Logan removed the cop’s hands from his jacket. “That’s not going to happen.”

The man yanked his hands away as if his very touch was diseased. “You think I won’t?”

“I think you’d try.”

They just glared at each for a long moment, a nice macho trip, and Logan watched the muscles in his jaw clench and unclench as he decided how to respond to that. “Are you going to talk, or do I make this official?”

“You can’t make this official. You have no grounds to arrest me, and it’s my guess you’re not even on duty right now. And violating someone’s civil rights is no way to make them talk, no matter what the feds think.”

“Are you trying to piss me off?”

Logan sighed, not sure why they had already staked out defensive, adversarial positions. “Look, I’ll make you a deal. Let’s go get a beer, and I’ll tell you what you think you don’t know, if you tell me what happened to Lily.”

His eyes narrowed to hateful slits, lips twisting into a moue of disgust. “Why should I?”

“Because maybe I can help you figure this out.”

The silence of the graveyard was absolute; he could hear the wind whisper through the leaves, making them rustle like newspapers scudding across an empty street. The cop still glared at him like a walking piece of shit, but finally said, “If there’s any justice in this world, they’ll come after you.”

Logan just shrugged. He couldn’t deny that he was thinking the same thing. “Maybe, if we work together, we can make that happen.”

****

The first thing Xavier said, when he opened his eyes, was, “Oh good, you stayed.”

Scott thought of two things immediately: ‘Do you think I’d go?’ and ‘Unlike Logan’. He ultimately said neither, but enjoyed the last thought especially.

Xavier was far from fully recovered, and he still looked deathly pale, but at least he was conscious and cognizant. Scott gave him the shorthand version of how the end of the world ended prematurely, how much of the mansion was damaged (and then “fixed” by witchcraft, however that worked), and who they lost. He was sorry he missed the funerals for Tom and Xia, but didn’t know what to say about Yasha. “How’s Logan?” He asked.

Scott couldn’t help but frown. How’s Logan? Like he’s the only one who’d ever lost anything in his life?
“I wouldn’t know. He did his usual thing and ran off.”

Xavier grimaced in sympathy. “It’s been difficult for him, Scott. He just lost his daughter recently, and
all of -”

“Wait - his daughter? When the hell did he have a daughter?”

So it was Xavier’s turn to catch him up on what he had missed while he was gone. How had everyone neglected to mention that Logan had a daughter show up here - along with his vampire girlfriend - and then, after causing just enough chaos, Logan’s daughter got killed right in front of him, sending him off on some sort of weird suicide/revenge mission. Scott didn’t understand how that could work. “Why didn’t you call me? I could have helped rescue his ugly butt.”

Xavier frowned and looked away, and for the first time Scott could actually see how old he was. It was weird, because he never thought about Xavier’s age, and now that he appeared so frail, sitting up in a hospital bed and ashen as a sheet, he realized he was, in fact, old. His skin looked as thin as parchment, the fine lines in the corners of his eyes looked more like crow’s feet than “character lines”, and there was a heretofore unseen weariness in his usually intense eyes. Scott felt a cold shock as he realized the Professor - who was honestly the closest thing he had to a father - could have died while he was away. How could he have lived with himself? “We weren’t the ones who rescued him,” Xavier said, and for some reason was staring at one of the blank metal walls. Why?  It wasn’t like the Professor not to look him in the eye.

Scott didn’t scoff, but almost. “You can’t tell me he saved himself, not from those people.”

“He -” The very fact that Xavier hesitated disturbed him profoundly. Since when did the Professor ever show any reluctance to share anything with him? He sighed heavily, as if too tired to hold it back, and said, “Jean saved him.”

It felt like his heart stopped, then dropped down into his stomach, which lurched at the very thought. “Jean?” He said, barely able to speak. “She … came back? She - no one - she came back for him?”
He swallowed hard, not sure if he was more enraged or disappointed, not sure he wasn’t going to get
sick.  He was just glad the visor hid the tears in his eyes.

Xavier shook his head emphatically. “No, Scott, it wasn't like that.  He is one of us - yes, Scott, he is - and he was in great danger. She would have done the same for any of us.”

He closed his eyes and took a deep breath, trying to swallow it all back. Logan didn’t tell him. The bastard was here, and looked him in the eye, and never mentioned that he had seen Jean, that she had come back. The next time he saw that fucking bastard, he’d blast him into the next eon.  "How did she even know he was in trouble?  And where the hell was she this time?  I mean, the world almost -”

“How do you think I ended up like this?” Xavier interrupted.  Then he looked at him for the first time in minutes, and raised a single pale eyebrow as something seemed to settle behind his eyes; they were almost dark with resolve. “They didn’t tell you.”

Scott felt like he’d been punched repeatedly in the stomach by Piotr while he was metalled up. It was times like these when suicide really didn’t look that bad; seemed reasonable, in fact. “She was here?”

“No, I went to her.  It’s a long story.  But we couldn’t have gotten through this without Jean’s help.”

Scott glanced down at the matte finish aluminum floor, which didn’t reflect anything but vague shapes and colors, and tried very hard to blink back his tears. Jean had come back, more than once. And did she ever come to him?  Did she ever even stop by to say hello?  Appearing to the Professor he could understand, but Logan?

He swallowed hard as he realized that Jean had probably made her choice.

5

 
Bear Creek - 16 Years Ago

She wondered if she could describe someone as “uber-freaky” in a report, and not be considered unprofessional.

The guy reminded her of a spooked horse. He seemed so frightened he was on the verge of jumping out of his skin, and while at first Lily thought it was because she was a cop, she was starting to think he was just afraid of people in general. She considered the possibility he was a shell shocked war vet (oh, right, it wasn’t called shell shock anymore; it was called “post traumatic stress disorder”. But shell shocked still seemed to describe it more succinctly ), but what war had they been in recently that might shake the guy up so bad? He sounded Canadian, not American, although he spoke so softly it was difficult to tell. Maybe he was hard of hearing, or disabled in some way. Mentally ill? Whispering so the voices in his head didn’t hear him? She couldn’t rule anything out at this point.

Dana’s place, a converted ski chalet renamed “The Last Chance Diner” (not exactly true, but that was an impression she liked to reinforce among travelers on the overpass), wasn’t too busy at the moment, which was great considering how jumpy the mystery man was.  There were only a couple of regulars she recognized as workers from the ski lodge up the road, and a long haul trucker who must have been responsible for the logging trailer taking up most of the heavily salted parking lot.

As soon as she opened the door, facing a welcome blast of warmth and coffee scent, the guy paused and winced, and for a moment he tensed like he was about to bolt. She looked around, and tried to figure out what had gotten to him. The Formica counter and metal tables all gleamed, spotless to a fault (Dana was a neatness freak; she made Felix Unger look like a drunken frat boy), and the soothing murmur of CBC news radio was barely audible over the clink of silverware on plates and the sizzling of food on the grill in the kitchen.

She knew the best way to soothe panicked people was not only to pretend that everything was normal, but also that you were in complete charge of everything. Nothing succeeded like the impression of authority. She took off her hat and brushed the snow off into the brass umbrella stand to the left of the door before walking farther inside. She didn’t bother to glance back, although she knew he was still standing outside the door, letting in all the sharply cold air. He would follow or he wouldn‘t; she was betting the smell of actual food would get him inside. “Got a fresh pot on?” She asked Miki, who was working the counter this afternoon.

Miki was a single mother in her early thirties, who had escaped a domestic violence situation way over in New Brunswick. Only Lily and the other members of the police department knew about it, because she was deathly afraid that her husband Ron would somehow find her here, in spite of distance and obscurity. It reminded her that Miki was a lot like the mystery man when she first came here; skittish and jumping at shadows. After almost a year, she seemed to be more at ease. Hopefully it wouldn’t take Freaky Guy a year to get in the door - he was letting all the heat out.

(She couldn’t imagine him as an abuse victim, not as an adult. Starving and wearing four shirts beneath his coat, she could still tell he had a broad chest and was skinny without being scrawny, a crucial distinction; even in his current state, he probably wasn’t a pushover. In fact, his fear would probably make him stronger, at least briefly. But victim of violence? In spite of your size and gender, anyone could be. Was that why he was so spooked?  Something happened to him that he had yet to get past?)

“Just put one on five minutes ago,” Miki replied, putting a new roll of register tape in the old fashioned cash register. She then glanced up, and her gray eyes narrowed suspiciously upon seeing the Freaky Guy, her usual smile frozen on her face. “Who’s your friend?” She said, striving for lightness. Miki lived in fear that Ron would send one of his “work buddies” after her, and lived in general fear of convicts as well. Ron was apparently a prison guard.

“A guy who had a spot of trouble in the mountains,” she said, with a lightness she had learned to fake well over the years. She looked back at him - he still hadn’t committed to coming inside, and asked, “Want some coffee?”

He looked at her, startled that she was talking to him, but he finally consented to come inside. “Nuh,” he said, his voice pitched so low she could barely hear him. “I don’t think I like it.”

“Wow. Well, I knew you people existed somewhere.  Have any objection to orange juice?”

He just stood near the door, his green eyes wide and blank. He had no idea what she was talking about. Jesus Christ, he’d never heard of orange juice? What kind of strict Amish household was he raised in?

“A coffee for me and an orange juice for my friend here,” she said, ignoring the odd look from Miki, who clearly didn’t get why the guy didn’t understand the question. Lily gestured, slowly and carefully, at the nearest empty booth, and after a moment, he seemed to understand what she meant and walked cautiously towards the booth.

Correction: he didn’t walk, he stalked. He kept his shoulders up and rigid, chin tucked in slightly, body tensed; he walked like a man itching for a fight. What was his story? All she could think was that he had been hurt pretty bad, but by who or what she couldn’t begin to guess. Interestingly enough, he slid into the booth farthest away from the door. Didn’t want his back to it?

One of the locals sitting at a booth in the rear, working on his plate of steak and eggs (since breakfasts were a “specialty” of Han, the short order cook, they served them at any time when he was on shift), looked up and said, “’ey Lil, is it true what I heard happened over near Briar’s Corner?” It was Roger
the ski lift operator, he of blonde walrus mustache and permanently sunburned lips. Also, as usual, his ski goggles dangled from a cord around his neck, nearly getting in his brunch.

She shook her head, and said, “I don’t need you spreadin’ rumors and scaring the tourist.  It was just a
car accident, Rog; a pretty messy one, but you know how bad that patch gets when the snowplow
doesn’t get through.” Although it was true the area referred to as Briar’s Corner made for a perilous driving experience, especially this time of year, she was honestly lying her fucking ass off. The impossible had finally happened; Bear Creek had finally chalked up its first homicide. A man found dead just the
other night by the side of the road, half buried in snow turned red with his blood. He had been stabbed to death and left in the middle of a snow bank to die, on a night when the temperatures dropped to below zero. The coroner had found ice crystals still inside his body.

There was no wallet, no identification, no murder weapon and no clue who this guy was or why or how he ended up there. If they could get a name for this John Doe, they might be able to figure out who would want to kill him. No one was missing from the ski lodges; there were no reports of missing skiers or snowboarders; no abandoned cars with unaccounted for owners had turned up. Although it would take longer to get complete confirmation, no one living in or around Bear Creek had turned up missing either. Besides, she was pretty sure she knew everyone who lived around these parts, and the guy didn’t look even remotely familiar. And he wasn’t dressed like a ‘boarder or a skier; he was wearing lots of black and a plaid shirt, like someone who got extremely sidetracked from his job as a dockworker or safecracker. (“Ninja skier,” had been Brent’s wisecrack of the day.)

There was no real forensic evidence to go on, either. The coroner admitted she had no idea what kind of knife was used, except it was “surgically sharp” and must have been used with great force, as the victim’s ribs had been cut through without cracking or fracturing; a type of “clean cut” almost unheard of outside of an operating theater. Copies of the guy’s fingerprints and post mortem mug shots had been faxed to Vancouver and Ottawa, in hopes he was a felon of some kind, in a database somewhere. But it was possible they wouldn’t know for days.

As she slid onto the blue vinyl bench seat, she noticed Freaky Guy had a sheen of sweat on his forehead and was loosening the collar of his overshirt, even though it looked like he shuddered. After coming in from the icebox, this place must have seemed almost unbearably hot. At least it looked like color was returning to his lips.

She wondered how he had survived so long with no heat, and no fires (at least, not in any of the homes
he camped in). Even wearing that many clothes, how had he not suffered hypothermia?  From what the Alberta boys could tell, the bust in along the range had been happening for months, during the worst winter in recent memory. And it was estimated - if indeed he was the only guy busting into the cabins - that he had covered a good fifty miles at least, and that was only on the Alberta side.  On foot.  In temperatures that verged on inhuman.  How in all that was fucking holy did a half-starved, freezing man manage that without ever getting caught out in a blizzard?  She had already glanced at his nose, earlobes, tips of his fingers (usually the first to fall to frostbite, even from wind chill alone), and found they looked perfectly fine. His skin - well, what she could see beyond all the facial hair - was flawless; not a single sign of windburn, or even a broken blood vessel. It seemed impossible - fuck, it was impossible. Just as impossible as a man walking nearly a hundred miles in the Canadian Rockies, in the dead of winter, in borrowed clothes that didn’t fit him properly, and having not a scratch to show for it. There had to be more going on than any of them realized, because, all that aside, the guy didn’t appear to be the sanest man in the province. The insane weren’t known for their acute survival skills.

“So, what do I call you?” She asked, picking up a laminated menu. Of course, she knew it by heart, but she didn’t want him to feel like she was studying him. She had a feeling he wouldn’t like that. “I mean, you know my name, and I could call you “Hey you,” but that seems pretty impersonal.”

He stared at her across the table, clearly torn about saying a single damn word. She took a second menu from the condiment stand and slid it across to him, as he watched her hand the whole time. What, did he think she was going to stab him with a fork? “You could make something up. I’d never know. I’d just like somethin’ to call you.”

Again that look, that thousand yard stare of someone who had seen something so horrible they just checked out and left their body behind. And yet, there was something far back in his eyes, a spark of … something, something fighting to surface. He glanced down at the menu in a way that suggested he had never seen one before, and mumbled, "Logan."

Now that was an odd choice. If he'd picked a bland, ordinary name like John, Ed, or Bob, she'd never have thought twice about it.  But Logan?  Come to think of it, he did look more like a Logan than a Pete or Jim, in as much as anyone could look like a name.  Then again, what was Han's famous dessert listed
on the menu?  Loganberry pie. Hmm.

Miki came over and gave her her mug of coffee, but put the glass of orange juice in the middle of the table, as if too afraid to get close to the freaky "Logan".  It was almost funny how they both eyed each other warily - which one was more afraid of the other?  Seemed like a tie. "What can I get you?" Miki asked, taking a step back and fixing her gaze on her.

She wasn't hungry, but she had a feeling Logan wouldn't even think to order if she didn't get something. "Just some whole wheat toast for me," she said, and glanced at Logan. Who glanced back, expression unreadable.

Wow. He had no idea what was going on here, like he'd never even heard the concept of a restaurant. Seriously, was he a space alien, dropped in the middle of the Canadian wilderness, all his briefings on this odd planet forgotten on impact? It would make as much sense as anything else.

(In her mind, she could hear Brent commenting, “With that hair, he'd have to be an alien. Earth gravity doesn't work like that.")

"And Logan here will have one of Han's special omelets," she said, ordering for him. Han threw just about everything in his "special" omelets, so it would give Logan all the protein and vitamins he must have been missing in his diet of nothing but dried and boxed food.

Miki glanced warily at Logan, who hadn't bothered to turn his curious gaze away from Lily. He didn't understand any of this, and maybe Miki was starting to get that idea. No threat to her; possibly no threat to anyone. "Okay, sure. Be right up." Miki retreated gratefully, happy to have something constructive to do.

"What..?" Logan began in that soft murmur of his, but wasn't sure where to start. Maybe he had a throat injury; a sore throat?

"Just got you some food, honey," she said reassuringly, unzipping her parka; now she was starting to feel too hot. "Don't worry, Han's a pretty good cook. Hell, he's as close as we have to a chef in these parts." She wrapped her hands around her coffee mug and gave him an encouraging look, so he tentatively reached out and took his glass of juice. He sniffed it, and then recoiled as if shot. Okay, sure, it was concentrate, but it was surely a top of the line brand. "So where are you from?"

He shifted his startled gaze from the juice to her. She could see him flailing for an answer inside his own mind. "Alberta."

"All of it? Wow," she said, with mild sarcasm. Of course it was lost on him. But her bullshit radar - something every decent cop should have - was not going off; this guy was too raw to have any kind of artifice. In fact, her space alien joke was starting to have more and more plausibility. Maybe she should call the psychiatric hospitals around here and on the Alberta side, see if they had a headcase who got
away on them. "I'm from Manitoba originally myself. You can probably guess why I moved away as
soon as possible."

That blank and flailing green stare. "No."

There was something in his naked honesty that made you want to bundle him up in a heavy coat and give him hot chocolate. He was a man who had absolutely nothing to go on, no frame of reference, and yet was still trying very hard to get along. He deserved an A for effort if nothing else. "Just a joke. There's a whole lot of nothing in Manitoba, or at least there was for me. I started off as a police officer in P.E.I, believe it or not, but after dealing with more fisherman than I ever wanted to in my life, I thought I should get away to the mountains, so I could deal with tourists and crazed loners who live by themselves in shotgun shacks, with nothing but sled dogs and conspiracy theories to keep them company." Again, a whole lot of nothing from him, just a curious quirk of an eyebrow, suggesting what he could comprehend he didn't understand. She shook her head and doffed her hat, putting it down on the seat. "I was just making a little joke. Don't worry about it."

He nodded faintly, still not understanding, and turned his attention back to his juice. She watched as he seemed to study it with all the fascination of an object that just dropped burning from the sky. She said nothing, just observed from the corner of her eye (she pretended to be enthralled by the menu, so he didn't notice her scrutiny) he went through the slow motions of taking a sip of his juice, putting it down and making a face as though he were about to barf, and then reconsidering it once his eyes stopped watering.

(What the fuck..? Why were his eyes watering?  It was orange juice, not lemon juice ... right?  Shit,
maybe she should order a glass for herself and make sure Han didn't fuck it up.  It would have to be
today, wouldn't it?)

"Is it okay?" She asked, nodding at the juice.

He continued to study it, as if afraid it would jump up and bite him. "I don't know. What ... what is it supposed to taste like?"

Wow. If anyone else had said that, she'd have thought it was bullshit, but he continued to be nothing but
on the surface; he had never had orange juice before. Or at least not to his knowledge. "Miki," she said. "Can I get a glass of water over here?"

Miki looked like she didn't want to leave the safety of her counter, but she nodded anyways. The good thing about being a cop was you could just throw out orders, and most people obeyed without question.

Logan watched suspiciously as Roger left, and Lily watched Logan. What did she have on her list: violence victim; mental case; possibly both. Another good thing a cop should have was a sense of people, a way to read their intentions, and she knew she had a pretty good one - she was even told she should go into hostage negotiation because she was so good at reading people and figuring out what they wanted to hear. (Of course she ignored that advice - where the hell was the fun in hostage negotiation? Also, not a big call for it in rural Canada.) But Logan was leaving her scrambling - she was getting no sense of him at all. He was all reaction: fear mostly, but automatic, knee jerk, as if he didn't know how else to act. He was like a blank slate.

But people could not be a blank slate. They were madly complicated things, with more baggage than
the Titanic. So he could only be an empty tape if he: A) suffered some kind of head trauma; B) was a complete mental case; or C) had been wiped out by some sort of massive psychic/emotional trauma. D) Alien observer who lost his notes was not a possibility she was going to entertain, amusing though it was. “Can you tell me anything about yourself?” She wondered.

He shifted uncomfortably, not sure how to answer, and truth slipped out again. “No.”

She wished more people were as honest as he was. Just without the freakiness.

Miki brought the glass of ice water over, and mistakenly put it down in front of her. She nodded her
thanks and waited until she walked away before shoving the glasses over to Logan. “Maybe you’ll like
this better.”

After a single suspicious glance, he sniffed the glass, then picked it up. She watched his throat work as he gulped down the water, not even taking a breath as he drained the entire glass in three swallows. How thirsty was he? Did he even turn the taps on in the cabins - did he know what they were for?

As if to prove even he hadn’t known how thirsty he was, he put down the water glass and picked up the orange juice again. He seemed to hold his breath this time as he finished off the juice in a similar manner. Shit - dehydrated as well as starving?

“Miki,” she said, getting her attention again. “Can we have the pitcher of water?” Miki frowned, as her fear and confusion seemed to be turning to annoyance. She didn’t blame her one bit. Lily prided herself on being able to solve anything, be it a crime or a person, and she could already tell Logan was going to be the challenge of her life. Well, on top of the corpse found at Briar’s Corner.

She suddenly wondered if there was a connection. Mystery man, mystery corpse …

But the Hodge cabin was up the mountain, several miles from the crime scene. Still, if Logan could basically walk the fucking Rockies, what the hell was a few miles?

She pretended to look out the window, all the while scrutinizing Logan out of the corner of her eye. The man was scared, obviously unbalanced - but a killer? ‘Are you a killer, Logan?’ She thought, trying to fit him into her crime scenario. ‘And if I asked, what would you say?’