Marie stared blankly at the security cameras, looking for all the world like a recently-lobotomized patient in her boredom. She'd given up all semblance of concentration hours ago, allowing her thoughts to wander. It was the only way to make it through the night with her sanity intact.

What had she done to deserve guard duty on a Friday night? Well, nothing actually. It was just her turn. Mr. Summers was incredibly uptight about the school's security. Despite the fact that nothing ever happened, he'd doomed the training X-Men and high school seniors to guard duty, and they rotated through the weeks.

This night was always the worst. Friday night in the bowels of the mansion watching nothing but the occasional blowing leaves pass before the cameras was an endless, unchanging hell.

That was until Jubes and Kitty showed up.

"Rogue, babe, we've come to rescue you," Jubilee said, entering the cramped room with Cheetos, soda, and other snacks piled in her arms.

It took Marie a second to shake off her stupor, and in that time, she saw Kitty enter as well with a CD player in hand.

"Mr. Summers'll kill me if he finds you here. I'm supposed to be on guard duty," she protested weakly.

"So, keep guarding," Jubes retorted. "All you're doing is watching a bunch of monitors. You can still do that while munching on snacks and listening to tunes."

"Yeah," Kitty concurred. "Besides, the whole system's automated. No one could get through the security to make it onto the surveillance cameras, anyway."

"But..."

"C'mon, Rogue, live a little."

Marie reached out and snatched the bag of potato chips Jubilee proffered. "Well... I guess as long as I keep my eyes on the screens, it's ok."

They had gotten through the play-by-play of Jubilee's latest date with Remy and were now in the middle of "Why Rogue Needs a Boyfriend," when Marie caught something unusual out of the corner of her eye. It was just a hint of black on black, a strangely familiar movement that was gone before she could focus on the screen.

"Did you see that?"

"What?" Jubilee asked, caught mid-sentence in her rant.

"I thought I saw something moving out there." Marie said, fingers dancing across the panel to adjust the camera controls and aim the lens in a new direction. She could see nothing out of the ordinary.

"Don't change the subject, Rogue. We were just getting to the root of why you break off relationships at the second or third date," Jubilee chastised.

Marie ignored her, checking the other monitors and sensors for anything unusual.

"It's probably just a squirrel or a bird or something," Kitty assured her.

"No, it was bigger than that," Marie responded, completely engrossed in her search.

A minute later, she sat back and sighed. All the sensors were green, all the monitors were clear, no intruders detected. However, in her gut she knew there was something out there.

"I'm going to check it out," Marie said, dragging on her coat and standing up.

"C'mon, Rogue. There's nothing out there," Kitty said.

"Yeah," Jubes added. "We'll quit teasing ya about your love life. Don't run off."

"I'll be back in a few minutes. Keep an eye on the monitors for me?"

"Ok, but be back soon, or Jubes'll finish off all the Cheetos without you," Kitty warned in a mock-serious tone.

Rogue cringed in feigned terror and then made a dramatic exit.

He prowled along the edge of the woods on the large estate, the trees providing more than enough concealing shadows. There were two targets, both human, both residing in the large mansion which lay before him across an open, green field. He would have to leave the cover of the trees to reach his objective.

Lurking in the shadows, he heard a mechanical whirring. Looking up, he saw a camera perched a hundred yards ahead of him, hidden in the tree line. He hadn't known it was there.

There had been a number of unexpected surprises tonight. A sensor net along the stone fence surrounding the property and a web of laser beams just yards onto the property had been the first of several. If he hadn't possessed such keen senses, he would have been easily caught. As it was, he'd had to enter the property through the woods. It left him miles away from the mansion, but the animals living there made most security systems ineffective.

As he'd hiked to the mansion, he wondered at his disturbing lack of information. Even with the emptiness of his past, on a mission he always knew exactly what he needed. Now there were several worrying gaps. These people had much more expensive and extensive security than he'd been programmed to know. They had to be protecting something very important.

Now at the edge of the open yard, he paced back and forth in the shadows at a loss for how to proceed. The camera he'd recently found was trained on the lawn, sure to detect his presence immediately. He couldn't succeed, but he had to succeed. The mission was everything.

He was startled out of his thoughts by the sound of the school's front door opening. A young woman emerged into the dark night and started across the grass towards his general direction as if she knew he was there.

He set his previous dilemma aside for the moment, knowing exactly what to do in this new situation. The primary objective of the mission was to kill Xavier and Dr. Summers. The secondary objective had three parts and was just as, if not more, important than the first: to avoid detection, eliminate any witnesses, and return to the base.

Marie felt silly walking out onto the deserted grounds of the school in the early morning hours. If there wasn't anyone out here, she would be teased mercilessly by Jubes and Kitty. If there was, then she was acting like a stupid, B-movie victim, walking right into the clutches of the slime beast or whatever the hell was waiting for her.

Back in the monitor room, she'd wanted to discount her sighting, chalking it up to exhaustion after hours of guard duty, but she couldn't. She just knew she'd seen something, and she had to find out what it was. Two years ago, Logan had told her to trust her instincts, and ever since, she'd followed that advice. His presence had faded in her mind to a faint whisper over the years, but she still thought of him almost every day.

She dated, boys at the mansion and guys at college, but she'd never felt the connection with anyone that she'd felt so quickly with Logan. She'd stopped wearing his tags around her neck, but they were never far. She kept them on her key chain and would find herself fingering them every so often, wondering when he would keep his promise and return. Lost in thoughts of Logan, she failed to see the dark figure step out of the shadows behind her until it was too late.

A hand with a grip like steel grabbed her neck and forced her to the ground. Using all the wrestling moves she'd learned in X-Men training, she fought to free herself from her attacker's grasp. She succeeded in turning over to face him and got in a few good kicks and punches before he sat down on her torso, pinning her arms to her sides with his legs and resuming his grip on her throat. She tried to push up, tried to kick, but he was heavier than his frame would indicate and she couldn't get enough leverage.

Her skin was covered except for her face, but the hands gripping her neck were protected by black leather gloves so that wasn't an option to defend herself. She was trapped and she couldn't breathe. She could feel the darkness seeping into the edges of her vision, but before she lost consciousness completely, she caught sight of her attacker's face in the moonlight.

It was Logan. His hair cropped short in a crew-cut and his face cleanly shaven, he looked different than he had when they'd first met. The biggest difference, however, was in his eyes. Before, she'd seen passion, depth, caring, and concern. Now she saw a cold, unfeeling emptiness. She saw her death in those eyes.