The shock that Logan felt when he found out that he had a wife was nothing compared to the sight of the identical boys who called him Daddy. As far as Logan knew, he didn’t have any children. At least none that he’d known of before his capture.
“Daddy, what’s wrong?” the bolder of the pair inquired.
“Hunter, why don’t you and Chase go outside and play,” said an elderly man in a wheel chair as he exited an ornate wooden door. “I need to speak with your father.”
“But....”
“Hunter, no arguing,” the older man said sternly.
Pouting, the two brothers turned and headed down the hallway. Logan watched them go, unable to believe that they were his. He had two sons. There was no doubt in Logan’s mind that they were his. There was no need to. Not when he could see himself so clearly in their faces and could smell his mark on them. They shared blood. Hunter and Chase were his sons and, unless his instincts were failing him, the Southern beauty was their mother.
“Won’t you join me in my office, Logan. We can speak in private and I believe that I will be able to help you answer your questions,” the old man invited, turning his chair towards the room he had come from.
“All I want to know is what the fuck is going on,” Logan demanded as he slammed the door shut behind him. “All I know is that I woke up from being experimented on by a bunch of fucking sadists to being experimented on by a bunch of mutants. I haven’t quite decided which is worse. Then, to top it all off, I’m being told that I’m married to a woman I can’t remember and that we have two sons together.”
The older man sat back in his chair, placing his clasped hands on his lap. Logan noticed that the sign on the front of his desk said Professor Charles Xavier. Good to have a name that he could shout at and curse. “Yes, I am well aware of what is going on. Rogue is quite distressed over the matter.”
“Rogue...? Is she the girl?” Logan asked, feeling bad that he didn’t know the name of the woman who had possibly fathered his children.
Even after Xavier’s confirmation, things still didn’t feel right to Logan. It was as though she shouldn’t have been Rogue to him. That he called her by another name. He didn’t now what that name was, but it wasn’t Rogue. Everyone else may have called her that, but it didn’t sound right.
Logan absently ran a finger over the indent on his left ring finger. “Was she telling the truth. Ya know... about her and me?”
“She was,” the bald man confirmed. “The two of you are married and have been for quite some time.”
“That’s not true!” Logan shouted, dropping his hands to his sides. “I have a wife and that’s not her! She’s not my wife.”
“Then what do you make of that?”
His eyes trained on the object that Xavier was pointing to, Logan felt his heart stop for a few moments. It was a framed picture. Of him. And of Rogue. Together. He was wearing a tuxedo and she was in a wedding dress. They were feeding cake to each other with their hands and they both had, happy grins on their faces. They were in love.
“You doctored that somehow!” Logan insisted, barely resisting the urge the urge to throw the picture across the room. He began pacing like a caged tiger, his eyes darting every which way. “I did not marry Rogue! I don’t even know her!”
“Until yesterday you did. the two of you knew each other very well,” Professor Xavier told him. “You were planning a vacation for you and the boys to Alaska.”
“Hunter and Chase.... How is it possible that I have sons and don’t remember it,” Logan mumbled, more to himself than the other man. “Look, I’ve gotta go... I need to think.”
Professor Xavier nodded his head. “You are free to come and go as you please, Logan. Though I hope, for your sons’ sakes, that you remain in Westchester until we get things worked out.”
“Sure. Whatever,” Logan grumbled non-commitally.
Logan all but bolted from the room then. He had every intention of leaving the mansion and would have, had all the air not been driven from his lungs by a force that he couldn’t see. As he stood there, hunched over and gasping for breath, Logan heard something that made his blood run cold.
“MOMMY!”
It as Hunter’s scream. There wasn’t a single doubt in Logan’s mind about that fact.
The scream had barely died down before Logan was running through the hallways in the direction of his son’s scream. Whether he remembered them or not, it didn’t change the fact that they were his sons.
“Let my Mommy go!”
“Hunter, Chase, go inside!”
“No!”
“Mommy!”
“AHHHHH!”
“HUNTER!”
Logan’s claws were out the instant that he heard his son’s pained scream. Pumping his legs harder, Logan raced towards the large French doors at the end of the hallway which led outside and, if the blurred images could be believed, to whatever had hurt his son.
Not even pausing long enough to open the door, Logan went crashing through the glass and into the back yard. Growling, Logan took off sprinting towards the fight that was taking place near the treeline. There were others rushing over as well, but Logan would be damned if they got there before him. No one was gonna save his boy but him.
As soon as the scent of Hunter’s blood hit his nose, Logan became even more enraged. Rogue was lying in a crumpled heap on the ground, a gargantuan blonde beat crouching over her. Hunter was sitting cross-legged nearby, clutching at his right arm with Chase hovering behind him.
“If you value your life, you’ll get the hell outta here now, fuzzball,” Logan snarled, coming to a stop only feet away from the monster that had hurt his boy.
“That you, runt? Too you longer to get out here than I thought,” it growled, turning to him with a maniacal grin on its face.
Logan advanced on the bigger man, placing himself between his sons and the bastard who was going to hurt them. “Look, asshole, I don’t know who you are, but you hurt my kid. That’s liable to get you fucking killed.... Chase, I want you to take Hunter to... to Dr. Hank.”
“What ‘bout Mommy?” Chase whimpered.
“Don’t worry, kid, I’ve got your Mom,” Logan assured the frightened boy, not taking his eyes off of their attacker. “Just get Hunter outta here.”
“I’ve been waiting for you, runt,” the beast snarled. “We’ve got some unfinished business to attend to. That being my need to kick your ass.”
Logan smirked, barely resisting his urge to laugh at the other man. “Yeah, you wish, bub. The way I see it, only one of us is leaving here. Seeing as how I promised that little boy I’d take care of his mom, that pretty much means I’m the one leaving.”
“I’d like to see you make that true, shorty.”
“Must you both be so juvenile?” a new voice interrupted.
Logan was thrown on edge by this new voice. His eyes scanned the area, only to come to rest on the form of an old man who was slowly lowering towards the ground. As soon as he was within striking distance, Logan swung his arm out, claws aimed at the man’s heart.
His hand stopped less than an inch away even though his muscles strained to continue with the motion.
“What the fuck....”
“You seem surprised, my clawed compatriot,” the old, accented man commented. “One would think that you were not aware of your own body. Nor of my particular abilities. Take your pick on which one is more appealing.”
“Who are you?” Logan growled, every muscle in his body fighting against the oppressive hold. It was worse than being confined because he was not tied down in any way. He just couldn’t move.
“Have you suffered from another bout of amnesia, my dear boy? I would have thought that I had made some sort of impact on one of our previous meetings,” Buckethead said, the grin on his face worrying Logan. “I guess I’ll just have to remind you.”
Logan screamed as his body began moving in ways that it had no right to be moving. He was aware of only on thing. A scream. Rogue was screaming again.