FIC: Lost in Finding the Way (R) 9/?
Author notes: Thanks again to September for the wonderful beta job.
Please don't hate me too much but we have another time jump. But I had to go this route on purpose. You'll understand later on.....
SIX YEARS LATER.............................
"Cyclops," Logan called over his microphone. "What is Val’s status?"
"She’s approaching the office now. Logan there are two guards about to approach you from the left. Remember no killing, just hit them hard enough to knock them out."
"Okay got it,’ Logan said, getting himself ready to fight.
Scott relaxed in his chair on the Blackbird. A few seconds later Valerie came over the speaker. "Cyclops,
I’ve reached the door and I’m about to roll the motion detector under it."
"Okay I’m ready," Scott said.
He waited a few moments until the layout of the room came up on the screen before him. Seeing that no one was in there he told Valerie, "All clear to enter."
Valerie eased the door open and entered what was a large office equipped with several desks. Locating the one she wanted, she walked over and sat down. She began typing in passwords and inserted a disk into the hard drive. "Okay, tell Logan I’ll be ready in five minutes and to start heading this way," she told Scott.
Just then the air vent in the roof flew open and a small figure dressed in all black landed on the floor. She had long brown hair and a mask that covered the top half of her face. She grinned at Valerie. "I believe that’s for me."
It took Valerie a moment to recover from being stunned. "Cyclops, the Assassin is here. Tell Logan to come quickly," she said into her ear piece.
The assassin charged towards Valerie causing them both to crash to the floor. Using her Martial arts training, Valerie escaped and stood up. She reached for the disk, but the Assassin grabbed her hand and said, "I don’t think so."
Valerie jerked her hand away and slammed a fist across her jaw. The Assassin backed off, only for a moment, but it was long enough for Valerie to grab the disk and try to run.
But she wasn’t fast enough. The Assassin grabbed Valerie’s long hair and pulled her back, causing her to scream in pain.
Logan was running as fast as he could to Valerie’s location. As he rounded the corner of the hall he heard a scream and a loud crash. The next thing he saw was a person dressed in black running out of the room and in the opposite direction.
As he ran into the office he saw Valerie laying on the floor by a desk. "Are you all right?" he asked kneeling beside her.
Valerie nodded her head. "Yes…she’s got the disk, you have to go after her."
With a frown, Logan stood up and took off quickly, sprinting towards the Assassin. But when he rounded the corner of the hall he was met with a black gloved fist, knocking him flat on his back. He blinked for a moment, trying to register what had just happened, before heaving himself back up and running again.
When he finally caught up and charged at her, he grabbed her around the torso from behind. They wrestled on the floor for a few moments until the Assassin pressed her knee against Logan’s crotch causing him to back off in pain.
He scowled as he watched her enter the stairwell, listening to her high heeled boots clicking as she disappeared up the stairs.
Now he was really pissed.
He followed her up to the roof, but as he looked around the open roof top, he saw nothing.
"Shit!" he hollered. He was still standing there, trying to catch his breath, when he heard a gush of wind behind him. He turned slowly to see the Assassin standing there with a coy smile on her lips.
"What’s the matter? Someone got something you want?" she taunted.
Logan let out a roar and charged towards her. The assassin met him with a roundhouse kick to the head knocking him back onto the ground.
She laughed and bent down, grabbing Logan’s wrists and pinning them over his head as she straddled his hips and sat down on top of him.
"You know every since we first met so long ago, you’ve been falling on your back for me," she said leaning in real close to Logan’s face. "I kinda like the idea of a man who is always ready."
Logan began to try and loosen his hands from her grip.
"Sorry, sugar but you can’t beat my super strength," she said smiling.
"I’ve told you once already, I’m not your fucking sugar"
"That’s too bad,” she told him. “I kinda like you.” She nuzzled her nose against his and began kissing him. Logan took the opportunity to bite down hard on her lip.
"Ouch! You son of a bitch!" the woman yelled. Then she bent back down and added, "But that’s alright, sugar, because I like it rough." She kissed him again quickly on the mouth.
Logan growled and popped his claws with a speed as quick as lighting, jerking his wrist towards her head. When he made contact with the left side of her face, he cut through her mask, causing it to fall to the ground.
The assassin grabbed her face and yelped with pain.
Still pissed, Logan reached up to remove her hands, to see who the hell she was. But she jerked away.
Just then the door to the roof opened. Scott and Valerie were approaching.
The Assassin removed her right hand to look at them. Then flew off.
Logan did a double take. He could have sworn she looked like Marie, but she had green eyes and no white streaks in her hair. He sniffed the air to try and pick up a scent, but couldn’t.
Valerie ran over to Logan and grabbed him by the shoulders. "Are you okay?"
Logan ignored her, still staring into the night sky, eyes fixed on the direction in which the woman had disappeared.
"Logan, you hurt?" Scott asked.
"I’m fine," he replied. He stood up and shook the dirt off his leather uniform.
"Did you get the disk?" Valerie asked.
Logan shook his head.
"Dammit!" shouted Scott. "For the past three years this Assassin has always been one step ahead of us!"
"Well I’m glad you’re okay," Valerie told Logan. She stood up on her tip toes and planted a kiss firmly on his mouth. Logan started to wrap his arms around Valerie’s waist to pull her closer.
Scott groaned and thew his hands in the air. "Okay, could you two at least wait till we get back to the mansion?" he said, walking back to the door.
Valerie laughed and grabbed Logan’s hand, leading him back down the stairs. But just before stepping inside, Logan looked back up to the sky, wondering who it was he’d seen.
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Logan sat in the locker room with his uniform unzipped and hanging halfway off. He began replaying each time the X-Men had met with the Assassin.
Slowly, his mind elsewhere, he removed his uniform and put on his regular jeans and white t-shirt. Grabbing his wallet out of the locker, he sat back down on the bench and opened it to remove a faded picture of Marie. He smiled faintly at the memory of when the picture was taken. He and Marie had been talking in the woods when Jubilee had appeared out of nowhere and snapped a picture of them. When Jubilee had given them a copy Marie had torn it in two, keeping the half with him for herself, and giving the Logan the half with her in it.
"Logan," Scott said, walking up, "what happened between you two on the roof? You looked as though you saw a ghost out there."
Logan snapped out of his day dreaming and clenched his fist around the picture to keep it hidden. "Nothing," he said, "I just got a glimpse of the Assassin’s face, that’s all."
"Really? What does she look like?"
"I didn’t get a good enough look Scooter," Logan said, standing up.
"Well, we’ve really got to find some information on who she is and who she’s working for."
As he closed his locker door, Logan nodded his head in agreement.
"I’ll see you around."
"Alright," Logan told him.
Only when he was sure that Scott had gone, did Logan stare at the picture of Marie once more. He placed his thumb over the left side of her face. Deciding that it was just his imagination, he began sliding the picture back in his wallet.
"What’s taking you so long?" Valerie asked leaning against the doorframe of the locker room.
Logan looked up and smiled at his fiancée. "Where is Kayla?" he asked.
"She’s staying over in Jenny’s room. They are having a slumber party."
"I’m going to look over some documents in the mission room for a while." Logan walked towards her, putting his arm around her waist and pulling her close. "I’ll be up later."
"Okay, but don’t stay too long. Remember our suite is ears free for the whole night," she told him, grinning.
Logan kissed her, then continued on his way to the mission room. He sat looking over mission logs to see if he could find anything that would give him a clue as to who the Assassin was working for. He had been down there for over an hour when the Professor wheeled in.
"Logan you should be upstairs getting some rest," Charles told him.
"I had some things I wanted to look over, Chuck," Logan said, without looking up.
The Professor picked up a few of the papers and skimmed over them. "Are you reading up on all the information we have on the Assassin?"
"Yeah, just trying to figure out who she works for and why she’s always where we’re going to be." Logan laid down the papers he was looking at and picked up some more.
"Well, all we know for certain is that she’s assassinated at least ten of the congressmen who were pushing for mutant registration," Charles said.
"Do you think we overlooked something when we were trying to find out if it was Magneto?"
"I don’t know," Charles began, "I have no doubt that Eric could have someone doing his work while he is in prison. Mystique is busy being Senator Kelley, but ‘he’s’ always away, so she’s probably been up to no good."
Logan nodded his head, deep in thought. He still thought that they were missing something, though he didn’t know what.
"Well goodnight Logan," Charles said turning to exit.
"Chuck, I need to run something by you," Logan said quietly.
Charles turned slowly around. "Yes?"
"I think I saw someone that looked like Rogue," Logan told him. "Except, this person had green eyes instead of brown. And she had solid brown hair, no white streaks."
"Logan, you are probably not going to want to hear what I have to say," Charles began gently, "but with your wedding coming up next week, you are probably feeling some guilt. You may even feel as though you are betraying Rogue." Charles paused as Logan hung his head. "But all that is normal Logan. The person you saw may have resembled Rogue, but it’s been almost seven years since she’s been missing."
"You’re right, I know you’re right, it’s just that this person really looked like her, and she…she even called me the nickname Marie used to call me," Logan said, standing up.
The Professor stopped him. "You know, it’s all right for you to hold onto Rogue, how could you not with Kayla? She is looking more and more like her mother every day. As I’ve told you many times before, if you ever want to talk about any of this, you can always come to me."
"Thanks, Chuck," Logan said, patting him on the shoulder.
Then he left the Professor sitting alone in the room, thinking about what Logan had been through and how far he’d come since Rogue’s disappearance.
Please don't hate me too much but we have another time jump. But I had to go this route on purpose. You'll understand later on.....
SIX YEARS LATER.............................
"Cyclops," Logan called over his microphone. "What is Val’s status?"
"She’s approaching the office now. Logan there are two guards about to approach you from the left. Remember no killing, just hit them hard enough to knock them out."
"Okay got it,’ Logan said, getting himself ready to fight.
Scott relaxed in his chair on the Blackbird. A few seconds later Valerie came over the speaker. "Cyclops,
I’ve reached the door and I’m about to roll the motion detector under it."
"Okay I’m ready," Scott said.
He waited a few moments until the layout of the room came up on the screen before him. Seeing that no one was in there he told Valerie, "All clear to enter."
Valerie eased the door open and entered what was a large office equipped with several desks. Locating the one she wanted, she walked over and sat down. She began typing in passwords and inserted a disk into the hard drive. "Okay, tell Logan I’ll be ready in five minutes and to start heading this way," she told Scott.
Just then the air vent in the roof flew open and a small figure dressed in all black landed on the floor. She had long brown hair and a mask that covered the top half of her face. She grinned at Valerie. "I believe that’s for me."
It took Valerie a moment to recover from being stunned. "Cyclops, the Assassin is here. Tell Logan to come quickly," she said into her ear piece.
The assassin charged towards Valerie causing them both to crash to the floor. Using her Martial arts training, Valerie escaped and stood up. She reached for the disk, but the Assassin grabbed her hand and said, "I don’t think so."
Valerie jerked her hand away and slammed a fist across her jaw. The Assassin backed off, only for a moment, but it was long enough for Valerie to grab the disk and try to run.
But she wasn’t fast enough. The Assassin grabbed Valerie’s long hair and pulled her back, causing her to scream in pain.
Logan was running as fast as he could to Valerie’s location. As he rounded the corner of the hall he heard a scream and a loud crash. The next thing he saw was a person dressed in black running out of the room and in the opposite direction.
As he ran into the office he saw Valerie laying on the floor by a desk. "Are you all right?" he asked kneeling beside her.
Valerie nodded her head. "Yes…she’s got the disk, you have to go after her."
With a frown, Logan stood up and took off quickly, sprinting towards the Assassin. But when he rounded the corner of the hall he was met with a black gloved fist, knocking him flat on his back. He blinked for a moment, trying to register what had just happened, before heaving himself back up and running again.
When he finally caught up and charged at her, he grabbed her around the torso from behind. They wrestled on the floor for a few moments until the Assassin pressed her knee against Logan’s crotch causing him to back off in pain.
He scowled as he watched her enter the stairwell, listening to her high heeled boots clicking as she disappeared up the stairs.
Now he was really pissed.
He followed her up to the roof, but as he looked around the open roof top, he saw nothing.
"Shit!" he hollered. He was still standing there, trying to catch his breath, when he heard a gush of wind behind him. He turned slowly to see the Assassin standing there with a coy smile on her lips.
"What’s the matter? Someone got something you want?" she taunted.
Logan let out a roar and charged towards her. The assassin met him with a roundhouse kick to the head knocking him back onto the ground.
She laughed and bent down, grabbing Logan’s wrists and pinning them over his head as she straddled his hips and sat down on top of him.
"You know every since we first met so long ago, you’ve been falling on your back for me," she said leaning in real close to Logan’s face. "I kinda like the idea of a man who is always ready."
Logan began to try and loosen his hands from her grip.
"Sorry, sugar but you can’t beat my super strength," she said smiling.
"I’ve told you once already, I’m not your fucking sugar"
"That’s too bad,” she told him. “I kinda like you.” She nuzzled her nose against his and began kissing him. Logan took the opportunity to bite down hard on her lip.
"Ouch! You son of a bitch!" the woman yelled. Then she bent back down and added, "But that’s alright, sugar, because I like it rough." She kissed him again quickly on the mouth.
Logan growled and popped his claws with a speed as quick as lighting, jerking his wrist towards her head. When he made contact with the left side of her face, he cut through her mask, causing it to fall to the ground.
The assassin grabbed her face and yelped with pain.
Still pissed, Logan reached up to remove her hands, to see who the hell she was. But she jerked away.
Just then the door to the roof opened. Scott and Valerie were approaching.
The Assassin removed her right hand to look at them. Then flew off.
Logan did a double take. He could have sworn she looked like Marie, but she had green eyes and no white streaks in her hair. He sniffed the air to try and pick up a scent, but couldn’t.
Valerie ran over to Logan and grabbed him by the shoulders. "Are you okay?"
Logan ignored her, still staring into the night sky, eyes fixed on the direction in which the woman had disappeared.
"Logan, you hurt?" Scott asked.
"I’m fine," he replied. He stood up and shook the dirt off his leather uniform.
"Did you get the disk?" Valerie asked.
Logan shook his head.
"Dammit!" shouted Scott. "For the past three years this Assassin has always been one step ahead of us!"
"Well I’m glad you’re okay," Valerie told Logan. She stood up on her tip toes and planted a kiss firmly on his mouth. Logan started to wrap his arms around Valerie’s waist to pull her closer.
Scott groaned and thew his hands in the air. "Okay, could you two at least wait till we get back to the mansion?" he said, walking back to the door.
Valerie laughed and grabbed Logan’s hand, leading him back down the stairs. But just before stepping inside, Logan looked back up to the sky, wondering who it was he’d seen.
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Logan sat in the locker room with his uniform unzipped and hanging halfway off. He began replaying each time the X-Men had met with the Assassin.
Slowly, his mind elsewhere, he removed his uniform and put on his regular jeans and white t-shirt. Grabbing his wallet out of the locker, he sat back down on the bench and opened it to remove a faded picture of Marie. He smiled faintly at the memory of when the picture was taken. He and Marie had been talking in the woods when Jubilee had appeared out of nowhere and snapped a picture of them. When Jubilee had given them a copy Marie had torn it in two, keeping the half with him for herself, and giving the Logan the half with her in it.
"Logan," Scott said, walking up, "what happened between you two on the roof? You looked as though you saw a ghost out there."
Logan snapped out of his day dreaming and clenched his fist around the picture to keep it hidden. "Nothing," he said, "I just got a glimpse of the Assassin’s face, that’s all."
"Really? What does she look like?"
"I didn’t get a good enough look Scooter," Logan said, standing up.
"Well, we’ve really got to find some information on who she is and who she’s working for."
As he closed his locker door, Logan nodded his head in agreement.
"I’ll see you around."
"Alright," Logan told him.
Only when he was sure that Scott had gone, did Logan stare at the picture of Marie once more. He placed his thumb over the left side of her face. Deciding that it was just his imagination, he began sliding the picture back in his wallet.
"What’s taking you so long?" Valerie asked leaning against the doorframe of the locker room.
Logan looked up and smiled at his fiancée. "Where is Kayla?" he asked.
"She’s staying over in Jenny’s room. They are having a slumber party."
"I’m going to look over some documents in the mission room for a while." Logan walked towards her, putting his arm around her waist and pulling her close. "I’ll be up later."
"Okay, but don’t stay too long. Remember our suite is ears free for the whole night," she told him, grinning.
Logan kissed her, then continued on his way to the mission room. He sat looking over mission logs to see if he could find anything that would give him a clue as to who the Assassin was working for. He had been down there for over an hour when the Professor wheeled in.
"Logan you should be upstairs getting some rest," Charles told him.
"I had some things I wanted to look over, Chuck," Logan said, without looking up.
The Professor picked up a few of the papers and skimmed over them. "Are you reading up on all the information we have on the Assassin?"
"Yeah, just trying to figure out who she works for and why she’s always where we’re going to be." Logan laid down the papers he was looking at and picked up some more.
"Well, all we know for certain is that she’s assassinated at least ten of the congressmen who were pushing for mutant registration," Charles said.
"Do you think we overlooked something when we were trying to find out if it was Magneto?"
"I don’t know," Charles began, "I have no doubt that Eric could have someone doing his work while he is in prison. Mystique is busy being Senator Kelley, but ‘he’s’ always away, so she’s probably been up to no good."
Logan nodded his head, deep in thought. He still thought that they were missing something, though he didn’t know what.
"Well goodnight Logan," Charles said turning to exit.
"Chuck, I need to run something by you," Logan said quietly.
Charles turned slowly around. "Yes?"
"I think I saw someone that looked like Rogue," Logan told him. "Except, this person had green eyes instead of brown. And she had solid brown hair, no white streaks."
"Logan, you are probably not going to want to hear what I have to say," Charles began gently, "but with your wedding coming up next week, you are probably feeling some guilt. You may even feel as though you are betraying Rogue." Charles paused as Logan hung his head. "But all that is normal Logan. The person you saw may have resembled Rogue, but it’s been almost seven years since she’s been missing."
"You’re right, I know you’re right, it’s just that this person really looked like her, and she…she even called me the nickname Marie used to call me," Logan said, standing up.
The Professor stopped him. "You know, it’s all right for you to hold onto Rogue, how could you not with Kayla? She is looking more and more like her mother every day. As I’ve told you many times before, if you ever want to talk about any of this, you can always come to me."
"Thanks, Chuck," Logan said, patting him on the shoulder.
Then he left the Professor sitting alone in the room, thinking about what Logan had been through and how far he’d come since Rogue’s disappearance.