PROLOGUE
Twenty minutes earlier, the Captain had announced that all personnel in this bunker were to undress, and prepare for a medical examination by the base's medical officers. It was a compulsory exam; routine after the number of problems this particular army regiment had been suffering through. Among the ranks, some men whispered of chemical warfare exposure.
One man had refused to undress citing his religious beliefs. The Captain declared that religion had no place in the army. He ordered the men under his command to pin the solider and forcefully strip him down.
Moments later, thirty soldiers, the medical officers, and the Captain himself, stared in undisguised horror and disgust at the stripped solider. He stared back at them from the corner, and the tail, which, until now, he had managed to hide, thrashed against the walls.
PART ONE—EIGHT YEARS LATER
Somewhere in the Midwestern United States.
Logan warily watched the crowd from the corner of his eye. Keeping his rifle in plain view, he slowly patrolled the fringes of the throng. A thin trickle of sweat rolled lazily down his spine. The heat of the night swirled lazily in the over crowded barn. The few women present were rapidly waving fans. It wasn't doing much good, other than adding their body heat to the furnace.
On a hastily erected stage, a well-built, blond man paced up and down speaking to the gathered men and women. As the crowd grew more excited with every hard comment or question he directed down to them, they punctured the air with their upraised fists.
"Sheep," Logan muttered under his breath. He nodded cordially to a guard he had just walked past. A reassuring mental touch calmed him slightly.
"Hey, Jeannie, what's taking so long? You wouldn't believe what these guys smell like!"
As if fate intervened to prove Logan's point, a large over weight man suddenly threw up both his arms and sprinkled Logan with small droplets of sweat from his shaggy hair.
"Goddamn! Sonofa…!"
Jean laughed lightly inside Logan's mind. "Almost ready. Just waiting for Storm to confirm position."
Logan smelt the air; anger, rage, excitement, a tinge of fear. And lots of failed deodorant.
"Getta move on it, will ya', Red! I don't know how much longer I can take this shit," he added in disgust.
Cyclops edged closer to Jean, "How's he doing?"
Jean broke her mental contact with Logan. "Tense. Annoyed. We're taking too long."
She shifted closer to Scott. They were standing behind the Blackbird. They had landed the jet behind a small hillock, concealing it from anyone in the barn who might wander outside before the time was ready.
Scott snorted in disgust, "You'd think that with all the time and effort he has taken so far, he could wait ten more minutes."
"You know Logan."
"Unfortunately," Scott added under his breath.."It's hard enough," Jean continued, ignoring Scott's snide comment, "for him on an everyday basis not to maim you, never mind being surrounded by hate mongering, mutant bashing humans. It's taking an immense amount of control on his part," she finished.
Scott cleared his throat and gave Jean a weird look. Changing the subject, he asked, "Are Rogue and Storm in position?"
Jean concentrated briefly. "Rogue's ready. So is Storm."
Scott checked his watch to mark the time. "Tell Logan to move into position, and strike on my count."
Rogue hovered over a small crack in the barn's roof. The leather of her uniform was creating an unbearable stickiness on her skin.
"Lord, Storm. Can't you do something about this awful heat?" Rouge whispered.
She picked at the seams of her uniform as her teammate flew up to the roof to join her. The crack in the roof added a steady stream of heated air into the humid warmth of the night.
"Logan must be melting in there," observed Storm.
Rogue watched Logan walk past one of the guards. He finally leaned back against a stack of bundled hay and rested the rifle he had been holding against his shoulder. Rogue had never seen Logan work undercover like this before. Apparently he was very good at it, but quite frankly, it was unnerving. Seeing him act so cordially towards these obvious bigots, knowing that under his blasé exterior he was dying to cause some damage appeared odd to her.
She remembered the lecture Logan received from Scott and Jean five months ago before he had left for this mission.
"Please, Logan. Don't use your claws."
"What? Not even to open a can or something?"
"Logan!"
"No more joking. This is important."
"Yeah, yeah."
"And no growling."
"Grrrrrrrrr…"
"Stop acting like a moron and listen, dammit!"
Logan had looked at both of them in hard silence.
"Look, it's not like I haven't done this before, you know." Was this another hint at his untold past?
"Okay," Jean continued down the list, "Don't bare your teeth. Keep body and facial hair down to a minimum."
Scott had burst out laughing at that followed by Rogue and Storm. Logan had glared while Jean carried on nonplussed.
"And try not to snarl. Got it?". "Got it," Logan nodded, and then almost fell out of his chair when he Jean produced a pair of barber scissors.
"Shit, Jean, no! No fucking way! JEAN!"
Scott and Storm got the hell outta there pretty quick when Jean forced Logan to sit still. and had Rogue stayed to help her give him a trim. Logan had actually ended up looking very good. It was not his normal rough, rugged, and sideburned look, but, all in all, not bad.
Rogue was broken out of her thoughts by Storm.
"As soon as Logan has Dawson, I'll send both of you some nice soothing mist." Storm pushed her head over the crack, edging Rogue aside, so she could peer inside.
Rogue pushed closer against the roof and listened to the litany coming from inside the barn.
"Why are our children afraid to go to school? Why are we scared to send them?" Dawson questioned his audience.
"MUTANTS!!" the crowd screamed eagerly jabbing the air with clenched fists.
"And why are we afraid to walk the streets?" Dawson questioned the crowd again.
"MUTANTS!!"
"Crimes on the increase…"
"MUTANTS!!"
"The Dollars falling…"
"MUTANTS!!"
The call and response continued.
Rogue sighed. Never mind him melting, Wolverine must be going crazy in there.
The two female mutants on the roof felt Jean's mental call.
"They're ready," Storm confirmed.
The crowd screamed a final "Mutants!" and waited expectantly as Dawson finally stopped his pacing and faced them. He was in total control. He had the right mixture of personality and propaganda with the added stupidity of the masses. He could get them to jump off a cliff right now, if he so wished.
"The time has come for people, HUMAN PEOPLE, Our Lord's first creation, to take back what is rightfully ours. Our lives and our Land!"
Two men in execution-style hoods stepped up to the stage. Between them, they were dragging a man who had a hemp sack over his head. The man struggled in vain, and tripped as the two brutes continued do pull him forward to the front of the stage.
Dawson stepped aside as a chair was placed directly in front of the struggling man. As if sensing what was about to happen, the hooded man's struggles increased earning him a well placed punch in the ribs.
Dawson felt the crowd falter in their enthusiasm at this bit of violence. He reworked them into frenzy as one of the guards tossed a thick rope over a roof beam and start to tie a hangman's knot.."God created us. We are his creation. The creation of holiness – not the forsaken filth spewed out by man's corruption, man's mistakes, man's sins…"
The hooded man was dragged up onto the chair, and the noose put around his neck. Dawson felt the energy beating out of the frenzied masses below him.
"WE must reclaim humanity! WE must purge out the ranks of decay! It is up to US to stop our fall into Satan's gutter!"
Logan felt the hairs on the back of his neck stand on end when he saw the hooded man's tail.
"Logan! What's going on down there?" Jean called frantically.
"Looks like we're about to witness a good old fashioned hanging, Darlin'."
Wolverine felt his muscles knot with rage and suppressed hate.
"Shit!"
"What's going on Rogue?" Storm's worried face moved into Rogue's peripheral vision as she tried to see more of the barn through the crack.
"Change of plans," Rogue answered answering Storm's worried expression.
"X-Men! Abort mission!" Logan almost flinched when Jean called. He knew what Scott would demand.
"No way, Darlin'—too much at stake here!"
"Logan! Repeat, abort mission and return to sleeper status."
Logan ignored Jean as she knew he would. He carried on with the plan.
"Rogue, we must leave at once and return to the Blackbird." Storm hissed behind her hovering just off the roof's gutter.
"We can't go now." Rogue turned to look down at Storm. "He's up to something."
As fierce as his namesake, Wolverine moved from the hay bales and jumped on to the stage. Grabbing Dawson, Logan leveled his rifle to the hate-monger's head. Logan fervently hoped that Rouge had enough of him still rattling around in her head to not to leave her position, and to keep Storm with her.
Dawson's followers rushed the stage knocking down the chair on which the noose-hung mutant still stood.
"Move one more inch and Dawson here gets an extra hole in his head!" Logan yelled pushing the rifle onto Dawson's temple harder.
"STOP!" Dawson was rigid and slightly pale, but his voice betrayed no emotion. "Listen to him… move back," he added calmly.
"Good advice," Logan's head was right next to Dawson's. The mutant-hater's arm was twisted behind his back by Logan who also held his rifle against his right temple.
"Now get him down!" Logan indicated the gasping, hanging mutant with his head. Harsh coughing sounds filled the now silent barn. The guards hesitated. Logan's hands itched to let loose his claws.
"I said, GET HIM DOWN… NOW!" Logan snarled almost fully baring his teeth, but at the last moment remembered not to reveal his sharp canines.
A brief flash of a knife and the gasping mutant collapsed to the floor. His frantic hands were immediately around his throat, tearing the noose loose and throwing the hood off. A badly pockmarked face stared wide-eyed back at Logan. The mutant's fingers rubbed his bruised trachea as he got up and stumbled over to where Logan was standing. The nearly hung mutant saw that the man who has saved him was practically ramming a rifle into Dawson's head.
Dawson tried to talk Logan down. He thinking desperately of what could of turned this man so quickly against him… all of his personal guards were hand picked. "Had the hanging been too much for him? Shit, he knew he should have waited. The people where still not ready for his kind of leadership, but he had never expected one of his own to bulk first."
Dawson garbled on trying to break through this obviously upset guard's mentality and to get him to think about his actions.
"Want do you want? We can get you anything. Money, is that it? Not enough pay? Has something upset you? Talk to me, I can help you, brother!"
Logan upressed a growl. "I'm not your fucking brother!"
Logan could tell this was not going to hold back the lynching mob for much longer. He took the rifle and quickly swung it hitting Dawson's head and knocking him unconscious. Logan this time swung the rifle back to face the mob who were now moving as one towards the stage. It would be hard to carry an unconscious man, but it was worth the silence.
Dragging Dawson and aiming the rifle towards the crowd, Logan started moving backwards with the mutant tag-along walking behind him to the wall of the barn and escape.
Rogue watched Logan grab Dawson and set the hung man free. She swore again when she realized the man was in fact a tailed mutant.
So far, the mission was still going according to plan except for an extra mutant which no one, not even Logan it seemed, had known about.
Rogue spun around to face the still protesting Storm. "Logan's pulled it through. We're going to need that fog now."
Listening with one ear as Storm summoned her goddess for mist, Rogue watched for Logan to almost near the wall before swooping down, and waiting for the next move.
Cyclops watched the tendrils of Storm's fog wrap around his wrist.
"I don't believe it! They disobeyed a direct order!" he hissed to Jean.
They lay just on the hillock's crest watching Rouge hover just off the barn's side waiting for Logan.
Slowly, she and Storm were hidden from view by a thick cover of fog. Jean was concentrating hard to keep tabs on all the team members. Logan, as usual, was not being very cooperative. She sent him some extra telekinetic help.
"Everything is still going as planned," she whispered to Cyclops. "They are all aware of the situation."
She frowned deeper and going pale, her eyes flew open. She gasped as if hit. "Logan—he's been hurt!" As if on cue, the distorted air of the night carried the sound of rapid gun shots.
The barn door threw itself open. "Thanks, Jeannie," Logan sent to the telekinetic. Warm air met fog cooled air, and Logan felt his shirt tug slightly at the vacuum it caused.
Logan heard the mutant stumbled behind him. Still in shock no doubt. Focusing on the progressing mob in front of him, the X-Man moved backwards toward the door. Catching movement from the side, Logan turned his head slightly to bring a small group of children, sitting behind a previously concealing pile of hay bundles, into focus. Their parents had dumped them here before the meeting so that they wouldn't get in the way.
A boy who couldn't be older than twelve, got up and looked at them. One small hand was holding something behind his leg. Logan reached the door and shoving the mutant out upon hearing Rogue signal him. The fog was almost totally concealing him. Logan turned to shove the doors closed and barricade them when the boy held a huge scythe up and aimed it towards the tailed mutant.
Screaming, "MUTANT!!!!" the boy threw the scythe into a widely flying arc.
Logan jumped right into the scythe's path. He bowled the mutant over, and drop Dawson and the rifle.
Rogue swooped down closely followed by Storm.
"Stay back!" Logan shouted as the gun shots started.
The angry mob had stormed out of the building shooting everywhere, apparently confused by the weather.
Logan felt a bullet rip through his chest passing the scythe blade that t had embedded itself just under his shoulder.
"This is fucking ridiculous!" he thought getting up. Blood shot into his mouth from his damaged lungs.
"Shit! That hurts bad."
Rogue grabbed the unconscious Dawson and the mutant. He wrapped his tail around her waist in panic.
"Logan, you alright?" she called tossing the unconscious man and the mutant over each shoulder and already starting back for the Blackbird. Super human strength was such an added bonus these days.
"No time for stupid questions," Logan grunted back.
As he started to run back to the blackbird, Logan's lungs were already repairing themselves around the scythe. No time yet to remove it from his body. Jean will have to do that. Storm started a heavy wind to cause more confusion. The gun shots subsided as Logan made the hillocks crest. Rouge was already inside the jet with Storm. Dawson lay slumped next to the wide-eyed mutant. Logan stumbled in slamming the controls to close the door. He caught himself on a chair as the Blackbird roared to life and took off.
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