Balloon
Jaya Mitai

It crawls on his back-
It won't ever let him be.
Stares at the walls until the cinderblocks can breathe.
His eyes have gone away,
Escaping over time.
He rules the crowded nation
Inside his mind.

10,000 Maniacs (pun intended.)

        Disclaimer - Marvel's people are Marvel's.  The 'terrorist woman' is
sole property of Kaylee (hint, hint) and used with her permission.
Everyone else is mine.  There's some language, violence, and mind games,
so more sensitive readers beware!  I worked long and hard on this, and
became much more confused than you will on reading this, and it has
taken me a month to get to this point, thanks to much help from
Kaylee/Jaya, Luba, and Kielle.  So tell me if I can do crazy!!  Feedback
to jaya_gm@hotmail.com.  (HINT, HINT)  If you don't send me feedback, I
will . . . uh, cry?  And you wouldn't want me to cry . . . WOULD
YOU?!?!?!?!?!

        Author's Note: Yes, you Trekkies you, I stole a concept from Star Trek
Next Gen.,  and I did it on purpose!!  Bite me, Picard! ::sheepish
grin::  Oh, and on the Russian . . . er, kardoeshka is phonetically
spelled . . . it means 'potato.'  I don't know the Russian alphabet-
forgive me.  There's a spoiler and explination at the end.

        He cradled the girl to his chest, rocking her back and forth, trying to
ignore the sharp fear scent and her violent trembling.  He tried to tell
her it was okay, and he wasn't going to hurt her, and he was sorry, but
all that came out were feral growls.  And then Control came, and forced
him to put his huge hand around her neck and squeeze, and squeeze, and
squeeze-
        With a yell he came awake, but it wasn't from the dream.
        "The balloon is red."
        "The flamin' balloon is green," Logan growled back, bracing himself for
another shock.  The electricity found the perfect conductor coating his
bones, and his muscles writhed, being cooked and healing themselves back
to flesh in nearly the same instant, his spine stiffening, pushing him
off the wall in an arc, his head thunking against the wall as he
convulsed, but he wouldn't yell for them, not again, no matter what they
did he wouldn't yell, wouldn't let them know how much it hurt -
        Yes.  Yes he would let them know how much it hurt.  He would hurt them
as they hurt him, laugh as they screamed as they wanted him to scream,
laugh as he cut them, all of them, he lashed out-
        And the woman before him crumpled into a heap on the ground, silently.
        He blinked.
        He was in a hotel room.  A nice hotel room.  Expensive.  A king-sized
bed with a pink comforter adorned one wall beneath a replica of a Monet.
The plush carpet matched the color of the comforter, and the light ivory
walls and numberous windows made the room seem bright and cheerful.  He
could smell the scented water in the bathroom through the stench of the
blood.
        He knelt beside the woman, already knowing she was dead.  She was
wealthy, her exotic silk gown indicating that she had been intending to
be somewhere and would probably be missed fairly soon.  He turned her
over, inspecting the wound he had inflicted.  She'd died quickly.  Her
ice blue eyes stared up blankly, her face a mask of surprise.
        He left the bedroom and the woman, coming out into a sitting room of
some size, with jade-colored furniture and a glass coffee table.  There
was a man on the couch, gutted, his eyes also wide in surprise.  A phone
was laying next to him, a voice still saying, "Sir?  Sir, can you hear
me?  Sir, please pick up the phone."
        Cops.
        Without thinking, he rushed towards the unlocked door, threw it open.
An elderly woman was heading toward her room in the wide hallway.  She
took one look at the wild-eyed bloody man and screamed.  Hastily he
ducked back into the room as the elderly woman stepped away, wide-eyed.
He slammed the door closed.
        That was when he saw his hands.  They were covered in blood.  His
blood?  No, the others'.  He went to the spacious bathroom, started the
water, used the perfumed soap.  The reek was unbelievable in the closed
space-
        Cops.  He had to get out of here.
        He heard the sirens and headed back out into the hall, dripping water
and still wearing blood-soaked clothes.  Hotel security was halfway to
the door.  He slammed it shut as they drew pistols, and locked it,
fumbling with the chain even as he heard them sliding a key into the
door.
        That left the balcony.
        He made it all the way out before they managed to cut the chain, and
leapt onto the concrete barrier, staring down at the busy street a
dizzying twenty stories below him.  He heard Security yell, in German.
They wanted him to come away from the balcony.
        Don't let them take you alive the thought flashed through his mind, and
without a second's hesitation he threw himself at the pavement all those
feet below, almost enjoying the air rushing past him as he fell.  About
ten feet from the ground, he suddenly realized what he'd don-

        He gasped as he came awake, the electric shock still sending his limbs
trembling.  He was completely useless as his healing factor scrambled to
repair damage.  His eyes didn't work, his lungs didn't work, his ribs
felt l- well, they felt better.  His ears were working fine.
        "I left him dead long enough for the coroner to pronounce death, then
smuggled him out of the morgue.  Of course it's going to take some
time."
        "We're losing him-"

**********************************
        After an eternity he realized that he was crying.  Crying helplessly,
hopelessly.  It was hopeless.  He just wanted it to be over, just wanted
to go to sleep-
        "The balloon is red."
        But the balloon _wasn't_ red.  It was green.  Green like moss, green
like all those plants in Ororo's att-
        He shook off the drugs for a moment, enough to scream at them again,
before the electricity took him down.
**********************************

        "Thank God."
        His lungs were working now.  His heart was beating somewhat steadily,
and his eye didn't burn quite so badly.
        "Though we were going to have to find somebody else-"
        "We probably should, as a precaution.  If Control fails us, we'll need
a contingency plan."
        "He stable?"
        "He will be shortly."
        "Get him back to his cell.  Right now, I think there's a certain
Russian that will want to negotiate."
        "If he doesn't?"
        "We know that his little girl's in Paris."

        Logan sucked in breath.  He felt the air enter his lungs, he felt his
lungs expand, he blew it back out.  And contemplated the feeling.  Was
it real?
        Bored, he touched the collar around his neck without attempting to
loosen it.  He'd made that mistake three times already.  Maybe.  Three
times he remembered.  They might not have happened.  Or maybe he only
remembered half the times.
        The cell around him gave no answers.  Metal walls, metal ceiling, metal
floor.  Or perhaps it was merely painted to look metallic.  It was
fairly small, smaller than most local sherrif's cells, hardly even
seven by ten.  The bunk was barely long enough to accomadate him, and he
was short.  He had only a scratchy brown wool blanket to fight the
uncomfortable chill of the room.  The metal sink and toilet sat squatly
diagonally from the cell door, which was also metallic and adorned with
a mirror, about head height.  The door was static; he received a jolt
just for touching it, though the electricity was nothing compared to the
juice that they used when they really wanted to hurt him.  The cell
otherwise was bare, like the thin brown polyester uniform he was forced
to wear.
        He leaned against the wall, not even knowing if he was really leaning
on a wall, and contemplated thoughts that may or may not have been his
own.  And he wondered if it was worth it.
        Again.  Or maybe for the first time.
        What was real?  Why did real matter?  What was important, what he
though or what he did?  Even his thoughts weren't sacred, here, but then
again, neither were his actions.  Again, he contemplated retreating back
into his mind.  He knew what it would cost.  He wouldn't make it back,
not this time.  All Xavier's telepaths and all Xavier's dreams couldn't
put Logan together again.  Not again.
        Or was it the first time?  Or had they ever?  Were the X-men merely
another memory, something planted by Weapon X.  Maybe he was still
there.  Maybe he had only been there for a few weeks.  Maybe he was an
old man, with grey hair, lying in a coma in some hospital in the middle
of nowhere.  Maybe he really was a beast in the wood, having dreams of
being a man.
        Maybe Jean was someone he'd killed, maybe he'd orphaned Jubilee.  Maybe
they were pretty naked models that he'd seen on one of the wall
calendars in a lab he couldn't remember.  Maybe the drugs had induced
Jean's fiery red hair and Jubilee's obnoxious coat.
        Or maybe they were real, and trying to break him out.
        Or maybe they were real, and trying to break him.
        Maybe they were doing this to him.  He didn't feel a telepath in his
head.  Then again, maybe he didn't know what a telepath felt like.
Maybe he'd just imagined it.
        Maybe he wasn't even Logan.  Maybe he was really Christian, or Jim, or
Billy-Bob.  Maybe he was some kid shooting up in an alley.  Maybe drugs
were a figment of his imagination.  Maybe all of it was a figment of his
imagination.
        What was real? Was it a figment of his imagination?  What is
imagination?  Is it real?
        Logan laid down on the bed, or maybe it was a slab of stone in a tomb,
or maybe it was a bed of nails, or maybe it was air.  Whatever it was,
it wasn't comfortable.  He tried to relax, not knowing if he was
achieving actual relaxation even as he felt himself drift off to what he
though might be sleep, but which could have been a myriad of other
things.

        When Logan awoke, he glanced down at the door.  Sure enough, someone
had slipped food to him while he had been asleep.  He went over and
sniffed it.  Didn't smell like food.  Smelled like cardboard and
chlorine.  He was glad his enhanced senses were dulled by the inhibitor
collar, or he probably would have vomited.  But he ate anyway, like an
animal, with no silverware, they never gave him silverware.  He ate
knowing the food was drugged, wondering why he was eating it knowing
that it was drugged, wondering whether it was a sign of defiance or
submission, wondering how they'd interpret it, wondering who they were,
wondering why he cared.
        The nauseous feeling returned to him, as it always did when he ate.  It
always did, because the food is drugged, idiot!  They can't handle you
if you don't eat the food, they can't drug you deeper if you don't eat
the food, you stupid shit, you did it again-
        The floor met with his face and cooled his cheek sympathetically as the
orderlies rushed in and pounced on him, holding him down to up the
sedatives, wheeling in the silent gurney even as he fell back into the
pseudo-sleep.

        Logan didn't even remember, this time.  Not a damned thing.  He was
back in his cell again, waking up on the bed, listening to them slip the
food in through the slit in the door.  Had he dreamed his previous
experience in the second between sleep and consciousness, or had they
taken his memories again?
        He spoke, treasuring the feeling of the vibration of his vocal chords,
whether the words were his own or not.
        " . . . the balloon . . ."
        He heard the orderlies stop outside, heard them open the one way
window, though he saw only his reflection in the glass.  He looked
haggard, eyes sunken, tired, three weeks growth on his face - or so it
appeared.  He remembered the picture Mariko had kept of him, in his
robe, doing his forms and katas.  How he'd looked, proud, controlled,
amused by her fascination with the camera-
        "Is fuckin' GREEN!"
        He launched himself at the glass, knowing he would only bust up his
hand, knowing the electricity would sting.  It was the principal of the
thing.  And to his amazement, along with dislocating his knuckles, a
spiderweb crack appeared in the glass.
        Encouraged, he pounded on it again and again until one of the obviously
startled orderlies on the other side of the door remembered to hit the
panic button, and the inhibitor collar around his neck shot hundreds of
volts of electricity straight into his spinal column, thanks to the
connector needle in his back.  Though not dead or unconscious, he was
effectively paralyzed, dumb, deaf and blind.

        Once the paralysis wore off, his senses and nerves began to work, as
well, and Logan realized how much his hand hurt.  It hurt bad.  Growling
to himself, he hurled the food and tray at the window, which, of course,
didn't break.  It wasn't even cracked.  There was no sign that anything
had happened . . . except that he'd been on the floor.  So had he had a
nightmare or had it happened?  Did it matter?
        He curled up on his bed, glaring at the one-way glass window, glaring
at whoever was looking in, glaring at his reflection, glaring at
himself.  He bared his teeth once, actually wondering what he looked
like when he went feral.  The reflection was absolutely frightening.  It
didn't even look like a man.  Hesitantly, he looked up and straightened
his features to that of a man, trying for the arrogant look he
remembered-
        But there was no guarantee that man had been.  There was no guarantee
that Mariko had even existed, like Silverfox, like Maverick, like Creed
- they might have all been mere demons, torturing him in his sleep and
his hallucinations.  That man, confident and in control, didn't exist.
        Then why couldn't he make that man exist?
        Because he couldn't.  That man, that martial artist would never have
allowed them to get him once, never would have been drunk at the bar,
and certainly would never have let anyone ever do it again.  He couldn't
be that man, he couldn't be anything more than their plaything, to be
manipulated and tortured and -
        Oh, the hell with this.
        He stood, kicking the bed against the far wall, stripped off his shirt,
and stepped into a position that felt as natural as killing to him.  The
martial artist was stable, and he needed it now.
        He went through the motions.  They were jerky, correct but not flowing,
not connected.  It was as though he went from one move to another almost
randomly.  The life was not there.  Frustrated enough to scream, he gave
up, standing in the center of the room, panting.  Something was wrong.
He'd been doing these things probably before he could remember, yet now
he could not feel the pulse.  Even this they'd taken from him.
        Something wouldn't let him quit.  Something whispered to him,
questioned him, taunted him into giving it one more shot.  He closed his
eyes, waiting until he could feel his own pulse in every fingertip and
toe.  He remembered the motions, and became them.  Instantly he had the
connection.  Without his senses, he could feel everything in the room,
even the soybean patty sliding down the door.  He could feel the
shuffling feet of the orderly watching him through the door.  And, with
his eyes closed, he could feel the Earth spinning.
        But what was the use?  Were these things real?
        Did it matter?  They calmed him.
        He went through every kata he could remember, eyes closed, sparring an
invisible partner.  He  worked up a sweat as he moved his stiff and
damaged body slowly, working disobediant muscles into fluid as he
gracefully slid around the room, finally findi-
        Intense pain shot down his spine, and he could do nothing more than lay
rigid on the floor.
        "201, this is useless.  The balloon is red."
        He couldn't even move his eyes to glare at the intercom by the door,
could barely hear it at all.
        "The balloon is red."
        And they left him.

        Sometime later, time having little meaning, Logan found he was cold,
and could stand.  He immediately fell back into a stance, and tried
again, but the rhythm and calm were gone, and his movements were clumsy.
He tried harder, but that only put more stress on damaged nerves, and it
only got worse.  He tried until he fell, then got up and tried again.
And again.  And eventually the time came when he couldn't get up.
        If the animal couldn't escape, and the man couldn't escape, what was
left?  He regarded the collar, and his hand, looking at the tracks,
wondering why he simply hadn't though of it earlier.  Without his
healing factor, there was an escape.  It was so easy, he couldn't
believe he hadn't contemplated it before.  Or maybe he had.  He'd
probably tried, only to be brought back to life and not remembered.  He
sighed, and let his hand fall.  Maybe they just wanted him to think that
so he wouldn't kill himself or free himself.  But if they could save him
from that fall, if indeed he had fallen, then they could save him from
himself.  At least they could; he certainly couldn't.
        Why not give up?  He was without options.  He was a victim, a captive,
and helpless.  Again.  Or for the first time.  Maybe he'd never gotten
free.  Maybe he was free, having a nightmare safe in his room in the
X-mansion.  If it existed.
        The door opened.  And the man was dead before he even realized that the
patient was no longer lying on the floor.
        Once out, Logan did not intend to be caught again.  He jumped out into
a plain white plastered hallway, clawing frantically at the collar.  And
as he did not remember, it shocked the ever-lovin' crud out of him.  He
lay on the ground, paralyzed, watching the same direction with eyes
fixed rigidly in his skull.  It went on another twenty feet before
taking a 45° angle, tiled, with a brown plastic molding around the base.
It was very interesting.  Interesting because no one came.  No one told
him the balloon was red.  The silent gurney was not in sight.
        He was dreaming.
        Once he could move, he reached up, flexing uncoordinated muscles,
popped his adamantium claws, almost screaming at the pain it brought,
and cut the collar.  All the power stored in that collar ran down his
claws into his arm, as he knew it would.  And he felt his heart stop, as
he knew it would.  He only hoped it would stay that way.

        Alive.  Logan gasped another breath, then pushed himself to his feet,
out of the sticky pool of blood that had collected on the tiles beneath
his hand and arm, knowing from the feelings in his arms and legs that he
hadn't been down long.  The hand he'd used the claws with was still
bleeding slightly, which meant less than a minute.  He could barely
stand.  His sight wasn't too good, either.  But he could smell someone.
Someone dead.
        He left the kid there, continuing down the hallway, noticing that it
wasn't the Weapon X part he remembered.  Did that mean anything?  No.
        He came halfway around the corner and stared about thirty feet down a
straight hallway at the figure in black.  A woman, petite rather than
short, roughly his own height, wearing black fatigues and weapons.  She
stared back, pulling her gun up so that it pointed at the tiled ceiling.
He noticed it was a tranq gun, though he spotted several that weren't.
Why was she not killing these bastards?
        "You Logan?"
        Remembering the reflection of himself, he bared teeth and glared,
growling almost silently.  She didn't look intimidated; she merely put
the gun away and reached behind her for the katana on her back.  Only
then did he notice that he had popped his claws.
        "Yeah," he finally spat, half growl, half English.  "What's it ta you?"
        She leveled the sword and took an entirely defensive position.
        "Nice claws."
        He found that he almost answered her half-amused comment, found a part
of him would banter with this threat.  His eyes were drawn to that
sword.  It was Japanese made, he was sure of it.  He'd seen others like
it, owned others like it, but he'd never seen it before.  The though
almost gave him hope - but it quickly wilted, as a plant without water.
Just because he didn't remember seeing a sword like it didn't mean he
hadn't.  That was no proof that it was real, new, actually happening to
him.
        "Get outta my way, girl."
        She didn't move.  "I'm here to haul your butt outta here.  Shall we
go?"
        He glared, part of his mind analyzing her voice while the rest screamed
death.  She had spent some time in America, but there was something else
in there, that tickled the back of his mind-
        "Who sent you?"
        She smiled enigmatically.  "Three Eyes.  I'll explain after we leave."
She dropped the defensive stance and sheathed the katana.  He didn't put
his claws away.
        "Goin' where?"  It was so low and rough, it was barely speech at all.
        She approached him rather slowly, though still easily twenty feet away.
She had a certain grace about her, that of a dancer, or a trained
fighter.  Hopkido, maybe, or jujitsu, and a sword that old had to be
earned or passed down in the family.  His senses screamed threat while
his mind wondered if perhaps he should take her offer.
        "Out of Russia, anyway.  Depends if we make it to the train or not.
Exit's behind you."  Her voice was soft, her tone and manner very easy.
It was very obvious that she was trying not to spook him, as though he
were an animal, that could be spooked.  She came right up to him, still
wary of the claws, walked around and headed the way he'd just come.  She
didn't have a weapon in her hand, she was exposing her back to him-
        He ignored his mind and struck.
        To his absolute surprise, she had already ducked and spun, and at close
range he was unable to dodge or deflect the darts she sent his way.
        "Figured you'd pull that."  Her tone was sad.  He went down hard as she
swept him, even as the drugs started to take effect.  He felt a strong
tug on his shoulders as she tried to pick him up and failed.  "Well,
damn."  Then everything got fuzzy, and he heard the nearly silent
whisper of the gurney, tried so hard to stay awake, to fight the drugs-

         A rhythmic thumping woke him, a slight rocking.  Light and dark
flashed on his closed lids.  He smelled coal smoke and a woman, very
nearby.  No antiseptic.  He smelled metal, but it was dull, salty, not
the reek of the steel doors and adamantium cuffs.  He smelled gun oil,
seeming out of place with the musty carpet and faint ozone of the
overhead light.
        He also smelled pine, and cold, clean, unpolluted air.  He smelled
freedom.
        Logan opened his eyes.
        They were in a compartment for four on a train.  He noticed the sun
glinting off the snow that flashed by as the train flew towards another
tunnel.  He noticed the heat he felt as the sun tickled the skin on his
face and neck, tingling warmly, something he hadn't felt in-
        He was on his feet, the dizziness and half-healed muscles but a memory.
The woman was sitting across from him, cleaning one of her automatics,
and didn't even flinch.  She had changed her pants to black jeans,
though she kept the black tank top, and wore a stylish black leather
shirt, zipped halfway up, over it.  She inspected the gun, rubbing the
barrel a little harder as she found a flaw on the surface.
        "Before you rip me apart, notice that we are on a train in a place
that's very cold and everyone outside the door has a Russian accent."
She sounded calm.
        His senses screamed again, but he remembered, and listened.  She was
right.  Every voice he heard, with the exception of a Frenchman, was
Russian.  He'd know the accent anywhere, thanks to Piotr an-
        "So?"  His growl made her look up.
        "I was under the impression that you were a man of honor.  Why did you
attack an unarmed opponent from behind, without warning?"  Her tone was
conversational, but her eyes were hard.
        That startled him.  Logan the martial artist would never have done
that.  But Logan the animal had.  He regained composure quickly.
        "Who sent you?"
        She pulled the gun up and looked at it a moment before tucking it into
a leather purse.
        "I told you."
        "Don't feed me bullshit, girl.  Three Eyes doesn't exist."  He began to
pace in the small compartment, too tightly wound to sit, surprised he
hadn't yet gone berserk, surprised he hadn't attacked her.  "Whaddaya
want?"  The tone was _not_ friendly.
        The woman picked up a vanilla folder beside her and tossed it to him.
        "Nikoli Galikov was a very important member of the former Soviet
Union's secret military force, and I'm not talking KGB.  When the USSR
fell, Russia ended up without any kind of nuclear weapons, though they
made claims otherwise.  Recently the Mafia sent out a little query as to
where these missiles ended up.  I don't think they wanted them, or
wanted anything to do with the sale, they just like to keep tabs on
these things."
        Logan lost the infinitesimal amount of patience he had left.  "What the
hell does this have ta do with me?"
        "I'm getting there, keep your pants on."  It was then that he noticed
he was not wearing the uniform that those . . . people had given him.
He was exactly her counterpart, in black jeans, a black turtleneck, and
a black leather vest.  He had a sturdy pair of combat boots on, as well.
Everything fit almost perfectly.  She continued on despite his low
growl.
        "The Mafia discovered that the Croatians are looking to buy the
weapons, and the Russians are the sellers."
        He glared at her.  "I though yah said the Ruskies didn't know-"
        "They're putting the pressure on Nikoli to give up the location, though
he claims he has no idea.  That's where you come in."  She took the
folder off the seat he had so quickly vacated and flipped through the
contents, eventually pulling out some photographs.  "These might be
familiar to you."  She sounded almost . . . sympathetic.
        One photograph was a woman, gutted, lying on plush carpet.  One was of
a man, much the same as the woman.  One was a child, her neck a solid
blue-black-red bruise, and obviously crushed.
        "There are only four people in the world that have this 'signature'.
One of them is Victor Creed."  Logan's growl intensified.  "One of the
is a man known as Puma, an African gentleman.  One of them is an unknown
woman, and one of them is you."
        Logan refused to look at the photographs.  Instead, he turned sharply
and stared out the window, leaning slightly as the train roared around a
curve in the track, and into a tunnel.  He watched the wilderness.  It
wasn't _his_.  There was something foreign to it, it didn't sing to him,
it didn't welcome him.  The woman hesitated, and spoke again.
        "The man is Artur Galikov.  Nikoli's brother.  The woman and child were
Artur's family."  She put the photographs back; he heard the slick paper
slid back into the slightly courser folder.  "I was sent here to find
and stop the persons responsible for these killings.  That led me to
you."
        "And?"  Again, more growl than speech.
        "And here I am.  You weren't cooperating with them, so we don't have a
problem."
        He turned from the window.  "You do."  He approached her, and she got
to her feet warily.  "A nice little terrorist woman just rescued me
outta the goodness of her heart.  I'm touched.  Why didn't yah kill me?"
He was slightly hunched, in perfect position to leap on her and rip her
throat out, which instinct had been screaming at him to do since he'd
first met her.  She noticed, and he noticed her noticing.  She settled
into a casual stance, appearing natural but perfect from a defensive
point of view.  Quarters were cramped; a fight would be messy.
        "File said that would be hard to do, considering the healing factor and
the adamantium.  Had to tranq you three times from the installation to
the station.  I was supposed to kill you."  She met him glare for glare.
"But you're not responsible for their deaths.  You didn't have a choice.
I'm after the killer of these people, and that's not you."  She took a
step back from him, though he smelled no fear.
        He tilted his head, his eyes narrow.  "How the hell would you know if I
had a choice?"
        She was definitely looking sympathetic.  "I told you.  I've got an
extensive file.  I know what you've . . . I know what's happened to you.
I know your history in Canada."  She took a another step away from him,
at his expression, and her own became neutral.  She didn't relax.
"There are others, and they'll probably try to kill you on sight.
They'll be looking for you in Paris.  That's where Nikoli sent his
daughter, and was probably your next target."  She indicated the vanilla
folder.
        "Now that I've told you that, there's something in there that I think
you'll want to read."  She backed towards the door, watching him.  He
did speak, eventually, rather roughly.
        "What's in it for you?"
        She smiled.  "I'll see you around."
        She opened the door and was mostly gone before he spoke again.
        "Who are you?"
        She closed the door gently behind her.
        He could have gone after her.  He thought about it a moment, but the
anger was being replaced by curiosity.  She wouldn't have rescued him
for nothing-
        If she'd even rescued him.  It had been so neat.  She hadn't even been
harmed, he'd smelled no blood, no injury, and he knew how much security
had been in that complex.  He hadn't seen her take anyone out, only him,
and so easily.  Why would someone go to all the trouble to use him as
the killer, when they could just hire an assassin?  This was obviously a
set-up.  He yanked open the door to the compartment.
        She was gone.  He couldn't even smell her.
        Frustrated enough to scream, he slammed the door and picked up the
folder, blinking as sunlight flooded the compartment.  He though he
caught a glimpse of something black disappear into the woods, but in a
flash the train was past.
        He flipped the folder open, not stopping to catch the photographs of
the dead as they fluttered to the floor.  He read a file on himself, one
of the most complete he'd ever seen.  Nothing he didn't know.  He
flipped the page.

        Logan ducked his head, fighting a stiff headwind as he continued his
trudge through the wilderness.  He fought his mind.  Fought his soul.
        "Take it easy, Logan. This will hurt, but it will pass."
        Knocked a pine branch out of his way.
        "Logan, how are you feeling?"
        Back when they'd still called him Logan.  He savagely kicked a snow
bank.
        "Gentlemen, this is Weapon X."
        He stopped, looking around him at the pines and the snow.  Canada or
Russia?  Was this merely another test?  Was he even here, or still
dreaming?  And what if he wasn't?  What if he was free?  What if he was
walking into a trap because he was too stupid to realize it?  What if
there was no trap?
        Still the wilderness didn't welcome him.  Oh, it told of the trails the
game had taken well enough, indicated where the ice was unsafe, but did
so with neither fear nor respect.  It was more as though the forest was
resigned to show him its secrets, not because of what he was, but
because of who he was.  And yet he didn't know himself.
        Logan looked up at the heavy sky, pregnant with another load of snow,
just waiting to dump it down on the wilderness.  What was Mother Nature
waiting for?  Waiting for him to get out of the way? Waiting to hide his
escape, to help him, or to hinder him when he needed help?
        He followed the trail, maybe a day and a half old; no new snow had
fallen between then and now.  He smelled the woman, faintly.  This was
the track she had taken with him.
        Or had she?
        He was free.  There were no restraints.  He wasn't bound, wasn't
collared-
        But he was.
        He was bound with ignorance, collared with his own soul, his own mind.
He was a prisoner of himself. He wasn't free.  He'd never been free, not
really.  Not for such a long time.  Such a long time, he'd forgotten
what it felt like.  What it tasted like.  Freedom.
        And now he gambled for his life and his freedom, and he didn't even
know the game.  He continued up the trail, looking for boobytraps, using
the tools they'd given him to beat them.  And if he wasn't?  If he was
playing their games?  Then he was already lost.
        His mind screamed against what he was doing.  It thought back to the
child he'd tried to reassure, before he'd killed her.  He couldn't
remember why, only that someone else had been there, had been thinking
his thoughts for him.  Had been doing everything but the killing for
him.  Had not enjoyed it.  Had been frightened by cops.  Had throw them
over the balcony.  Had fled before he'd hit the ground.  Someone else.
He had never been afraid of cops, he would never stop to wash the blood.
A screaming woman would not make him flinch.  Someone else was in his
mind, dictating his thoughts.  And were they still there?
        He thought of the little girl in Paris.  Surely they had another
assassin.  But if they did, why did they need him in the first place?
They hadn't needed him.  They'd wanted him.  Because the funding had
been there.  Because he'd been there.  They'd wanted to break him.
Because they'd failed the first time, and they weren't going to this
time.
        But they had.  Hadn't they?  He was bound by himself, not by them and
their petty physical restraints.
        The image of the child came back, unbidden, and the sharp fear scent,
and how he'd tried-
        Logan stopped, his feet crunching in the snow, then popped claws and
tore into a nearby tree with the speed of a rattlesnake striking, barely
curbing a roar of frustration.  If he left the trail now, he knew he'd
never find it again.  The snow would fall any moment; it would mask the
way.  Even if he marked it now, there was no guarantee that he'd manage
to come this way again.  If he went to Paris, the woman's friends would
hunt him, his enemies would hunt him, and he might already be too late
to save the little girl.  Maybe the thoughts were just a plant, to send
him there to kill the girl, as they'd planned his escape, as they'd

smuggled him out of the country.  Maybe it was all going the way they
wanted it to go, and he was just another pawn.  Mother Nature waited
calmly for his decision, quieting the biting wind.  He stood there many
long minutes, not moving, so long that a deer emerged from the trees
only three feet from him before realizing that he was there, and
bounding off.
        "God dammit."
        He turned and headed back.  A few flakes kissed his cheek.

        Olga stretched, straightening out her nightgown and rubbing the sleep
from her eyes.  As usual, her over-vigilant nurse had awakened her with
the sun, and rather suddenly, by throwing back the blinds loudly and
swiftly.
        "Ms. Pulatnik?  Is my father here?"
        "Nyet.  He promises to visit within a few days, kardoeshka.  You should
eat something."
        Olga wrinkled her nose at the proffered oatmeal on the colorful plastic
tray.  "Isn't there anything else?  This is France!  They have pastries
and cheese for breakfast."
        "The Frenchmen are swine, kardoeshka.  You needn't follow by their
culture because you are in their country."
        "But Pappa said-"
        "Your father is far too liberal in his raising of you."  Ms. Pulatnik
went about busily, choosing an outfit for the girl while Olga managed to
get to the bathroom without too much trouble, shower, brush her teeth,
and reemerge in her little Whinnie the Pooh towel.  Her nurse was
nowhere to be seen.
        "Ms. Pulatnik?"
        There was no answer.  Maybe she went to get the pastries and cheese.
Brightened by the thought, the girl quickly climbed into her dress and
stockings, and then felt for her shoes beneath the king-sized bed.  Not
finding them there, she headed to the closet.  It was a huge walk-in
closet, with its own lightswitch.  She'd never seen one so big, except
in the czar's palace, and even then, she hadn't ever had a whole one,
all to herself.  She walked in, then shut the door behind her.  Ms.
Pulatnik would search the whole apartment before she thought to look in
the closet.  Giggling, the girl tucked herself behind her travel bag and
waited breathlessly for her nurse to start calling.

**********************************
He woke to immense pain, pain in his head, pain in his back.  Panic took
him.
"The balloon is red."
He blinked; this couldn't be.  The labs, the table with its adamantium
cuffs and yellow wires and             scalpels and hypodermic needles
met his disbelieving eyes.  Several of the white-coated techs stood
around, taking notes on their clipboards, almost blending in with the
builder's white walls and tan   speckled tiles.  This couldn't be.  He'd
been on a train, he'd been there, he was going to bea-
A small electric shock reminded him of his present location.  It truly
was no more than a reminder,      they could do, had done, so much
worse.
"The balloon is red, 201."
He muttered something derogatory in Japanese, and received another jolt
for his trouble.
"It doesn't have to be like this, 201.  Just say, the balloon is red."
"The flamin' balloon is flamin' green, yah colorblind-"
A powerful shock took consciousness from him.
***********************************

        With a jolt, Logan awoke to the gentle rocking of a train, and the
smells of pine and snow and the couple consummating their marriage three
compartments down.

        Olga was drowsy, and hot, and cramped, and her nurse had not yet come
looking for her.  Rows of wool coats and sweater and dresses made the
air stale.  She contemplated going to get the oatmeal, but she was too
tired, and besides, lukewarm oatmeal was even worse than hot.  She
leaned her head against the wall and promised herself, in five more
minutes, she would come out and go back to sleep, and then Ms. Pulatnik
would chide her for the wrinkles in her dress, and her mussed hair, and-
        The closet door was thrown open in a great gust of wind, and the figure
silhouetted in the sunlight was _not_ her nurse.
        The little girl screamed, once, for her father.  He did not come.

        Logan stared at the file, unable to believe what he was reading, unable
to believe, after all these years, that the man he stared at could
possibly be who he looked like.  It was impossible.  But he'd remember
that face for the rest of his life.
        "Please, Logan, I really don't want to have to give you this, but if
you don't start behaving, you'll leave me no choice."
        And of course he hadn't, and of course the boy used the rabies pole
with all the skill of a seasoned veterinarian, and given him the
injection that had caused so much pain.  He would never forget the
feeling of sulphuric acid in his body cavity, in his muscles.  And he
remembered recovering, and curling up in the corner, growling, nursing
his wounds, and waiting.  Waiting for them to do it again.
        To his surprise, he found the folder crumpled in a fist that had three
claws protruding from it.  There was no way this could be.
        Surely they were all dead.  Surely none of them were still alive.  Why
hadn't he heard about it?  If one of those techs had lived, Alpha Flight
should have found out about it.
        And what if they had, and hadn't told him?  Even Jimmy wasn't that
stupid.
        He smoothed out the folder as best as he had patience for, then slumped
back down in the seat, so recently vacated by a woman he didn't know
whether to trust or hunt.  He was still tired, still recovering from
what looked like weeks of malnutrition and torture.  As though to remind
him, his stomach began to growl fiercely.
        He left the compartment, taking the key with him, and headed to the
dining car.  He'd dipped into his own funds to purchase a ticket from
Switzerland to France, and he hoped that his kidnappers would track him
down.  Easier that he let them come to him, and Paris was a place he
knew fairly well, though it was a long, long time ago.  He hadn't been
back since . . . since World War II.  That he remembered.
        He sat down at a small table by the window, nodding to the waiter,
before staring out the glass at the wilderness, flying by.  There was
something about travelling by train, something that flying couldn't
compare to.  At least in a train, you got a tantalizing glimpse, whereas
in a plane, everything resembled toys, it didn't even seem real.
        The waiter came to him and he ordered a fillet, rare, and a baked
potato.  He was hungry enough to eat the whole cow, but somehow eating
still gave him that naseous feeling, as though he were still being
drugged.  Even drinking plain water gave him the same sensation as when
he drank the tap water that came out of the faucet in his cell,
hallucinagens in every sip.  He'd even drunk the toilet water to get
moisture into his mouth that would not give him terrible dreams, but
they'd anticipated that, too.  It had been even worse.
        He became aware that someone was staring at him, directly at his back.
It made the hair on the back of his neck rise and his skin crawl.  He
could smell rage, it danced before his nose as though in celebration.
Rage and patience.  The window wasn't at the right angle to give him a
reflection of the person behind him, there was no way for him to take a
casual glace.
        So he turned.

*************************************************
        He saw the familiar walls of the cell, smelled only his own body odor
and the blood on his arm and head.  For a moment he merely sat there,
blinking.  Again.  He looked at the paper cup in his hand, the tiny
drops of water sticking to the wax lining of the pretty floral cup.  He
just stared, aware that he couldn't smell the water, or the cell, just
the blood and his own filth.
        Of course.  He'd drunk more of the water, that explained everything.
He'd drunk more of the fuckin' water!  Enraged with his own desperation
and weakness, he crumpled the cup and hurled it back at the sink,
listening to it rattle around as it found the bottom.  One of the techs
slipped food through the slot.
        It was a fillet, still bloody, with a side of baked potato.
**************************************************

        Logan stared at the waiter a moment, before thanking the man, and
waiting for him to go.  Then he glanced again behind him.
        There was no one there, just the fake fern and an empty table, with a
gold coin lying in the credit tray. The smell of rage still lingered in
the air.  Suddenly not hungry, he paid and left the food uneaten,
pocketing the coin casually and replacing it with a ten.
        He carried it back to his compartment, waiting until he was inside and
sure that no one else had been in it before taking out the coin.  It was
a very large, solid gold replica of a Canadian penny.  And it smelled of
hate.  Stank of hate.
        He pocketed the coin, and stared out the window at the sun, and the
snow, and the sky, suddenly so very tired.
        Why this?  Why now?  Why play with him, when they'd made it so very
obvious that they could take him oh so easily?  Logan's head fell into
his hands unbidden, and something dangerously sob-like trembled in his
frame.  For a moment he was still, then tore his head back up with a
snarl.  He wasn't worthy to hide his face, now.

        Ms. Pulatnik whimpered as the rope cut into her wrist, cursing for the
umpteenth time as she felt the knot slip from her fingers yet again.  So
close, and that thing was in the room with the kardoeshka.  She
whimpered again as the rope dug painfully into her skin.  If she wasn't
careful, she was going to hit an artery or a vein and bleed to death.
She'd read it in a Steven King novel.
        She didn't have to wait long before that . . . that thing re-emerged
from the bedroom, and came up to her.  She glared as it tilted her chin
up, to stare into her eyes.  It lowered its face to hers, sniffing her
cheek, before wetly licking her.  Fingers? in her stomach, yanking
upward, were the last thing she ever felt.

**********************************************
        He forced the food down, ignoring the queasy feeling it brought,
knowing that he needed it to survive.  Even with a healing factor, he
had always had to eat.  He could just go longer than normal folk without
food.  And just like always, it fell from sensless fingers, and the
techs ran in, and tackled him, sat on him while two or three grabbed his
arm, looking for the vein that they so easily found.  And then there was
only the gurney and flashing hall lights, before the pain started again.
They said they were 'testing his thresholds.'  He'd test their's if it
was the last thing he ever did.
        And they poked and prodded his still form, surprised that he was still
so limp and unresponsive.  They debated whether that was due to the
nerve and muscle damage, making the heart less powerful, or the
malnutrition, causing his kidneys and liver to fail.  And they'd died
for that.
        Now he wished that he'd waited longer, long enough for Sinclair to get
within range, as he was now.
        "Control tells me that you're fighting again.  We simply can't have
that.  We know all about you, you know.  We know your weaknesses and
your flaws.  This fighting will only break you, and your spirit is what
we need most.  Save us both the trouble.  Give up."
        He glared murderously, actually attempting to bite the scientist, who
jerked his arm away just in time.
        "Give him 100 cc's sodium chlorithodol, and take the collar off after
about ten minutes.  If he dies . . ."  The old man left the sentence
unfinished as he wrote something down on a chart and left it at the foot
of the gurney.  And the techs were always quick to obey.
        This time, it felt like his veins were becoming putty, melting and
leaking the warmth of his blood through his body.  They probably were.
He screamed himself hoarse at the pressure in his head, he could feel
the warm liquid running down his cheeks, not tears, thicker, warmer.  He
felt his stomach flip as he vomited the blood and the substance that
passed for food, robbing him of all nutritional value.  They always made
him vomit, always kept him hungry, hurt, weak . . . they kept him.  Like
a plaything.  Like a pet.
        And as he faded, he hoped that the bantering techs would forget, would
let it go too far, too far for his healing factor to repair, too far to
be saved.  He heard the high-pitched beep as the collar stopped
functioning, and felt a tightness as his healing factor tried to repair
the veins and arteries, collect the blood that had left.  His head felt
tight, his mouth like it was full of cold, thick cream of wheat.  And he
fell back to sleep, retreating from the pain, and from his mind, and
from his body, retreated further than he had ever been before, feeling
his healing factor slow, faintly hearing the frantic beeping of
machinery as he faded further, and further, dying on will alone.

        It hadn't been enough.
        He'd woken up; they'd saved his life.  Or had they merely saved his
body?  He stared at the ceiling of his cell, metal, unscratched,
unmarred, perfect.  A perfect prison.  For the perfect prisoner.  One
that could bounce back from anything.  One that was always willing to
put up a fight that he knew he'd eventually lose.
        He suddenly found himself thinking about his mother.  Though now she
must have been dead for many, many years, he wondered what she would
have thought of her son.  He wondered what his father had done for a
living, what he'd done that had condemned his son to this Hell.
Probably nothing.  He'd never know.  And he'd committed enough atrocity
to more than deserve this.  Hadn't he?
        He remembered once in Isreal, he'd knocked a young boy out of the way
of a Army jeep, been hit himself, and had to fake his death while an
overzealous medical student had begged and pleaded for permission to
dissect him.  Fortunately, lunch break had occured, and he was just put
on the rare list of cadaviers that maintain a steady body temperature
after death that mysteriously vanished.
        Why was he thinking of these things now?
        And he remembered watching Kitty snarf an ice cream concoction down
that he wouldn't have believed she could have survived _with_ a healing
factor. What had it been?  A super hot fudge quad-scoop sundae
banana-rama split with all the trimmings.
        He buried his face in his hands, shaking, digging the heels of his
palms into closed eyes.
        And he remembered the day he'd let Phoenix nearly kill the Black Queen,
and she'd run, and how Storm had berated him for it, and taken his hand,
and they'd stood there in the approaching dusk-
        He shook his head sharply, trying to dislodge the train of thought.
Why were these memories resurfacing?  Terror clutched his stomach like
iron.  Were they surfacing like bubbles in a stagnant lake, to burst and
be gone forever?  They weren't his memories, they were the other's, the
one he so strove to be, to copy, not his memories, it shouldn't be like
this . . .  He tried to think of something else, anything else, anything
but this, pressing harder with his hands, harder, until spots danced
behind the lids.
        And he remembered the time that Jean . . .  And the time that Jubilee .
. .  And the time that -
        He threw his head against the wall, again and again, until the time
came that he could not raise it, and the memories, as well as conscious
thought, stopped.
************************************************

        Logan awoke dripping sweat, listening to the slow deceleration of the
train, the unsteady rhythm of a deteriorating cycle toward its end.  He
sat up, feeling queasy from lack of food, the smell of his own fear
stinking the room.  He shook his head hard before putting on his shirt
and vest, grabbing a black leather bundle, and leaving the compartment,
dropping the key casually on the seat as he left.  He walked down the
hall toward the end of the car, file folded into the leather bomber that
he'd found tucked in the compartment closet.  He stepped into that brief

space between cars, casually leapt over the chain guard, opened the
door, and without hesitation stepped off the train toward the waiting
wilderness zipping past.
        He landed very well, balanced despite his dizziness, displacing but not
slipping on the small rocks and dirty snow sent scattering by his
arrival.  He watched the train fly by, only an hour out of Dijon.  He
would not arrive by train; the woman had warned him that there would be
those that hunted for him.  And he would let them come to him, but
first, they would play a game.
        He headed off towards the trees, mostly pines and hardy oaks, glad to
be out of the cramped train compartment. This was obviously only a
wooded area rather than a forest, someone's private property.  He tilted
his head to the wind, sniffing.  There was a farmhouse within a mile to
the east, smoking meat.  No surprise that it was deer.  There were signs
of game everywhere, and here they could not chose which animal he would
hunt, they couldn't poison them all.  He began to follow the trail of a
deer, maybe twenty minutes old, his feet not making a sound on the
moss-carpeted forest floor.

*********************************************
        He found himself grabbing his carry-on from the overhead compartment
and filing off a commercial jet toward the terminal.  It struck him as
wrong, but he didn't care enough to fight it.  Everything was backround;
everything was vague.  He still saw the world through sharp eyes, still
could smell the perfume of the french prostitue one hundred feet away,
but it was hard to notice unless he put forth effort that he was
unwilling to exert.  He allowed the scene to run like a poorly written
short story, and he a secondary character.
        He knew he didn't have far to go as he headed out of the gate, left the
terminal, caught a taxi, and gave the directions to the driver.  He
found that he settled rather comfortably into the spacious seat,
enjoying the sights and sounds of Paris.  He'd never been here, as far
as he could rem-
        No, that wasn't right - World War II, wasn't it?  Or was it?
        He found that knowing really didn't bother him as much as it used to.
It hardly mattered, his memories.  All that really mattered was the
present.  He should have learned that by now.
        And there was the matter of the game, and it was his move.
        The taxi pulled up far quicker than he had anticipated, depositing him
at one of the more luxerious hotels in France.  He tipped the man
generously, grabbing the duffel bag and taking the stairs two at a time.
He went without haste to the information desk, telling the receptionist
his name.  She handed him the key with a smile and a 'Thank you.'
        He accepted it with a nod, and continued towards the elevators.  It
went up several flights, depositing him onto the fifth floor.  From
there he turned left, zipping open the duffel bag as he walked.  There
was no one in the halls.  He found that thought comforting, somehow, and
that vaguely surprised him.
        He slid the key card throught the slot even as he reached for the hard,
round object in the duffel bag.  The door clicked, the light flashing
green.. He eased it open with his toe, peering around the edge.  A
female voice called out.
        "Hello?"  It wasn't the most friendly of tones.  His senses screamed
out; she was very near the door, and she was armed.  While he didn't
quite know why he was so certain, he accepted this as fact.  He pulled
the pin and casually tossed the grenade toward the voice.  Then he shut
the door.
        An immensely bright flash, pure white light, briefly illuminated the
hallway, yet only a slight *pop!* and some fizzling was heard.  He
reopened the door, almost overwhelmed at the stench of sulfer,
phosphorus and burning carpet.  He found the woman tripping backwards
over the king bed, heels of her hands pressed firmly to her eyeballs,
and though she was muttering, it was heated swearing rather than a
whimpering of pain.
        "Guess yah won't be seein' me like yah said."
        She didn't scream.
***********************************************

        Logan did his best to ignore everything, concentrating instead on
keeping the flames small enough that the smoke wouldn't attract
attention.  Why he was even bothering to cook it.  Somehow the thought
of raw meat augmented the queasiness.  Animals ate raw meat, and he
wasn't an animal, to be caged and kept.  He was a man.  He had to be.
Animals didn't have dreams like the ones he was having.
        When it was at least slightly warmer than living flesh, he pulled it
off the stick he was using as a spit and tore into it with relish.  And
the queasy feeling returned.
        He ignored it, and continued eating.  It's deermeat.  It isn't drugged.
They aren't here.  It's all in my fucked up head.  And the queasiness
gradually got worse.  And yet he still ignored it.  He ate as much as he
could hold, using a technique he was almost positive was taught to him
in Japan to keep the food down.  His body was so used to bringing it
right back up that it simply couldn't believe it would be allowed to
digest this.
        Right?
        He blinked, watching the wilderness around him.  No, it wasn't fading.
He was not being drugged.  The moss blended almost indistinguishably
with the bark of the trees, giving them a fuzzy look and it did not mean
his sight was fading.  He was not drugged, he was here, in the forest,
sitting on a bed of pine needles with everything he could ever want
about Weapon X in a folder beside him.  He was going to nail the
bastards, he was going to rid himself of this nightmare, he was going
to-

**************************************************
        He dumped the woman rather unceremoniously on her butt, and to her
credit she moved quickly enough.  He wasn't going to be caught off-guard
by her again.  He easily leapt her sweep and countered with a kick to
the face that sent her sliding across the floor.  Then the others came
in, and, still partially robbed of her vision, she really didn't have a
chance.  He couldn't explain her quick recuperation when she should have
been rendered completely and permanently blind.  It was slower than his
healing factor, so she obviously wasn't a mutant.  It wasn't worth
worrying about; she was not his responsibility at the moment.
        He watched them interrogate her with a removed expression, felt removed
from the whole thing.  She was pretty enough, but she'd screwed him
over, she'd set him up-
        And she'd rescued him.
        He shook the thoughts from his head, concentrating.  There was no point
in listening to those stray thoughts.  They were full of pain and
confusion, not even his own. This was reality.  This was how it was, how
it would be, how it should be.
        This was what he was meant to do.  All he could do.  All he'd ever
wanted to do.  Wasn't it?
        The woman had fire, trying first dry wit, then switching to insults and
finally, silence.  She was very good; they didn't get much.  That was to
be expected, considering.  He watched her pupils gradually become more
and more receptive to light and stimuli.
        It was like watching someone come alive.
        The thought disturbed him, but it was growing slowly, like a flower
blooming - no, like a balloon inflating.  If it grew too large, it would
destroy itself.  It would destroy him.
        He shook his head violently, glaring as the old man looked at him in
concern.  The man blinked, then turned back to his other subject, taking
a hypodermic needle from his pocket.
        She didn't scream then, either.
********************************************

	The little girl was dead.
	It didn't take a rocket scientist to figure it out.  The cops crawling 
around and the American Embassy car there did the trick for Logan.  Not 
that the car was labeled.  He'd been too many places, done too many 
things for the government not to recognize an American bulletproofing 
job when he saw one.  Not that the Americans had done it; they were the 
only ones brave enough to let Libyans design it and then display it on 
their automobiles for the world to see.
	He stared at the hotel.  The 'official' cops had left, as had the 
crowd.  The deaths happened as much as a day ago.  He had the impression 
that if he went into the hotel, he'd see pink plush carpet and ivory 
walls.
	He stood on the stairs, staring a hotel that he recognized.  The 
concrete.  The valet.  He'd been here.  He remembered it.  He'd killed 
the little girl, and her nurse.  The little girl that had been cowering 
in her closet.  Her nurse that had reeked of fear and, oddly enought, 
hate.  He remembered killing them with his own hands.
	But had he ripped her apart?  If he were standing outside of the place 
now, surely everything that had transpired before had not been a 
hallucination.  But that would mean that he hadn't committed the crime.  
He'd been on that train on the way here.  And it wouldn't seem so 
strange.
	The other had been there.  He remembered his thoughts, strange, 
detatched.  It didn't make sense.
	He needed to find that woman, and figure out what the hell was going 
on.
	While his mind raced, his keen ears picked up many things.  They picked 
up the sound of gravel being dislodged by a passing bicycle.  They 
picked up the sound of the squirrel raiding a paper sack in the trash on 
the corner of the block.  They picked up the sound of someone in the 
lobby of the hotel screaming,
	"That's him! Right there!"
	Instinct screamed; instinct had been wrong.  He chose now to listen to 
his mind.  He vanished discretely into the street, before the police had 
time to yell.  In the black jacket he blended right in with the 
tourists, and practice at evading enemies far more cunning than Paris 
police enabled him to disappear as if mist.
	When he felt he was a safe distance, he hit a 'pub.'  He was surprised 
to find that the atmosphere seemed actually British, instead of the 
pseudo-British the French usually managed.  He ordered the bitterest ale 
they had and took the farthest, darkest booth with his face to the door.
	For a long while he sat and regarded the alcoholic drink, merely 
appreciating it for what it was, noting color, scent, the frothy head, 
even the way it seemed to ooze mellow.  Then he downed it in practically 
one gulp.
	It made him naseous.
	After that, he paid and left, and headed straight to the station, 
buying a one way ticket to Russia.  He'd kidnapped the woman, and if he 
hadn't, his alternate self must have; either way, he knew where she was.  
And if he was going to get any information, he was going to have to get 
her out.


********************************************
	He paced the tiny metallic cell, back and forth, back and forth.  It 
wasn't fair.  Why had he ever agreed to this?  This torture, this pain 
was not worth the gifts they'd given him, not worth the metal or the 
healing factor or the enhanced senses.  And they hadn't given him those.  
Those he had taken himself.
	Still he paced, thinking, sweating, concentrating.  Keeping the psychic 
link was too hard; too much of Logan's mind was contaminating his 
thoughts.  Half the time he couldn't remember who he was, what he was 
here to do.
	What was he here to do?  The bastard was crazy enough, he didn't need 
any help.  He was here to-
	 A light flashed beneath the cell door.  He stopped broadcasting, 
letting out a great sigh of relief as he dimly felt Logan awaken through 
their connection.  He watched the door open cautiously.
	"Don't pull that shit with me.  Yah know who I am."  Oh god, now he 
even spoke like the bastard.  No wonder they were spooked.  I am not 
Logan.  I am not Logan.  I am myself.
	The tech gulped and handed him a cool wet towel.
	"Dr. Sinclair would like to speak with you."
	"'Bout time."
	He took the towel, mopping the sweat from his own face.  Couldn't 
understand how a body with a healing factor could sweat so much-
	His stomach growled noisily, and he realized how dizzy he felt.  Like -
	Like he hadn't eaten in a week.
	He stopped, confused, and the tech backed away from him slowly.
	"S-sir?"
	Like he hadn't eaten in a week.  But he had.  He wasn't Logan.  Was he?  
He'd tried so hard to be Logan.  Could he?  Had he?
	A hypodermic slipped into his shoulder, and the incredibly fast-acting 
drugs took him to the ground before he had spun one hundred eighty 
degrees.
	"It was bound to happen.  I noted the warning signs earlier.  Get him 
back to the cell."
	Then he heard the whisper of the nearly silent gurney, before something 
was clasped around his neck, and he succumed.
*******************************************

	Logan watched the guards, keeping track of their passes.  Once every 
minute.  Not bad at all, considering the elements and the layout of the 
installation.  This would be enourmously difficult to do.
	He shouldered the pack of supplies he'd brought with him - grappelling 
hook, rapelling rope, several concussion grenades, and three handguns.  
He didn't think the grappelling hook and rapelling rope were necessary, 
but he'd brought them along, just in case he wanted to do it without 
leaving a mark in the concrete.  Honestly, he didn't care, so long as he 
got in-
	He closed his eyes, opened them.  Blinked.
	Something was gone.
	He had the feeling that he'd forgotten something, something important.  
Something was gone that had been there moments ago.  It clicked together 
like legos.
	The telepath.  The other.  The other was gone.  Simply . . . gone.
	On a hunch, he unshouldered the pack, leaving it with the guns and 
grenades.  Then he trekked out of the woods towards the complex, in 
plain view.

	They didn't fire.  They waved him in impatiently.  He cruched through 
the hard-packed snow, telling tales of countless jeeps and heavy 
vehicles having been past it.  Nature still hadn't dumped her load on 
the earth, she merely squatted on the horizon, heavy, dark.  She was 
definetly waiting for him.
	And the forest behind him seemed to murmur a word of caution to him.
	And he smiled.
	He nodded to the gatekeeper, changing his expression of one to 
glowering.  The guard raised an eyebrow.
	"Where's the jeep?"
	He glared at the man, and the guard hastily hit the button to open the 
gate.  Without a word he stroke through.
	So the telepath was disguised as him, eh?  Where did they ever find a 
telepath as short as he was?  The thought scampered happily through his 
head, free of influence.
	Right?
	His instincts were still screaming.  He passed throught the chain-link 
gates, noting the dogs.  The fences were fifteen-foot chain link, 
running parallel with each other, four feet between them.  In that space 
roamed heavily-furred German Shepards and razorwire.  He noted the 
absolute smoothness of the snow beyond.  Guaranteed that there were 
mines there.
	The guards in the three towers talked among themselves, using old issue 
walkie-talkies, their automatic rifles slung loosely over their 
shoulders as they cupped steaming mugs of some hot liquid.  Their casual 
demeanor didn't fool Logan.  They were probably all crack shots, the 
best Russia's military and terrorists had to offer.  He'd have to take 
them out before he could escape.  He suddenly regretted leaving the 
handguns where he had.  He'd buried them in the snow and only hoped the 
dogs weren't let out to sniff around.  He'd been watching for the past 
three hours, but they might let the animals roam at dusk, to secure 
before nightfall.  That gave him a two hour window, if no one realized 
that he was actually Logan.
	The installation itself was covered in lights and biohazard signs, 
looking for all the world like a chemical or bacterial agent complex.  
Even a LifeLine helicopter adorned the roof, along with another ten 
guards, all armed and looking for something to shoot.
	Without trouble he made it into the complex.  The wide hallway was 
tiled as he remembered, and made a gentle curve.  He stamped the snow 
from his boots and found himself standing before a flat black podium in 
front of a reinforced metallic door.  Without hesitation he placed his 
hand on the panel, a light flashed green, and the door opened without a 
sound.
	A telepath with his fingerprints?  Or another trap?  His instincts wer 
screaming.
	His insticts were right.


********************************************
	When he awoke, he was not at all surprised to find himself in the cell.  
The collar on his neck blinked steadily.  He was on the floor.
	"Sinclair!"
	The techs weren't stupid enough to answer the door or give any sign 
that they were listening.  He bellowed again, and was rewarded with 
silence.  He had to get their attention somehow.
	He calmly popped three shining claws, ignoring the spouting blood, and 
stabbed himself in the stomach.  And listened with glee to the frantic 
sounds from outside the door, even as he floated away on a wave of pain.
	And he did awaken, his healing factor racing to fix his body.  And he 
did move, fast, as fast as he could.  The startled orderly fell in a 
splash of blood, a folder marked "S" still clutched firmly in nerveless 
fingers.
	He rolled of the bed, noting that the cuffs had been released, and the 
gurney was beside him.  They had been about to move him and hadn't 
counted on how food would speed his healing abilities.  A stupid 
mistake, an ametuer mistake.  Which meant that Sinclair had had nothing 
to do with it.
	With the collar gone and his healing speeding, he climbed slowly to his 
feet from the floor and staggered out into the hallway.
	A dead guard at his feet, with a broken neck.
	A slow growl escaped his lips as he went down the hall, expecting to 
see that woman standing there.  He didn't.
	He saw about ten guards, heading his way quickly.
	Instict took the place of thought, and he headed straight for them.  At 
first they were too startled to do anything more than watch him 
approach.  And then they went for their weapons, and then it was too 
late.
	He mowed through them like they were so many wax dolls, and in a flash 
he was past and they lay as puddles on a gravel path.  This time he knew 
the way.  He had his answers, and he was out to find Sinclair and end 
this.
	Once he'd made it to the labs, he started looking around.  The lab was 
clean; brown tiles on the floor, freshly mopped.  He could smell the 
semi-pine odor of the cleaning agents.  Everything was laid out in its 
place, from the guaze to the solvents to the shining table with its 
restraints and electrodes.  And the double doors behind, the ones he had 
never seen, swinging ever so gently.
	He made his way to them hesitantly, pushed open, smelling.  Three men, 
not one minute passed.  He hurried down the hall, unable to quell the 
growl that rose from his throat like bile.  He would end this here.  
There were to be no more games.  He had been through enough.
	The hallway curved steeply and became a stairway, leading upward.
	Upward.  The roof!
	Growling loudly, he bound up the stairs on all fours, using his 
momentum and his shoulder to knock the door open, surprised at the 
sudden and aching pain that came.  Probably dislocated.  He ignored it, 
watching the helicopter, surprised by the sudden noise as the door had 
opened.  Soundproofed.  The helicopter was already above the trees, out 
of range of the automatics that the three remaining guards were wearing.
	They had turned at his arrival, and opened fire.  He leapt to the 
right, feeling the bite as one found his right thigh.  It didn't save 
the guard, a redheaded woman.  He grabbed her gun, surprising himself as 
he used it to take out the two others.
	The guardtowers.
	He limped to the side of the roof, hearing more gunfire.  It wasn't 
aimed at him, though.  No one was paying him the slightest attention, 
actually.  Everyone was shooting the figure in black, fleeing along the 
fence.  And she was about to take a shot to the back.
	He picked off the guardsman in the key tower, drawing the attention of 
the other two to his location.  He ducked behind the ledge as bullets 
ricoched off the concrete above his head.  Then he leaned up and fired.  
He hit one; the other was concentrating on the woman, now over the main 
gate, leaving black mounds and spotted red snow in her wake.
	At least she'd gotten around to killing some of the bastards, this 
time.
	He leapt the side of the roof, extending claws and dragging them over 
the concrete to the two-story drop below.  Despite that, he landed hard, 
rolling to take the fall on his shoulder, which still hurt a great deal.  
Growling with the effort, he took a path much the same as the woman's, 
and the remaining guards had the sense not to attempt hand to hand, 
preferring to shoot from a distance.
	He had to go for the main gate, or risk the mines, and in the snow that 
would be suicide.  The guards had concentrated there, firing at him as 
he approached.   There was little or no cover.  Another bullet struck 
him, this one a graze to the side of his neck.  More gunfire.  This time 
from behind the gate.
	The startled guards ducked for cover as the woman opened up on them 
from somewhere on the hill.  He took the opportunity to leapt onto the 
gate, using his claws to cut through, falling onto the other side.  He 
landed running.  There was no cover for a hudred yards, standard 
military procedure, and he made them, still favoring his shoulder, 
though the thigh wound was nearly healed. He caught sight of the woman, 
retreating into the woods.  She glanced up at him, and trained the gun 
on his heart.
	"Back.  Off."
	He stopped, watching her.  A cool wind brushed his cheek, carrying her 
scent away, though the  look in her eye was more than enough to convince 
him that she meant it.  He spoke quietly, letting the wind carry his 
words to her.  "It wasn't me."
	Her eyes narrowed consideringly, then widened sharply.
	She fired.
************************************************

	"Logan!"
	"Thank God!  Rogue, you have him?"
	"Shore do.  Light as a feather."
	"He's . . . he's blue . . ."
	"He was lyin' in th' snow . . . Ah think he was shot.  Trees hid him."
	"Bio waste facility?  What would Logan be doing here?"
	"Here, Rogue, set him down, let me have a look."
	There was bright light.
	"Logan?  Logan, can you here m- . . . oh my stars and garters."
	"What?  Hank?  What?"
	There was a long pause.
	"His shoulder is broken."
	" . . . But that's-"

	Impossible.
	It was impossible.  He listened to the steady thumping, the rhythmic 
drumming.  Like a . . . a train.  It had to be a train.  It had to be.  
	It couldn't be.
	It wasn't.
	The drugs flowed into Logan's arm, and he fell unconscious at the same 
moment Dr. Hank McCoy sedated the mutant before the X-Men.
	The mutant called only Control.


Addittional notes/Spoiler - In case you didn't guess, the *********** 
indicated someone other than our near and dear Wolverine.  Logan, poor 
dear, is on the helicopter, having not regained consciousness to escape.  
But Control did.  And Kai shot him, and the X-Men retrieved him.  Poor 
dear just can't win.  Sigh . . . =)