Heal Over
Chapter Four
He'd been telling the girl all day not to be afraid.
They were going to see some friends of his, he said. A big place, with lots more people. She watched his mouth as he spoke and Logan wasn't certain she understood. Still he promised her, over and over, that nobody would harm her. As if repetition had a magical ability that would shield the girl from fear.
It was a few hours drive to Westchester, going by the back roads to avoid traffic. Halfway there, the grey clouds turned black and rain splattered against the windshield, ran down the windows as if racing. Fat, loud drops that turned the car into a drum.
The kid was entranced.
"Water," she told Logan, shocked. It felt like a punch to his stomach. Without his adamantium ribcage.
"Uh-huh," he agreed, flipping on the windshield wipers. "Rain."
'Rain', she mouthed to herself, turning to the window. And stayed like that for the rest of the drive, delicate cheek pressed to the cold glass. Staring.
The rain made the ivy on the school's walls darker, almost black. Tar shaped into leaves. The white gravel of the drive became squishy grey mulch and Logan's boots obtained a fresh coat of mud.
The car's door handle made a wet *cliksh*.
"Come on, Baby."
He urged the girl to turn pulled her hands around his neck, her legs around his waist. He carried her with her weight resting in the crook of his arm, his other hand pressed between her shoulder blades. A hold designed to keep the kid dry as possible, but she didn't seem to care. The girl twisted her palm to catch the rain drops, fascinated. She tilted her head up in a search for the water source.
Rain ran across her cheeks, her forehead, her mouth. And almost reflexively Logan pressed his lips to her exposed throat. He didn't question this act later; it happened to quickly. She was too used to his touches to respond.
Up the drive, through the oak doors. The girl turned her head this way and that, absorbing the new, grand environment. So many things to see and keep track of. Logan felt her muscles tighten.
The entrance hall was a blur of polished wood and decadent paintings (which most visitors oohed and ahhed but Logan found no more stimulating than motel art. It was just fruit, for fuck's sake.). It was crowded, the noise and scent of teenagers penned in by the weather and hustling between classes. They stared curiously--a new facet to add to the Wolverine Legend--but knew better than to whisper amongst themselves yet or meet his gaze for too long.
The girl's breath came in sharp intakes, anxiety rising in her scents as if somebody had spun a dial. A faint whimper, and Logan worried her body would go into shock from the appearance of so many people.
"'Salright Kid. You're okay. You're safe." He glowered at Jubilee, who was gaping with particular zeal.
"Logan!" Ororo appeared as if summoned by magic, gliding out of the library. "The Professor said you were on your way but I expected tomorrow." Her dark eyes went to the girl, her face drawn in gentle concern.
"I wasn't far." he said. "Chuck here?"
Storm shook her head, touched the elbow of the nearest student. "Bobby, go down to Cerebro and tell Professor Xavier that Logan is back and waiting in his office."
"Yes, Ms. Munroe."
Ororo said she had a class soon, but walked Logan to Xavier's greeting center/classroom/office/general place of braggery. He held the girl tightly, marched though the space others cleared for him as he filled her in on the events of the previous weeks. In the spacious office, Logan eased the kid onto her feet.
"Hi there." Ororo gave the kid a kind smile, but kept her distance, a good fifteen feet. Logan's respect for the weather witch multiplied. The girl stared from the shelter of his side before burying her face in his jacket. Storm didn't take it personally.
When she was gone, ("I've got to get back. The students will be absolutely miserable if I'm not here to make them study the Cold War.") he leaned down and kissed the top of the girl's wet head. Waiting was awkward, but Logan didn't sit down. Something animal always called for him to stand when facing Xavier, and shifting up and down made the kid nauseous. He rubbed his hand down her spine and wondered if there'd been any better way to prepare her.
The rubber whirl of the Professor's wheelchair, the hiss of the handicap door opener.
"Good afternoon, Logan." Xavier greeted him with special enthusiasm, though he thought the old man seemed weary, pale as if recently ill. Chuck glanced toward the girl, then away as if she weren't there or he wasn't interested. "I'm pleased to see you arrived safely."
"Are you?" Logan couldn't resist.
Xavier's eyes widened with a surprise he thought neither entirely truthful nor entirely feigned. But his response, whatever it may have been, was interrupted. The door opened again, and in strode the only woman who's greatest talent was not telekinesis, but making an entrance. Jean absorbed all focus as if gifted with the lead role, a spotlight, and a set of stage directions no one else had access to.
Jean gave the girl a long, assessing gaze that went all the way up her thin body. A flicker of distaste, the faintest curl of a lipsticked mouth. And then, her green eyes shifted to Logan, became warm and teasing. There was no doubt the red haired doctor was a beautiful woman. And she was fully, constantly aware of this fact.
Theirs had always been a love-hate relationship...on Logan's side. Who knew what motivated Jean. She would tease him, ignore him, declare her devotion to Scott over and over. And just when Logan was ready to say to hell with it, she'd change. Jean would come to him--to his room, to the garage, to the locker room, to the holding space at rear of the Blackbird. Raking her nails across his skin and letting him know Scott was otherwise engaged. Logan could recall a particularly vivid instance when Jean, during a raid on a FOH base, had pulled him into an empty storage room. They'd fucked there, as the voices of their battling teammates drifted through the Comm.
And for the next month, Jean refused to speak to him.
The game had gone on so long Logan forgot what made him keep playing.
"...sorry you found yourself in circumstances without aid." Xavier was saying. "I'm sure you understand, I was looking toward the safety of the students here. I should have realized that your sympathies would lie with the victim of the moment, rather than the future--not that there's anything wrong with that!" Chuck's forehead crinkled with what could have been amusement. "But it has all worked out, and I'm pleased to see your instincts have delivered this poor child safely here."
"More or less," he told Xavier.
Jean's lip were tight,and if she shared the Professor's sentiment, it didn't show. "She looks terrible," she said, eyeing in the girls wet, tousled hair. "That is what you dressed her in? How could you let her go out in that?"
Logan looked down at the blue sweater and cotton pajama pants he'd found for the girl. He though they looked alright. "I had bigger shit to worry about than fashion," he said defensively, and saying 'fashion' like it was his version of foul language. Something inside him turned hard, and cold. An unplaceable anger without release. Though he didn't notice, the arm he'd wrapped around the girl had tightened, immovable as steel. Jean seemed surprised, perhaps expecting something a little less sharp and a lot more flirty.
"Is she hurt?" asked Jean, her demeanor suddenly soft, matronly.
No fucking shit, Logan thought. "Yeah. I've done what I could, but she's got some drugs in her I don't recognize. Her feet are torn to hell; she's got cuts and rib fractures and a bunch of other stuff you needta check out." Little harsher than he intended, and Jean was surprised into movement.
She crossed the carpeted space, speaking to the girl, who's heartbeat was so rapid(if not strong) that Logan imagined it breaking free of her chest, cutting through their clothing and his skin and continuing to pound inside his own ribcage. She peered out at Jean from the folds of his leather jacket, uncertain and apprehensive.
"Hello, dear," Jean told her, smiling, confident in her own maternal skills. "I'm Mrs. Grey. May I take a look at you?" She was two feet away, stretching out her hand. An emerald bracelet sparkled around it. Probably the latest Scooter-Gift. "It's okay, sweetie. I'm a doctor."
They were possibly the most ill-chosen words Jean Grey could have chosen. Their effect was immediate, and served only to prove that the girl understood English because Logan, although he could not claim the fancy education of the other adults at this school, would never have said the word 'doctor' to the kid.
She jerked as if electrocuted, stepped backwards and Logan's arm shifted from a comfort to a cage, never mind that he loosened it right away. She let out a startled, upset whine. He let her go, and she stumble back.
"What's wrong?" Jean asked, prematurely frustrated, straightening up. "What's the matter with her?"
"Kid," Logan said, placating. He smelled panic. "It's alright." The girl shuddered, flinched away from him. Her wide eyes went from him to Jean to the Professor, incredulous and frightened.
"What did I say? What's wrong with--"
"Child." Xavier said. The girl's eyes locked on to him. Logan was positive Chuck was performing his patent, 'Hey-I'm-A-Mutant-Look-What-I-Can-Do-Welcome-To-The-Land-Of-Oz' routine. He'd had the same knowing expression when he'd used the trick on Logan, and countless mansion recruits since. But after a moment The Professor's face seemed a little surprised, then unsettled. His eyes narrowed-
-and a moment later, the girl was gasping in pain.
Her brown eyes were wide, glistening with tears and Logan saw she'd broken a blood vessel in one of them. Tiny spiderwebs of red stained the white of her left eye. He grabbed the girl again, pulled her to his chest.
"Enough.", he said, picking the girl up.
"What are you doing?" Jean demanded, doing her best to seem bewildered though Logan didn't think her nearly so ignorant. Getting the fuck out of here, he wanted to say. "Taking her to my room. Settle her down."
"Logan, that would be highly inappropriate," Xavier argued. "You can't bring a child to your bedroom. We have rooms for new young students-"
Logan glared at him.
"You're overreacting." Jean said. "She's just having a little panic attack. And if she is hurt, the girl should be examined right away and treated-"
"Well, she's lasted this long. A little more won't hurt. You can wait 'til morning," Logan said, bitter.
"Wait, Logan." The Professor ordered him. Against his will, he paused at the door, though it may not have been The Professor's power that made him do so. "...You have the files?"
Logan shifted the girl, reached into his pocked and withdrew the three black cases. He tossed them in the vague direction of the two telepaths, and it was only Jean's telekinesis that kept the disks from smashing against the floor.
Inside his room (which he'd told the cleaning staff not to enter, but from the biting scent of bleach it was an order they'd chosen to ignore), Logan sat the girl on the edge of his bed. She appeared disoriented and strained, as if she had a migraine. She looked at him, eyes wet and reproachful.
He knelt, bringing himself level with her. He kissed her forehead but the girl flinched, shrank away. Logan sighed. "Sorry, Kid. But you're okay. This is a--hey. Hey, look at me. This is a good place. Nobody's gonna hurt you here. I promise."
Her lips wobbled and Logan tugged her forward. She buried her face against his throat, shivering. "Relax," he told her. "Relax."
Three hours later, Logan had given the kid a bath, himself a shower. He had raided the mansion's fridge and brought back anything he though might please her. It was a ancient, quiet way of showing off, and telling the girl nice things could come from the mansion. He'd also slipped a crushed Tylenol into her water, because the kid really did seem to have a headache. And though it was early in the evening and Logan's body craved movement and a beer, he coaxed the girl into laying down with him. She was still agitated, nervous, and he thought the comfort of routine might calm her down.
He turned the T.V. on, but it was hopeless. Never any decent sports on Tuesdays. So Logan shut it off, wrapped his arms around the cuddling body that lay half-on his chest. Logan listened to the thousand-and-one mansion sounds, so much louder and pedantic compared to a motel, or the road. He couldn't barely hear the rain outside.
She was asleep long before him.
::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::
It was early in the morning and despite a crick in his neck, Logan could almost pretend it had been a restful night.
He looked into the girl's face, thought of what Chuck had said about being inappropriate, bringing a kid into his bedroom. Logan hadn't thought twice about it, couldn't see what was wrong with the situation. They'd done it for weeks, months. The suggestion Logan would hurt her, after all this time, sparked a restless fury and an itch where his claws lay inside his palms. He wasn't overly fond of other people, of sharing personal space, but Logan was inexplicably a creature of habit. He hadn't even considered the possibility of the girl sleeping in a separate room far from him.
He listened as the kid's breathing quickened, touched the pace of waking before evening out again. Her sleep patterns resembled a cat's more than a humans, her body seeking more and more nourishing oblivion. Logan guessed that she'd woken up more than once during the night, found him still asleep and assumed she should be doing the same.
She did not squirm or murmur before waking. The only sign of rousing was the acceleration of her pulse,and then the sudden lift of her lids. Her brown eyes found Logan's, and he stroked her cheek. "Go back to sleep, darl--"
A series of brisk, staccato raps on the door. Loud and harsh, snapping the morning's quiet in two. The girl jumped, twisted in his arms to face the door. Logan tested the air, but didn't have time for profanity. Jean opened the door, marched inside in a flurry of red hair and a dark green dress, low cut and new.
"Good morning!" she bleated, cheerful. Logan sat up straight.
"What the hell are you doing?", he half-shouted, growling reflexively.
Jean stared at the girl deliberately before answering. He could feel her judging the scene, choosing the details she wanted to remember. Their half-dressed state, the tousled bedding, the girl's petrified expression. "It's morning, Logan," she said slowly, as if reminding someone not very bright of something obvious. "Were we not going to do the exam today?"
Logan glanced at the TVs clock. It read 6:18. He gaped at Jean, incredulous. "Are you fucking kidding me?"
She tried to look put-out. "Of course not. It troubles me to know there's an injured child here I have not helped. But I can't wait around all day for you to be in the mood, Logan, for you to bring her down to the med lab. I have classes, other students. I can't just--"
"Okay, okay." Logan ran his fingers through his hair. The girl seemed half-paralyzed, staring at Jean with a choked expression of fear. Son of a bitch. "Does it have to be down there? Wouldn't it be better if it you do it somewhere less-"
"No", said Jean decisively, almost triumphant. "All of my equipment is in the med lab."
"Alright," Logan said. "Alright...I'll...I'll have her down there in a few minutes. Lemme...get her ready."
Goddammit, he thought.
"Do you want help? I can dress her."
"No thanks. Get out."
"I can--"
"Jean. Get out."
The mansion's sense of luxurious warmth was only skin deep. It disappeared the moment you stepped into the elevator, and only became more cold and spiritless the further down you went. Grey, undecorated walls. Silent and chilly. Not unlike the mutant lab, actually. But Chuck's was decidedly more up-to-date, with a thousand gadgets Logan could neither use nor name.
The med bay, spacious and sharp. Hospital beds with white cushions. The girl shaking, struggling in his arms. Terrified since the moment they'd got in the elevator, but especially panicked when Jean appeared with the hospital gown. Logan stripped the sobbing kid, guilty and fighting to be reassuring the whole while. Jean kept protesting-"Logan, this is wrong. I can do it. I can do it."
Logan watched the red haired doctor running her painted fingers over the girl's skin. Pushing, probing. Meticulous. Studying the brand on her neck, curious. She removed the bandages he'd put and placed her own. Checked her pupils, her blood pressure. Drew blood, six vials whose scarlet contents seemed to accuse him from their glass case. The lump on the girl's arm seemed to especially interest her, and after a few minutes Jean said she wanted to do an x-ray.
He held the girl, restraining and soothing, trying to convince her she wasn't back in hell.
There were tests, much more than Logan thought necessary or reasonable. At first the girl cried, frantic, looking to him again and again for help. But she grew silent, motionless. Logan watched pieces of her die, one after another. Like tiny murders. By the time Jean pressed her down on the table, lifting her petite feet into the stirrups, the girl had stopped reacting entirely.
"That's better. Good girl, sweetie," Jean said, not seeing that the girl had locked herself far away inside her mind. Logan stroked her hair and searched lifeless eyes that gazed at him but through him, while Dr. Grey changed rubber gloves and told him to leave, repeatedly. This was private, she said.
Logan barely heard her.
Jean gave up, settle a sheet over the girl's knees like a screen, covering her lower body but not blocking the click of her tongue or the sounds certain instruments made.
And after that exam was over, Jean's voice had lost it's bite. It was quiet, perhaps genuine, when she told Logan to take the girl back upstairs.
Logan held the girl on his lap and bit down on an inscrutable guilt. He rocked her, kissed her forehead. Caressed her back and arms and murmured promises. Time slipped past, unmeasured but feeling like years. Her cheek lay against his collar bone and a single tear traced a path along her cheek.
"Please," the girl whispered, no emotion in the word, hopeless and sweet voice. "Please. Please. No more. No more."
It was the longest string of words she'd ever made. Broken whimpers, and Logan almost preferred the silence.
That night, she had the first nightmare.
Glistening scalpels and doctors who studied her closely, without seeing her.
Voices that said, 'Shut Up' when she cried. Gags in her mouth and rubber.
Strips of her skin peeling away under knives.
A curling piece of metal, orange with heat. Tables, voices. Pain....
Concrete floor, under her back, against her cheek.
Little bowls of dirty liquid thrown and lapped up eagerly when she had the strength.
Hands rattling a wire cage.
A hand between her legs, which became a penis, which became a tube, which became the neck of a bottle, which became the muzzle of a gun, which became a.....
Harsh voices.
Rought cloth. Sometimes white, sometimes the black uniform of the guards.
Flashing lights.
Needles, injected in her veins. So many. They never stopped.
Needles that made her hot, like her skin would bubble off. Drugs that made her feel like she was turning to ice.
Needles that made her loose control of her bowels, made her thrash and brought a blackness that lasted too brief a time.
Needles that made her see things, terrible things: ants emerging from the poors of her skin, waterfalls of blood, a smiling boy in a pretty bedroom that wanted to kiss her, gaping caverns where doctor's eye should be.
Needles that made her hurt everywhere.
Needles that made her scream and scream and scream and scream and---
Logan. Logan was there. Touching her face. Logan. Saying, "Baby, wake up. Baby. Shhh..." She was sick and her heart was pounding too hard. It hurt her chest and made breathing difficult. But it was okay. It was okay, because that's what Logan kept saying, over and over. Logan. Logan. She wasn't There anymore, not right now. Logan. Logan's arms and Logan's body and Logan's rough voice, saying she was okay.
"Honey, shh.. Wake up, kid. You're okay. You're safe."
Safe. Safe. Logan. Logan. Logan. LoganLoganLoganLogan.
"Logan," the girl whimpered. He kissed her cheek.
"It's alright, kid. You're alright. You're safe."
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Author's Chapter Notes:
>pants, out of breath< Just finished typing this up.
I'm reasonably happy with this chapter, although the ending was written late last night hence not read by my beta reader. It's dark: Children, beware. Anyone who enjoyed BadXavier in the previous chapters will sure like this.
I'm having a great time writing this story, even when I'm struggling through tough scenes. I love the blankness in my head before I start a chapter, the first word or phrase that gets it started. I love feeling a vague, blurry skeleton of a chapter design fill out and connect each idea. As I've said before, I've been playing with this story for a long time. But I always thought it would disappear if I tried to set it on paper, turn out horrible compared to the images in my head. I'm pleased that so far it hasn't.
Anyway, sorry for the rambling! I'm extremely thankful for your reviews and...Happy Reading.
I'm reasonably happy with this chapter, although the ending was written late last night hence not read by my beta reader. It's dark: Children, beware. Anyone who enjoyed BadXavier in the previous chapters will sure like this.
I'm having a great time writing this story, even when I'm struggling through tough scenes. I love the blankness in my head before I start a chapter, the first word or phrase that gets it started. I love feeling a vague, blurry skeleton of a chapter design fill out and connect each idea. As I've said before, I've been playing with this story for a long time. But I always thought it would disappear if I tried to set it on paper, turn out horrible compared to the images in my head. I'm pleased that so far it hasn't.
Anyway, sorry for the rambling! I'm extremely thankful for your reviews and...Happy Reading.
Chapter End Notes:
What do you think? I hope my attempt at html tags worked. It's the first time I've tried them(I really hate using astericks for italics). Fingers crossed.
Please, please review.
Please, please review.