From the private Journal of Professor Charles Xavier…
Life goes on. We are quieter now, we are all scarred, we are all more weary. We all miss her. But life goes on.
There are new people here too, who would have thought? Just this time last year, all the students here were my children, but now there are new faces. Kurt Wagner has chosen to stay, for a while at least, and we are pleased to have him. We all feel bruised, we all feel the gap in our lives, and in our mansion. His light-hearted presence is very welcome, and his sweet nature is infectious. He has suffered as much as any of us, and yet still turns such benign eyes to the world; we can all learn lessons from him, and he – well, I believe he is treading carefully, lest he wake from this dream of acceptance, of family, a dream he has had all his life, and find himself alone again. Above all things, we fear being alone. I must remember to talk to Scott.
Yes, I must talk to Scott. He has not said much for days; some wounds are too raw to expose. There is no hurry now. We have time. Storm has a new friend in Kurt, and the children are buoyed up by their near-miss. The mansion bears its scars, but once again the corridors ring with childish noise. We have time to heal. Time heals all, does it not? Great healer, great leveller.
Well, Logan would not agree, but then his brief and brutish experience of life has taught him some different lessons. Time, he feels, is dragging him away.
He came to see me today. Yes, he is still here too, and I think he will remain. At least, he will always come back here. He has been thinking about wandering again, always prowling along the edge of his thoughts, more out of habit than a real desire to be elsewhere. He’s so used to moving around, and as long as his feet are busy, his mind can keep still. It brings him a sort of peace.
I know it’s an effort for him, the small things are an effort. To fight is easy, to live with a family is the great unknown. To sleep in the same bed every night, to deal with the same people every day. Prickles run up and down his spine. All through the day, he seeks out places where he can be alone. He is almost skittish, as life continues and the danger fades away. It seems a strange word for him, this Wolverine, but it is the best I have to describe him. He is hyper-alert, like a nervous dog that jumps at the slightest noise.
Yes, I think he will leave us again, unannounced one night, as he did before. But I also think he will come back. I was not surprised when he finally came to see me in my office. He has been thinking about it for days.
I was marking papers, a welcome escape. Jean used to think it was funny that I found marking so relaxing. The focus is so welcome. It blocks out all the noise, but it didn’t block out the knowledge that someone was approaching my office door with me in mind. It is like overhearing one’s name in a conversation, but catching nothing else. I looked up. The drift of Logan’s mind is easy to recognise. His thoughts have locks like slamming doors, and all his thoughts concerning me are laced with caution. He’s not sure where to put me in his mind. Like Kurt, he treads carefully, lest it all turn out to be too good to be true.
Yes, he has itchy feet. My suspicions are confirmed. He’d rather just leave again than talk to me. I am pleased he is making such an effort to be civilised, to remember how to be civilised. And such an effort! He stopped just short of barging through my door without thinking, and instead gave a careful knock. Knock knock knock! It’s an unfamiliar action. Has he ever knocked before in his memory? Wolverine does not knock! There should be a memory here, to go with this thought, but there is not. Instead, the scent of pine polish drifted into my mind from his. Leaning close to the door, listening for any sound within, it really is quite pungent. How interesting. Maybe I should consider a change of brand. Logan may care to choose one himself, since he is the only one with an interest in it – or at least, with an interest in protecting his nose from assault.
“Come in.” I said, my tone neutral. I always know who is knocking at my office door even before they do, but it strikes me as polite to feign surprise, and also to pretend not to know why they’ve come. He is telegraphing his question so, I could answer it before he even opens his mouth, but he has made such an effort to be civil I feel I must be as well.
He entered, and nodded in answer to my greeting, careful to say nothing without thinking first. I could feel the outburst on his mind, but it didn’t take a psychic to tell that he was trying to swallow his tongue. He gulped back the turmoil, and swallowed the abuse.
Jean felt drawn to that intensity, and there’s no denying he holds your attention. Indeed, he commands your attention, much as a Bengal tiger would if it chanced to stroll into your office. It’s hard for a psychic not to turn and look at him across a crowded room. Whether she mistook this for attraction, or whether it was genuine – or maybe that’s simply what attraction is. Well, even I’m not qualified to comment. I’m with Scott on this one. I’m not sure that I like him. I would not choose to spend time with him, he brings his tension into every room he enters, he’s rough and belligerent, he’s pushy and demanding. He’s certainly not restful to have around, but then, liking is not an issue here. He’s a mutant in pain, and I promised to help him. He’s also nervous. I have to hide a smile. The Wolverine doesn’t like confrontation! At least not a confrontation he can’t solve with his claws. Yes, interacting with people is so difficult. It’s dangerous and unpredictable, and he knows I have the power to tell him things he doesn’t want to hear, and maybe even to make him listen. He doesn’t want to be here.
So, he picked his words with great care.
“You know who I am.” He said. Ah, yes. “You knew from the first time you saw me. You didn’t tell me.”
Three facts, one, two, three. He doesn’t like to mince his words, he doesn’t like clauses and complex sentences. Clear and simple. The same man with a less complicated life would prefer to see in black and white. As such, he may have trouble understanding why I didn’t tell him all I knew straight away. But then, all I know amounts to very little. I have no idea who he is. So, I shook my head, and clarified;
“I knew what you are. It’s hardly the same thing. I have no better idea of who you are than you do.”
He shakes his head, hard. Not relevant, Professor! Don’t quibble over semantics! Logan is a man of such few words that in conversation you must supply half of his for him. In such circumstances, being psychic is most useful.
“You should have told me. We had a deal.” A simple thing. I really didn’t know much about him. That he was Stryker’s mutant, Stryker’s weapon, that’s all. Stryker’s Wolverine. What other creature could have adamantium wrapped round his bones? If I didn’t know that he really didn’t know, I never would have let him into the school.
“I promised I would help you. I want to help you. If I had told you what I knew, it wouldn’t have helped you. Part of the remembering is to find out for yourself. I showed you where to look.” Will that be enough?
“You should have told me.” Should have. Dear Logan, he will talk about his rights next. We like things simple, we like things clear. This is what is, what must be.
“I don’t think that I should have. I’m not sure you would have believed me. You might have lashed out at me – I know you are angry. You need to lash out at anyone, and I played a part in what happened to you. You would not have stayed here.”
“You don’t know that,”
“I do know that. And so do you. Remember when we first met? You were there too, so I hope you do. As I recall, you declared all this to be the stupidest thing you’d ever heard. You would not have been inclined to listen to a stranger tell you things, things that would have meant nothing to you.”
“These things...!” A burst of anger. He swallowed it. “These things don’t mean nothing to me. This is my life. I needed to know.”
“You needed to remember. There’s knowing, and remembering. I want to help you remember.”
His eyes drifted to the ground, and back up again.
“I still don’t remember.” He told me, with a tight smile that was really a snarl. “I don’t know if I can remember. I always thought… They always said, it would get better. Amnesia isn’t permanent, they said. Give it time, give it time, they said. It’s been fifteen years, and I still don’t remember a single damn thing. I don’t give a damn about remembering now. I just want to know.” Each word was spat like an accusation. It was an accusation. My head hurts, and you won’t help me! I picked my tone carefully. Repetition and emphasis.
“It’s true. Amnesia is very rarely as total or as permanent as yours. But I don’t need to tell you, yours is not a usual case. There’s no precedent for handling a case like yours. Logan, I already told you I can’t just open up your mind like a box, but I do believe your memories are there, and I think in the right circumstances, they will resurface. I really don’t know much, and I don’t think it would have helped you to know.”
“You don’t know that either.”
“I do know that. Or, at least I can have a very educated guess. I can feel the way that your mind… flows, even when I don’t know what you’re thinking. When we first met, you were confused, and anxious, displaced. Mistrustful. I had to tread carefully, if I really wanted to help you,”
He snorted. “Yeah, and look at me. All better now,”
Sarcasm is a blunt weapon, in my opinion. I looked him hard in the eyes until he looked away. He snorted again. I make him feel vulnerable, and he doesn’t like it.
“I ain’t one of your students.” He hissed. “I don’t need to be taught lessons, and I don’t need your ‘voyage of discovery’ crap.”
“I only want to help you,” I told him again. Help is so oppressive to him.
“Help me!” He spat.
“That was the deal.” I reminded him.
“Oh, yeah,” He muttered, sitting back, feeling disarmed, and suddenly tired. Giving up. Is it comforting to know he won’t fight me to the death? I don’t know. He waited for me to make a move.
“There’s no one thing I can do, Logan, to heal the damage that has been done to you. I just can’t use my powers and make it go away. I will try to make it easier for you, but you must learn to come to terms with it yourself. In time, it may be easier,”
He smiled thinly. His thought was that time makes no difference. I’ve had plenty of time. I don’t want anymore of it. This is interesting. Before, he was simply aggressive, and then he was childishly sulky. A badly used mutant clamouring for his head to be clear. An aggrieved child. Really, our Wolverine is only fifteen years old, that’s all the life he’s had, and he’s been well used to pushing to get what he wants. But he thinks to himself, Time festers, it doesn’t heal. Everything seems like it’s just on the tip of my tongue, and then it’s so far away. I remember this, and then I don’t. Lord, there is something I need to know. But I keep getting further and further away. How in the hell can I miss something so badly when I have no idea what it is? Bub, this is not funny, and it’s no fun!
He doesn’t have to tell me it’s not funny. For a shadow of a moment, just a shadow, it seems like something is funny to him. The whole thing. How ridiculous! Amnesia is funny. It’s stupid and funny, and it’s damn well unnecessary. Godammit, it’s not! He tells himself, peeved. For a shadow of a moment, he’s a different man. A man whose thoughts are laced with dry humour, whose mind is shrewd and sharp, and that great self-possession, for just a moment, is not an effort. Somewhere within, there’s such stillness. Is this what Jean was drawn to? Is it animal or man, or something greater than both? If Stryker knew a man with such raw power – No, a mutant with such raw power, no wonder he wanted to harness it, and turn it to something furious. For just that moment, had I had a Bengal tiger in my office, I think I would have been less afraid.
Then it passed. He sighed and shifted in annoyance. Really not funny. Oh yeah. He felt it too. Is that the man, I wonder? Still alive, inside the wolverine? Sometimes Logan thinks this man must be dead. He thinks they killed him. The soul, if you like, the thing that was this man, checked out, but the body just wouldn’t stop regenerating. They killed him and all that survives is the mutant – or the mutation. This is what happens when your body just won’t die decently when it should. All that’s left is a memory of a name, a name that doesn’t belong to him. Logan is dead. There’s only Wolverine.
I thought he was wrong before, and now I am sure. For a moment then, he was older and wearier and better than his fifteen years of memory. But it’s so damn elusive! He thinks that too, in simpler terms. But is it too late? He thinks. And is it too hard? Wouldn’t it be better to just let it all drift away?
I wanted to show him that I am honest with him now, so I said;
“I suppose I felt a little responsible. If I had been able to help Jason Stryker all those years ago, his father might have been a different man.”
He thought about this for a minute, staring at the ceiling. He counted the rafters to save himself from thinking so hard that his head hurt. Seventeen across.
“I don’t blame you.” he said flatly. He was too self-absorbed to think of comforting me, so I knew this was nothing but the truth. We were silent for a while.
“I don’t know.” He whispered, half to himself. I let him compose himself.
“I’m sorry…” He started to say, eventually, groping for the right words. “For fifteen years. I haven’t had the slightest idea where to even begin looking, how to even begin… to come to terms with anything. I know there ain’t no magic solution, you can’t just… switch it off, just like that. But you’re the first person who’s been able to even help me a little bit, to show me which way to go. I guess I’m being grabby. It’s just…”
“I know,” I said softly. He nodded once. Check. No need to say more. He counted again. Still seventeen.
“I killed that Japanese girl,” He said, a little absently. “She was just like me… Just like me. I wonder if… She looked a little familiar, you know. She looked peaceful. She looked… at the end, she looked like she was thinking, ‘Finally, thank you!’. Like it was God’s own mercy… I wish…” He trailed away again. I followed the line of his thoughts, but they drifted into nothing. Again, there should be a memory here, but it all trails away. Really, we are none the wiser. God’s own mercy. I wonder if he has been talking to Kurt. I waited for a while, while he wandered among the rafters, but he had wandered off in thought on his own again, drifting after traces of scent that came from the corridor.
Satisfied that he had said all he would say, I changed the subject to release him.
“I’ll get some different polish.” I told him.
Must remember to get some.
~fin~
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