X-Men: Dark Mirror (21 page)

that made Logan squint against the shadows. It irritated him to no end that his eyesight was no longer good enough to see in the dark.

"What is it?" he asked softly. "What's troubling you, darlin'?"

"Nothing," she said. "What makes you ask?"

"Instinct," he said. "And I know you too well. Come on, Rogue. It's a long drive and with those sleeping beauties back there, it's just you and me. Spill."

She hesitated. He had some idea of what she would say and he was not far wrong.

"It's that man I killed," she told him. "I can't stop thinking about him."

"Yeah?" he said. "Nothing wrong with that."

"Everything is wrong," she argued. "He's dead."

"We already discussed this, darlin'. You were trying to stop him from killing someone. It was in self-defense."

"It's more than that. It was arrogance, Logan. My arrogance. I thought this body," and she stopped, gesturing at herself as though she were something distasteful, "wouldn't be strong enough to kill. I didn't hold back."

Logan sighed. Rogue was one of the finest women he knew, but she could hold on to guilt like it was a second superpower. It did not make sense to him to feel bad about things you could not change. Better to learn from mistakes and just move on. Of course, he was a different kind of animal from Rogue. She was more civilized than he.

"Let it go," he said, trying to make her understand. Her lips tightened into a thin line and he shook his head, exasperated. "Forget it, then. I give up, Rogue. I don't know how you do it. How you manage to be the oldest woman I've ever known while living in such a young body."

"You can stop now."

"Fine." He leaned away from her and stared out the window, watching shadows pass along the freeway. A moment later he felt a warm hand touch him, fingers curling around his fingers.

"Thank you," she said softly. "I do appreciate it."

Logan squeezed her hand. "Anytime, darlin'. Anytime you need to talk. I'll always be there for you."

Rogue pulled over at the next rest stop and everyone clambered out to stretch their legs and use the restroom. The parking lot was full with semitrucks, red and yellow edge lights twinkling like it was Christmas. It was still early enough for the sky to be dark, though the birdsong had changed.

The building itself was almost empty. Logan thought he glimpsed some tall figure in an alcove looking at maps. It was almost four in the morning; most everyone, especially the truckers, were tucked snug in their cabs and cars, fast asleep. Logan began to follow Kurt into the men's bathroom and was saved by a loose arm draped over his shoulders. Rogue, steering him into the woman's bathroom. Personally, he did not see how it really mattered where he went.

"Remember your place," she whispered, her breath tickling his ear. She glanced at Scott, who was just now emerging from the bathroom. He had been the first to jump out of the car, charging into the rest stop like there

was some Sentinel inside needing its tin metal butt kicked. Scott said nothing, but Logan thought he looked infinitely more comfortable.

The bathroom smelled and the toilets had seen better I days—better ends of a bleach bottle, too. He
really
misled standing up.

"You okay over there?" Rogue called over the stall, her voice monstrously loud. "I'm not hearing any tinkle- tinkle."

"Ain't none of your business what I'm doing in here," he said, still standing up. He had already done this multiple times, but it never got easier. It felt so wrong.

"Sure thing," Rogue said, clearly proud of her own wondrous ability to relieve herself. Her toilet flushed and then she was out, washing her hands. He heard her slap water on her face.

"You going to be okay if I head back to the car? Logan?"

"Sure," he said, gritting his teeth as he finally went through the motions. "Just get away from me. I'm concentrating."

She chuckled, and he heard the door swing open. Less than a minute later someone else entered. He wondered if it was Rogue, but kept his mouth shut. The last thing he wanted to do was talk to some stranger. He finished, flushed, and left the stall. Stopped. A man stood in front of him. Tall, with a narrow face and hollow cheeks. He wore a tight T-shirt and jeans. Logan thought he looked familiar, and placed him as the map-reader.

"You're not supposed to be in here," Logan said, already planning his moves, the classics: throat, nose, groin. He shifted to the balls of his feet, hands loose and ready at his sides. Great. Didn't seem to matter what he looked like; he always attracted the weirdos.

The man smiled. His teeth were very sharp. Too sharp.

Logan thought,
Oh, crap,
and then he had to dart sideways because the mutant attacked. Logan slammed his fist into the soft part of his throat, following up with another blow to the nose. The combined impact did not slow his assailant in the slightest. His fingers lengthened, scraping Logan's shoulders, searching for a hold. Logan batted away those hands. He got in another punch and then one more, and he watched the man smile, so wicked, confident and smug, and he realized those blows meant nothing to him, weren't even tickling his skin. Jerk was a mutant and he needed a mutant to fight him. That, or Logan was going to require something stronger than two small fists of fury.

He was not fast enough, not in this body. Impossibly long fingers wrapped around his ankles and he hit the ground hard, slamming the back of his head into the tile. Stunned, dazed, he still tried to kick, to scoot backward. The man fell on top of him, fingers uncurling from ankles and snaking upward to wrap tight like rope around Logan's soft arms. Logan snarled, trying to buck him off. Nothing worked. Enhanced mutant strength. For one moment, Logan understood why humans hated his kind.

"Get off me," Logan growled. The door to the bathroom rattled. Logan head Rogue's voice, asking if he was all right. He shouted out to her and got head-butted for his trouble.

"Shhh," hissed the man, speaking for the first time. "Be still."

"You idiot," Logan said, struggling. 'You must be the worst rapist ever."

The man smiled. His mouth was close and hot and wet Soft, he whispered, "Who said anything about rape?"

Logan watched those lips peel back, those teeth glint white and sharp. He thought he saw meaty bits plugging the gaps between them.

The door rattled again. Logan shouted as that scraping mouth touched his cheek.

And then a boom rattled the air, a concussive blast that knocked something out of the door, and Jean and Scott burst into the bathroom. Jean held a gun—that gun she had taken off the pimp—and she aimed it at the mutant holding down Logan and said, "Get off him right now or I will shoot you in the face."

He hesitated. Jean said, "Now."

And then behind them another figure entered, a man—

—a gun went off. The mutant's head exploded and Logan got a mouthful of blood that had him spitting. He heard Scott say, "No," and Jean added, "I didn't do it."

Logan was blind with blood in his eyes and could not move his arms to wipe it away. His ears were fine, though, and he heard a low voice, the voice of a stranger, and the man said, "Hope you don't mind, sir, but I always wanted to kill me a mutant."

And Logan was fine with that. Really.

His name was Duke, or at least, that was what he called himself. Logan did not imagine his mother had given him that name. Duke drove a semi for a furniture company. He always carried a gun, and he did not like most mutants. Some were okay, but the rest could just go hang themselves because they were too dangerous to live, and if he couldn't even trust his sheriff not to be corrupt, or his wife to be faithful, or the local politicians to keep things on the up and up, well, he didn't put much stock in the ability of mutants with superpowers to keep from abusing the little guys. It was just a fact of life, according to Duke. Power made people corrupt. Why, look at that Magneto fellow, or the Brotherhood of Whatsit. Even those X-Men probably had some fishy deal up their sleeves.

"Probably," Logan said, shaking his hand. "Thanks, Duke. You sure you'll be okay?"

"Yeah," he said. "Like I told you, the sheriff around these parts doesn't like mutants too much, and I got a dozen witnesses here says you were being attacked. Or at least, he was on top of you when I shot him. I'll just say you got scared and ran away. Nothing's going to happen to me, sweetheart. Won't even make the papers."

Which was disturbing, and under any other circumstances, worthy of an in-depth investigation. Except, Duke and the men backing him up—all of them truckers who had heard the ruckus and come running—were trying to be good people. Had been, too. They just had a different perspective on things, and Logan really couldn't blame them. Hell, psycho cannibal mutants like that corpse in the women's bathroom did not do much for making a good impression.

Scott, thankfully, kept his mouth shut. Logan could tell he was itching to say something, to speak up for the goodness of all mutant kind, but this was not the time or the place.

Duke said, "You take care, Patty. I hope you and your friends make it home safe, without the law on your tails."

Because none of the X-Men wanted to risk encounters with the police, and Duke seemed like the kind of man who understood why it wasn't always good for some people to have face time with the cops.

They got into the car and drove away, fast. Scott was at the wheel, jean in the front seat beside him. Crammed in the back with the others, Logan felt like a little kid about to get a lecture from his mommy and daddy.

"What happened back there?" Scott asked, the moment they were back on the freeway and gunning it at ninety.

"Someone took a look at me, thought victim—or maybe just Happy Meal—and decided to go for it. Might have taken a chunk or two if Rogue hadn't come back to see how I was doing."

"I didn't think anyone, even you, couldn't possibly take that long " she said, squeezed up tight against him. Logan felt grateful for her good Southern common sense. He glanced at Jean, noting the lines of her pensive face.

The gun was in the glove compartment. Logan wondered if she really would have shot that mutant, and decided yes, if push came to shove.

"He didn't even get a chance, though," Scott said. "That man, Duke, didn't ask any questions. He just shot that mutant, and was happy for it."

Logan stared at the back of his head. "Did you miss the part where I was going to be eaten alive?"

"All right, so the situation merited some defensive measures. My point"—here Logan could barely hear him over the low shocked laughter from the rest of the car—"is that it could have been something completely different. That mutant—and yes, I know this wasn't the case, but let's be hypothetical—could just have been trying to help you. Maybe the situation merely looked bad. You can't justify a 'shoot first, ask questions later' policy, just because it involves mutants. And then the way they were going to sweep it under the rug—"

The soapbox was coming, and Logan did not feel in the mood to hear Scott rant about injustice.

"Scott," he interrupted. "If it makes you feel better, I would have killed him myself if I'd had the chance. In cold blood. You don't let psychos like that run loose. All they do is cause pain."

"Is that your professional opinion?" Scott asked, his voice cold. "You think the same hasn't been said about you?"

Kurt made a soft sound of protest. Logan said, "I know it has. Doesn't bother me, because they're partly right I am a dangerous man. And one day, if someone puts me down for being dangerous, I'll know they probably had a good reason. Thing is, Cyke, there are the kind who are dangerous just because, and the kind who are dangerous because they get off on it. Those are the ones you should be worried about. Those are the ones you shouldn't feel sorry for. That was the kind of man who had me pinned down on the floor of that bathroom, and who was going to take a bite out of my face. You can bet I'm not the only one he's cleaned his teeth on. So don't you dare ask me to sympathize, and don't you make me apologize for being alive."

"We're not vigilantes," Scott said. "We can't take justice in our own hands. No one should be able to do that."

Logan said nothing. He and Scott had never seen eye- to-eye on certain issues, this being one of them. Logan was the kind of man who did what had to be done, no questions asked. Scott was the same, except he asked the questions. Which, when he thought about it, was probably the reason why he was team leader, and why Logan respected him for it. Scott could be a pain, but he usually knew what he was talking about.

Except for now.

"You're thinking too much in black-and-white," Logan said. "Those guys back there are good people."

"If you're not a mutant."

"Maybe so, but imagine the kinds of experiences they've had with mutants. Tonight might be the closest any of them has come to one, and what do they see? A murderer, a cannibal. What do you expect them to do, hold hands and sing the praises of forgiveness? I don't think so, bub."