XCave.NET

** ** indicates telepathic communication
‘ ’ indicates thought
“ ” indicates spoken words

That ‘something’ around his back was a *woman*

“Ororo,” Jean rested a hand on her friend’s shoulder. “Ororo, are you alright?”
The x-men were flying towards the last reported location of the elusive Wolverine, with their special passenger, Ororo Monroe, Storm.
“Huhn....” the tall Nubian beauty looked down at her friend, the television still grasped in her hands. She had seen the video more than a dozen times, trying to find a way to disprove or falsify it. But to no avail.
“Are you alright?” she repeated herself, gently squeezing her grip.
“Yes Jean,” Ororo answered half heartedly, her mind going back to what the professor had told her about Logan’s past, the morning after he left the mansion.

//Flashback//

“What did you tell him about his past?” Ororo stood in front of Xavier’s desk, Jean and Scott sitting in the chairs next to her.
“Ororo, I don’t think….” He started.
“I don’t care about what you do or don’t think,” she coldly cut him off. “I just want to know what told him about his past that you didn’t tell us.”
“Ororo…”
“Now CHARLES,” both Jean and Scott as well as Xavier himself were taken aback by Ororo’s use of his first name. It was something she had never done in all her years at the institute. She always gave and expected the proper respect to everyone around her. It was part of her mysterious goddess charm.

Nodding his head, Xavier began.
“Wolverine had a life before he was captured for the first time, even before he met you.”
“I know,” Ororo agreed. “I wouldn’t have expected him no to.”
“He,” Xavier took a deep breath. “He was married.”
Ororo’s breath hitched at those words. “I would imagine so,” she finally managed to word out.

“I had some information about that part of his life,” Xavier clarified. “About his…wife…and maybe his children.”
Ororo didn’t say anything, waiting for Xavier to continue.
“I had obtained a ring…a wedding ring,” he specified. “On it there was an inscription of love for James.”
“But his name is not James, its Logan,” Ororo looked up, her tone slightly lifting at that bit of news.
“No,” Xavier shook his head. “Logan is something he remembers as his name, maybe someone from the same part of his life, maybe his father, brother, friend….or son.”

“Son?” her voice cracked. She had had the same thoughts over the years. What if his past came to haunt her? What if he had a wife? Children? Would they have waited for him or would they have moved on?

“I’m not sure,” Xavier said clearly. “I don’t know.”

//End Flashback//

From the video footage, it seemed that he had found his past. His wife had waited for him and now that she had found him again, and both of them were happy with each other. He wouldn’t leave her now and neither would she?

‘And why should they?’ the logical part of her brain piped up again. ‘When you waited for the man who was so good that even with just six to seven years worth of memories he had made you so happy, how would he have been with a full life worth’s or memories?’

‘But he loves you too?’ her heart countered. ‘He told Remy that he did.’
‘Did he?’ logic pushed back. ‘He just said, what else is there worth thinking about?’
‘Coming from Logan, it’s the same thing,’ her love for him sounded.

‘He left you.’
‘Only because he thinks he is not good for me and that I love Forge and not him,’ her heart was trying to find any and every way to shut her logic up.
‘He may have left because of that,’ logic went in for the kill. ‘But what now? Now he has found his wife, maybe even children. He is not just going to leave them for the stupid emotions of a teenager.’
‘I’m not a teenager,’ she frowned.
“But you were when you met him, fell in love with him…lost him.’

-----

“Ororo,” Scott squeezed her hand. “Ororo, there is something else you need to know…..something you need to see.”
“What?” she asked dejectedly. What else was left to see?
“This,” Scott located a second file and started to play it.

-----

It was more video footage from the same mall, about an hour after the first one.

Logan and his *companion* entered into the camera’s view, loaded with bags of shopping from the mall. Reaching the camper, Logan pushed against it as if to knock on the door.

The next instant, the door was thrown open and another form stepped out, a female form, younger than the one standing next to Logan. She seemed to just as ‘familiar’ with.
‘What has he been doing?’ Ororo frowned. From the first video, it had seemed that Logan had found his wife, but a second woman.

“Who is that?” Jean questioned her. “And do you know the first woman?”
“No,” Ororo shook her head.
“We had thought that it might have been his wife,” Scott spoke slowly. “Until we saw the second video. Now it just looks like he is picking up women to have a good time.”
“Scott,” Jean scolded, sensing the hurt from Ororo at his comments. “We don’t know anything.”

**For god’s sake Scott, don’t say or do anything to complicate matters any further** she added telepathically.
**Jean…** Scott started.
**NO** he flinched at the boom of her thoughts.

-----

“ETA in ten minutes,” Kitty announced from the navigation control.
“Thank you Shadowcat,” Cyclops answered in full mission mode. “Alright guys. Up and at ‘em.”
“Sure ting’ cyke,” Remy spoke from his seat. Pulling his collar further around his head, he lowered it to his chest and went off to sleep.
“How do you vant us to handle it,” Kurt turned to Scott and Ororo.
“We go inside and try to find him,” Scott said evenly. “But no one approaches him. If you find him, signal the others. Once we are together, only then are we to go near him. Understood.”
“Yes, fearless one,” Kurt mock saluted him.

-----

Ten minutes later,

“So this be it?” Remy looked around at the run-down bar n’ motel. It was just like the one they had found Ororo in, right down to the broken no-vacancy sign. “This where we find th’ Wolverine. Even his camper be here,” he pointed to an old camper standing in one dark corner.
“Shadowcat,” Scott turned to Kitty. “Check the camper. See if you can find anything familiar.”

Nodding her head, Kitty nodded and phased into the camper. She came out a couple of minutes later, holding a weathered sweatshirt in her right hand. A sweatshirt with the x-symbol on its left side.
“Its him,” Ororo said stoically. “What else did you find in there?”
At Kitty’s hesitance, she repeated her question a second time.
“Clothes and stuff….female stuff.”
“Oh,” Ororo’s face hung at those words. “Lets go,” she said finally.

“Lets get this over with.”