**02.30 GMT-6, 14 February 1996, Somewhere in Canada, preferably a long way from Alkali Lake, near the Yukon area, and apparently its both geography and geometry Wade failed…**
LOGAN
The silence after Wade left was a physical weight on Logan's shoulders, a stark and unnerving contrast to the kid's relentless, buzzing energy.
So much for the silences he wanted.
He stood sentinel at the cave mouth, his senses stretched taut, tracking the fading imprint of his son's scent on the wind. It was tainted with the coppery ghost of blood—both of theirs—a constant, sickening reminder of the brutal fight that now felt like a colossal failure of him as a father.
Maybe it's better for him to stay away from them.
He heard the subtle shift in Marie's breathing behind him, the soft sigh that meant she was waking. He didn't turn, bracing himself. Her voice, husky with sleep, cut through the quiet.
"Logan? Where's Wade?"
"The kid was restless. Said he was gonna take a leak, he'll probably be back in a few minutes." he grunted, forcing a casual tone that felt like sandpaper in his throat.
A pause. He could feel her gaze on him, sharp and assessing. "Logan… is that blood? What happened?"
Damn it.
He'd hoped the darkness and his position would hide the evidence. The dried, dark stains on his shirt felt like a brand of his shame. He couldn't tell her. Not the whole, ugly truth. The words would choke him.
He deflected, the only defense he had. "It's nothin'," he lied.
"The kids… are they okay?" He finally chanced a look over his shoulder, meeting her eyes. He saw the immediate suspicion, the maternal fear, but she, mercifully, let it go for now.
"They're fine. They're pretty warm, cuddle up with each other." she said softly, her attention turning to tucking Wade's stolen jacket more securely around Laura and Ken. The unspoken question lingered, a tension in the air between them.
The quiet that followed was heavier than before, filled with everything they weren't saying. The guilt was a stone in his gut. It wasn't just the fight with Wade. It was everything. The words came out before he could stop them, a raw, pained whisper. "Marie… about what they made us do… in that place. I'm sorry. For all of it."
Her response was immediate, a soft balm on a festering wound. "It wasn't you, Logan. It wasn't your fault."
But the forgiveness was too much, too undeserved. A spark of anger flared in him—directed solely at himself. "I was drugged, my mind was gone! You weren't! It must've been… must've been worse for you." He couldn't even give the horror its proper name. He was a monster.
"Maybe I should stay away from you and the kids after we get somewhere safer."
ROGUE
Marie's heart ached for him. She saw the torment in the rigid line of his back, heard the self-loathing in his ragged voice. He was carrying the weight of a lot of sins, some even not for him to bear.
She moved then, carefully shifting so as not to wake the children nestled against her, and came to sit closer to him. She didn't reach out, not yet, letting her presence be her first offering.
"You always looked me in the eye after," she began, her voice steady and clear, cutting through his despair. "When it was over, and the drugs cleared from your head for a few moments. It was the only thing that felt real in that whole damn place. You saw me, not just a subject. Or a thing."
She saw his shoulders tense, but he didn't interrupt. He was listening, trapped by her words.
"When they took… when they took the first one," she continued, her voice wavering for only a heartbeat before firming again, "you roared. It wasn't an animal sound; it was a father's grief. You fought them so hard they had to sedate you for a week. You fought for them, Logan. Even when you didn't know who they were, you fought for your children."
She listed his quiet acts of defiance, building a wall of truth against the fortress of his guilt. "You positioned yourself during the… procedures. You always put your body between me and the worst of it. When they came with the needles afterward, you'd snarl and they'd think twice. In that hell, you were my only comfort." Her voice dropped to a fervent whisper, willing him to believe her. "You didn't make it painful. You made it bearable."
A wounded, choked sound escaped him—a whimper that shattered her composure. He was breaking, and he was letting her see it. He leaned forward, and she met him halfway. Their foreheads touched, a gesture of shared exhaustion and a pain that was finally, finally being acknowledged together. "I don't deserve you," he breathed, the confession torn from the deepest, most broken part of him.
Her gloved hand came up, her fingers gently cupping his scarred jaw. "No," she said, her voice fierce with a love that had been forged in fire and loss. "We deserve each other. Don't you ever dare say otherwise to me."
Then she closes the final distance, kissing him.
CRUNCH. DRAG.
They broke apart as a voice, dripping with mocking disgust, cut through the moment.
"Awww, you're gonna be those kinds of parents... both of you really do belong to each other. Too sweet man! Some of us are single! Well, I know it has been a long time, yes, but still… in front of your own kids?"
They turned, breath caught in their throat. Wade stood at the cave entrance, looking like he'd lost a fight with a woodchipper. He was covered in a horrifying tapestry of dried blood, gore, and dirt. His clothes were shredded rags, and one of his ears was a distinct, pinkish new color, freshly regenerated. The smell of blood and raw meat was overpowered by the sheer, monstrous scent of the colossal, silver-tinged polar bear carcass he was dragging.
"I can't even decide yet to be the 'eww gross don't show PDA in front of me' son or 'lil fanboy parent shipper' son. Maybe I'll be both."
"Where have you been? What happened to you?" Logan's voice was a rasp, a mixture of anger, fear, and sheer, undiluted shock.
Wade dropped the bear's leg with a thud. "Sabertooth's pet polar bear got me... but on the other hand! We got breakfast!"
"Sabertooth?" The name meant little to nothing to her, but the way Logan reacted to it—the sudden, icy tension that gripped her frame suddenly—told her it was a ghost from his past.
"Oh, you're gonna meet him in a few chapters, probably chapter 20? I don't know what exact number it is since HE didn't write it just yet," Wade said, waving a dismissive hand.
Logan just stared, his mind struggling to process. "Ookaay," he managed, forcing his focus back to the immediate crisis. "Are you okay?"
"I am exhausted, I'm gonna fall asleep any minute now," Wade slurred, his body beginning to sway like a sapling in a strong wind. The bravado was crumbling, revealing the utterly drained child beneath. "Umm, could you please…"
"Oh, yeah. Let me." Logan surged forward, taking the immense weight of the bear carcass from Wade's shoulders just as the boy's eyes rolled back into his head. His legs gave out.
"WADE!"
He hit the ground. A soft, contented snore echoed in the sudden quiet. "Zzzzz…."
Rogue was at his side in an instant, her hand hovering over his chest. "Oh, he's asleep…" she murmured, her voice thick with a relief that bordered on tears.
Logan looked from his son's peacefully unconscious, filth-caked form to the mountain of dead bear. "He's gonna need new clothes," he stated, the understatement of the century.
"We all need new clothes," Rogue replied. "We're all only wearing these lab clothes. If it wasn't for our mutations, we'd have died from the cold alone."
Logan's gaze settled on the polar bear. "This thing's got enough fur to clothe us all. I'll skin it later." As Logan gently lifted Wade, cradling the boy's head to keep it from lolling and place him near Laura and Ken.
As she added wood to the fire, the flames danced higher and cast warm light on her family—her fierce mate, her two sleeping cubs, and her impossible, heroic firstborn—Logan looked up from his children. His eyes met hers, and in them, she saw an awe he wasn't trying to hide.
"We got one hell of a kid, yeah?" he said, the words rough with emotion.
Rogue looked at Wade, snoring softly in a pile of his own gore, and then back at Logan, a true, warm smile finally gracing her features. "Yep…"
"Uhh…"
A small, quiet sound made them both turn. Ken was sitting up, his dark eyes wide and fixed not on the dead bear, but on Logan's hands–on the single, gleaming claw that moved with such precise, deadly grace. There was no fear in his gaze, only a deep, unnerving fascination.
Logan stopped, meeting his son's stare. The boy didn't look away.
"You wanna learn?" Logan asked, his voice low.
Ken gave a single, sharp nod.
"Later," Logan promised. "I'll need to do the grunt work first, I leave something for you to practice,"
She took the bear fur Logan had already skinned, a large, heavy pelt, and draped it over Wade once Logan had settled him in a cleaner, drier spot. The silver-tipped fur enveloped him, making him look small and young again. Ken immediately shuffled over and curled up against his brother's side, his small hand resting on the fur, claiming his place. Laura woke up and followed him not long after, claiming the other side.
Logan returned to his work, but his movements were slower now, his gaze frequently drifting to the huddle of his children. "We're gonna need a bigger place," he muttered, almost to himself. "Somewhere with real walls. A roof that doesn't drip. Somewhere warmer. Somewhere far away from them."
"A home," Marie said, the word feeling foreign and wonderful on her tongue.
He looked at her, and for the first time, she saw not just determination, but a flicker of hope. "Yeah," he said. "A home."