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The first twenty-four hours were bad. Logan had been little more than an animal. He had to be physically restrained and carefully at that, lest his claws either cut him loose or cut whoever bound him.
Over the last couple of days, he has calmed and quieted. A few occasional outbursts, but nothing violent now in nearly a day. He's in a makeshift cell in the medbay, kept well away from any other patients. He's still manacled, but he's stopped struggling against them. Mostly he just sits, quietly.
Two hours ago, he spoke for the first time.
"Tobacco," he muttered, almost sullen.
Maybe it was like magic, the connection that Jean and Logan shared since they first met in the hospital room.. and the things they were put through on the space ship was a little more reason for her to avoid him. He had to come down on his own, something he had to work out for himself, and with her sitting outside his room every night to listen and not coax his mind into something more relaxing.. well, it was a hard thing to resist. But yet, as soon as he spoke his first word, she was there. Lucky strikes, a cigar, an ashtray and a lighter in hand. But there was no smile that touches upon her face. Not yet.
"Hi Logan." Is all she says, using her foot to drag a chair with a few half steps, stopping at the side of his bed to finally plop down into a seat she doesn't want to sit in. Her butt hurts.
The look in his eyes is wary. Not out of distrust or, at least, not distrust for her. While Jean may not be reading his mind directly, she can feel, at least, that the radiant, violent rage that consumed him has, for the moment, quieted. What's left is an open wound, radiating pain through his mind.
"Jeannie," he says softly. He takes a cigarette gratefully and lets her light it for him, inhaling slowly as he feels the nicotine hit his system. He's not a physical addict, but a psychological one, addicted to the rush and the feeling, brief though it may be. "You okay? I hurt any o' you?"
-Finally-, she smiles. Eagerly leaning forward to light the cigarette, then places the ashtray upon the tray in front of him so that he could ash. "You didn't hurt anyone really but Voon. I'd like to think that there was some.. residual.. sanity in you that thought that she may have been attacking me. But, I didn't have time to check, we had to ferry her people out of there before they all were killed." She frowns at the thought, then shakes her head, her own hand reaching out to grip upon his thumb.. given that his hands were larger than hers.
"But we're okay. We've been searching for you for weeks. We've missed you. Charles misses his drinking buddy."
Logan shakes his head, "Dunno Voon," he says. He takes another long drag on the cigarette, his chian rattling. He hasn't been able to bring himself to look at Jean yet, really, keeping his head down. His hair's a bit shaggy, his beard grown in.
"I killed a lot," he says blankly. "I mean, I've killed before, but this was…different," he says. "Bodies piled around me. Slaughter, nothin' but. Most of 'em didn't stand a chance. Those things, those…Subterraneans…they ain't built like much more'n skinny kids," he says.
"And I chopped 'em up. One after another after another."
Jean doesn't say much, but she does listen. In fact, she listens with as much patience as she could, even though the images upon his surface thoughts bother her. As he remembers and lets them up and out of his lips, she sees and doesn't turn her head. As much as she wanted to, she didn't. "Skinny kid like me.." She says quietly, though, she wasn't so much of a kid now.. was she?
"You were controlled, they took you and we saw that man torture you. What you did? What happened? It is not your fault."
Logan shakes his head, "That ain't control. I been controlled. He just…broke me open. Found the bad shit I keep buried down deep and let it out. Then he pointed me at what he wanted dead," he says. "In his own way, he did me a favor. I been sittin' here around the mansion, fishin' in the pond and playin' handyman, actin' like I can just be a person like anybody else. Trying to forget what I am."
"You've grown up a lot. And don't forget I stabbed you, too, once upon a time," he says. "Only luck you didn't die," he says.
"You did." Jean finally admits. "You put me in a chair because I hurt you. Because you followed your baser instincts and wanted to stop me from tearing the skin from your bones. We could have done that, we could have killed you. We could have torn you apart and used you like he did.." She frowns a little, then shakes her head, her fingers pressing against her eyes. "Logan. What's done is done.." She draws in a breath, then exhales. "You've never made an excuse as to what you were. You never tried to hide it.. maybe you stayed because of me. Maybe you stayed because these kids need someone like you around. I don't know Logan. But I can't do this back and forth. This push and pull as to what you are and what you could be. I had enough of it, my entire relationship with Gabriel.. it was this!"
She rose to her feet, gesturing. "Explaining and telling him that he could be so much more. His refusal and resistance and redunancy that he put himself into as a monster. And he's gone, and I'm -tired-. I'm free of this back and forth.. this.. self pity." She sniffs hard.
"Man up and deal, Logan. You say I've grown up a lot.. don't grow down on me. Okay?"
And for a moment, her last words had her frowning, and then cracking a slight smile, and hands soon shooting up so she could release a melody of a laugh that she herself didn't expect. And he could hear her thoughts, loud and clear.. ~My god Jean, you sounded -so- dumb!~
Logan looks away for a long moment. He'd expected this to be goodbye, to be him telling Jean that he can't be here anymore. That he's a danger, that he'll always be a weapon. That she should hate him. Maybe that would be the right thing to do. It sure as hell feels like it, after everything he's been through.
"Was, huh? You and spaceboy not shackin' up anymore?" he manages, his voice creaky as he takes a drag on his cigarette.
"I ain't no kid, Jean. I'm done grown. I ain't saying it to be down on myself or to make a pity party. I'm sayin' I gotta learn to embrace it. I'm a man made out of knives, darlin' - I gotta cut. Cause horrible as the shit I did was, as much as the people I did it didn't deserve it, a lotta what I felt felt -right-," he says. "So I gotta find a new way. I can't play at bein' the loveable uncle anymore, chuckin' kids on the chin an' helpin' 'em grow up tall an' straight. Fuck a lotta that," he says.
"I can't be Chuck. I gotta be me."
The laughter dies down just so that she could finish talking, this time settling upon the edge of the bed, her shoes soon kicked off, and with a lurch forward she crawls to at least try to settle into one of them chained arms. "He left the night I went off on my own to look for you." And that was all that she said. Obviously she was clearly hurt by it, and often times, she'd block herself so that she couldn't feel the pain enough to cry.
"I think you embraced it.." She says quietly. "..you just got kinda lazy. And you were getting fat anyways." A little joke here, and then she shrugs, plucking the rest of the cigarette from his fingers to put it out. Another was taken from the pack, focused upon, and lit within the thin of the air as she offers it to him.
"We know you can't be him. Everyone knows that you aren't. Whenever people need to hear it plain as day, they come to the cabin. If they wanted a .. how do you say? A pat on the ass? They'd go to Charles." She smile, then stares out, slightly nodding. "You can be the lovable uncle, but behind it all, away from the kids and the school and the others? Be you."
In other words? Don't let them see.
"Do you understand?"
Logan takes another drag and looks sidelong at the girl, the red girl, the one who saved him from madness a half dozen times already. Brought him here so they could find ways to save themselves.
"Sounds like he kind of pussied out," he mutters about Gabriel.
He shrugs a bit and finally looks her in the face, "I just don't think I"m gonna do too good a job o' playing with the kiddies for a bit. I know I never did, but now…"
"Chuck wants us to be heroes and I ain't never gonna be that, darlin'. Just not the way I'm wired. Don't mean I don't wanna help. Just means my help's gonna come bloody."
Jean shrugs her shoulders just a little at the mention of Gabriel. It was something that she didn't want to talk about anymore. Perhaps that's why she seems a little closed off now, a little bit colder than her once, slightly gentler self a few momentsago. "Probably.."
"Well no shit." She finally blurts out. "I can still feel that rage, I think if any of the kids happen to throw a ball and it nearly misses your face you'll wreck the whole damn mansion." She grunts a little, then sits upright, her shoulders lifting as she twists her head left and right. "Charles never really asked you to go to a fight that you didn't want to. And he knows you. Like I said before, you didn't make who or what you were a secret. You kind of.. just chilled out and took a vacation."
Logan nods and cracks his neck for a moment, that strange, metallic clatter as his adamantium-laced vertebra click against one another. "I think vacation might be over," he says.
"Whatcha say, Red? YOu wanna help me find some bad, bad people and put 'em in the ground on behalf o' mutantkind?" he says, looking at her with a fierce affection and a wary hope. As long as she accepted him, the rest would be all right.
The cracks of his neck/spine has her nearly shuddering. Her hands even lift to shake in the air as she lets out a little huff. Though, as he gives her that look, one brow shoots up as she considers his words. They never talked about it.. no.
"No." It wasn't as simple as that. "I never showed you the many things that could happen, what the aliens showed me. I want to say that this very thing happened, that in one of those lifetimes, you asked me to join you. And I did. And we fought, we killed, and we wanted more. It was like a demon on our backs. And she.." Jean gestures at her chest. "..the Phoenix, she separated. Part of her went to me, and the other you. And eventually, we burned the world and everyone in it until there was nothing left."
She holds up her hand faintly. "I'll help you find them, but I won't kill them. Indirectly their blood will be on my hands but.. I can live with that. But actually.. wrapping my fingers around their necks?" Her eyes glance down towards her hands, then her head shakes. "But if you need me, think of me and I'll be there, yeah?"
Logan nods, "Fair enough. You always kinda been my angel. Probably better I don't get your wings bloodied," he says.
"How 'bout gettin' me outta these chains, though? I promise, I ain't gonna rip nobody a new one. Well…not unless they ask fer it," he says.
"And I need a god damn beer."