Series: Sequel to Lateo's Asylum. It *must* be read FIRST.
Author: Khaki
Category: Drama with a touch of Halloween fun.
Rating: PG13
Disclaimer: These characters are very relieved that I don't actually own them.
Archive Rights: If you have Lateo's Asylum, you can have mine.
Author's Notes: This is what I get for popping in and flinging bunnies with reckless abandon. To paraphrase a line from the Godfather movies, "Every time I think I'm out, those plot bunnies pull me back in."
Author's Warning: Nice!Scott and Nice!Jean alert. For those of you who only like Wimpy!Scott and Mean!Jean, be warned.
Summary: Logan and his daughter meet again under less controlled circumstances.

I'm twenty years old. Old enough to drive. Old enough to vote. Old enough to live away from home. I'm an adult. Right now, though, all I want is to be held by my mommy and daddy and told everything's going to be ok.

It's not.

I was sleeping in my old room, home for summer vacation, when I woke to the sensations of latex-gloved hands stroking my face, and a gravelly voice whispering, "Marie."

When my eyes met hollow sockets in the dim light of my bedroom, I knew who it was. How did he escape? I only saw him for the first time with Dad this afternoon, and now he's here, in my room. He's blind for heaven's sake. How the hell did he get here?

"Marie," he whispered again, and his hands moved lower, gliding down my neck and massaging my shoulders. "I found you."

I couldn't move, frozen in terror. He's insane. He thinks I'm his dead wife. What's he going to do to me?

He leaned down and... did he just sniff my hair? That's right, mom and dad told me all about him. I got my heightened senses from him, my senses and my claws.

When his hands roamed down past my shoulders, pushing back the bedcovers to caress my breasts, I used the gifts he gave me, and released my claws into his chest.

"No!" I yelled, pushing him away, the momentum throwing him off of my claws as he fell.

"Mom! Dad!" I screamed for help, hoping they would arrive before he could recover.

It was a futile hope. Even before I finished calling for my parents, he was up and attacking. He grabbed each of my hands in turn and sliced through my claws with his own metal ones before I could pull away.

The pain, ripping bone-deep agony, raced up from my arms and spread throughout my body. I wanted to scream, but all that came out was hoarse gasping in my shock. I could feel tingling pinpricks encompass my arms as my body tried to repair what had been done to them, but the throbbing ache didn't go away.

I was so focused on my injuries, that I didn't even realize we'd left my room until he almost tripped the first time on the uneven ground leading to the woods. I was draped over his shoulder, and he was carrying me away, away from the safety of the mansion and my family.

I yelled at him and pounded on his back with my fists, trying to make him stop. All I succeeded in doing was making the pain in my arms flash white hot again. He wasn't going to stop, and there was nothing I could do about it.

It was only after twenty or thirty minutes of running and stumbling that he finally set me down against a tree. He's pacing around me now, sniffing at the air and cocking his head every once in a while, listening to the sounds of the forest.

Sitting here, watching him, I can see the truth. This really is my birth father. I can see myself in his coloring and the way he holds himself.

A month ago, if you'd asked me who I was, I could've answered without hesitation. My name is Maryann Summers. I was born in the Med Lab at Xavier's School for Gifted Youngsters to Scott and Dr. Jean Summers. I'm the oldest of three kids. Now everything I know is a lie, or if not that, at least not the entire truth.

There'd always been hints of my true origins, but they were easily explained away. Nate and Rachel, my little brother and sister, have a mix of Mom and Dad's mutations, but mine are different. I heal and have claws, which is just weird, but Dad told me that not all mutations breed true. I am also a touch telepath, kinda like mom only I have to touch someone skin to skin to see into their minds and reveal my own. Everyone always told me it was a weaker form of my mom's mutation. It's only now that I realize they were referring to my birth mom's mutation and not my mom's.

Mom and Dad have red and light brown hair and light complexions as do Nate and Rachel. My hair and skin are darker, making me stick out in family pictures. Dad told me my great grandpa Summers had dark hair and that's where I got my coloring. It was just another lie.

When I was younger, some of Mom and Dad's old friends would visit the mansion and say I looked exactly like my mom. That always confused me since Mom and I look nothing alike. That is, until I saw the picture.

Professor Xavier died after his long struggle with brain cancer during my Spring Quarter at college. I came home for the funeral, but it was only when I got home for summer vacation that Mom and Dad felt like they could start gathering up his things and packing them away. I helped them sort through his office, and that's where I found the picture. A picture of a brightly smiling man with wild, dark hair, and a pregnant women with white streaks who looked exactly like me.

That's when the truth came out. Mom and Dad weren't my real... well, my biological... mom and dad. I was supposed to be named Anna Logan. When my birth mom died and my birth dad went nuts, Mom and Dad adopted me. They named me Maryann Summers because they wanted to keep the name my original parents had decided on, but they also wanted to honor my birth mom.

They decided to keep what had happened a secret to protect me. They thought it'd be too confusing and painful to know that my mom was dead and my dad had gone crazy. At the time, I thought they were wrong to keep it from me, but now I don't know.

I insisted on seeing her grave that day. Dad was hesitant, but Mom just stood up and took me.

Marie Logan, the mother I never knew. Her grave was in the same small graveyard as Professor Xavier's. There were fresh flowers on the grave, and it was well tended even after 20 years. Mom told me that she and Dad kept it nice. She confessed that she came out and talked to Marie all the time, telling her about me and asking for advice. She told me that my birth mom had loved me so much, even though she never got to see me, and Mom wanted to make sure that I got all the love Marie wanted so much to give me but couldn't.

When we got back, I asked to meet my birth father. It took a month of persuasion, of begging and cajoling, of promises and compromise before I got to meet him for a minute, locked behind a thick panel of armored glass. He looked so angry, frustrated, and confused. Kind of how he looks now.

"Marie," he said, stopping his pacing to kneel down in front of me. "I'm sorry I hurt you. Why did you attack me? Where did you get claws?"

"I'm not..." I started, before he interrupted.

"Oh yeah. The last time I touched you. Guess they must be a part of me, too. Bone covered with metal. Uh huh. That explains it."

"My name is..."

"Shh... I'm sorry it took me so long to find you. They kept drugging me. Damned Summers. I'm gonna rip him apart for sending me there."

"No, don't, not my..."

"It's ok, now, Marie," he soothed, stroking my face with his gloved hands. "We're together. It was a hard year being away from you, but I'm here now and we're never gonna be separated again."

"A year? It's been twenty."

"I gotcha now, babe. We're..." he paused, taking in what I'd said. "What?"

"Twenty years, not one."

He shook his head forcefully. "No, that's not true. I would know if it'd been that long. You... you smell the same, feel the same."

"I'm not Marie. I'm Maryann Summers."

"Summers? Marie, what are you sayin'? Did you marry..."

"I'm your daughter. I was born twenty years ago when Marie died. You saved my life. You cut..."

"NO!!!" he shrieked, his voice echoing through the woods. "Nothing happened! You're alive. Marie, I can feel you, smell you, hear you. I've heard you talking to me, even when I was back there."

"I'm not Marie, I'm..."

"I'll prove it to you!" he shouted, ripping off his latex gloves and gripping my cheeks with his bare hands.

Mom's been trying to teach me mental shielding. Telepaths can't lock onto my thoughts, but when I touch someone, they get my thoughts, feelings, and emotions, and I get theirs. If I'm prepared and I concentrate, I can control the flow, but now, touching the raw, tormented mind of a delusional man, I had no protection.

The scents came first. The heady aroma of a fresh kill mixed with pain, fear, and the sickly sweet smell of blood. Next came the feel of silky smooth hair in my loose grasp sticky and wet from fresh blood. Sounds followed. Dad screaming, "Sabretooth!" and then the sound of one of his blasts. Mom crying, and saying there was nothing she could do. A rougher voice, crying, "I'm so sorry, baby. I couldn't protect you. I promised, but I failed you."

I heard Dad's voice again, saying, "Look!" and then I could see. That was the worst. Metal claws cutting into milky, perfect flesh. Strong hands reaching into the massive wound and pulling out an infant. A flash of metal as the umbilical cord is cut. Then, sight, sound, touch, and smell combine into a wild frenzy of sensations, one mixing with the other. Emotions flooding the physical, tainting every moment with grief and guilt.

Distantly, I felt the hands fall away from my face and heard someone running away, deeper into the forest. I didn't react. My mind was consumed by the visceral memories I'd been given.

I spent minutes, hours, or perhaps even days writhing on the ground, battered by wave after wave of twisted memory and overpowering emotion before I felt the strong arms of my father pull me to him, and the gentle mind of my mother kissing my own as she urged me to sleep.

When next I awoke, I was in my room, lying in my own bed. For a moment, I could almost convince myself that it had all been a dream, then I rolled over.

Laid out next to me was the surreal image of a pale corpse who, except for her chesnut hair color, white streaks, and grievous wounds, could be my twin. Her throat was slashed so far open that she was almost decapitated, and her belly was ripped open and covered with what looked like liters of blood.

I was frozen in place, my mouth opening and closing in silent horror.

Then, the body opened her eyes and gasped in a voice mixed with pain and biting accusation, "Logan."

I screamed.

The End.