Wir Sind Keine D�monen

Logan was proud of himself for not tearing apart the little Cajun shit. He was vaguely annoyed that Rogue hadn’t torn him apart anyway; although, she had made her exit exceedingly soon after the Cajun’s “official” introduction. Logan had seen the way Remy had watched her go–that boy was all too intrigued by the idea of pursuit.



Logan would be more amused with the idea if he could be sure the boy’s pursuit would end in Rogue ripping off key parts of monsieur Remington’s anatomy, but he really wasn’t sure; the fact that it bothered him so much was not a sign of Logan’s mental health, he was sure. He relaxed somewhat when Rogue strode into his room: no knocking, no hesitation–she knew him that well. Her hair was still wet from her post-spar shower, and she had a smallish towel across her shoulders that she was using to further hasten drying. She wore short sleeves and long gloves. Logan tried to avoid noticing the low-cut neckline of her shirt and instead looked at her legs. Stretch denim looked lovely on her.



“How’s your ankle?” he asked.



“Mm. Just bruised more than anything,” she said idly, rubbing her hair a little more before stopping to look at him as she sat on the well-worn leather chair beside his bed. She smirked at him. “What’d ya think?” she inquired oh-so-intently. Logan puffed on his cigar once more before setting it aside in the ashtray at the windowsill and collapsing on the middle of his bed, shifting so his lower back rested against his headboard.



“You’re pretty impressive, kid,” he said, his voice slightly surprised. Both of his eyebrows raised as Rogue all but glowed in response.



“Really?”



“Yeah,” he said. “Without a healing factor and a lotta mass on my side, you might just be able to take me down without pulling off a glove.” His breath caught at the smile she gave in return; it was so pure, uninhibited, luminous, and it seemed to wipe away vast swathes of the extra centuries she always carried behind her dark eyes, making her suddenly making her look radiantly young and happy. Logan marveled at it, and had almost regained his ability to breathe when the thought occurred to him that he’d caused that smile. The realization struck and struck hard, that Marie was a beautiful woman, perhaps the most beautiful that Logan had ever seen. The smile itself only lasted a couple moments before Rogue seemed to recall herself, color rising to her face as she unconsciously lifted two glove-covered fingers to cover her lips. Then her expression changed a little, the curve of her lips taking on an hint of wickedness.



“Thanks, Sugah, but what do ya mean by ‘might’?”



Logan found himself smirking back automatically, his heart beating a little faster than usual. “Can’t give it away to you too easily, darlin’, you might get a big head.”



“At least I don’t emphasize it like you do,” she teased, using her hands over her head to imitate the strange pointy bits of Logan’s hair.



“Nah, but you naturally highlight it,” Logan shot back.



They smirked at each other for a brief moment in mutual mockery and derision before Rogue broke the amused silence. “Ass.”



“Brat,” he countered.



“Bastard.”



“Basket case.”



Rogue reached forward and mussed his hair with a gloved hand. “Pointy-haired person!” she declared, even as Logan gave a playful growl and poked her side. Rogue gave an involuntary squeak and jumped back, automatically on her guard as Logan eyed her knowingly. Shit. He knew she was ticklish. To her relief, Logan turned his head at a faint sound from down the hall.



“The yellow one is lookin’ for you,” he said idly. He was smirking evilly. Rogue backed away slowly towards the door, her gaze at once challenging and wary, ready to dart away, to run––and perhaps the idea of pursuit was interesting.



“Later, Logan,” she said casually, her normal good-bye in sound, but she did not turn her back on him even as she shut the door. Logan smirked, his eyes dark with intent to pursue his new knowledge of Rogue’s ticklishness; it was a playful venue for his predatory nature, and distracted him from his initial reaction to Rogue’s smile.



He would not use his knowledge of this little weakness of hers today, maybe not even tomorrow. Let her sweat a while. It would be fun to watch.





~~





Scott stared at the stranger still unconscious in the med bay. Her mutation had come back and transformed her in her sleep from the mostly-human figure Rogue had dropped to the snow into very a different creature––more like one Scott could see slicing and dicing Logan––with ash-colored scales covering most of her visible skin. She had been dressed in some of her own clothing from her bag when Rogue has said that hospital attire might affect her as a lab setting had affected Logan on his initial arrival to the mansion; it was a possibility Scott had not been happy to hear about.



“Any precautions for us, Hank?” He turned to face the fuzzy blue mutant who was nearly finished putting a few files together, his last minor duty before heading off to Washington where he was, after all, employed by the white house.



“Other than to make no sudden moves when she first wakes up?” Hank gave a light grin. “Kurt has already offered to take night duty again, and I’ve kept him fully informed. As for you, I trust your paranoia, my dear friend. What is it the students call you now? Fearless Leader?”



Scott groaned lightly. “It’s better than ‘One-eye’ or ‘Scooter’ I suppose.”



“Yes. At least Logan’s penchant for nicknames is not, on the whole, catching. I do not like to think of how I might possibly handle anyone else so casually referring to be as ‘Blue.’”



“Better than Kurt. He’s officially ‘Elf’ now; although he seems utterly unfazed by it.” Scott rubbed his chin. “Why is he so interested in this one? Is it the tail, do you think?”



Hank admonished himself even as he repressed his laugh. “Actually he seems to have met her before, in Germany.”



“Really?”



“Yes. Berlin. They were both evading the police––he because of a riotous mob that had been pursuing him, and she...well, we do not actually know why the police were after her, but she apparently helped Kurt a great deal.” Hank saw the Fearless Leader’s eyebrows indicate suspicion and potential ire. “Keep in mind that we ourselves as X-men have been not unoften hounded by representatives of laws we may be bending at the time.”



“I’ll keep that in mind,” Scott sighed. Hank squeezed the man’s shoulder and made his way out. Fearless Leader continued watching the unconscious mutant. After a while, he got himself a chair. No sense in being needlessly masochistic. After an even longer while, he sighed and picked up the stack of papers he had brought in with him; Fearless Leader exhausted, he reverted to Mr. Summers––albeit he was unusually aware of his surroundings and still prone to shooting suspicious looks toward the unconscious Flux. So he was an unusually paranoid version of Mr. Summers. So he shouldn’t have jumped when the door to the med bay opened.



He cursed under his breath, and glared at the intrusion on his peaceful paranoia. Not that most people could tell. And it eased away anyway when he saw Rogue and she gave him a faint smile that he could not help but return. They had a reasonably good relationship, even if it consisted alternately of being serious X-men sort of people, arguing over fighting styles, and fighting playfully and childishly like siblings when other people were not looking. They had connected on a very familial level after Jean’s death. Rogue half-wished that their connection had not so clearly revealed to Scott how non-sibling-like she and Logan really were. The poor man was still trying and still mostly failing to understand the bonds between his adopted sibling and his in-house arch-nemesis.



“Hey. I don’t suppose you’re here to be ever so kind as to relieve me of watch duty?” Scott smiled brightly.



Rogue only smirked in return. “Nice try, Summers, but no dice.” She laughed when he pouted at her.



“You are heartless.”



“And you are pathetic.”



“I am Fearless Leader. ‘Pathetic’ is only in my vocabulary to use against mine enemies...and Logan when you need him to do something.”



Rogue gave a dramatic gasp of surprise. “Dost Fearless Leader subtly allude that the Wolverine is not amongst his enemies! Oh! The shock!”



Scott sniggered despite himself.



“I win,” declared Rogue.



“Fine. I am abject and sorrowful. Was that your purpose in coming down here? To torment an innocent man?” he mocked.



“Nah. It’s sad, Scott, but the unconscious person was the one in this room who caught my interest. You’re just not on par with her.”



“Not fair. She has scales, and paws on her feet, and a tail. All I have are these rose-colored glasses that I’m lookin’ through that show only the beauty because they hide the truth, and they let me hold on to the good times, the good lines-”



“And horrible jokes of preposterous corny-ness,” Rogue interrupted, giggling helplessly. Scott smirked.



“Win for me.”



“That’s hardly fair. I thought we agreed no singing.”



“I wasn’t singing-”



“You were about to, you were picking up rhythmic steam, and I can tell when you’re about to burst into song because you get this evil look-”



“I still win.”



“Maybe.”



“Why did you want to stare at the vast uninterestingness of this, admittedly peculiar, unconscious mutant?”



“You were talkin’ to Hank, weren’t’cha?”



“Perhaps. Conceivably. Perchance. It could very well-”



“Bloody thesauruses, the both of ya, when ya get started.”



“You didn’t answer my question.”



Rogue’s lips formed a thoughtful moue and she leaned on one of the tables, her eyes on Flux and her expression something a little more solemn. “Ah think she’ll wake up before tomorrow.”



“That’s not all,” Scott murmured. “Is it because she blocked you from taking from her mind?”



“Of course it is,” she said softly. Scott looked at Flux now as well, with less hostility than he had previously. “Ah can’t help but think she could help me, if I could only persuade her to.”



“You’re infamous SCIPP won’t work?”



“Ah’m not at all sure she’s susceptible to the Sad Cuteness Insistent Persuasion Program.”



“Truly her powers must be very great.”



Rogue smirked. “What ever would Ah do without your sparkling wit, oh Fearless Leader?”



“At least you stopped calling me ‘Oh Captain, My Captain.’ It made me horribly afraid to go to the theater or wear my top hat or grow a beard.”



“Yeh’re a nerd, Fearless Leader.”



“They make me teach Literature classes. Do you have any idea how many times I’ve seen ‘Dead Poets Society’?”



“Four times.”



“...You be quiet.”



“Ah would be, but yer sparkling wit keeps getting in the way.”



“You’re never letting me live that down, are you?”



“No more than Ah’ll let Bobby live down his girly squeal when he found out how Kurt reacts to waking up with an icicle in his ear.”



Scott grinned in an evil manner that would shock and terrify most of the student populace. “Yeah, that was good.”



“Still have the tape?”



“Yep.”



Rogue chuckled softly and gave Scott an amused and grateful look. “Thanks, Scott. Yah put me in a good mood. Ah was dangerously close to approaching angst.” She dropped a kiss on the top of his head and started walking away. “Ah’ll bring dinner down to ya later.”



“Fine! Leave me. Leave me to my misery and sadness! My rose-colored glasses that I’m lookin’ through that show only the beauty because they hide the truth, and they let me hold on to the good times, the good lines-”



“Leaving now!”



Scott heard the door slam shut and grinned. Oh yeah. He totally won.





~~





Flux had started listening to Scott and Rogue more than a minute before she was remotely conscious enough to understand any of it. She was used to this. Her ears usually woke up long before she did. Sometimes she was under the impression they never actually turned off, which seemed more likely; they were just more impatient than her other senses in blatantly invading her unconscious state. While this particular hearing habit had saved her life innumerable times, it was still really annoying to be pulled from the warm fuzzy depths of dreamland any earlier than necessary.



Her first thoughts were along very simple lines:



Talking. Stay still. Play dead. Medical smells. Male voice, unfamiliar. Female voice...Then Flux began to wake in earnest, but she kept her breathing deep and slow to mimic sleep; her heart rate did not change, which should have been impossible, but decades of meditation had given her control over most every aspect of her self (except her damned ears waking her up). Flux could hear loud-sounding beeps indicating her heartbeat and blood pressure, and much, much softer sounds that she recognized as an EEG or EKG buzzing with what scrambled signals of brain waves it managed to get through the interference caused by a skull of organic adamantium.



Then Scott and Rogue were talking again and Flux was relieved to note that the brain wave monitor was on too low a volume for them to hear, probably because of the somewhat useless static sounds of interference. They had not noticed that the monitor had begun to report the end of REM signals and the return of alpha waves, indicating consciousness.



The playful banter being tossed around threw Flux off a bit. Where the hell am I? She could feel that her limbs were not bound, there was genuine good humor between the familiar voice and the unfamiliar one, and there were sounds from upstairs, children laughing, pedantic teacher-sounds; and then around and below her were sounds of electricity and large buzzing chunks of technology.



Flux’s head was still spinning in silence as Rogue left and Scott chuckled to himself. With some effort, she restrained the only semi-voluntary actions of her tail, which wanted to lash back and forth nervously with its larger scales standing outward like the raised hackles of a nervous feline. She did not move, and listened to the sounds all around her. Rustling papers from the stranger apparently watching her. He smelled a little bit like one of the less-than-overwhelming Old Spice body washes, comfortable sweaters, books, high metabolism, and the ghost of a smell Flux associated with intense heat like that produced when a powerful laser burns something. What was the rose-colored glasses joke about, anyway?



The constant buzz of electronics from around and below her was maddening. What the hell did this place have down here, anyway? Flux wanted to listen more intently to noises from outside this technological furor, but if she lifted her ears any further to take in more sound, she feared she might never get the damned buzzing out of her skull.



She waited.



Eventually, Rogue brought down Scott’s dinner as promised. Flux’s mouth watered at the smell, but she still did not move.



“She’s still not awake yet?”



“Nope. She is like the dead, but breathing and stuff. Food?” Scott was making for his adorable pout ploy again. Rogue sighed and handed him a tray piled with enough food to feed three normal people. Scott’s metabolism worked way too hard, supporting those eyes of his. He dove into his food with savor.



Rogue strode up to Flux’s bedside, her dark brown eyes scanning the sleep-slackened face. The grey scales there were small enough to look almost like normal skin. “She does look Indian, doesn’t she?”



Scott made an affirmative noise, muffled by a mouthful of food. Rogue shook her head. When the man was not around his students and was not in Fearless Leader mode, he really was a goof.



Flux, meanwhile, was taking in Rogue’s scent with great interest. Not long into her olfactory survey she felt a dull pain behind her heart and a knot in her throat. Really, the girl’s skin should have been enough of an indicator, but Flux had never really denied that her hunger for knowledge and information seemed to have a touch of masochism in it; and Rogue’s scent was like having an old scar split open and squeezed so it bled again.



Rogue tilted her head curiously as she saw a flicker of expression cross Flux’s face, but it eased quickly and she attributed it to a dream. She had, after all, had a few of Flux’s less pleasant memories tossed her way and thus into her own nightmares.



“Ah think she’s dreaming.”



“Hmm. She may be coming out of it then.”



“Ah’m not sure whether ta feel guilty or a little proud,” Rogue mused. It took immense effort for Flux not to flinch at the familiarity of that phrase, and how she knew exactly what it referred to.



“You did well, Rogue.”



“Ah did what Ah needed to.” She almost touched Flux’s arm with her gloved fingers, but pulled away more quickly than she had reached out. Turning to Scott she noted with wide eyes that more than half his food had vanished. “Holy mackerel, Scott. Yer like a damned vacuum cleaner.”



He grinned. “It comes with the territory. Sometimes it pays to be able to consume food quickly.” His knife and fork worked while he spoke and as if to punctuate his sentence he popped a large bite of food into his mouth.



“Ah’m just glad Ah didn’t watch or Ah might’a lost my own dinner.”



“Har har. You might’ve suffered nausea, but my migraine is gone, so call it a trade-off.”



“Is that one of your eating-fast benefits?”



“And my crazy-ass metabolism benefits. Eat quickly, and absorb quickly.”



“Freak.”



“And you are?”



“Yeah, yeah. This is the House o’ Oddities. We should do a catalogue of all our individual varieties of weird...maybe turn it into a game of mutant-spotting bingo for newcomers.” She smirked as Scott half-choked, quickly washing his not-so-well-chewed food down with a gulp of water.



“God, Rogue, don’t do that while I’m eating! It’s dangerous.”



“Yeah, you’re right. Next time I’ll wait ‘til you’re drinkin’ milk.”



“You are an evil sort.”



“Ah’m not bad, Ah’m just drawn that way,” Rogue cooed, in full Jessica Rabbit mode. Scott laughed freely this time, no food in his mouth to possibly block his windpipe.



Flux processed this. A house of mutants. This could be very good or very, very bad. These people had better senses of humor than most of Magneto’s people, though, so that was something. Idly, Flux wondered if she was still in New York or not, and tried to remember what someone had told her about a place in New York very long ago, something that she felt was actually quite non-threatening. She was aware that Rogue and Scott had moved along in their conversation.



“I saw the security tape of your spar with Logan.”



“Yeah?”



“...Okay, so off the gym mat you probably could kick my ass. Without either of us using mutations anyway.”



“Ah told you.” She sounded smug but her smile was sincerely flattered.



Scott returned it and wiggled his eyebrows. “Now lets just keep training until one of us can kick Logan’s ass, too.”



“That may take a while.”



“Don’t shatter my dreams.”



“It’s my job. Sorry.”



“You aren’t sorry.”



“Yeah. Not really.”



“I saw Kurt on the tape, too. I’d have thought he would have been asleep after his guard shift last night.”



“Bobby woke him, telling him about Logan and Ah sparrin’ in the hopes that Kurt would take him along when he ‘ported in to see us.”



“Ah. That was the reason for the icicle.”



“And Kurt went back t’ sleep again after that. He’s gotten about twelve hours total today, Ah think, even with the icicle incident and his retaliation. He should be down in a few hours. After dinner he was feelin’ kinda hyper and decided to run a sim in the Danger Room.”



“And I thought my metabolism was weird. That guy is wired like a kitten: lots of sleep, then lots of hyper time wherein he is distracted by anything remotely shiny.”



“His sleepin’ habits let him be as nocturnal as he naturally likes, while still bein’ social most of the day...at least when he’s not down here all night.”



“Hank said he’d met this one.”



Flux was interested once more. Again, this could be kinda good or very, very bad.



“Yeah.”



“In Germany.”



“Berlin,” Rogue agreed.



Flux’s brain was working overtime. Mutant. Berlin. Kitten-like guy. Teleporting?



“She gave him ‘is coat,” Rogue added.



Oh. That one. Flux mentally sighed in relief. Things could have been so very much worse. What was it he was called...the Incredible Nightcrawler? Yes...



“Hmm.”



“Charles said he’s been gettin’ paranoid vibes off of ya all day.”



Charles, Flux thought. Why is that familiar? It was a very faint bell ringing in a distant part of her memory, and it was hard to connect to it, mostly because that part of her memory was not one she usually delved into.



“I just don’t trust her.”



“‘Cause Charles can’t read her?”



Psychic, then? Flux wondered.



“Mostly. Did I mention how creepy it is when you call him Charles?”



“Well, part of my brain calls him Charles and the other alternates between Chuck and Wheels.”



Scott shuddered in horror and glared at Rogue when she giggled at him. “Okay. Charles it is then.”



“Ah have tried to call him Professor Xavier, but it always comes out in a mocking tone and I hate that,” Rogue sighed.



As Scott said something comforting, Flux found herself completely absorbed in some very old thoughts, very aware of the chain of memory blocks her thoughts had wandered near as she viewed an old scene in her head, her bones aching dimly as it played. Charles Xavier, most powerful psychic in the world...except the mutant who had been telling her about him, but he had gone dormant again, waiting. He would not wake again until the right interesting mutants found him again––or until Flux called him. Hence the blocks. She could not call him even accidentally if she could not recall his name.



Her memories flicked quickly into fast-forward. That was only the first time she had heard the name but sometime more recently––a school. A school for ‘gifted youngsters’ it was called. Flux had the urge to laugh, but outside of her adamantium skull she looked for all the world as though still deeply unconscious. She was planning, now. She was waiting.





~~





Scott sagged back in his chair, his head lolled back so he stared at the ceiling in a bored daze. A pencil dangled limply from his fingertip. He’d finished all his papers half an hour ago. Rogue had left two hours ago. He felt that his boredom might cause him permanent paralysis soon.



Bamf!



Scott nearly jumped out of his skin, but as it was only managed to fall out of his chair, tumbling it and himself to the floor. “Dammit, Kurt!”



Kurt did not stifle his laugh very well. “Sorry, Scott. I thought you were expecting me so I vouldn’t...er...startle you.” He had a hand over his mouth to hide his smile.



Scott mumbled something under his breath and pulled himself to his feet. “It’s alright, but take into consideration how boring watch duty becomes. I can only be prepared and waiting intently for so long before I zone out with nothing to do.”



“I understand. Sorry.” He still sounded amused and Scott smirked at him a bit.



“Mm-hmm. Save it for annoying Bobby.”



“Oh, I think he’s learned his lesson,” Kurt chuckled.



“I’ll get you a copy of the tape.”



“You are a marvelous man, Scott.”



“Yeah, yeah. Goodnight, Kurt.”



“You can turn off the lights when you go. I can see in the dark.”



“In pitch black?”



“Mine eyes make their own light.”



“I’ll turn off most of them.”



“Gud Nacht.”



“Bye.”



Every light in the lab save the one on the ceiling directly above Flux’s sleeping form promptly went black. Kurt sighed contently as darkness enveloped him. It was very quiet, the only sounds consisting of the quiet hum of the machines beneath the school, and the persistent beeps of the machines attached to Flux.



“I have to vonder, how you vill react when you wake, fremder,” he said quietly, wondering if she could hear.



Very subtly, Nightcrawler, Flux thought to herself. She caught his scent through the initial cloud of sulfurous smell from his teleporting: ginger, malt, faint musk, and something not unlike the smell of cider. It was nice.



“You helped me a lot, almost more mit your vords than your money.”



She could hear his rosary’s soft clicks as he moved closer. It reminded her of why she had helped him: a rare moment of sentiment and that rare jolt of knowledge that told her everything she needed to know about him. He was a good guy. She almost regretted his current position in her plot.



“I think of you now and zhen. Idly. Curiously.”



Flux felt an unexpected jolt as he picked up one of her hands, but showed no reaction, struggling a little to keep her breathing even and her heart rate low and relaxed. His fingers were surprisingly nimble, despite his odd tridactyl hands that meant they were wider than normal human fingers. He ran his fingertips along the thin scar bisecting her forefinger, then over the tops of her fingertips, noting her lack of fingernails. Flux’s skin tingled with the urge to react and the effort of keeping her muscles slack and loose; and people just didn’t touch her hands. She had begun to forget what it felt like.



“I could not have thought you vhere truly right...zhat you could be right, vhen you said you vhere stranger than me.” He sounded amused.



Flux’s eyelids fluttered, and Kurt paused, staring at her face. She still seemed to be asleep, or otherwise unconscious.



“Can you hear me, fremder?” he asked quietly.



“Yes,” Flux said softly, and sensed Kurt’s entire body stiffen. “And I’d like to apologize for this in advance. Sorry.”



“Vas-” Flux’s tail swung up in an arc so the end of it caught Kurt on the base of his skull, the combination of the momentum gained in the arc and the sheer weight of the adamantium in the bones of her tail created a force sufficient to result in a knockout. Flux sat up quickly and caught Kurt just as his legs gave out, pulling him up onto the medical bed as she climbed out of it.



“I really am sorry,” Flux sighed, running her scarred fingertips over his brow. She tracked down the always-easy-to-find-in-a-med-bay drawer with syringes of sedatives in them. She read a few labels and found the mildest one, only giving Kurt a third of a dose before tossing the needle in the little biohazard-disposal bin. She had a feeling that his teleporting ability messed with his metabolism, which in mutants usually led to acute drug sensitivity––something her healing ability did not allow her to ever experience.



She lifted Kurt’s hand, but only to look at the watch on his wrist. She looked up at the ceiling as she listened for activity upstairs. “Hmm...too early. It’s only nine.” She bit her lip for a moment, and sat on the bet next to Kurt’s unconscious form, her tail twitching nervously. She looked at the rising bruise on the back of Kurt’s head, reassuring herself that she hadn’t actually concussed him...at least not very badly. He was not bleeding, anyway.



“I see why the other guy was bored.” She paused for thought and sniffed her shirt, then abruptly looked about the med bay for...aha! Over on a tray with an empty IV bag lay the clothes she had been wearing when she arrived. Darting over and lifting them to her nose she sniffed her battered shirt. It still smelled of her previous opponent’s blood across a wide area, which she cut out with a pair of surgical scissors she also found on the tray, leaving only fabric saturated with the her own scent. Flux smirked, the tufted ends of her ears popping up from under her hair.



“Ah, the sound of central air conditioning.” She began walking toward the door, tossing her shirt in the air now and then. “This should keep the most persistent hunting dog off my trail.”





~~





Logan snapped awake for a reason he could not, at first, discern. He sat up slowly, listening intently to the quiet and the dark. He glanced at the clock and found that it was only fifteen-past eleven. He rubbed his face and sniffed, then froze, and sniffed the air again. She’s awake. He jumped out of bed, extending his claws and trying to pinpoint the scent’s origin, but he did not growl, straining as he already was to try and hear his enemy. It smelled like she had just been here. His window was shut, and when he retracted his claws and tried his doorknob, it was still locked.



Pulling on a pair of sweatpants, Logan stepped out into the hallway, looking left and right, sniffing again. The scent was fainter to the left, stronger to the right. Logan moved right, entering the main hall, where he found a faint trail of fresher scent. He followed it slowly, careful to move as quietly as his impatience and his metal skeleton allowed. He paused at the corner leading to another hall: Marie’s hall. His lips curved into a snarl and he leapt out, facing only an empty hallway, doors on the wall to the left, railing open to the hall downstairs.



Logan followed the trail of Flux’s scent to Marie’s door, where it abruptly stopped. Logan tried the door and found it locked. The trail was a dead end. Logan growled to himself quietly and tried to find the source of the scent. He walked past the fresher trail, further down the hall. He stopped when the scent increased, turning to look and saw...and air conditioning vent. Understanding suddenly broke across his features and he bolted away back down the hall, headed for the elevator leading to the lower levels.



On the floor below, crouched out of sight of the railing she had leapt off of when she heard Logan approaching, Flux smirked to herself and trotted in the opposite direction toward the moonlit wall at the far end of the hall. With deft ease she slipped a window open, climbed onto the roof outside, and silently shut it again.



Flux trotted along the roof to the corner of the second story, and extended her claws with a grimace before sinking them into the bricks with the ease only adamantium can manage. She scuttled like a gecko in slow motion, but not sticking to the wall so much as dangling; passing window after window, counting the rooms she passed under her breath until she reached number six and pulled herself up to its windowsill.



Just as she’d heard when she stopped by Rogue’s door, the window was open partway. Retracting the claws of her right hand and pausing as the wounds healed, Flux pushed the window the rest of the way open as quietly as she could manage and pulled herself inside as she sheathed the rest of her claws, feeling very glad there was nothing delicate or noisy to land on as she did so.



Once she had her paws under her, she was able to again move with fluid silence as she stood upright. She paused to pull a scrap of fabric from her pocket, dab it with her tongue and clean the streaks of blood off the windowsill, then off her healed fingers. Re-pocketing the scrap, she pushed the curtain open further and finally turned her gaze toward Rogue where she slept in her bed.



Paws noiseless on the wooden floor, her tail swishing very slowly with each long cat-like stride, Flux made her way to the side of Rogue’s bed and looked down at her face. The girl was dressed in only a tank top and tight cotton shorts that extended only a few inches down her thighs. She was halfway under her sheets, tanged about her, and half exposed, her deadly skin caressed by night air and moonlight. Her breathing was calm, and she was not currently dreaming.



Flux’s face as she looked was unreadable, save the slightest touch of something haunted in her eyes. Her gaze lingered on the streaks of white hair threading through Rogue’s messy ponytail, on little things like the lines of her cheekbones and the shape of the bridge of her nose: mixture of the unfamiliar and the familiar. Again Flux took in the girl’s scent, its notes of orchid and something vaguely...feline, like the faint traces of musk present in a cat’s fur.



She did not know how long she watched in silence before Rogue’s eyelids began to twitch and shudder as her eyes moved beneath them and the girl began to dream, but Flux found herself watched emotion slowly flicker across the sleeping face for a few long minutes before the first fit of dream passed and a period of slower, less intense in-sleep activity began in Rogue’s brain.



“What do you dream, little one?” Flux whispered, scarcely louder than a breath of air. She found herself leaning against the post at the foot of Rogue’s bed and waiting, now, waiting for her to dream again. It was half an hour before she had something new to watch.



Rogue shifted, her head turning as if looking for something. Her breathing grew more rapid and a look of mingled anger and anxiety marred her facial features. Flux tilted her head to one side and moved to stand at the head of the bed, more closely observing Rogue’s face. After several minutes, the girl was nearly thrashing, her breathing ragged and a cold sweat beading on her brow. Flux looked conflicted, her brows drawn in a look of concern. She shut her eyes for a moment and composed something, a few memories from her travels: the hike to the Ice Lakes Basin in Colorado, the dunes of White Sands in New Mexico at sunset. She held them at the front of her mind, felt them travel down her arm, opened her eyes and, carefully erecting her shield in a different manner than before, rested her fingers on Rogue’s brow. One...two...the feelings and the memories were drained away and with an effort, Flux tugged back her hand.



Rogue’s breathing smoothed, her muscles slowly relaxed, and Flux leaned heavily against the bed post, watching her and listening to her heartbeat slowing into a normal sleeping rhythm. When Rogue slept soundly at last, Flux let her head fall back, resting on the wall behind Rogue’s bed, her breathing still even but the look on her face one of rather stormy emotion that broke into an odd sort of elation.



Once she regained her composure, Flux glanced at Rogue once more and then left––out the door, this time, half-closing the window on her way and locking the door again behind her.



She listened carefully to the sounds of the mansion around her as she approached the railing. For fun, she gave the stairs a miss and leapt off the railing again. It was always a bit liberating.



She glanced at a clock on her way down the hall and realized it was one in the morning. Shaking her head, Flux slowly wandered the halls until she found Xavier’s office; it took half an hour. Since the office doubled as a classroom, it was not locked, and Flux let herself in, sat in one of the chairs in front of Xavier’s desk...and waited.





~~





Logan growled to himself, making his way from the lower basement that housed the central air conditioning system, cursing Xavier for being eco-friendly enough to have a well-based one. Stairs were a bitch sometimes. In one fist, he clutched Flux’s shirt, which had been tied to a vent that led into half the other vents in the mansion. He had to give her credit; the bitch was smart. He had wasted a few hours on this particular hunt.



It was only after his discovery that Logan remembered that Kurt had been responsible for watching her and preventing this sort of thing. He was not at all shocked to enter the med bay and find the little blue mutant unconscious on the medical bed Flux had evacuated.



“Damn.” He gave Kurt a once-over and found the bruise on the base of his skull, just visible at the edge of his hair line. It was, at most, a minor concussion. Either Flux had been gentle, or the boy was lucky. Or...Logan sniffed gingerly. Damn. Sedative. Not much, though.



“Hey, Elf,” Logan hissed, shaking Kurt’s shoulder.



“Mmm?” He sounded confused, but the fact he could respond was good. It meant Flux had probably underestimated the amount of sedative to use on him.



“Wake up, Elf, your unconscious lady got away. You might have a concussion.”



Kurt hissed and muttered something incoherent in German. “Ach. Mein head,” he groaned. “Vas ist going on?”



“Are you dizzy?”



“Logan?”



“Yes. Answer the question.”



“I...don’t know.”



“Can you sit up?”



“Head hurts.”



“I know. She whopped you one good, Elf.”



“Who?”



“Flux.”



Kurt opened his eyes blearily and pushed himself up. “Oh. How is she?”



“Gone. And a clever bitch.”



Kurt blinked a few times rather slowly. “...Vas?”



Logan sighed. “I can’t figure out if you’re this way because of a concussion, the sedative she gave you, or both.”



“Ugh, Gott in Himmel, I vos sedated?” Kurt groaned.



“Yeah.”



“Zhat explains a lot. I do not (groan) medicate vell.”



“I see. Good thing she gave you a pretty low dose then.”



“She did? Good. Still very bad, but could be even more bad. Very much more bad.” Kurt scratched the top of his head and then gingerly touched the back. “Ow.”



“Yeah. Be careful with that.”



“Scheisse. Do you know vhat she hit me with?”



“What?”



“Her verdammt tail. Felt like a scaly riot baton.”



“Mm. She went easy on you.”



“Verpiss Dich.”



“Don’t get mad at me.”



“You’re zhe only one here, Logan.”



“I can fix that. Look, do you think you can help me find her or are you thoroughly incapacitated?”



“I do not zhink I can give chase. Everything seems to be swaying...and your face is a funny color.”



“So it is the sedation. Are you nauseous?”



“I cannot feel most of me.”



“Yep. The sedation. It still may not be advisable for you to sleep, at least ‘til Hank makes sure you don’t have a concussion. From what I hear, sleeping with a concussion is bad. I think. I wouldn’t know.”



“O...kay.”



“Coffee would be good. Need help gettin’ upstairs? If you even think about tryin’ to ‘port up, I’ll make sure you have a concussion.”



Kurt lowered his feet to the floor and swayed a great deal but eventually regained his balance. He sniggered. “I am a blue Johnny Depp.”



“Hallucinations? What the hell did she sedate you with?”



“No, no, no! Look at me.” Kurt tried to walk, and staggered like a half-drunk land-lubber on an ocean-going ship. “I have suddenly vastly improved my Jack Sparrow impression, ja?”



Logan shook his head. “Alright ya have a point. Let’s get upstairs to the coffee machine. Flux is obviously either long gone, or off biding her time somewhere.”



“Vhy do you say zhat?”



Logan explained the shredded shirt he’d found in the central air conditioning system. “If she wasn’t gonna be hangin’ around, she would have just buggered off in one of our numerous vehicles, all of which are untouched.”



“Ah. I see.” Kurt was pulling himself up the railing, having given up on trying to walk up the stairs normally. “But you do not think she is doing anything bad?”



“Nah. It’s too quiet. If I were in her shoes, and I have been in them, I’d just start scopin’ the place out, tryin’ not to alert anybody to my presence. One of three things might happen: she’ll surprise the wrong person and a loud fight will ensue and thus we’ll find her, she’ll talk to somebody on her own, or she’ll fuck off.



When they reached the next level, before Kurt could attack the next flight of stairs, Logan dragged him into the elevator, tired of watching him struggle.



“You do not think she will do anything like steal something or attack anyone like a silent assassin?” Kurt inquired.



“She didn’t have the desperation of a thief. And who would she assassinate? I thought about it. She coulda hurt Rogue real bad when she touched her, if she’d really tried, but I think when she saw Rogue, she didn’t wanna kill her.”



“Like maybe she didn’t want to slit mein throat?” Kurt asked cheerfully.



“You’re still able to talk, move about, and even climb stairs. She could have been a lot less kind.” Logan shrugged.



“Ja. I see. My vision is a bit odd, mit zhe throbbing pain in the base of mein skull, but I still see.”



“Just don’t hit it on anything else.”



“Ja,” Kurt groaned.





~~





By the time Kurt was settled and Logan woke up the professor, it was nearly dawn. Scott, horrified that Flux might pull a Logan, had rushed to the garage and then, presumably, begun outdoor patrols. Logan was one more patrolling the halls. He made a neat circuit of the lower students’ halls, then made his way upstairs, working his way from the teachers’ halls to the senior students’, soon once more finding the trail he had discovered earlier, less fresh but easier to follow now that he’d gotten rid of the distraction in the air vents.



Then he reached Rogue’s door and froze. The scent was fresher and came from the door as well. Again he tried the knob, but it was still locked. He put an ear to the door and listened, thinking Rogue would either be awake by now or in the midst of another nightmare; he was surprised to find neither. Rogue was asleep, calmly, her breathing even and undisturbed. And Logan could smell no medications or sedatives.



He leaned against the door, still just listening, momentarily shocked and smiling faintly. It was so good to hear her, even briefly, at peace.



Leaving Rogue’s door, Logan leaned lightly against the railing––all too aware that it was not built to withstand the full weight of his skeleton. He took a deep breath to calm himself, then paused, exhaled, and sniffed the railing. He smacked his forehead.



“She jumped. Fuck.” Logan was tempted to follow, but it was early morning now and he might land on someone; it would be just his luck. He still managed to rumble downstairs at record speed. He was growling as he moved into the lower hall, searching, searching, and finding her scent. Following the slightly older trail first, he cursed under his breath as he climbed out onto the roof. Then he reached the corner and saw the vague trail of scratches in the brick...and where they led.



“Fuck.”





~~





Rogue’s eyes fluttered open at about six in the morning, and then blinked in confusion as she firmly clutched the tail end of her dream.



Flux. Flux had just said, You’re welcome.



When the hell did those memories show up in mah head? Rogue rubbed her eyes, trying to think. The she pulled herself out of bed and wandered over to the window. She narrowed her eyes at it. It was more open than it should be, and her curtain was pushed open. Following pure instinct, Rogue opened the window all the way and leaned out.



“Claw marks in the brick,” she murmured, running her fingers along the nearest set, just under her windowsill. “Ah am confused.” She shut the window and got dressed.





~~





Rogue was surprised to run into Logan wandering around downstairs with a distinct grimace of determination on his face. She was also surprised when he stopped to look at her and immediately seized her shoulders.



“You okay, kid?” he demanded. “Flux is loose. I caught her scent on your door, but-”



“Ah was sleepin’ quite peacefully. She, uh, was kinda responsible for that.”



Logan’s shoulders relaxed visibly. “Really?”



“Yeah. She touched me just long enough to give me a couple...better memories to dream about. Someplace in Colorado. Another in New Mexico.” She realized she was smiling a little. She felt good.



Logan was smiling back. “Good. Good. I’d still feel better if I could fuckin’ find her, though.”



“Ya can’t?”



“She was wandering around here, but the trail is faint and a few hours old and it keeps gettin’ mixed up with the lingering effects of the damn air vent fiasco-”



“Air vents?”



“Yeah. Mind if I explain as I try to recover this damn trail?”





~~





Xavier entered his office, tired from his too-early awakening. It took him a moment to notice the figure sitting in front of his desk, reading his volume of The Complete Works of William Shakespeare. It was so strange to him that, even as she looked up from the page expectantly, amusement and intelligence shining in her bright cat-green eyes, Xavier could sense no scrap of her mind to inform him of her presence. It was as though she existed two-dimensionally to him, missing some crucial depth to his perception. Flux smiled very faintly at him as he shut the door with a small telekinetic nudge.



“It never ceases to amaze me how truly shocked all psychics seem to be when they meet me; although it’s better than when I meet empaths. They look at me with outright horror and sometimes the expression never quite leaves their faces whenever they look at me, even given time.” She stood up and bowed slightly. “Charles Xavier. I’m betting that you are not wholly surprised that I have heard of you.”



Xavier bowed his head in a return greeting. “If you were on the run from Magneto, then no, I cannot say I am surprised that you are aware of myself and my school.”



“And your X-men, I might add, but I actually had not connected that leather-clad rumor to you until I met them––even if they weren’t in the same leather that the rumors promised.”



“We are fully capable of blending in when we need to.”



“Yes. I know the feeling.” She watched him approach and then settle behind his desk. He looked at the page she had left Shakespeare open to. Somewhere in Hamlet. She closed the book. “It was merely my favorite play as a youth, Xavier, nothing symbolic. I’d considered being that utterly smart-ass, but decided against it.”



Xavier felt a faint smile tugging at his lips. “I do thank you. It makes you seem less like an evil genius or a megalomaniac.”



Flux shook her head, the tip of her feline ears sticking out from under her hair. “No. I am not megalomaniacal; I am merely isolationist to the extreme.”



“Except when Magneto’s people are after you.”



Flux sighed. “Yes. There is that. I suppose you are wondering why.”



“Always.”



“Yes. Me too, but not with so much emotion. It is merely my nature to inquire and to collect knowledge. That is part of why Magneto is after me; I have acquired a vast and impressive collection over the years, including knowledge about mutant heredity and the history of the X-gene through the ages. Also, I am great soldier material, am I not? Not to mention the nature of the metal I carry around.”



Xavier looked at her with calm and intelligent eyes. She looked at him as though she thought he had much to learn. “How old are you?” he asked.



Flux smiled faintly, with a touch of anticipation. “I was born in 1921.”



Xavier leaned back in his chair slowly, his eyes wide. Flux’s smile widened with an air that suggested she was enjoying the fruits of what she had anticipated, but her eyes were still full of something old and too-knowing.



“Mutants are not so recent an occurrence as you might think. Admittedly, our numbers seem to be much larger and to have begun growing faster within the last twenty years, but we have existed for several millennia.”



“How do you know this?”



Flux faced Xavier directly and unsheathed the claws of her right hand, wincing visibly as the bright metal was exposed. “This metal was not put here by any human with an experimental laboratory. I received it in the late 1950’s from an obscenely powerful mutant who took me on as a bit of a pet project for the brief period of time he was awake. You see, he spends most of his time dormant, waiting for some prophecy to be fulfilled to wake him and let him take over the planet with his four horseman or something. He was born in ancient Egypt and worshipped as a god. He liked the idea of having another immortal around, and the fact he could not control made me a game piece of sorts for his amusement.” She sheathed her claws with another wince and held Xavier’s gaze.



“This is...very strange.”



Flux smiled crookedly, a bit too honestly because it made her look completely drained, as though she had not slept well in years. “I am as strange as they come, Xavier.”



“Charles, if you please.”



“As the little brunette may have mentioned, my name is Flux.”



“Yes. Her name is Rogue. If she has another name, Logan––the one with the claws you may recall––is the only one who knows it.” He saw a spark of guilty intrigue in her eyes for a moment before she looked away, pulling the scrap of cloth from her pocket again and cleaning her hand. “About Rogue: her powers are very great, and she has a difficult time with them. You are the only one who has been able to issue any degree of control...any ability to prevent her from absorbing something.”



Flux stared into his eyes for a long moment, the tip of her tail swishing a little faster than a moment ago. “I have met a great deal of mutants in my time,” she said quietly. Her face revealed nothing. She took a deep breath with the practiced ease and idleness of a yogi, and strode up to Xavier’s long chalkboard as she slowly exhaled, aware of the psychic watching her as he focused on her mysterious mixture of presence and lack of presence.





~~





Logan and Rogue stood outside Xavier’s office/classroom with a look of hesitation. It was the end of Flux’s trail. Rogue worried her lower lip with her teeth.



“Why would she stop in here?” Logan growled. “Xavier can’t find her, let alone get in her head. He has no defense against her.”



“But why would she attack him? Maybe she’s even heard of the school and just wanted to talk to him.”



Logan snorted and yanked the door open.



Flux was standing at the long chalkboard near Xavier’s desk, one hand on the top of it, and her face turned expectantly to the door as Logan and Rogue burst in. Logan growled and took a threatening step toward her, his knuckles itching, but a small gloved hand gripped his upper arm and he halted, still glaring at Flux for a long moment––she had her eyes wide in a look of innocence that was surely mockery––before finally easing back and meeting Rogue’s eyes. She was nervous, but not out of fear. Her gaze told him that Flux was not a threat, but that Rogue understood no more than that. Logan remembered that Flux had apparently helped Rogue with her nightmares and let her sleep peacefully through the night for the first time in years. He lowered the arm he had lifted with intent to extend his claws.



“Good morning.” Flux had watched their exchange intently, but her thoughts were hidden behind her faint knowing smile and a spark of amusement in her yellow-green eyes as she looked at both of them. “I am sorry about the misunderstanding the other day.” She held Logan’s gaze and smiled enough to show her slightly-too-long canine teeth. “It was a damn good fight though, I must admit.”



Logan’s eyebrows lifted. “Anytime,” he rumbled.



“Logan, Rogue, if you would like to sit down I believe Flux was about to explain something about herself,” Xavier said, glad to finally get a word in. It was an unmitigated relief to look at people whose mental presences he could sense. With a slight telekinetic nudge, he shut the door behind them.



“And the fewer times I have to explain it, the better. Also...” She glanced pointedly at Rogue, who froze for a moment only half-seated in one of the chairs in front of Xavier’s desk. “It should prove to be of interest to you especially.”



“O...kay,” Rogue stammered.



Logan growled lightly from his own seat, and Flux shot him an irritated glare. Then she gripped the top of the chalkboard and pushed it down, the whole board flipping so they could see the somewhat elaborate drawing on the back of what appeared to be a family tree. Also, in the top corner was a drawing of a silhouette of a humanoid figure with a tail and ears, a longish double ended arrow pointing at it and at the next drawing, which was a similar silhouette of a feline shape roughly the same mass as the humanoid one. Just about halfway between the two ends of the arrow was a line marked “comfort zone.” Flux looked up at the three shocked (and in Logan’s case, frankly suspicious) faces she was to address with an explanation. She blinked innocently at them.



“What? I had a lot of time before you people finally woke up,” she explained defensively. Logan rolled his eyes as she cleared her throat. “So anyway, I’ve got a somewhat unique family tree. At the top here, my great-grandfather, was the first mutant of the lot––and there was a lot eventually.” Ignoring the silent buzz of surprise behind her, she continued. “He wasn’t exactly a spectacularly strange guy, but he had unnaturally sharp senses and cat-like reflexes. His son was an apparent improvement of the model because it was reported that he could also leap roughly ten feet in the air, but as this was a report from my father’s childhood it may be questionable. My father himself had retractable claws that broke the skin of his fingers.” She lifted her own hand and traced a line from the tip of one forefinger that ended halfway down the inside, similar to the thin scars even her level of healing could not fully remove from her hands. “He, however, still had fingernails.” She wiggled her fingers at them and turned to point at a different part of her family tree, right next-door to her father.



“My uncle was similar and shared the advanced senses and reflexes of my father, but his claws were of a different style, only extending from his fingertips. They were straighter claws, not as curved as mine or my father’s. He also healed a bit faster than my father. He moved to America and was a successful industrialist during World War II, from what I understand, but died before the war ended in a mining accident that his healing was inadequate to counter. I think that Magneto’s lackey Sabertooth is his son or grandson, and that he underwent unpleasant psychological experiments at some point.” She turned to look at them at this point, tapping two fingers on a blank bit of the chalkboard. Logan was gaping openly but snapped his mouth shut when she met his gaze, Xavier looked interested and thoughtful, and Rogue was a mixture of patient light-confusion and keen attention.



“I apologize in advance for my distant relation. He’s one screwed-up mother fucker.”



Logan chuckled darkly and Rogue smirked.



“Go on, please,” Charles urged.



“Yes. Back to my father. I’m the product his first marriage. He was...well, very British imperialist I’m afraid. My mother was, and I’m sure some of you’d guessed, from India. My father had actually heard about the strange powers her siblings had, most of which had to do with changeable appearance or something to do with armor. My mother had the ability to grow thick black scales at will; they put kevlar to shame. I did not inherit their durability, but skin changeability is a major mark of my mutation. Apparently, and I’ve noticed that this is a trend in other mutant families, when two X genes get passed on, the offspring is often much, much weirder than its parents, often in unexpected ways.” She pointed at the drawing in the upper corner of the blackboard. “Hence, I change shape between a mostly-human form that, with some effort, can pass for perfectly normal in daylight but hurts my feet a great deal to maintain, and this rather drastic feline shape wherein I have little control over my mind, but am a formidable force to be reckoned with. My healing ability is a sort of side-effect to the constant fluctuation in shape. I don’t really like either extreme, but I much prefer the human one. I’m most comfortable perfectly in the middle.” She gestured toward herself; her legs were currently digitigrade so her oddly-shaped heels were in the air as though she wore an invisible pair of five-inch heels on her long, thin feet, ending in cat-like paws. Her skin was mostly covered in scales but not in a manner that looked like large plates of armor, the way they had when she had fought Logan.



“Have you ever seen the movie ‘Chronicles of Riddick’?” Rogue asked.



Flux blinked a few times in surprise, but then looked thoughtful. “Uhm...I think I was forced to, which is a long story for another time. Why do you ask?”



“You remember the big dog-like creatures in the maximum security place, with the scales and everything?” Rogue was smiling a little.



“Yes. I see where you’re going with this. Imagine them to be a dark grey color with yellow eyes and a more feline structure, and that’s about what I’d look like,” Flux agreed.



“Okay.”



Flux cleared her throat again and turned back to the board. “Anyway...my father’s second marriage–” She paused and turned to look at them again. “My mother died in childbirth along with the child who would have been my brother.” She turned away before they could try to say anything. “My father remarried to a non-mutant French woman, producing my half-brother who had my father’s mutation and a healing ability similar to my own, and my younger half-sister who was not a mutant. I was quite close to her, even as I began wrestling with my difficult-to-control shape-shifting. In retrospect, I suspect she may have inherited the bizarrely common dormant form of the X-gene.” Flux paused, steadying herself with a deep breath.



“My father took us with him when he travelled through the Middle East, where my sister met a powerful mutant named Ahmad; although he was actually a Frenchman by blood, he had been forced to change his name multiple times in his life for lots of interesting reasons. He had a semi-psychic ability to read the thoughts and emotions of anyone touching his skin. As he learned to control his ability he also found he could drain their energy or pull parts of them into himself. He was a playboy, and an extremely successful one for obvious reasons.” Flux’s voice was laced with blatant ire. “He had an affair with my sister, and then dropped her. Her heartbreak was profound. When my father and I tried to find the man, we discovered that he had vanished into a chaotic part of India, and were forced to give up the chase when my father was ordered to come back to England. Out of the whole thing came my nephew.” Again she stopped for a moment, this time as though her last statement had unexpectedly winded her. It had been a long time since she had tried to talk about this without consuming enough alcohol to pickle an elk, but she forced herself to keep talking.



“He had inherited a different form of his father’s mutation. His skin pulled at the energy and psyche of anyone he touched, and he was able to ‘borrow’ others’ mutations. Unfortunately, he had no control over it when he first manifested and knocked out his mother for a week.” Flux turned when she heard Rogue give a long, ragged breath, a stuttering inhalation of surprise. For a moment the pain in Flux’s eyes was visible to everyone in the room but it was hidden quickly.



“What happened ta him?” Rogue asked quietly, aware of all eyes on her, but she was focused only on Flux, who looked at the floor, her eyes distant.



“At the time he manifested, I had been at one of a number of places I have found here and there, on various continents, this time in England; it was a club, with a very specific sort of customer...much like this school is for a specific sort of student.” She tapped her fingers on Xavier’s desk. “I had been hunting Ahmad in my spare time for years, but I was aware that I needed a way to keep him out of my head when I did meet him, just in case he somehow survived the meeting, I did not want him to know about his son. I had made friends with a couple of psychics, and had learned a lot from them. When I did finally find Ahmad in Persia, he was able to drain me on the few occasions I was in contact with him for longer than it took to cause him pain, but I’d kept him out of my head after I figured out what he was doing on his first attempt. It was different than a psychic, his mind was different, and when I found out that Isaac had manifested the way he had, I was able to help him. He was very afraid, and he had gotten to know his mother’s mind better than he should have.” Flux’s lips twitched.



“I loved my sister, but there are thoughts a mother in her position has, usually against her will, often fleeting, but still so harmful to a child that-” She stopped a moment, looked out the window, cleared her throat. A long silence followed. “Sorry.”



“It’s quite alright,” Xavier said softly.



“It took a very long time. His mutation was quite different from his father’s, and more powerful. If not for my healing ability it would have taken even longer; as it was, learning together one piece at a time it took us more than half a year just to figure out a theory to work off of, and then another year of practice, mostly because of how young and scared he was.”



“But you succeeded?” Rogue whispered. Flux looked at her sadly.



“Yes.”



Rogue opened her mouth to speak again, then gently closed it, confused by what she saw in the other woman’s face. Flux watched her intently for a long moment, her eyes edged in pain.



“How old are you?” Logan asked suddenly. Flux looked at him with a vague smile.



“I’m sorry you missed it when Charles, here, asked. It was priceless.” She allowed herself a faint smirk as she looked at the chalkboard again. “I was born in 1921.”



Rogue gave a squeak. Logan’s eyes went momentarily wide, then he slowly nodded.



“My nephew died in 1954. His daughter was only five years old when his widow asked me for the money to send her to and support her in America. I tried to keep track of the woman, but she had gotten to know me a bit too well. I received a letter from a large city in Mississippi saying that her child had not manifested anything strange, and I couldn’t trace it. The daughter’s name was Laurel Annette.” Flux was looking directly at Rogue again.



“Meridian, Mississippi,” she said quietly. Flux clicked her tongue. “Laurel Annette was my momma’s name–she died the year ‘fore I manifested. She’d kept her maiden name and insisted I have it-”



“D’Ancanto?”



Rogue nodded, her eyes wide.



“Your grandmother’s maiden name. I don’t know how I didn’t find it,” Flux murmured, shaking her head. “Then again I’ve never heard of Meridian. I suppose I’m still not very used to dealing with Americans and some aspects of this country.”



“So...” Rogue seemed to be doing some kind of bizarre math in her head. “What the hell does that make us?”



“You know my favorite thing about Shakespeare?” Flux tapped the Complete Works with her tail. “No matter how people are related, if they aren’t actually siblings or somebody’s parents, they’re essentially just called ‘cousin’ because it’s far easier.”



“This...is really, really weird,” Rogue sighed.



“How did your nephew die?” Logan asked quietly.



Flux froze, her face empty of expression but her eyes turning a little more yellow for a moment. She leaned against Xavier’s desk as Logan avoided the glare Charles was shooting at him to try and indicate how tactless he had been.



“He got hurt. It...a half-brother of his tracked him down somehow, thinking Isaac had killed their father. Isaac didn’t even know that bastard was dead.” Flux squeezed the bridge of her nose, restraining her anger. “I was only a few blocks away, but I still didn’t get there in time. I took out the guy, but when I got to Isaac...he wouldn’t let me heal him.” Her voice cracked for the first and only time, just faintly, and a flicker of frustration crossed her features. She turned away from all three of them and crossed her arms over her chest. Her tail was flicking now and then, small tremors running down the length of it in the mean time.



“Sorry,” Logan murmured, feeling a strange tension in his chest thinking of Rogue...if he somehow could not heal her when she was...



Flux only shook her head dismissively.



The scaled mutant was focused on her own breathing, momentarily unable to hear anything but her own breath and heartbeat as her ears pressed almost painfully against her skull, muting the world. Her eyes were shut and her face looked calm if not for the lines of pain at the corners of her eyes and her mouth. She shivered at the touch of a gloved hand on her elbow, her ears relaxing enough that she could hear the quiet tension of the room. Slowly turning her head, Flux opened her eyes and met Rogue’s. She swallowed hard, aware of a sense of calm washing over her as she looked at the young woman’s face, framed in chocolate and white.



“You have his eyes,” Flux said very quietly, so that even Logan strained to hear. Rogue could think of nothing to say, but gently squeezed Flux’s arm. Tentatively, Flux lifted her free arm and stretched a hand out towards Rogue’s face. Rogue’s lips tightened, but she did not move. Both of them relaxed as Flux only gently pushed Rogue’s hair out of her face and tucked it behind her ear. After lingering near Rogue’s temple, Flux’s fingers settled on the gloved hand that still touched her, lightly brushing it, then tapping softly as she had tapped the chalkboard, her fingertips leaving pale streaks on the black leather gloves from the chalk. “Thanks.”



Rogue smiled.



The door slammed open, making everyone in the room jump this time, breaking up the tender moment. As Scott suddenly halted his charge into the office, his eyes fixed on Flux, then on Flux’s proximity to Rogue, and the odd drawing on the chalkboard behind them, an awkward silence filled the room for a few seconds. “Uhm,” said the deflated Fearless Leader. “I missed something here, didn’t I?”



“Rather a lot, actually, Scott,” Xavier sighed, but he had a faint smile on his face.



Flux cleared her throat. She looked a bit ruffled, but more at her ease than before. “I have to make a few calls, if you don’t mind?”



“You’re quite welcome. There is a phone in the-”



“I know where a few of them are, thanks,” Flux said with a smirk and nodded a farewell to all of them before she left, shutting the door with surprising quietness behind her. Scott and Xavier exchanged glances, looked at Logan who was looking at Rogue and Rogue who was looking at the door, then looked at each other again.



“It’s a long story, Scott. Pull up a chair if you’d be so kind. Perhaps I can tell you all what she and I had been discussing before either interruption...”





~~





Kurt, having emptied half the coffee pot, had decided to move on to beer. His selection consisted of Scott’s American brews, which he distrusted, and Logan’s Molson, which was better but still not German enough sometimes. Deciding to go out to a liquor store on a mission to find some seriously fine wheat beer, Kurt settled for a Molson Golden. Two of them: one to hold on the back of his head, one to drink.



He had finished his first beer and was muttering to himself about sedatives and their side effects when he felt a hand on his shoulder.



“Let me see.” The voice was female, and its owner’s hand––after gently but audibly dropping a bag to the floor––gently lifted the beer from the back of his neck.



With a sigh, Kurt complied, setting down his less-cold-than-he-might-like-for-his-head beer. “I didn’t hear you come in.”



“I’m talented that way,” the voice said. Hands eased his head forward, their fingers gently moving over the hair at the base of his skull, and Kurt was relieved when they carefully avoided touching his bruised skin, which looked purple-black compared to his usual blue.



“It throbs badly.”



“I can offer you some asprin...”



“I do not usually medicate vell. Is it low-dose?”



“No, but I can break the pills in half.” Her voice was increasingly familiar.



“Ja. That might do it.” Kurt’s tail half-consciously curled around the legs of the woman behind him, careful not to touch her.



“I really am quite sorry.” She released her hold on him as he stiffened in recognition, but she had been so focused on him that his tail suddenly making a tightened lasso around her ankles caught her by surprise and she was scarcely able to keep from hitting her head on anything as she was hauled upward by the tight hold. Flux found herself eye-to-eye with Kurt’s left knee and looked up at his face as he turned slowly to face her.



“It really, really hurt you know,” he snorted.



“I know. I couldn’t have you alerting everyone to my presence at that time, though. I was only barely aware of where the hell I was, and I had...I had a few things I needed to do.”



“How did you have any idea vhere you were?”



“I’ve been awake since late yesterday afternoon. Listening.”



Kurt nodded, a look of surprised respect on his face. “You’re very good.”



Flux smirked a little. “Thank you.”



“Vhat did you need to do?”



Flux ran her fingers through her hair, which hung down partway down the length of Kurt’s medium-height barstool. “I had to be sure where I was, keep Logan from finding me too quickly, and...I had to see Rogue.”



“Vhy?” His voice was suspicious now.



“I suspected she was a relative of mine,” Flux said softly, her feelings masked.



“And vos she?”



“...Yes. I spoke with Rogue and Logan when they burst into my meeting with the professor. Remind me later to see if they erase the diagram and family tree I drew on the chalkboard earlier this morning.”



“Vhell, it’s unfair they probably got zheir questions answered and I am left ignorant,” Kurt pouted. “I do, after all, have zhe head injury.”



Flux squeezed the bridge of her nose between her thumb and forefinger, letting him see the look of pain on her face. “Look, if you don’t hear it from Logan or Rogue anyway, please please do not ask me to repeat the ordeal of all the explanations I just gave until I have enough liquor at my disposal to pickle a Sumatran tiger.”



Kurt gave her a kinder look. “I am sorry.”



“You are not at fault. I just have one or two wounds that are very deep, even after more than forty years.” Flux lowered her hands to the floor and splayed her fingertips, supporting herself somewhat. “Before you ask, I can answer you one thing I think I know you will ask: I was born in 1921 and I am far too lazy to do math.”



Kurt’s jaw dropped even as he loosened his tail’s hold on her and she gently tugged away, going into a back-bend and then pushing herself back upright. Turning to face him again, she smiled faintly stepped closer, and gently closed his mouth.



“I told you I was stranger than you.”



“No kidding.”



“Also...” She bent down and zipped open the large duffle bag she had dropped behind Kurt, pulling out a thick metal briefcase with a combination lock. She set it on the counter in front of him, unlocked it, and pulled out what to Kurt’s eyes appeared to be the Holy Grail for a moment; when he corrected himself, he felt no disappointment. “A pint-sized bottle of Weihenstephaner Hefe Weissbier. Consider it a peace offering.”



“All is forgiven,” Kurt whimpered, delicately taking the beer from her hands.



Flux smirked. “Good.” She snapped the briefcase shut. “Now, I have to make a phone call, if you’ll excuse me.” She strode over and picked up the wireless phone in the corner of the kitchen. Kurt seemed to be humming with glee as he opened his beer, and audibly purred at his first sip.



“How did you get it at the perfect temperature? Just a little cool so it warms on the tongue-”



Not looking up as she dialed, Flux replied, “I left the briefcase under the main cooling vent in the hall. Which is to say I tied used a removable handle from my bag to tie on it so it dangled a few inches under the vent, which was on the ceiling.”



“I like you.”



Flux smirked at him, despite herself, and then held a finger to her lips as the phone rang on the other end. Kurt nodded and went back to his beer.



Five rings in: Click. “Hello?”



“Hey. It’s me.”



A pause.



“Flux, who else.”



Kurt looked up when Flux made an exasperated noise at the suddenly loud flurry of words he could not distinguish from the phone, which she now held a few inches from her sensitive ears.



Flux waited a long moment, through the initial rabble, listening for the key security questions. “1921.” Another long moment, more babbling from the phone. “No. No. Yes. No. Hell no. Yellow, green, or blue depending on the situation and my mood. Depends, have you changed bodies recently? No? Then hazel.” Flux’s head fell back as yet more chatter came from the phone.



“Dammit, Calliope, just listen to me, will you?” she snapped abruptly, making Kurt twitch. The murmur from the phone grew quieter and Flux let it closer to her ear.



“Yes. I’m not. No. Yes, I know you’re surprised.” Flux sighed heavily. “I found something...Yes. Yeah, can you bring me the things from storage? Yeah, New York, why else would I be talking to you?...Really? Well how should I know you’d taken over in San Francisco, too? Good to know, though.” Flux tapped her chin, listening again. “I’m out in Westchester. The school. Yes that school.” Flux smirked into the sudden silence, knowing it would not last.



“Yes. Can you help me figure that out while you’re here?” Flux paused again, then rolled her eyes with an exasperated look. “Don’t get smug, I’m just biased currently.” Flux’s face turned serious, but seemed very relieved to be so. “Yeah. Yeah. It...” Flux shut her eyes and cleared her throat quietly. “It relates to Isaac.” A long pause. “Good, thanks. See you then.” She hung up the phone and slumped against the counter, tangling her fingers in her hair and curling them tightly.



“Uhm...pardon my irepressable curiosity...”



Flux sighed heavily. “I just called one of my oldest living accquaintances. She is very very very verbose. I trust her, which is rare, but she can also be so ungodly annoying and more nosy than anyone else on the planet.”



“She is a mutant, zhen?”



“Yeah. Weird psychic-esque voice powers. She won’t be around long.”



“And you?” Kurt’s tail swished a bit nervously.



Flux lifted her head slowly and looked at him seriously. “I don’t know. That’s part of why she’s coming.”