For instance, Maddie knew how to change a tire, but the pimply faced teenager holding down the thankless graveyard shift at the gas station was happy to do it for her, even though that kind of thing was no longer in his job description. She had a spare, but not a jack or a tire iron; the station did, although they looked brand new and never used.

So while the kid fumbled with the lug nuts and vaguely flirted with her as he clumsily put on her left rear tire, hoping for her number or at least a little gratitude, while she kept looking back at Logan, sitting on the curb outside the quick mart, propped up against the pay phone.

He could have been a derelict or a homeless guy who picked a bad place to crash, and she bet the clerk in the store -if she saw him - or anyone driving by thought that, thereby rendering him invisible. But that was far from true, and she couldn't help but wonder what his story was.

Where did the questions stop? He knew about vampires and all that shit-he even knew how to kill them. Why? Sure, he was a mutant, but did that automatically predispose him to freaky shit like this? He helped her - why? He didn't have to - fuck, she ran him over, even if he didn't remember it - but he did anyway, even as bad off as he was. And through it all he was so cool; he never lost it once, even when the place was burning down, even when he was getting beaten by vampires. The guy was fucking fearless. She envied him; she admired him. And she never noticed how attractive he was before now.

Oh Christ, she had the worst taste in men. She needed therapy. Better yet, she needed to go to the arctic and live with penguins or something, just get away from people and their freaky shit. It would be better for everyone.

But she hoped he was okay. He didn't look okay; he looked like he was dying. But he wasn't even giving into fear about that. That was balls, but then again, so was taking on all those vampires.

She was really having a hard time believing vampires existed. And where had Steve met one anyways?

The kid was just about done with her tire when she noticed something odd. It took her a moment to figure out what the problem was, but she finally got it - the wind was gone. She had gotten so used to its persistent howling that it became background noise, but now it was gone, and almost eerily still. So were the leaden rain clouds. How had they cleared off so fast with no wind? In spite of the lights of the service station, she could see a yellow silver of moon, and a smattering of pale stars in the black sky. Since when did storms act that funny? Weren't changes gradual?

Just as she was pondering the oddity of all of this,she heard another noise. It was a low roar, like thunder  in the distance, but how could you have thunder without clouds? She would have sworn there was the slightest rumble under her feet too, like a big rig passing by on the highway, but there had been no truck driving by on the road.

Maybe it was because of all this vampire shit, but instantly she was paranoid. Something weird was going on, and she didn't know if it was a threat to her or not. Her first impulse was to go ask Logan, but wasn't he dealing with enough?

In a couple of minutes, the weirdness came to Logan.

These two women came walking out of an alley behind the convenience store, and after looking around briefly, headed straight for him. One was a tall redhead with an unfortunate ponytail, and the other was a shorter black woman with long white hair. What did that woman do to her hair? Who told her that was a good look?

It was so quiet, she could kinda of hear them talking. "Logan?" She was pretty sure that was the redhead talking, because she reached him first, crouching down in front of him. She reached out and touched his face. "Oh god .... are you still with me?"

He moved very slowly, but he looked up at her. "Yeah. Where else would I go?"

"Storm, help me get him up," she said, moving so she could take his injured arm.

"I don't need help," he protested weakly, but it was clear he did.

Storm? Did that woman call the white haired woman Storm? Was that a coincidence?

The redhead - Doctor Jean, she assumed - examined his arm carefully before draping it over her shoulders. The other woman got his good arm around her shoulders, and knowing from experience how heavy he was, she was sure they'd collapse. But somehow they managed, although it looked like they would have rather hit the ground. She wondered if one of them was his girlfriend.

They started helping him back the way they had come, and only then did Maddie realize if they had come from New York, they must have broken the sound barrier. How could they have gotten here that fast? Well, they were mutants too, right? Mutants could do all sorts of weird things. Look at Logan - he had Ginsus in his hands, and seemed to be able to take a lot of damage and keep going ( although maybe that was a personality thing, a stubborn, testosterone fueled "Giving up is for pussies" kind of deal ). Except for his arm. What happened to his arm?

She wanted to go after them, see where they were taking him, but the geek had finished with her tire, and she knew she couldn't just walk off now. Logan was with "his people", so he should be fine. But she was a little sad that she probably wasn't going to see him ever again. She hoped he had a good life. As free of vampires as possible.

Actually, she was rather hoping for that herself too.

13

Jean used a little of her telekinesis to hold Logan up, and to lighten the heavy burden that he was so they could make it back to the jet. He was semi-conscious at best, his pupils dilated and eyes glassy, and he still had the ghost tracings of bruises on his face and inexplicable second degree burns on his forehead. And his arm - good god, his arm. He reeked of blood and smoke - and not cigar smoke either, wood smoke. She wondered how that related to the burns on his forehead.

Even Storm recognized that Logan was beyond merely hurt, and hovering somewhere in the seriously injured category. Unlike Bobby, who had simply tired himself out by trying to use his powers too hard and too fast, Logan looked beaten half to death. But Jean asked her to go to the cockpit and just get them the hell out of here - the sooner they could get him back to the mansion, the better, as the medical equipment she had here was very limited.

She didn't really even have a place to put him - they had to lay him out on the floor in the rear compartment. As soon as Storm left for the cockpit, she pulled out all the medical supplies she had brought with her, and knew they were inadequate. But what could be adequate for Logan with a malfunctioning healing factor?
"Talk to me, Logan," she said, as she got an oxygen canister from an overhead compartment. She might not need it - she hoped she didn't - but she knew she had to prepare for the worst. He didn't answer, so she said, much more forcefully, "Talk to me." Until she could determine if he had a head injury, she wanted to keep him conscious.

"What's there to say?" He mumbled. His words sounded loose, and under any under circumstances she might have said he was drunk, but since he couldn't get drunk, that wasn't possible. Of course, without a healing factor, he could, but he didn't smell like alcohol.

"Anything, I don't care," She said. "Tell me what happened that you can remember." She sat down beside him on the floor, and using scissors, carefully cut away what remained of the sleeves of clothing on his right arm. They were tacky and black with old blood, but just wet enough that she knew it was still bleeding.

"Uh, there were these vampires working for something called Qanlon. Lame ass deal all the way around."

"Vampires?" It was bad enough she had accepted this; it was worse that she was wondering if they could have hurt him this much. "Did they do this to you?"

His hazel green eyes locked onto her face, but she could tell he was having a hard time focusing. His eyes looked like they were made of glass. "Naw, it was a wimp brigade all the way around. If I wasn't hurtin' so much, I coulda dusted them all in a minute."

"So you encountered them after you were hurt?"

"Yeah."

She tried to memorize the name Qanlon, so if she called Bob for help, she'd know at least a little of what to tell him, whether it was related to his injury or not. Who knew if it was important?

She pulled away the soppy, shredded remains of his sleeve, and found his arm was so crusted and black with blood it was hard to say where the injury started and where it ended. There were moistened towelettes in one of the emergency kits, and she used one to try and clean up the area enough so she could see exactly what she was dealing with. "I have to admit I don't understand. Were you attacked by a demon?"

"Maybe. The vamps said somethin' about a Rhedoc poisoning my blood, but I have no idea what they meant."

Even though he probably couldn't see her, she was careful to keep her expression neutral, free of any emotional response. He didn't need that right now. "Poison how? And is a Rhedoc a demon?"

"I don't know either way. But I guess."

She had cleared enough old blood away to see it was a mostly even vertical slash, about three inches wide and about five inches long. Through it she could still see the striations of muscle tissue, the ragged tear at the edge of the skin, and ... what was that? Maybe it was old blood that had fallen in the wound when she was cleaning it, but it looked like small black spots. Logan was right about the wound missing the deltoid nerve cluster, but not for lack of trying; it was a close thing. It also looked like something had tried to cut off his arm, but found it couldn't - the adamantium, of course.

He shivered, and that shook her out of her horrified fascination with the wound. "Are you cold?" A stupid question, but only now did it finally occur to her he might be in shock. It was hard to think of Logan being as frail as the rest of them.

"You guys have the a.c. on too high," he said, as she pulled out an emergency thermal blanket and spread it over him. She didn't have the heart to tell him they didn't have the air conditioning on.

Mentally she kicked herself for leaving shock out of the equation - after losing so much blood, of course he'd be in shock. How could he not be? At least she knew now that keeping him conscious had been the right thing. She moved his right arm so it would stay outside the blanket, and realized it felt stiff, like the muscles were going into rigor mortis - holy shit, what was that?

"Keep talking," she told him, as she searched the small kit for the drugs it had. Ironically, here was an anti-venom and medications for several illnesses, but nothing for demon poisoning or any other kind of poisoning. There were medications for pain of various strengths, but she had no idea if any of them would work on him.

"Do I have to?" He said. But he did as she asked. "I'm sorry to put you through this."

"You're not putting me through anything," she said absentmindedly, setting up a portable monitor. She needed to get an idea of how his vital functions were holding up. Rather than tear open his shirt ( although that sounded fun ), she attached the electrodes to the side of his neck, figuring she'd get a good enough reading.

His eye met hers as she looked down at him, and he said, "You know, it's funny."

"What?" She activated the monitor, and his vital statistics started to pop up on the digital readouts. His blood pressure was amazingly low - typical for a shock victim, and for someone who had lost a lot of blood - so low she didn't know how he was still conscious. His heart rate was also troublingly slow ( for Logan - she'd learned enough about him to know his heart rate differed from the standard norms ) and somewhat erratic, but considering he was in shock, that was to be expected.

"I don't think I wanna die right now. I've wanted to die for so long, Jean."

She looked down at him, startled. "What?" She knew about his supposed suicide attempts in the past - Heydon taunted her with them and she couldn't believe it, but Bob had all but confirmed it as true. Even at her lowest - and she had had her moments - she'd never even come close to thinking she'd rather be dead. And while she could understand others getting that depressed, she couldn't fathom Logan - stubborn, irritating, "never say die"  Logan - dropping to such depths that not only would he think about killing himself, but that he'd actually try it. Repeatedly.

Maybe all his bluster and desire to rush head long into danger was just another form of attempted suicide.

She gazed down at him, and said, "Don't say that." She ignored the irony.

" 's true. Aren't people with syndromes always suicidal?" He tried to smile, but it was very weak, and for the first time she noticed his lips were so pale they were virtually white. "It'd just be nice to stop, you know? Rest."
He paused, then added, "To sleep, perchance to dream."

She gave him a curious glance as she looked for a pressure bandage. The jet wasn't so perfectly stable that she felt good about giving him stitches up here, and he needed quite a few. She probably need to start an i.v. drip too, get some fluid in him, but the portable saline bag she had wouldn't be enough. Still, it would have to do until they could get him back to the mansion. "Aye, there's the rub," she replied, relatively sure that wasn't the next line, but she couldn't remember what it was right now.

"Hamlet was a whiner," Logan said, almost dismissively. "I mean, damn - shit or get off the pot, man. Do something or don't, but don't whine about it for three hours."

She couldn't help but chuckle. Only Logan could characterize Hamlet as "three hours of whining". Of course he was right, but still it was funny to hear it put so baldly. "I didn't realize you knew so much about Shakespeare."

"I know a lot about a lot of things, I'm just not sure how."

That was almost heartbreaking. He was so totally adrift in the world, unsure of his place in it, and the funny thing was - although Scott would argue with her about this - she was sure, underneath it all, Logan was a very erudite man ( he'd have to be to be so completely fluent in so many languages - his ability to smoothly jump back and forth between tongues without any problems was impressive ), or at least had been, until the Organization got ahold of him. Then they left his brain so scrambled he didn't even know his full name.

"Are you in pain?" She asked, wondering if any of the drugs she had would work on him for a millisecond. Maybe she could give him a telepathic suggestion that he wasn't in pain - that could work.

"Naw, I'm okay. Just cold and tired and feelin' delirious."

She couldn't believe he was keeping a sense of humor about this. She didn't know how he did it. Or maybe it was just the delirium. "Okay. You might feel some pressure once I get this on - let me know if it hurts." She said, as she wrapped the pressure bandage over the gash on his arm. Okay, was it just that she hadn't cleaned enough old blood away, or did some of the veins in his arm, moving away from the injury site, look black?

"It won't hurt. That arm's meat. I could lose it, I wouldn't know."

That was frightening. But he was right - his arm was not only unnaturally stiff, but it was cold to the touch. She got the bandage on it, and there was no indication on his face that he felt it.  She went about setting up the i.v. drip in his left ( good ) arm, and he went on rambling, possibly to make her happy, or possibly because his shock induced delirium was getting worse."I don't regret anything I've done, you know? Not when I knew what I was doin'. But I regret we never got our act together, Jean."

She gave him a surprised glance even as she slid the needle into his arm. Once again, there was no sign on his face that he felt it. "Logan - "

"We coulda been pretty good, ya know?"

She gave him a sad smile, and touched his face, feeling the scrape of his ubiquitous stubble against her palm. All his skin was apparently that cold; he felt like ice. She never really wanted to know how much blood he could lose before he stopped functioning, but she had a feeling they were both finding it out, whether they wanted to or not. "We still could be. I'm not going to let you die."

He smiled at her, but it was faint, and something about it suggested he was humoring her. "I know." After a brief pause, he added," The raincheck's still good."

She smiled and looked away, finishing setting up the i.v. bag. " I'll keep that in mind." He could never know what a tempting offer that had been. For a minute, she had actually contemplated taking him up on that, back in that park in Canada. Not that she'd ever cheat on Scott - she wasn't that type of person. But something about it had sounded ... alluring. Damn it, it was his fault! She was not one of those self-destructive women who was hopelessly drawn to "bad boys", but there was something damnedably, primally, irritatingly attractive about him. She liked to write it off as simply the mystery of him - he was so full of contradictions and paradoxes, and she did have this great urge to solve any puzzle she came across: was there any puzzle greater than Logan? - but it was probably more complicated than that. Wasn't everything?

They'd never have worked as a couple in any way, shape, or form. But as Logan himself had said, "So what?" Yet she didn't have the courage necessary to take such a big risk as that, even though she knew that was probably another one of Logan's appeal - just throw caution to the wind and go for it, no matter what. His fears were far more complex than simple heartbreak.

"Maybe it was for the best, you know?" He continued. "Everyone I've ever loved has been hurt or died, and I couldn't save them. Nothin' I could do could save 'em. That was the worst; that was always the worst. I wouldn't have cared if they just went for me, but that was never enough."

She studied his face curiously, wondering what he remembered and what he was talking about. She knew about Naomi and what must have happened there, but the only woman she knew he'd been involved with beyond her was Helga, and not only was Helga fine, but still with Bob - as far as she knew, he had never been serious about her, and vice versa ( but she would never understand that whole Bob-Helga-Logan love triangle in a billion years, nor did she want to). "What do you mean? Naomi - "

"You see her again, you apologize for me, okay? She deserved so much better."

"You can tell her yourself."

He smirked, and said, with obvious doubt, "Yeah, sure." His eyes were starting to close. He was forcing them open, but not for long. She wanted to encourage him to stay with her, but honestly, considering his poor vitals, she was surprised he'd made it this long. That proved he was superhuman if nothing else did. "Maybe Bob was wrong," he muttered, eyes closing once more. "Maybe I'll see Mariko again."

"Mariko?" She asked. She'd never heard that name before.

But he had finally lost consciousness - his head lolled to the side and his face went slack, eyes remaining closed. He'd fought as long as he could, but he just couldn't do it anymore.

His vital signs - while still poor - were at least steady, and she found an ampule of medication that could be used for treating some symptoms of shock, but she wondered if it would work on Logan. Well, she had to try, didn't she?

It reminded her that as soon as she could, she had to call Bob. Worse come to worst, he could always save him, no matter what.

14

Bob realized, in retrospect, he had been too visible with the Org, although he was sure he had covered most of his tracks. According to Jack, they had purged all files relating to Wolverine that could be accessed on the Australian continent, because of the possibility of him "interfering". Well wasn't that a fine how do you do?

He checked out the base before he left, but no, there was no useful information to be had, and no captive mutants to free. He left Jack to join the UNESCO, and left the rest of the soldiers sleeping in the hall - who was he to wake them?

Bob had just left the dreary desert camouflaged cinderblock building when he felt reality invert, and the dimension turn itself inside out.

A wave of disorientation passed over him before reality resolved itself once more. But this time, instead of orange sand dunes and high blue sky, he was standing on a field of glossy black stone under a red sky boiling with crimson and orange clouds, a disc of blue and green just visible in the right quadrant of the sky.

And standing right before him was Eris, Osiris, and Fudo-Myoo.

"Wow, no foreplay?" He asked, instantly shedding the Logan guise. They couldn't know who he was, and he didn't want them to know. Unlike what many very religious Humans thought, it usually wasn't in your best interest to have gods know exactly who you were.

Eris looked just as she had before, only she had changed her beach gear for velvet robes more fit for a self-indulgent queen. Osiris looked an awful lot like the Roy Batty character in the "Blade Runner" movie, only with a hawk's gold and black eyes, and fingers that tapered into sharp ivory tips of exposed bone; it was really disturbing, and that's probably why he chose that guise, as he could be a twisted motherfucker. Fudo-Myoo, known to the Japanese as the guardian of wisdom and the personification of the virtue of perseverance ( and therefore possibly Logan's patron god ), chose the guise of a matronly looking older Asian woman, wearing a lovely turquoise silk gown, her heavily lacquered black hair held up by clips that looked like suns. "Sorry, Bob, but we're running out of time," Fudo said, polite as always. Fudo was one of the more polite gods he knew, next to Ganny, who was always thoughtful, if just a bit ungainly. ( Not his fault - being mostly elephant put some limits on you.)

"You have had enough time," Eris said scoldingly. She was one of the ruder gods.

"Enough time for what?"

"To contemplate our offer," Osiris said.

"Offer for what? All you said is you want me among you. What the hell for, and what's in it for me?"

Osiris raised a single white-blonde eyebrow at him, his hawk eyes burning into his in an attempt to intimidate him. Osiris was powerful, but he still wasn't scared of him. "You would dismiss the elite so easily, peon?"

Bob chuckled. "That's right, mate - blow sunshine up my skirt."

"What are your reservations, Bob?" Fudo asked.

"I don't sign a contract without knowin' what I'm gettin' into, okay?"

"You've been among the Humans too long." Eris said coldly.

"And who's fault is that?"

"Not ours," Osiris pointed out. That was fair enough, but he wasn't letting him get off that easily.

"But you could have recruited me at any time, and you didn't. So if you're doin' it now, it's only 'cause you want something from me. Truth time - what?"

"It doesn't work that way," Eris replied, black, star speckled eyes looking straight through him.

"Yes it does. Tell me or I walk, now."

"You'd never," Osiris sneered, pale lips twisting in disgust at his defiance.

Bob fixed him with a caustic stare. "Yes, I would. Would you like to see, Sy?"

"This is why we need him," Fudo pointed out.

"Because you've become so isolated you've completely lost your balls? Figurative balls, of course."

Oh, they didn't like that. Eris came as close to expressing an emotion as he had ever seen, and Sy gave him a truly frightening scowl that seemed to gouge deep lines in his face. Fudo simply looked on impassively, letting the emotional fools have their little pissing contest. "You try my patience, peasant," Sy hissed, in a gravelly, inhuman voice.

"Want to get it on?" Bob asked, then put up his fist and started bouncing around on his feet in a comical manner, like a cartoon boxer. "Come on, mano a mano ... er, divine being a exiled higher. C'mon, put 'em up, put 'em up!"

Rage flared in Sy's eyes as he realized he was mocking him, and Eris snorted in disgust, but Fudo put an end to it before Sy could lash out. "There's been a disruption in the higher dimensions, that might have allowed Loki to free Fenrir from the damned dimension."

Bob dropped his hands to his side. That explained a lot."What kind of disruption?"

"We are not at liberty to say," Eris claimed.

But Fudo contradicted her. "Ares and Ra are leading a group of elites who have decided we have been stagnant for too long."

"You have been," he agreed.

Sy's frown deepened, turning truly evil, and Eris's expression remained as cold as Antarctica, but Fudo went on smoothly, as perfectly unruffled as always. "They wish to make other dimensions more ... friendly to our kind. We are among those who do not wish to see that happen."

"More friendly?" Oh, that wasn't good. "Are they plannin' to wipe out the Humans?"

"We don't know their plans," Eris admittedly ruefully.

"Except they have designs on you," Fudo said, clasping her delicate hands in front of her.

"Do they?" That was surprising. Or maybe not. "Was Fenrir the first strike?"

"We don't know if they were involved in that at all," Sy admitted, still giving him the stink eye. "But Loki was on their team."

"Ooh, bad move there. Loki ain't much of a team player. Also, he's kind of a coward."

"Indeed," Eris agreed. She hated Loki, and he had avoided her ever since she threatened to put out his head. Of course now he was avoiding everyone, although not voluntarily.

"Think they may be p.o.'ed at me for abandoning him in the chaos realm?"

"It is possible, if they know," Fudo said. "It is equally possible that they wish to recruit you to their side."

"And kill me if I refuse?" A safe bet, that. Ares was a right cranky bastard. If there was anybody who seriously needed a good fuck, it was him. Not that it would help - nothing short of a full lobotomy would help him.

"That is the assumption," Fudo agreed, with a dignified nod.

"So what are you more interested in - recruitin' me first, or savin' my life?" He then laughed. "Ah, ask a stupid question ... "

"The balance of the multiverse would be thrown off if anything were to become of you, Bob," Fudo said kindly. He always thought she/he had a bit of a crush on him.

"If you do not choose our side, what makes you think we're letting you go?" Sy growled menacingly.

Bob smiled at him. "Do you really think you can stop me, Sy?"

"He can't, but I can," Eris said. It wasn't a threat ... yet. Just a point of fact.

"What exactly is "your side"?" he wondered. "The status quo, I know, but what exactly are you planning to do?"

Eris and Sy exchanged a glance best described as wary, and Fudo told him, "We have no plan as such."

He crossed his arms and tried not to smirk. Oh what the hell. "Ah. So you want me for my brains and not my body? Oh man, what a disappointment."

Only Fudo found that vaguely amusing, which was not a shock. "Are you going to assist us or not?" Sy growled.

Bob simply stood there, gazing back at them casually, and wondered if he actually had a choice.