this guy, Wolverine,” the man in the sunglasses said wearily, as if repeating something for the tenth time. The Wolverine just grunted.

They reached the door to the apartment building. Thankfully, it wasn’t in a nice enough neighborhood to use buzzers to get in. The youngest looking woman slid her face into the wall in what everyone apparently though was a normal move, and then she peaked back out again.

“No security systems,” she said. “They’re a very trusting lot, this building’s tenants.”

“And we can definitely take advantage of that,” the Wolverine said. Metal claws slid out of his hands, long and gleaming in the sunlight.

“Wolverine, no! There’s an easier way to get in. Remember, we don’t make any show of violence until we know whether or not she’s involved,” the redhead said, putting a hand on the Wolverine’s wrist. Her eyes focused on the doorknob and narrowed. The air around the group seemed charged for a moment, and then the knob began to turn. “There, that wasn’t so hard,” she said finally, pushing open the door.

They filed in quickly and followed the redhead’s lead up the stairs. The door she stopped at was the second one on the second floor, a dingy yellow thing that was probably supposed to be cheerful. The man in sunglasses stepped forward and knocked.

---

Marie was certain that she’d seen the last of her black-clothed shadows when she looked out her window and realized with relief that they were nowhere in view. She set down the bag she’d been carrying and sighed. She was glad that her husband was rarely around. It gave her time for what was most important to her: writing. She was currently working on a collection of originally rewritten fairy tales. She had a publisher for them already, and with five stories done, she only had three more to go.

Her laptop beckoned her from the small desk in the main room which was its home. The beautiful machine had been a present to her from Remy, although when he had given it to her, he had expressed scorn that she would ask for something like this for their anniversary when he could just as easily have bought her jewels or pretty clothes. She hadn’t been able to explain her love of writing to him then, and she was sure she never would.

There were times when Marie wondered about her marriage, if it was everything that she had hoped for as a little girl playing with dolls. But, really, what more could a woman whose skin was lethal hope for than a husband whose night-time pursuits were definitely of the illegal kind and a small apartment in a wealthy city where he could hide away when he needed to? Remy had never laid a hand on her in anger, and she had to be grateful for that, she was sure. And she cared for him, even if it wasn’t the all-consuming love she’d longed for as a teenager. Even if he didn’t seem to care all that much back.

Marie sometimes had to admit to herself that Remy had probably only married her because he hadn’t wanted all of the chasing he’d done to be in vain. He’d never married any of the other mutant girls he’d slept with in their gang, the Shadows, back in Mississippi four years ago. At the time, she’d told herself that he also hadn’t looked at them the way he looked at her, his dark eyes flaming red with passion that he couldn’t act on. That he hadn’t whispered in the other girls’ ears about ways to get past their more disfiguring mutations, hadn’t promised them the world and more.

He had. She was sure of that now. Knowing Remy as she had come to in the last four years, he’d have done anything to get his way.

Of course, there was a part of Marie that thought, wistfully, that perhaps Remy really had thought he loved her, during those days of promises and dating. She usually managed to repress those thoughts because she knew them to be untrue. Remy loved himself first, best, and only. It was foolish to think otherwise.

Marie often regretted that she had gotten involved with him at all, especially when, after a year of marriage, she discovered that her husband had decided to become a professional thief because he’d had so much success with it while their gang was still intact. He preferred to prey on the rich humans than to do honest—or at least legal—work. She tried to distance herself in as many ways possible from that part of him while still remaining a loyal, if not loving, wife. After all, she couldn’t divorce him. There would be nowhere else for her to turn, no one to support her. She didn’t have many friends in New Orleans, or anywhere else for that matter, and the ones she did have were barely able to survive on their own. With a GED but no college education and very few skills besides writing, there wasn’t anything else Marie could do but stick it out in her marriage.

Every once in a while, as she sat at her laptop and typed, the half-formed thought of leaving once the book was finished, if it sold well, entered her mind. Marie usually dismissed it, though. She wrote for herself, not because she was sure she’d be a hit. The same little imp that made her mind wander to leaving pointed out at these times that she wouldn’t be publishing the book if there wasn’t a reason she wanted or needed the money. She always answered it with silence.

The knock on her worn door interrupted Marie’s thoughts. Her first fearful thought was that it was her shadows from earlier, coming to interrogate her or worse. She pushed that thought away. More than likely it was her neighbor, Helen, whom she spent some time with every once in a while, when the other woman was bored with her own home life and not wanting to put up with the antics of her two teenage sons.

Marie made sure that the chain latch was secure before opening the door, just in case. She wished, not for the first time, that the door had a little peep-hole so that she could see visitors first, but there was nothing she could do about that. The landlord had specified that any work on the apartment had to be approved by him, and he’d been so slimy the first time she’d met him that Marie avoided contact with him as much as possible.

The sight beyond the crack that the chain provided proved her fear to have been well-founded. Her shadows, the seven black-clad men and women, stood crowded in the small hallway. Was it just her imagination that made the sunglasses worn by the man in front gleam with a red light? Her mother had always said that red was an evil color, but Marie had never believed it. If she had, she certainly wouldn’t have married Remy. Still, look where that had gotten her.

“Hello, Rogue. Mind if we talk to you for a few minutes?” the man asked, as calmly as if he was a neighbor or a casual acquaintance. And he knew her name, the one she’d gone by during her stint in the Mississippi gang. She was pretty sure she didn’t like that.

“Look, I don’t know who you freaks are, or how you’re associated with Gambit, but I want you to leave. Now,” Marie said, making her voice stronger than her quaking insides felt. She used Remy’s street name, the first she’d known him by. Back when she’d been the Rogue, and had more than she did now, in almost every way that counted.

“We’re not associates of your husband, Rogue. We’re here to see that some wrongs that he’s been committing are made right,” the redheaded woman behind the guy with the glasses said.

Marie wasn’t sure what to make of this all. None of the people her husband worked with had ever come to her door before. They’d never asked to speak with her, had never shown any interest in her whatsoever unless they were on guard detail. Add to that the fact that she knew that Remy was involved in at least minor criminal activity, and Marie found herself facing a problem she wasn’t at all prepared to deal with.

“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” she said sincerely, hoping that the truth would drive them away. She saw the leader look back at the redhead, who nodded. He turned back to face Marie.

“I believe that you don’t know what’s been going on, Rogue. But maybe it’s time that you found out. You could be the key to helping us fix a very bad situation,” he said quietly, leaning forward intensely. Marie didn’t have any doubts that he meant every word he said.

After another moment of hesitation, she unlatched the chain and stepped back. She did have one weapon that would get rid of them, which she would use if she had no other choice. However, for now she would hear them out.

“Come on in,” Marie said neutrally.

They filed in, one after another, faces grim except for one Eurasian woman who winked at Marie. She smiled back thinly, then turned to see them all perched on any available surface in her small apartment’s main room. One man, the roughest and most dangerous looking of the lot, sat in her desk chair. That should have made her more than a bit upset. No one sat there but her, not even Remy. But she didn’t really care too much now. There was more at stake, it seemed.

“Now, can you please explain to me what exactly is going on?” Marie asked the guy in the glasses. “And who are you anyway?” No use thinking of him as “the guy in the glasses” if she could get his name.

“I’m Scott. This is Jean,” he said, pointing to the redhead, then going around the circle he introduced, “Bobby, Ororo, Kitty, and Jubilee. Oh, and Logan.” He added that last while pointing at the man sitting in her chair, and to Marie it sounded as if he didn’t really like the guy.

“Okay, so I know your names. You know I’m the Rogue. Now, what do you know about Gambit?” Marie still wasn’t ready to trust these people all the way.

“Well, I’m sure that you’ve heard of human groups who are illegally capturing mutants and selling them as slaves for various purposes,” Scott began, looking questioningly at Marie to see if she had heard the rumors.

“Yes, I’ve known about that. But what -- you don’t think Gambit’s helping humans kidnap mutants, do you? He may – that is, his activities may not always be legal, but he’d never hurt one of us!” Marie said earnestly, feeling that she should defend her husband in this case. He really wouldn’t do something so terrible. He knew what it was like to be a single, young mutant trying to escape from people like that.

Scott shook his head. “No, your husband isn’t helping the humans, Marie. He’s part of a group of mutants who decided to take revenge on humans for what they’re doing. They call themselves the Nightstalkers, and they’re starting to gain attention. Not many humans really cared when it was mutants being kidnapped and sold into slavery, but they’re paying attention to the same being done to their own kind,” he said, then he stopped to let the truth sink in.

“Gambit isn’t – he isn’t doing that to humans, is he? Kidnapping them and selling them into slavery?” Marie asked, horror-stricken.

“I’m afraid that he may be, Rogue. We’ve received information suggesting that he’s near to the head of the operation. We don’t have any facts yet, though, and that’s where we were hoping you could help us,” Scott said gently.

“How? Gambit doesn’t tell me anything about his work, not really. I had to drag what I do know out of him, and that’s obviously not as much as I thought,” Marie said bitterly, sinking down onto a corner of the coffee table. She’d been standing since her guests had entered, as on the defensive as she could be, but now she needed something besides her weak legs to support her.

“We know that you and he were part of a gang of mutants in Mississippi. You called yourselves ‘The Shadows,’ and some of the mischief you got into was far more illegal than that of other teen groups. One of the gang’s old members knows us, and he told us about you. Remember Pyro?” Jean asked.

“St. John? You know him?” Marie did remember one of the few friends she still was in occasional contact with. He’d always been there for her, no matter what, and sometimes when she was lonely she’d chat with him online. Talking with St. John had always made her feel better.

“Yes. He came to live at the school for mutants where we work,” Scott told her.

“School for mutants? I didn’t know there was such a thing,” Marie said in shock. If she had, she might have headed straight for it four years ago instead of joining the Shadows to support herself.

“It’s run by Professor Charles Xavier. The Professor got St. John out of jail when he’d been arrested for arson. He earned his high school degree at the school, and now he’s in college, but he’s still living with us,” Scott told her.

“Why didn’t Johnny ever tell me this?” Marie asked, starting to get suspicious. Surely he would have mentioned it, at least!

“He said that he thought at first that you were too in love with your husband to leave him, and then he thought that you wouldn’t leave out of duty or something like that,” Jean said, putting a hand on her arm.

Marie reflexively pulled away, her eyes narrowed. “You’re lucky that wasn’t bare skin, lady. Otherwise you’d be on the floor right now, not exactly conscious, and I’d have your mutation for a while,” she said harshly, eyes suddenly blazing. No one touched her, especially not mutants. It was an unspoken rule that even those who didn’t know her seemed to follow.

“I know, Rogue. That doesn’t scare me,” Jean said with a soft smile.

Marie was unable to process that at the moment, so she turned back to Scott. “What does my having been in that gang in Mississippi have to do with anything?” she asked angrily. These were very strange people, or so it seemed to her.

Scott didn’t answer. Instead, the one he’d called Logan said in a rough voice, “You can say that you’re bored where you are right now. Say that you’ve been feelin’ the need to get some action out in the city. Follow your husband where he goes, help him, gain his trust. Then you might start hearing the things we need.”

Marie raised an eyebrow at him. “Do you think that my husband won’t find that a little strange? I’ve never wanted to take the family business back up, and he knows that. Also, how would I get the information you say you want back to you?” She listed all of the objections she could think of.

The group was silent for a moment. Then the one called Jubilee jumped up and started to pace. Apparently, this was normal behavior, because no one’s expressions changed a bit. It didn’t seem to help her, though, because she didn’t suggest anything.

Finally, the white haired woman Scott had introduced as Ororo spoke up. “What you need are some new friends, ones who are involved in something not quite legal as well, and who are interested in doing more. Some women, perhaps, and a man, who will induce you to become the Rogue once again,” she said.

Marie was awed by the craftiness of the woman’s plan, if she understood her rightly. “But who would volunteer for something like that? And what would they be doing that would be ‘not quite legal’?” she asked.

“As for the second question, we can decide on that in a while. In answer to the first, Jubilee, Kitty, Logan and I will be your new friends,” Ororo said calmly, as if she was commenting on the weather.

The room was suddenly in an uproar. Logan and Kitty were vehemently protesting that they be involved, while Jubilee was jumping around the room excitedly, looking for all the world as if being told that she was going to become a pseudo-criminal was the best thing that had ever happened to her.

“No, ‘Ro’s right,” Scott said loudly, effectively quieting the din. “Logan, your past will help you blend in perfectly with the less-than-legal, and so will Jubilee’s and ‘Ro’s. Kitty, your mutation is one that would be perfect for a thief, and the underworld would just assume that you decided to take advantage of it, just like they all do.”

These arguments apparently made sense to Kitty and Logan, because they finally shut up and stopped shaking their heads. But Marie saw that Logan didn’t look happy with these developments at all.

“Now, Rogue, we have to know if you’ll be willing to help us,” Scott said, looking at her. She somehow got the impression that, despite the glasses, he was staring straight into her eyes, willing her to agree.

She didn’t need much persuasion. If Remy was involved in such a horrible business, then he needed to be stopped. It was for his own sake as well as for the sake of however many human lives would be affected.

“All right, I’ll do it,” she said quietly. “There’s two empty apartments in the loft of this building that are going to be put up for rent in the next week. Their current tenants are sick of dealing with the landlord, who’s as much a piece of slime as he is human. He doesn’t like mutants, but he likes money, so he’ll rent ‘em to you. Just make sure that you keep an eye out and get to him first. Then I’ll ‘meet’ my new neighbors, and we’ll start hanging around each others’ apartments until it won’t seem strange to see us together. Gambit’s due for another visit in a month or so. That should give us some time to get established,” Marie finished. Her voice rang with the old authority she’d used when she’d had to lead sections of the Shadows on trips to find food or shelter. There was no use in being unorganized about this, after all.

“Wouldn’t it seem strange that we move into these two apartments at the same time and you’re instantly friends with us, and then you’re always with us?” Kitty asked.

“No,” Marie answered immediately. “There aren’t any other mutants living in this neighborhood. I’ll explain it to Gambit, and he’ll believe me. He doesn’t pay all that much attention to me anyway.”

“Obviously,” Logan said quietly. Marie glared at him, but decided to ignore that little comment.

“All right then. We’ll leave to start getting things set up. Rogue, so that you know, Logan goes by the name Wolverine at times like this. Ororo goes by Storm. Kitty’s Shadow Cat, but Jubilee’s always just Jubilee,” Scott said, standing up. He smiled at Jubilee as he added that last bit, as if it was a joke between them. She grinned back at him, and Marie found herself longing for that kind of companionship.

Maybe, just maybe, she actually could make friends with these people even while they were working on this problem. It would be nice to have more friends.

“Marie,” she said impulsively. When everyone looked at her, she blushed and said, “My real name is Marie.”

“St. John didn’t tell us that. I guess he was trying to protect you as much he could,” Jean said, laying her hand on Marie’s arm again. This time, she didn’t shrug away. “It’s a beautiful name, Marie.” With that she went to the door and opened it, then looked back expectantly.

Scott smiled at her a little as he left with Jean in tow. To Marie’s surprise, Ororo patted her arm and Jubilee hugged her tightly on their way out. Kitty smiled shyly as she clung to the hand of the blond guy, Bobby. Logan was the last to leave, and the hard look he gave her made her shiver. It felt like he looked all the way into her soul and was disappointed by what he found.

When they were gone she closed the door and latched it, then sat down on her couch. So much had happened in the last twenty minutes that she wasn’t sure how to handle it. One thing was certain, though. She was about to get the kind of adventure she thought she’d left behind. Suddenly, the idea was an exciting and intriguing one. She supposed that she had missed it, after all.

---

Logan couldn’t get the events of the last hour out of his head as the Blackbird took them swiftly back to Westchester. The way that woman, Marie, Rogue, whatever she wanted to call herself, had talked about her marriage, it was like she didn’t even care that her husband was an asshole who barely had anything to do with her.

From the way he’d seen Jean and Scott Summers interact, Logan was pretty sure that there was such a thing as love, at least for some people. He knew that it took hard work. He admitted to himself that he’d made things even harder for the couple during his first few months at Xavier’s, but eventually the thrill of flirting with Jean to see her blush and make Scott angry had lessened. He’d pretty much given up on that, except for the occasional pass he’d make for the fun of it.

Logan was by nature a very private person. In the last three years he’d had more personal interaction with other mutants than he’d ever had in the eighteen years he could remember living. Ever since Xavier had involved him in fighting Magneto’s failed plot to turn all humans into mutants, he’d felt as if he was as much a part of this group as he’d ever be a part of anything. He wasn’t sure what he felt about that. The fight itself had been fun, and the fights following it, when they’d had to track down Sabertooth, Mystique and Toad after they’d escaped, had been just as exciting, but the whole living part-time at Xavier’s mansion thing was what bothered him. There was a place for him there, and at times he felt he even belonged in it, but he’d still far rather be out on the road, searching for clues to his hidden past.

Of course, Xavier’s money and connections helped his search more than anything he’d ever been able to make fighting in cages across Canada. All the Professor asked in return was that he help the team known as the X-Men whenever they needed it, and that he train some of the older kids at the school in personal combat. Not so much, really, when Logan considered the amount of help the man was giving him.

However, despite his private nature and his desire to let others keep their own lives to themselves if they wished, he couldn’t help but wonder about this Marie. Was she really as innocent as she had appeared, with those big brown eyes, long dark hair and the face of an angel? Or did she know what was going on with her husband after all, and that was what made her so distant about the whole mess he’d gotten into?

Logan just couldn’t tell with her. They’d never heard anything criminal said about her besides what St. John had told them about the Shadows, that Mississippi gang, and that had been more about survival than anything else. Logan understood about doing what you had to just to survive. But you never knew with some people. One criminal activity could excite them so much that they would seek out more and more, and not always the big jobs. As Scott brought the plane down onto the Blackbird’s landing pad, Logan resolved to keep an eye on the woman, just in case.

Marie watched for her expected new neighbors a week later. She was just finishing up her rewritten “Cinderella” story when she heard someone pull up in front of the building. She got up and stretched, then went over to the window overlooking the street and peered out.

A moving truck sat there, and a black convertible pulled up behind it not a minute later. Logan and Storm got out of the car at the same time as two men opened the truck’s doors. Bobby and St. John went around to the back of the truck and released the catch, allowing the door to slide up.

Marie’s breath caught when she saw St. John. It’d been years since she’d seen her friend. He definitely looked older and a lot more mature than he had at sixteen. Seeing him brought back a lot of memories, both good and bad, that she’d avoided in these last few years.

With a weird sort of perception, both Logan and St. John looked up to see her staring down at them. Logan frowned and turned away, but St. John grinned and almost waved before remembering that he wasn’t supposed to know her, that he was, in fact, supposed to be a mover. It was the sort of thing that made St. John who he was, and Marie laughed a little to see that at least some things hadn’t changed.

For the rest of the day she went on with her normal activities. She wrote, cooked, cleaned up a little, then wrote some more. Finally, around 10 pm she was tired enough to sleep.

Marie never went to bed until she was sure she’d be gone the second her head hit the pillow. It was too hard, lying awake in the dark, cold and alone in a bed built for two. She never stayed in bed if she couldn’t sleep. Instead, she’d get up, make herself some hot chocolate, and watch late night TV until she really was tired.

This was not a sleep-as-soon-as-your-head-hits-the-pillow night. Marie realized very quickly that she was in no state to go to bed yet, despite how tired she was, so she got back up and went into the kitchen to make her hot chocolate. As she watched the cup spinning around in the microwave, her thoughts drifted to what she was about to do.

It would probably mean at least prison for Remy. Those humans who kidnapped mutants had gotten sentences of imprisonment when they’d been caught, mostly because there were enough mutant supporters in the government to push the charges through. Of course, there were more supporters of the new Humanity First political party, as it was on the rise in mainstream politics. If Remy were to be caught and convicted of kidnapping humans, the consequences would not be pretty.

Marie sighed as the timer on the microwave went off. She retrieved her cup and went into the living room, deciding to curl up on the couch and think some more. Once she got started on pondering her life, it was often difficult for Marie to stop.

Her mind slipped back to the days when she’d first become a Shadow. All of the teens hiding in the run-down building were runaways, and all were mutants. Each had experienced some sort of trauma when their power exhibited itself full force, causing them to break away from the lives they’d known.

She hadn’t been sure whom to trust back then. She’d been so afraid that her parents would find her, would make her go back home and then institutionalize her or something worse, that she’d decided not to be Marie anymore. That’s when she had become the Rogue.

As the Rogue, she was a scout for the Shadows, making sure that all of the jobs they did were secure before, during and after. She’d killed only once, but that violent death had convinced her that she never wanted to do so again. She avoided any job that seemed more dangerous than the usual sort after that.

No one in the Shadows was there to make friends, but it happened anyway. Rogue came to cherish her friendships with Pyro and others like him. One girl, known as Cara by everyone, was an especially frail mutant who raised Rogue’s protective instincts. She made sure that Cara had enough to eat and drink every day, and that no one messed with her.

Rogue’s first meeting with Gambit was the night of Cara’s death. She gone out with two other Shadows to rob one of the richer jewelry stores in town, an old shop owned by a human who foolishly thought that it could be protected by a less-than-state-of-the-art alarm system. Rogue had filled her bag with fine diamonds, sapphires and rubies and was just getting ready to leave when she saw the most beautifully delicate emerald-encrusted butterfly. The bejeweled insect had made her think of Cara, so she picked it up and slipped it into her pocket quickly on the way out.

Rogue didn’t have a chance to give Cara the pendant, though. When they reached the set of abandoned Victorians that the Shadows had made into their homes, Rogue went up to Cara’s room to find her friend lying cold and still on her cot. For some reason, Cara’s mutation, the ability to freeze particles of air into shards of ice, had gotten out of her control. She’d frozen the air in her own lungs.

Rogue was kneeling on the floor beside the dead girl, weeping hysterically, when Gambit had found her. He picked her up, ignoring her frantic cries to put her down so that her skin wouldn’t hurt him, and carried her to her room. On the way, he told one of the other Shadows to get rid of Cara’s body.

Although she refused to talk for almost an entire week, Gambit stayed with her, making sure that she ate and telling her parts of his own story. Other friends also watched over her, but it was Gambit she came to feel the most grateful for. And that was how their relationship began.

Looking back, it was a pretty sorry reason to go out with someone, but he was one of the few men she was attracted to who was actually willing to touch her, who didn’t seem to care about the fact that her skin could drain the life out of him in seconds. That made her attraction to him all that much stronger, Marie supposed.

Marie was finally ready to go to bed. After putting her cup in the sink, she walked heavily to her room, crawling under the sheets and pulling them tight around her. Thankfully, sweet oblivion caught her up as soon as her eyes closed.

---

Their first meeting was spontaneous enough, at least on Marie’s part. She’d spent the last few years so much alone that she’d almost forgotten how to deal with all of the social niceties of friends, but it all came back to her rather quickly. To her surprise, after a quick knock on her door and pretend introductions, she found herself laughing at her small kitchen table with Jubilee and Kitty, each with a cup of hot chocolate in front of her, being regaled with stories of growing up at their school for mutants. It reminded her of the better days she had spent with the Shadows, when they’d managed to scare up enough for everyone to eat well and relax for a week or so.

More visits followed, with Jubilee and Kitty “introducing” her to Ororo and Logan. Soon they were getting together every few days for dinner or a night of movies watched on the TV in one apartment or the other. Marie learned more about each of them, some of which she even believed, and she began to feel close to the other women. Logan, and her reaction to him, was another story. Marie couldn’t understand how he did it, but every time they were together in a group he managed to say something that would put her guard up, some sarcastic comment, and she’d shoot back at him. She was pretty proud of the fact that she usually gave as good as she got. There would be a moment of silence, and then Jubilee or Kitty or Ororo would pick up the conversation again as if nothing ever happened. Logan also wasn’t nearly as forthcoming about his past as the three women, and they were never alone together.

Marie learned that Ororo had an amazing ability with the weather. There were times when her control was a little off, such as the day they learned that a mutant down the street had disappeared and storm clouds quickly gathered in the sky above their building, but she usually kept a tight grip on her powers and rarely used them in overt ways. Jubilee was another story. She enjoyed showing off her “sparklies” whenever the opportunity presented itself. Marie did make the rule that no sparklies were allowed near her precious computer. Kitty’s ability to walk through walls--and other objects like sofas if she wasn’t careful--was kept as quiet as possible. They saw no need to worry the neighbors. They were after bigger fish, after all.

Logan remained a mystery to Marie as the weeks passed. She had no idea what his mutation could be, although she was sure he had one. The older she got, the easier it was to spot mutants. They all had ways of reacting to hide whatever it was that made them different, if they could. Logan tended to be careless with sharp objects but moved deliberately at all times, as if he was more aware of what his body was doing than any other person she’d ever known. There were times that she saw something almost feral in his eyes, especially when she mentioned her husband, so she avoided that topic as much as possible when they weren’t discussing their “mission.”

It felt good to be part of a group again, even if it was only for a little while. They went over their plans in Jubilee and Kitty’s apartment. Marie was sure that Remy didn’t have their apartment bugged, but they decided that there was no reason to overlook what might be a necessary precaution later on. So far, the five of them had decided that petty thievery was out. Remy would never believe that Marie suddenly had the itch for that after so many years of being content with the life he was providing her with. Ororo suggested gray market dealing in items she could provide from her own country. She thought that such a business would be a more logical one to have lured a young, lonely housewife into, and Marie had to agree there. Still, she wasn’t very comfortable dealing with something less than legal if it wasn’t a matter of survival. Only the reminder of what they were trying to stop persuaded her to go along with that plan.

---

Logan settled onto the couch in the apartment he was sharing with Ororo. While they had one time enjoyed a quick fling, it had settled into as deep a friendship as he ever permitted himself. They hadn't been physically intimate in years, but they were comfortable around each other and able to live in the same space without driving each other crazy, especially if duty called for it, which it did in this case.

As Logan let himself relax into the cushions underneath him, he closed his eyes and tried to block out the night noises around him. Sirens echoed in the distance but close enough for his ears to pick up. A baby cried somewhere a few buildings down. And one floor below him, a woman was crying. Logan growled and turned onto his side, resisting the urge to let his claws snap out.

Every time he thought of Marie—never Rogue anymore, really, and always Marie—he couldn't help the frustration that built up in him. What had happened to that woman to make her think that what she had was the best she could get in life? Every time he turned around, there she was, acting as if a lonely apartment and a computer were the only things she needed, wanted. Then some nights, like tonight, he would hear sobs that felt as if they ripped into his soul and pulled it towards her. He didn't want that. He didn't want a connection with her, but damn if one didn't seem to be forming despite both their attempts to antagonize each other.

Maybe it was her eyes. He was beginning to realize that Marie carried her whole soul in those eyes when she actually allowed you to see it. They were deep and dark, something he thought maybe she was sometimes. Kitty and Jubilee had been able to draw out more about how her mutation affected her and those around her. It seemed that she kept a part of the psyche of each person she touched permanently imprinted in her mind. Maybe she wasn't as lonely as he thought, if she had all those personalities up there, although they probably weren't much of a substitute for simple human—or mutant—kindness. The smiles she would give the women sometimes, when they did something nice for her or initiated a hug or a squeeze of her hand...those smiles were just beautiful. They lit up her face, and for a few moments she seemed truly, deeply happy. It was enough to take Logan's breath away. Usually he reacted to this by becoming gruffer even though he hated to see that smile fall when he blurted out some sarcastic remark. However, the spark that burned to life in her eyes when she came up with a good retort was almost worth losing that smile. It added a dimension to her that he really didn't want to know, a spitfire who could take care of herself.

Logan often had to remind himself that she had taken care of herself. From what they had learned from St. John and her own admissions, she'd been alone since she was sixteen, three months after putting the first boy to kiss her into a coma. For four years she had run with that Shadow gang, and from what St. John said she'd been more than able to hold her own. Sometimes he saw flashes of that when they were discussing their mission or when she got angry with him for some stupid remark, but then other times she seemed to soft and sad that he wanted to gather her in his arms and reassure her that she wasn't alone. He'd had his fill of reaching out to women who belonged to other men, though, so it was safer to keep his distance.


Distance was on his mind, and distance was what he hoped for, as his mind slipped into dreams. Instead, Marie was there, dark hair draped across a pillow, smooth skin suddenly touchable, shining eyes watching him as he ran his hands over her body. She moaned, pulling his mouth down to hers with soft hands. Their lips met and seemed to burst into flame. Tongues dueled, wet flesh sliding together and apart, teeth nipping and stinging. The feel of her, pliant and soft beneath him, drove him crazy. His hands found her round breasts, his mouth captured her moans as he pinched her nipples. He felt her body arch into his, press into him. He used one thigh to part hers, growling when he felt the moist heat there. His hands slid down to cup her buttocks, drawing her closer as her legs fell to either side, inviting him.

He pressed kisses to her jaw, her neck, his tongue worshiping the planes of her collarbone before he finally let his mouth find one of those tempting peaks. She screamed when he sucked strongly, her fingers tangled in his hair. She moaned when his mouth left her and then screamed again from the pleasure as his mouth found her other nipple and lavished the same attention on it. Meanwhile, he took one hand from her hip, slid it over to dip between her legs, playing with the curls there for a moment before he simply had to feel the heat of her, the slick folds that told him she was more than ready. She made the sexiest little sound in her throat when he rubbed her sensitive nub, a sound that transformed into a strangled cry when he slid first one, then another finger into her, swirling his fingers expertly. His thumb pressed on her clitoris, and she was bucking and screaming for him, holding him tightly.

After she came down from her orgasm, she ran her hands over him, exploring his chest as his mouth played with hers. Her fingers followed the trail of hair down his stomach, and then her hot fingers were wrapping around him, pulling him down to her. He growled as she guided him into her, feeling relief at the moist welcome of her body. Then they were moving together, and the only thing he felt was how tight she was, how right she felt even as she convulsed around him in her second and third orgasms. Then he found his own heaven in her arms, crying out her name. When he came down from his high he rolled off and held her in his arms as they both drifted off to sleep.


Logan woke slowly. He could swear his arms were still full of willing woman for half a second, and then he realized that it was morning, he was alone on the couch, and there was a large wet spot on the front of the sweatpants he wore in deference to Storm...or so he told himself. If he were being honest, he wasn't sure he could handle her waking up before him, coming into the main room of the apartment and seeing him with a raging hard-on. He really, truly hoped he wasn't calling out Marie's name in reality as well as in his dreams.