Jean saw the metal doors of the elevator fall into the hallway followed by a barely recognizable Logan. It had been two years since he'd left, and he hadn't aged a day. In fact, clean-shaven he looked even younger.

"Logan?" Jean asked, hardly believing her senses. How had he gotten on the property, let alone into the lower levels of the mansion, undetected?

Logan turned to look at her and his expression changed from purposeful detachment to murderous intent. Her blood ran cold and she froze in place like prey before a hunter. For a surreal few seconds, Logan charged at her, claws loose and ready to tear her to pieces, then a red beam shot from behind her, striking Logan squarely in the chest, throwing him the length of the corridor, and slamming his body into the closed Cerebro door. The claws jumped back into the arms of the unconscious man as he slumped to the floor.

Finding her voice again, Jean screamed, "Scott?!?", in a mix of disapproval and panic. He had used a kill setting.

"He was going to murder you, Jean!"

Jean looked at Logan's still form, then back at her husband, then at Logan again. She started to walk towards Logan.

"Jean! Get away from him! It's too dangerous."

"I have to treat him, Scott. I'm a doctor."

She was five feet away when Logan shook his head with a grunt and stumbled jerkily to his feet. If he hadn't had a metal skeleton, his chest would've surely been crushed by Scott's concussive blast. As it was, he was gasping for breath.

Still, when he saw her, so close as to be almost in arm's length, the claws came out and he lunged clumsily at her. Jean backpedaled away, out of reach.

"Jean, get out of the way," Scott yelled as he ran towards her, and she realized she was in his line of fire.

Logan took a step and then another, struggling to reach her. Then, his eyes rolled back in his head, and he collapsed bonelessly to the floor.

Scott reached her and tried to drag her away from the prone body, but she resisted, looking at the suddenly subdued Logan and then back at the professor.

"Scott," the professor said calmly, taking control of the situation, "Logan is safe now. Let Jean treat him." He closed his eyes in concentration and then, turning to Kitty and Jubilee, said, "I think you'll find Rogue by the lake path on the edge of the woods. Please bring her down here for medical attention."

Marie's arms were aching, her legs were stiff, her throat was sore, and all she wanted to do was find Logan. He had acted so differently that it was almost like there was another person in his body. She knew deep within her mind and soul that Logan would never harm her. Why then had he attacked her so brutally?

When she'd first woken up, she'd wondered if it'd been Mystique, but then why hadn't she been killed or kidnapped? Logan had obviously been trying to hurt her when they'd fought, and she'd seen cold brutality in his eyes. Then, she'd woken up, restrained but relatively unharmed. It didn't make sense.

"Rogue!"

"Rogue?!?"

She could hear Jubilee and Kitty's voices calling to her in the distance.

"Mmmph!" she mumbled around the gag, trying to call to them for help.

"Rogue! Are you ok? Are you hurt?" Kitty asked frantically when they finally found her.

"Let's get the gag off first, Kit. How about that?" Jubes said, carefully unknotting the glove in Marie's hair and pulling it away from her face. "You ok, girl?" she asked once the gag was off.

"Logan?" Marie croaked, her curiosity more important than her current predicament.

"He's in the med lab," Kitty said, working on the knots in the scarf tying Marie's hands to her feet, ever cautious of her exposed skin.

"He kinda went loopy on us," Jubes added. "Professor got him under control, and they're trying to figure out why he went nuts... He do this to ya?"

"Yeah. I want to see him."

"No prob. Professor said to take you to the med lab anyway."

Jubilee helped Kitty with the knots, and once Marie was free and her wrinkled gloves were back on her deadly skin, they pulled her to her wobbly feet.

"You sure you're ok, girl?"

"My legs are just numb. Help me."

With an arm around each girl's shoulders, Marie made it slowly back to the mansion. Once there, she was lead down the hallway, past the destroyed elevator and into the emergency stairwell.

When they emerged on the lower levels next to the Cerebro entrance, it was easy to see a large dent in the door as well as the damage to the elevator further down the corridor.

"What the hell happened?" Marie asked.

"Logan happened. We told you he went nuts," Jubilee said.

"He was trying to kill Dr. Summers," Kitty added.

"Why?"

"That's what the Professor's trying to determine," Scott said, waiting for them in the hallway. His face changed from frustration and anger to concern bordering on panic. "Rogue? Are you ok?"

Marie saw his gaze fall to her throat and was sure that the bright lighting allowed him to see the bruises she could feel forming as a result of her near strangulation.

She nodded and opened her mouth to reassure him, but he was already overreacting, lifting her into his arms and carrying her the rest of the way to the med lab.

"Jean?" he called as they entered.

Jean turned and walked over to them, allowing Marie to see Logan lying on the examination table behind her. He was restrained with secure-looking straps, his arms spread-eagle away from his body, making his claws useless. The professor was leaning over Logan's prone form, his hands on either side of the limp man's temples and his face a mask of concentration.

As soon as Jean saw Marie's condition, she went into action.

"Put her on this table. Rogue, can you talk? How do you feel?"

"How's Logan?" Marie croaked, her throat scratchy and painful.

"He's ok right now... Did he do this?"

"He wasn't himself," Marie said, defending Logan in a knee-jerk response.

Jean nodded kindly and pulled on latex gloves to begin Marie's examination.

Logan's mind was a haze of half-remembered missions and half-forgotten truths. Charles Xavier treaded through it slowly and carefully, like a soldier in a mine field, never knowing what memory would explode into being next.

Finally, he made it to the core consciousness, or at least as close as he could. It was blocked off and protected by a mental barrier.

'Logan?'

~There is no Logan,~ a flat, emotionless voice answered.

'Who are you?'

~I am the Weapon.~

'Where is Logan?'

~There is no Logan.~

'Who created you?'

~That is classified.~

'How long have you been the Weapon?'

~That is classified.~

'What is your objective?'

~To fulfill the mission.~

'What is your mission?'

~That is classified.~

This was getting him nowhere. At least now he knew that Logan had acted so aggressively because of mental programming, and whoever had done this had been a mutant. Only a psychic could infiltrate so deeply in someone else's mind. He had to find a way to break this programming if Logan would ever be himself again, but direct questioning obviously wasn't the solution.

He backed out of the other man's mind and looked up into the worried faces that surrounded him, all waiting for answers.

Hours after Jean was done examining her, declaring her bruised but otherwise healthy, Marie continued to sit in the med lab. She watched Logan's chest rising and falling as he lay strapped to the examination table. It was a good thing he was unconscious. He hated being restrained because of the experiments he'd suffered through so many years ago. She'd had his dreams for a while after he'd left and they were just like this: confined to a metal table in the middle of a lab.

"It happened again, didn't it, Logan?" she asked the sleeping man. "They found you again and this time you couldn't escape."

Logan lay still.

"I'm so sorry, Logan. If we'd known, we would've come after you. If they hadn't gone, I would've come alone," Marie said with conviction.

Logan didn't respond.

"You're here now. You're safe. Do you hear me, Logan? You got to fight and come back to us."

Hazel eyes snapped open and gazed up at her. For a moment, she saw a hint of recognition, and then his face hardened into cold resolve and she heard a *SNIKT*.

"They are on full alert. The grounds are lighted like noon-day. The perimeter is fortified with electrical fences, sensor nets, and laser-sighted heavy artillery. There are ludicrously well-armed soldiers on patrol. This is a bigger operation than we'd possibly imagined, Colonel. There's no way we can get in there without more men than we've got on the entire project and more firepower than a small country. I'm afraid the Weapon is lost," the captain reported to his distant superior.

"Damn, Damn, DAMN!" an older voice, the professor's, broadcast into the captain's headset.

"Colonel? What are your orders?"

He was trapped. The mission had failed, and he'd been captured. All objectives had been left unfulfilled. He had to escape.

Releasing his claws, he tried to cut at the material binding his wrist, but his hand was at the wrong angle. He tried to shift positions, but he was securely restrained.

"Logan?"

It was the young woman he'd attacked back by the woods. She looked at him in fear and concern. Had she been his downfall? Had his inability to kill her gotten him captured? He hadn't followed the instructions he'd been given and now the mission was lost.

No! He fought harder against his bonds. While he was still alive, there was a chance to succeed.

"Jean? Logan's awake," the woman called to someone in the far room.

He sniffed at the air and caught the scent of one of his targets seconds before she came into his line of sight. The compulsion to kill her was overpowering, and he used all his strength to pull against the restraints on his right hand.

Ignoring the pain and resistance, he pulled until his blood-slicked hand, stripped of large portions of flesh, finally came free of the restraint. Releasing his claws on that hand, he reached over at cut at the fabric holding his left hand in place.

"We cannot allow this situation to continue, Professor. The Weapon cannot be allowed to remain in the hands of mutant lovers. They'll use him against us," the Colonel argued.

"He has no memories of this place. They'll never be able to track us down," the Professor reasoned with equal conviction.

"But they can still use him as a weapon against our cause."

The Professor paced the cramped control room, shaking his head in disbelief. "I've worked so hard for so long. I created this weapon before you were even out of high school."

"And you lost him, if I recall correctly."

The Professor slammed his hand down on a nearby control panel. "But we recovered him! It was fate that he returned to the Alkali Lake base. He was meant to fight for all humans against the mutant menace."

"My men cannot retrieve him."

"Then get more men!"

The Colonel shook his head. "You know that will take months of tricky requisitioning. Most government officials don't even know we exist. We can't afford that time. You must terminate."

"No! Not when we're so close," the Professor yelled, but now his strong voice was giving way to despair.

"It's the only way, Professor. If you won't, I will. There are other mutants. We can begin again."

The colonel reached for the remote activator, but the Professor snatched it first. "No. If it must be done, I will do it."

Flipping up the safety guard, he depressed the red button.

Logan was almost free, having unshackled his arms and one leg. Marie begged him to stop while Jean struggled to telekinetically hold him in place. Neither woman was successful as his claws inched closer and closer to the remaining strap.

Suddenly, Logan began to shake, collapsing back on the bed in spastic convulsions.

"Jean! Stop it!" Marie commanded, her voice filled with unrestrained fear.

"I'm not doing it," Jean responded.

Marie ran to Logan's side despite the threat he'd presented just seconds earlier, attempting to calm his seizure with her hands alone. As soon as she touched him, the electrical shock threw her across the room.