The next day was nice and quiet, no one woke her, which allowed her to sleep in until almost noon before her stomach began to protest. She dragged herself out of bed, rubbing at her tired eyes in an attempt to wake them up, as she stumbled to the bathroom to relieve her straining bladder. Her hair was a mess, after having gotten damp in her early morning shower, and dried in bed, she couldn't be bothered combing it out, so she just piled it on top of her head in a very messy bun, before going to her bag to find clothes.

She pulled on jeans, and manoeuvred around inside Logan's t-shirt to put a bra on, before tucking the t-shirt haphazard into her waist band and deciding that was good enough to go get breakfast - well, lunch. She tugged on gloves as she made her way downstairs. As she was raiding the fridge again, for another meal that would have made Logan proud, Scott walked in.

He eyed her attire critically before commenting disdainfully, "Don't worry Rogue, we'll get you your own clothes, you don't have to wear those anymore."

"Gee sorry," Marie commented angrily, looking down at her clothes, "I know I don't look that crash hot but I did just drag my ass out of bed after being kidnapped for a day and almost killed, I'll make more of an effort to not show it next time."

"That's not what I meant Rogue," Scott hurried to assure her, "I just meant you don't have to wear *his* clothes any more, you've got choices here, no one is going to make you do anything you don't want to anymore."

Marie looked shocked for a second, before a feeling like she had been kicked in the gut made her want to vomit. "That... how... you think! Oh my god, that is sick, you think Logan...! For your information mister, I chose to wear this, had to go to Logan's room to get it. And for the record, Logan would never make me do anything I didn't want to, he's done nothing but take care of me since we met, which is more than anyone else has done for me in a damn long time!" she raged, before storming out of the room.

When she stepped off the elevator on the sublevel that held the med lab, she was thankful to notice she'd had the good sense to grab her lunch before she made her dramatic exit from the kitchen, she wouldn't have to head back up there for a while. She silently stalked down the hallway to the room that held Logan's prone form, and slouched into the seat that was still next to the bed. Wheeling over an empty instrument table to set her lunch on, she began to eat, talking to Logan periodically around mouthfuls.

She was still fuming over what Scott had implied in the kitchen, Mind-Logan wasn't in a much better mood, when Jean walked in. Eyeing the now empty plate she scowled. "Please don't eat in here in future," was all she said, before turning her attention to Logan, reading monitors and checking his vital signs as she scribbled notes on her chart.

Scott entered a moment later, immediately putting Marie on edge. She allowed Logan free range in her mind, resulting in a menacing growl flooding the room. Scott looked abashed and took a few steps away from her, keeping his head low and refusing to make eye contact with her, as he headed across the room to Jean's office. Jean followed him a few minutes later, once she had completed her examination.

Rogue still had Logan's heightened senses, and she exploited them shamelessly to eavesdrop on the two in the office.

"What's wrong Scott?" Jean asked.

"Have you managed to get anything out of the girl?" he asked, concerned.

"Nope, she still won't say anything, I haven't been able to determine whether she's trying to simply protect his privacy or if she's trying to hide something," was the reply, "I take it you tried to say something to her and that's what all the growling was about before."

"Yeah, she was in the kitchen getting food, I made a comment about getting her her own clothes because she was wearing what appeared to be his shirt, she took offense at something I said and stormed out, I'm worried Jean, we know what happens to girls on the street, we've seen it often enough, she seems to think whatever's going on between them isn't like that, like Wolverine's not like that, but in all seriousness, just one look at the guy will tell you he would easily be able to talk a vulnerable little girl into agreeing to anything," Scott sighed exasperated.

"Well, perhaps we should just stop pushing her, we don't want to push her away, let's just work on convincing her how great this place is and encouraging her to stay. If we can get her out of here, away from him, and introduce her to some of the other kids, maybe some friends will be what she needs to give her encouragement," Jean suggested.

"That sounds like a good plan," Scott agreed, "Though perhaps we'd better get Ororo to make the suggestion, she's usually better at that sort of thing, and I think I've already blown it with her for now."

"Sure, why don't you go find Ororo now, Wolverine is stable but he hasn't started healing yet, so I'm not expecting him to wake up tonight," Jean stated.

Whatever they were talking about next was drowned out to Rogue's ears when a noisy machine started in the office; she assumed, from the scent that began wafting through the room a short while later, that it was a coffee machine. Scott left a few minutes after that, she ignored him, and the smile he threw in her direction, but didn't growl at him this time.

Knowing, from Jean's comments, that Logan wouldn't be waking up any time soon, she moved over to the bed and bid him a quiet goodbye, leaving a quick peck on his forehead this time, before silently slipping out of the room. She wanted to get some exploring of the grounds in before classes let out for the day, Ororo had showed her around some when she first arrived but she wanted to take a better look.

--

Several hours later she was curled up on a couch in the library, in front of a roaring fire reading a book, when she heard voices behind her. Two teenage girls, around about her age, walked in chatting about useless teenage gossip.

"I swear, I saw him, the guy is sex on legs, if scary and hairy is your shtick, personally I've never gone for that type but hell for this guy even I would be tempted!" The loud Asian girl spoke, while she popped gum and loudly thumped her books down on the table.

"For goodness sake Jubi you must have gotten, what... a five second look at the guy, and he hasn’t been seen since, don't you think that's rushing it even for you?" The mousey looking brunette replied, sounding amused.

"Kit-Kat, that is sometimes all it takes," the first girl, 'Jubi', replied.

"What about the new girl that Bobby and a John said they saw, no one new has been introduced to the dorm, and there's no one new in classes. Do you think there really is a new girl, or is that just wishful teenage boy thinking?" 'Kit-Kat' asked.

"There's a new girl," Rogue finally spoke from the couch. "But it's been a busy couple of days, almost dying and all, and I haven't decided if I'm staying yet," she added.

Both girls jumped in surprise when she first spoke but calmed quickly when they spotted her. "Oh, hi, sorry, we weren't meaning to talk about you behind your back or anything, my name's Kitty, and this is Jubilee," the mousey girl replied, holding out a hand in greeting. Marie hesitated, to make sure she was still wearing her gloves, before she shook the girls hand.

"I'm Rogue," she replied, "And I have a feeling the 'sex-on-legs' guy you were talking about before is Wolverine. Tall, dark hair, little scruffy looking, probably had a really bad attitude?"

"That sure sounds like him," Jubilee confirmed, "You know him?"

"Yep.” And that was as much detail as Rogue would go into regarding their relationship for now. "He's not always so grouchy but I got kidnapped yesterday so he was a little tetchy."

"Where is he now?" Kitty asked curiously.

"In the med lab, he had to touch my skin, to give me his healing power, because I was kind of dead when they finally found me, he's recovering, Jean thinks he should be okay in a day or two," Rogue replied casually, as if it was perfectly normal to tell stories of kidnappings, daring rescues, and death by touching skin.

"Wow, sounds like you have had a busy few days!" Jubilee exclaimed, somewhat in disbelief. "So are you thinking about staying?"

"I don't know," Rogue replied, "I'm not even a hundred percent certain what exactly this place is to be honest, I think I must have missed an orientation or something, someone said something about a school though, which sounds good, I was almost done with high school before I left home, it would be nice to finish up."

"Well let me introduce you to 'Mutant High', as we like to call it, where not only do you get to study all the normal boring school subjects but you get to practice superpowers with the best of us!" Jubilee announced.

"If you do stay, I'm sure you'll enjoy it, and no one's going to look at you funny if you've got a weird power, or extra body parts," Kitty added. "What is your power anyway?" she asked curiously.

"My power sucks," Rogue answered, "Literally, I suck energy and memories and even some mutant powers out of other people when I touch them skin on skin."

"Oh, so that's what the gloves are for," Jubilee blurted, before smacking a hand over her mouth. "Sorry, I speak before running my comments passed my brain sometimes, I didn't mean to be, uh, what does Ms Munro call it?" she directed to Kitty.

"Insensitive," Kitty replied, rolling her eyes at her friend.

Rogue laughed. "It's okay, I've gotten used to it, after my parents kicked me out I went up to Canada, I was aiming for Alaska, so that people wouldn't look at me weird for wearing gloves, so, I get it. What about you guys, what do you do?" she asked curiously. She could see herself being friends with these two girls quite easily.

"I make fireworks!" Jubilee announced excitedly, as tiny coloured explosions began sparking from her fingertips.

"My power has a whole bunch of boring technical terms but I basically just walk through stuff, I'm like a living ghost," Kitty answered, suddenly standing up and walking through her chair.

"Oh man, I lucked out in the superpower pool," Rogue commented sarcastically.

All three girls laughed before Jubilee commented, "It could be worse, you could be massive, blue, and furry like Hank."

"Or have a tail, or goat feet, or something else weird looking, at least you still look normal, though really, my power’s not that great, it took me months to stop accidentally falling through the floors at random times, one time I fell into Mr Summers and Dr Grey's room, while they were, uh... busy," the girl admitted, blushing bright pink, and causing all three to burst out laughing again.

"If it's any consolation I think Mr Summers was more embarrassed than you were," Jubilee continued, laughing at the memory.

The library door opened again and Ororo popped her head in. "Hi girls," she alerted the girls to her presence.

"Hi Ms Munroe!" Kitty and Jubilee answered. Marie just smiled and waved.

"I was actually looking for you Rogue, I'm glad to see you're starting to make friends, I was wondering if you'd like to sit in on a few classes tomorrow, just to get a feel for the school?" she asked.

"Uh, I guess, if Wolverine's still out of commission I won't have anything else to do," Marie answered. It would be nice to get a feel for the teaching style of the school, though Marie had never been one to have difficulty in school, she had always been ahead of her peers academically.

"Great," Ororo replied, "I won't be able to do any placement tests for you until the weekend so for now, let's just go with what grade you were in at your last school?"

"That sounds good," Rogue responded, "I was just starting twelfth grade but I'll probably have a bit to catch up on after missing most of this year," she added, with a resigned shrug.

"Oh well, that's alright, that would put you at about the same grade as Jubilee and Kitty, why don't you just tag along with them for classes tomorrow, I'll see you get some stationery after breakfast, can you girls show Rogue to my office at about eight thirty tomorrow?" Ororo asked the other two girls.

"Sure we can Ms Munroe," Kitty replied, flashing a smile.

"Yeah, don't worry, we'll take real good care of her," Jubilee added.

"Alright then, breakfast is tomorrow from six in the cafeteria Rogue, classes start at nine. See you all tomorrow," she called, leaving the girls to get back to their bonding.
You must login (register) to review.