Disclaimer: This fan fiction is not written for profit and no infringement of copyright is intended.

Marie was pulling his shirt off.

Whispering soft, sweet gentle things in that sexy Southern drawl o’ hers, asking him to make love to her just like he used to. Calling him shugah and darlin’, telling him she loved him so. Logan hadn’t the heart to tell her that given the physical state he was in sex just wasn’t a possibility right now- It felt too fucking good, the sensation of her against him. Her breath like a prayer, her wet lips on his. Two whole years he’d been without her, two years he’d been dreaming of this and now- She was here. Her skin, her touch, her scent, he’d have known it anywhere, it felt wonderful-

Except for the voice that was tugging at his mind.

Telling him to breath in more deeply, to test that scent…. Was it Marie? The Wolverine within him was asking. Was it really our girl..? He buried his nose in her throat, sniffing, teeth scraping against her skin even as she moaned loudly and suddenly he had his answer-

“Sonofabitch!” he snarled.

“Wrong gender, baby,” Mystique muttered then. Letting her eyes turn yellow but otherwise retaining Rogue’s shape. Trying to kiss him again, snickering when he turned his head away. Her hand travelled roughly down his chest, the nails clawing as she cupped his hardening cock in her hand and dug them in viciously.

“Aw, look,” she cooed, “You do like me.”

She licked her lips. Logan head-butted her.

Judging by the look on her face you’d think he’d kissed her instead.

Mystique shifted her form completely back to Marie’s then. But it was Marie the way she’d looked on Liberty Island, bruised and bloody and pale. A Marie at death’s door. “Why’d you hurt me shuggs?” she asked him in Marie’s best little girl lost voice. “Why didn’t you save me from them?” She manipulated her appearance once more, Marie’s face turning bruised and swollen. A leer his darlin’ girl woulda never worn splitting her face-

“Fuck you,” he snarled.

“Only if you say pretty please.” And she let her hair flash red for a second, though she still wore Rogue’s face. Her eyes glowing red like a phoenix. “Would this help?” She pouted. “Or is the performance anxiety just because you’re an older man?”

“No, it’s cos you’re an evil bitch.”

“Aw, don’t be that way. I thought you liked it rough, Jim.” Her smile widened. “Besides, I brought you a present.” Mystique reached onto the floor behind her and held in a tiny spike, about the length and width of an ear-phone jack but much sharper. It glittered wickedly in the light. “This is what’s going to get you to betray that little fucking parasite of yours,” she told him conversationally.

Logan cocked his most cynical eyebrow. “Really?”

“Oh yeah, baby. Really.” She leaned forward, trailing kisses down his cheek. Those bitch-sharp nails raking his chest. He hissed in pain and she kissed him harder, her features transforming into Rogue’s again. But this time she was healthy, adult- The Rogue he remembered from before she left the Mansion. Despite his best efforts his body responded to the visual stimulus, and he fought back a wave of disgust. “The cuffs are dosing you with anaesthesia,” Mystique was murmuring into his ear. “When the spikes dig into your body-” she raked her nails against his forearms- “They pump a mixture of hallucinogens and muscle relaxants into your blood-stream-”

“Tell me something I don’t know.”

She grinned wickedly. “Unfortunately however, that damn mutation of yours is fighting them off.” Her hands curled up into his hair, scraping at his scalp as she moaned. Logan wondered if this was how a Rampant Rabbit felt when it got put to use. “If we just switch off that damn healing factor though,” she continued, licking at his throat, “we can fill you up to the brim with every fucking narcotic known to man, and there’ll be jack shit you can do about it.” She kissed the tip of his nose. “Which is exactly what we’re gonna do.”

And quick as lightning she slammed the adamantium spike into his neck at the nape, ramming it into the bone. Digging it in extra hard as he snarled.

Fuck!

Blackness flashed before his eyes then as he felt an electrical charge tear through his body. Every muscle and sinew twitching uncontrollably as the device took hold. He thought there’d be more pain, but there wasn’t: Instead for the first time since Marie had drained him at the age of sixteen he felt woozy. Sick. Like he had a cold or something-

Which was impossible fer a man with a mutation like his.

He hoped.

Mystique grinned then. “I’ll just leave that to settle,” she murmured. “I know men don’t normally like bling but that works for you, it really does. Besides, I have a matinee performance.” And her eyes flashed blue, hair turning blond. Skin fading until it was pale as a snowflake, her clothes pristinely white. She stood. “I’ll be back in a little while, lover. And then we’ll see how friendly you get without that sense of smell to guide you-

Shuggs.”

And with that she was gone.

Leaving Logan feeling helpless for the first time in a long time. Leaving him afraid of what he might do to the woman he loved without even knowing it. Leaving him praying Marie really hated his guts as much as he thought she did- Because then at least she was probably still safe from Vic and the Blue Bitch.

Because Christ knew, she was no longer safe from him…