Logan’s visit to Emma Frost’s little academy of oddities was to no avail; Rogue was long gone, and Miss Frost had one blue eye and one green eye all of a sudden, and seemed to be quietly whole again, rather than the strong, but broken, woman she had been back at Xavier’s. It was just that she silently seemed to talk to herself; although Logan was glad that the woman’s restraint and social savvy kept her from drifting away from other people. If only she’d stop switching accents at random from dangerously soft and oh-so-educated and dapper, to brash and borderline-crass Midwestern.
Logan rather liked her more coldly practical approach to mutant-human relations, as they were something he could better grasp and approve of than Xavier’s idealism, but Logan was keenly aware of his own flaws, and aware that striving for perfection produced more and more honorable positive results than ruthlessness, because life was more than survival; it was about honor, and being able to live with himself for the many, many, many years he had left in his seemingly endless goddamned life.
So he came home to an emergency close to––although he still winced to call it thus, because of how unnatural the world felt on his tongue––home: a big goddamned fire, obviously arson and obviously involving Pyro.
It took an hour to track down the room where Pyro kept half a dozen hostages, threatening to burn them to a crisp. Logan knocked him out just as Storm called down a torrential downpour and Iceman made a flame-shield, preventing the hostages from scorching.
Logan was left patrolling the ash and making sure none of Magneto’s other friends had been around, when he saw a hunched, ash-coated figure, cursing and digging for something at the edge of the site. She smelled like the fire, and Logan could glean nothing else, except that she was female, from the south, and had a colorful vocabulary which she used in new and creative ways that even impressed him, and he himself could make a sailor blush. He watched her dig for five minutes and then pull out a battered steel case, scorched and minimally dented, from under a few rafters.
“Victory!” she muttered in a satisfied growl. “Damned fire-bug. Inconvenient as fuck.” She dusted off the case and then opened it after some careful code-entering. “Yes! fire-shielding for the win!”
Logan had, by now, silently stepped up behind her. “Who are you?” he growled from around his cigar.
The girl sprung to her feet, snapping the metal case shut and spinning to face him, instinctively crouched in a fighting stance that could take down someone twice her weight, especially since she was poised to wield the metal case like a weapon.
Logan was a little impressed, even if he was pretty sure that he was more like three times the girl’s weight, with all the adamantium.
Then the girl’s eyes widened a little, but then she actually smiled. “Oh. Hey, Logan.” She straightened up.
With skillful ease, Logan pinned her against the remainder of a wall, claws to her throat. In a casual, business-like voice, he asked, “How do you know me?”
Rogue seemed to passively allow him to pin her, still smirking a little. Her teeth were starkly white, smeared as her face was with ash; even her white streak wasn’t visible under the thick muck of raindrops and burnt building. She looked like a shadow with human eyes and mouth. “Xavier’s,” she said simply. “And mutual friends.” Not entirely a lie.
Logan’s eyes were still narrowed. “You don’t sound familiar.”
Rogue sighed and pointed at her hair, then seemed to notice the ash, and grabbed a lock, tugging on it and freeing it of enough ash to show a hint of a white streak and a glint of brown. “Ah’m used t’ bein’ a little more recognizable.”
Logan’s eyebrows raised briefly, and he gave a grunt of acknowledgement, retracting the claws. “Fury’s.”
“I’m not partial t’ the possessive, but yeah, Ah know Fury.”
“Did he tell you my name?” Logan was wary.
Rogue smirked. Well, sort of. “No. He didn’t tell me.” Before Logan could ask anything else, Rogue looked around, spotting another X-man figure in the distance. “Oh, hey, it’s the whole crew. Ah thought that rain was unnatural, but considerin’ it was focused on a different part of the fire than I was in, Ah was understandably distracted.” As if she’d just noticed, she started dusting off the sleeves of her muck-covered coat.
Logan looked her over. “Bullshit.”
Rogue put her hands on her hips. “Ah wasn’t wearin’ the trench coat at the time. Ah had to go t’ my car an’ get it or Ah’d be diggin’ around in the ash practically naked. Ah’m fireproof, but most a’ my clothin’ ain’t.”
Logan looked at her a little more intently.
Rogue crossed her arms over her chest. “Don’t. Even. Think about it,” she growled, suddenly serious and suddenly not joking or lighthearted in the least.
Logan raised an eyebrow and smirked. “Don’t know what ya mean, darlin’.”
Rogue snorted, carefully relaxing again with a visible effort, and looked over her shoulder in another direction before turning to Logan again. “Actually, speakin’ of my car: it’s kinda...well, it’s that mess over there.” She pointed at a vehicle that had been half-crushed by a large bit of furniture that had been flung from the formerly burning building. “Can Ah get a lift? Maybe hang out at the school for a while? Ah was kinda livin’ in that car, y’see.”
Logan had to admit, he was already partial to her. She was amusing, and he was curious as to how she managed to appear so old and so young all at once. “What’s your name, kid?”
She arched an eyebrow and put her hands on her hips. “Just ‘cause ya older than the hills doesn’t mean ya can call everyone kid. Especially not me.” She snorted and lifted her chin a little in defiance, but her smile was a little soft and a lot bitter. “My name’s Rogue. Nice t’ finally meet ya, Sugah.”
Logan almost dropped his cigar. As it was, he had to catch it shortly after his jaw dropped. He glared at her, expecting a laugh, but she was only looking at him with an intent sort of curiosity. And he stared back, trying to read her face through the streaks of gray ash. It was a fine enough face, from what he could tell. He took in a deep breath through his nose, finally catching a few faint, fresh traces of that oh-so-familiar scent from under the ash, especially sinse she was beginning to sweat a little under the trench coat; from warmth rather than nervousness, he could tell, because she was utterly calm. And Logan had no doubt at all that she was the Rogue who had given him the keys to his past. He took a slow pull of his cigar and asked, “What took you so long?” he asked finally.
Rogue smirked a bit, but then visibly hesitated, looking over her shoulder toward the now-no-longer-faint sound of an approaching fire engine siren that had been giving Logan a head ache for the last ten minutes. “There’s some people in this city and through other parts a’ the state that Ah don’t want knowin’ Ah’m not dead on the side a’ the road somewhere between Mississippi an’ Alaska.”
“It’s a big city.”
She looked at Logan again and snorted with a faint smirk. “That’s puttin’ it lightly, Sugah; it’s New York. But it’s also unfamiliar turf that Ah don’t want them catchin’ me on, even if the chances of them seein’ me are slim, they can never really be slim enough. Of course, Ah’m not so vulnerable as Ah used t’ be.” She looked up at him with eyes that glinted with faint traces of green. “Also, Ah was busy. And in the midst of business Ah was...interrupted.” She pushed her hair behind her ear, a faint glint from the white streak in her hair catching the light.
Logan nodded. “I’d gathered.” His face was drawn in a look of cold understanding. “I found your blood on top of the statue.”
Rogue gave a low sound of acknowledgement. “I’d wondered if you an’ the X-men had looked int’ it. That’s where Ah got the white streaks, ya know: the mixture of what Ah took from Erik and what the machine took from me.” She did not look shaken and battered about it now, but there was a solemnity and low anger in the words that Logan recognized, and could relate to all too well. She held his gaze, not asking for pity or demanding anything, just stating fact and watching him passively.
Logan looked at the remains of the vehicle she’d claimed was her car. “So what did you have to do with the fire?”
Rogue smirked a little. “Nothin’, actually. It was Sabertooth’s ass who went after me ‘cause he thought Ah knew somethin’ about the scheme. Ah didn’t. Ah was just makin’ use of the electronics systems in the place to get into a local bank mainframe.”
Logan considered this. “Where is he?”
“Trapped in a sewer pipe with the back of his head smashed in. Actually...” Rogue tried to look at her watch and sighed, tapping at the melted metal and plastic half-glued to her wrist. “Dammit. Now Ah’m a goddamned paintin’ by Salvador Dali. Do ya know what time it is?”
“Never liked that painting,” Logan muttered, but looked at his own watch, which was more flame-retardant. He told her the time.
“He should be awake by now, but he ain’t goin’ anywhere for a while.” Her grin was vicious and had a hint of sadism in it.
Logan’s communicator went off at his hip, and he picked it up. “Yeah? No, none of the others. Sabertooth mighta been here, but he’s––” he gave Rogue a significant look “-gone off somewhere, the bastard.” He listened a little more. “No. Nobody injured, an’ no bodies. I did find somebody diggin’ around, though. She’s comin’ with us.”
Rogue could faintly hear the murmur of Scott Summers’ voice, asking the predictable question, to which Logan had such an unpredictable answer.
“She’s a friend of mine, gettin’ into trouble, I’d guess. Her car got fucked up from the fire.” A slight pause. “Not funny, One-eye. No strip joints like that in this part of town anyway. We’ll meet up with ya in a sec.” he snapped the phone shut and turned back to Rogue. “You got anything else left in that car?”
Rogue looked around at the ground around them and seized a battered-looking duffle bag, formerly camouflaged amongst the other debris at her feet by its less-than-thrilling coloration and thin coating of ash, and hefted it over her shoulder. She still had the big metal case in her other hand. “Nah. Let’s go.” The bag and the case together appeared to weigh about as much as Rogue did, but she carried them as though they were little more than pillows, even as they started walking towards the blackbird.
Logan’s brow furrowed, suddenly remembering a steel vault door mangled and ripped off of its hinges. “How strong are you, exactly?”
“Exactly? Not sure. But Ah know Ah can pick up an entire eighteen wheeler. Ah coulda thrown it if Ah’d wanted to.” She hesitated. “That’s a long story.”
“You’d better have time to tell a few long stories once we get to the mansion.” Logan gave her a severe look.
“Did Ah mention Ah can kick your ass six ways from Sunday? You’d better be glad Ah like you, ‘cause your people skills leave somethin’ to be desired.”
“How do you know me?” Logan growled.
“Luckily, that story’s not so long: Fury.”
“You said he didn’t tell you my name.”
“He didn’t tell me. He touched me. Before Ah had control. T’ be fair, he was tryin’ to save me from a few thugs an’ his fightin’ skills, once Ah had ‘em, helped out quite a bit. ‘Course, it knocked him out on his ass for a few days.” She shrugged.
“So you had his memories.”
“Have. Ah can keep the mental stuff with some effort. And unlike some of the sleaze-balls who’ve tried to grab me in the distant past, Fury’s a good man. And his head had plenty in it worth holdin’ on to.” She looked at the other X-men, now nearly in hearing distance and waiting for them under the blackbird. Scott in particular looked particularly suspicious, and Rogue fell silent.
Scott immediately stepped up to her with a harsh, “Who are you?”
Rogue pushed her duffle bag at him, catching him off guard as the weight hit his gut, forcing him to catch it. “Ah’m your guest. The name’s Rogue. Hold onto that for me, will ya?” She then brazenly sidled past him and up the steps of the blackbird.
Scott gaped openly as Logan merely smirked and followed her. “C’mon, Scooter.”
“Asshole,” Scott bit out. “And how the Hell was she carrying this thing?”
“I dunno, but I think I like her,” Storm mused, sounding amused.
“She seemed a little ungrateful, considering,” Jean said, even as she started up the steps with a faint smirk on her lips.
“Maybe it was her way of matching Scooter’s unique brand hospitality,” Logan said as he made his way up the last few steps of the plane.
“The man has a point, Scott,” Storm sighed, and made her way into the plane.
Scott muttered under his breath irritatbly, but followed.
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