9 Logan's problem

|a few weeks later|

Kitty wakes up still half asleep, causing her to phase through her alarm to shut it off and just walk right through the doors into the girls' bathroom, which is occupied by Rogue.

"Hey, do you mind? The sign says occupied." Rogue tells her shoving her out of the bathroom.

"Who can read at this hour?" Kitty says and gets dressed already, deciding to brush her teeth after breakfast when the bathroom is free. So, she decides to get started on writing her parents an email of how she's doing, something she agreed to do every now and then.

'Dear mom and Dad, today started like any other school day with everyone feeling a little crowded especially with a roommate like Rogue.' Kitty types but leaves the room once Rogue starts to use a blow drier. She takes her laptop and phases through her room door, walking right into a gathering of her fellow students walking through the hallway, most headed to the bathrooms.

Jean and Rogue who also left their room bump into her, getting her annoyed since she only wants to get some peace and quiet.

'Finding a place to be alone around here is really a matter of timing. Sometimes you have to settle, like when Mr. Logan's around but that's OK cause he doesn't like to talk to anybody.' Kitty types after relocating to the kitchen where Logan is reading the paper.

"What's the matter half-pint am I reading to loudly for ya?" Logan asks her, seeing her stare at him.

"No, just enjoying how quiet everything is." Kitty replies. Though in that moment the other students walk in and start to raid the kitchen whilst talking amongst themselves.

Logan sees a news story on the small TV in the room and instinctively turns it up to full volume, feeling something familiar about the place they're showing.

"Mount McKenna?" Logan says thoughtfully and walks away grumpily, throwing the remote away.

"Logan, you OK?" Ben asks him as the man walks past the table everyone is sitting at.

Logan only ignores him and walks past them heading straight into his room.

'Mr. Logan can be so rude sometimes and the Professor tells us that we're all a big family and have to get along but Mr. Logan doesn't act like it." Kitty types before choosing to relocate again.

I his room Logan starts to thrash the place, having a killer headache and memories flashing into his head for unknown reasons.

"Mr. Logan? Sorry, are you OK?" Kitty asks cautiously hearing the man yelling and throwing things around his room until he finally damn near slices his door in half.

"Yeah, fine just fine. Just decorating." Logan grumbles walking past her.

'some of the kids around here are pretty nice, like Scott. Sometimes he tries to be so totally responsible for professor Xavier and the others, then other times he acts just like a regular highschool kid. Today he's definitely a kid.' Kitty types having taken a seat in a tree, being able to watch the garage from her spot and nearly falls out of the tree when Scott turns on his music and drives off somewhere.

"You OK up there?" Ben asks looking up at her.

"Yeah, fine." She replies.

"Good, I'll go see what Logan's up to." Ben tells her.

"He's right there with the prof." Kitty points out to him, motioning to the terrace.

"Thanks Kitty." Ben thanks her and heads over to the adults.

'Then there is Ben. He is really nice and tries to take care of everyone in his own way, though that could be mostly me and Rogue, with the boys he's not so soft. Too bad he's already involved with Rogue. And then there is the professor. He keeps the lid on things around here which is not an easy job sometimes. Especially with Mr. Logan' Kitty types and choses to leave to her own personal spot, which is the storage area of the blackbird. (AN: sorry I used X-wing before didn't realize that was Star Wars not X-men)

"Something in that news story, I don't know what set me off. Charles there is something in my head buried there, how about you get inside and try to pry it lose?" Logan tells him.

"Alright but first you need to relax." Charles tells him.

"Hah easy for you to say." Logan replies and Charles starts to look through his mind, finding a memory of how Logan got his adamantium skeleton.

"Tell me that was a dream or something." Logan grumbles.

"No, a memory I believe it was about how you got that particular skeleton of yours." Charles informs him.

"That guy in that coat he's the guy that did this. I gotta go." Logan curses and starts to leave.

"You're going to that mountain in Canada aren't you? The one you saw on TV and in your nightmares, do you want company?" Charles says trying to stop the man.

"Do I ever." Logan grumbles.

"Well you don't seem to mind mine." Ben tells him, leaning against the door leading back into the house, having watched the two of them for the last few minutes or so.

|In the blackbird|

'Well I guess I better log off before Kurt pops in here and finds me. He's always doing that, totally freaks me.' Kitty types as Kurt teleports into the back compartment of the blackbird, shocking her.

"There you are. Why are you in here?" Kurt asks her.

"Out of like necessity." Kitty shoots back.

"Whatever, come on Scott is giving us a ride to school." Kurt tells her.

"All I wanted was just one minute alone in this stupid mansion." Kitty says annoyed.

"Ohh touchy, sounds like someone has an astrophysics test they didn't prepare for." Kurt tells her when suddenly the blackbird takes off and knocks the now standing teens right off their feet and send them flying forward.

They open the door and see Logan flying the plane with Ben sitting next to him looking relatively relaxed.

"It's Logan and Ben." Kurt says and wants to go over to them.

"I wouldn't Logan's been acting like mega weird all morning." Kitty warns him.

"Ah don't be so dramatic. Hey man, what's happening?" Kurt asks walking up behind Logan and tapping his shoulder only for Logan to swing at the blue furred boy nearly taking his head off if it weren't for Ben knocking his arm off target, thereby making the man miss the teen.

"Oh, is this seat taken, sorry my mistake." Kurt says teleporting back over to Kitty.

"Still think I'm being dramatic?" Kitty asks him.

"Actually, no I don't." Kurt tells her.

"Engage autopilot." Logan says and gets out of the pilot seat, taking Ben with him, which confuses the teen.

"Why are you following me?" Logan ask the two storaways, shoving Ben over to them.

"We're not following you. I was just…" Kitty says and Logna starts to lose It and swings at them, only for Ben to stop him by turning into four arms. Kurt teleports him and Kitty further back just to be safe.

"I got to take you back before. Agh. You gotta get away, there is something in my head, I can't be trusted." Logan yells in pain and manages to shut the door between them.

"He locked us out." Kurt says scared.

"No, he shut himself in so we're safe." Kitty replies.

"There is a crazy person flying the plane, you call that safe? We gotta get out of here." Kurt says.

"Can you transport us to the ground?" Kitty asks him while Ben makes their way over to them.

"Picture this, bumpity-bumpity-bumpity-splat. Too high up and way to fast." Kurt tells her playing their decent out.

"I could get you out but only one at a time and I don't know if I'd be able to find the way back to the plane again." Ben tells them.

"Then I guess we're stuck on this flight. Question is where are we flying to?" Kitty says.

"All I heard was something about Canada and a mountain." Ben tells them.

"What were you doing with Logan anyways?" Kitty asks her best friend.

"Well the prof. seemed worried so I offered to tag along, since Logan doesn't seem to tolerate anyone else, even me he barely stands most of the time." Ben says.

Once the plane lands in Canada on the mountain they saw on TV that morning Kitty and Ben, both having changed into their mission suits phase through the bottom while Ben teleports into the cockpit to try and alert the Institute.

"Something is jamming the transmitter way out here, I couldn't get the Institute." Kurt informs the others teleporting to them.

"Looks like we're on our own then." Kitty says and the three of them start to follow Logan at a safe distance.

"You sure you don't want to wait at the plane? I'm not entirely sure what's up with Wolverine but he doesn't seem to be in full control." Ben asks the others.

"Yeah, we're sure. No way we let you go out here on your own." Kitty tells him.

Somewhere in the mountain the man Logan saw in his dreams is talking to Sabretooth, talking about Logan and explaining that he has a chip in his brain, making him controllable and is surprised that Logan can stay in control to this degree. He then sends Sabretooth to fetch him, following after the larger mutant with a control device, which controls the chip in Logan's brain. Once the man catches up to the two mutants he turns up the dial on the device until Logan is weakened and Sabretooth hits him over the head, knocking him out. They then take him to the laboratory where they reveal that the man is the one who gave Logan the adamantium implants and is using a chip in his head to control him, having designed Logan to take out his fellow mutants. He then sees surveillance videos on the mountain showing the three teens which followed Logan into the woods.

"Man it's like he just dropped out of sight somewhere." Kitty says.

"I can't sense him anywhere either." Ben tells them having tried using his telepathy to find him.

"Well he's back and you must be broken or something." Kurt tells them pointing at Logan, who's standing on a cliff in front of them.

"Huh that's weird. I can't sense him like at all. Something must be up." Ben tells them.

"Mr. Logan over here. Kitty shouts waving her arms at the man only for Sabretooth to show up behind Logan, grinning evilly at them.

"Oh oh, he's brought a friend." Kurt says getting nervous.

"Sabretooth, but they are like mortal enemies." Kitty says backing up.

"Yeah, ours." Kurt yells seeing the two men charge at them.

"You guys, run I'll slow them down." Ben yells at them and transforms into Echo-echo, a white little alien with a megaphone which can duplicate.

He uses his duplication power to make a wall between the two men and his fleeing friends.

Once the animalistic men are close enough Ben shouts into the megaphones , creating a sound barrier, stopping the men from advancing as well as causing them pain because of their enhanced senses.

Hearing something going on behind them the two running teens look back and see Ben stop Logan and Sabretooth in their track.

"Run guys, it won't hold long." One of the small white aliens yells at them, running after them with his stubbly legs.

A few seconds later Logan yells loudly and runs over one of the aliens, breaking their wall and Ben quickly shifts back to human, making his clones disappear.

"Faster, they are gaining on us." Kurt shouts panicking, while Ben catches up to them, having taken the place of the alien already running after them, however Wolverine and Sabretooth are quickly hot on their heels because their animalistic power gives them enhanced strength and speed.

Logan jumps at Kitty once he's in range and Kitty dodges to the side, sliding down the small hill they were on.

"I got her, you try to stay alive." Ben shouts at Kurt, jumping after his female companion with Logan chasing them both while Sabretooth focuses on Kurt, who manages to evade direct hits by the man by teleporting out of the way last second.

Kitty comes tumbling to a stop at the foot of the hill and quickly gets back up, when Logan lands right next to her, with Ben not far behind him.

Logan yells out and walks over to the girl, who's trying to talk him down.

"Mr. Logan it's me, what's the matter with you." Kitty says but Logan can't fight his instinct and swipes at her. He would have hit her if Ben hadn't shoved her out of the way only to get hit himself with Logan's claws piercing through his left shoulder.

"Kitty, run." Ben grunts, trying to hold Logan in place by gripping the front of the blades with two arms and sprouting two additional arms to hold his wrist in place with the other ones.

"Ben, no!" Kitty yells frantically, tears falling out of her eyes.

"Kitty, now!" Ben shouts at her angrily and she takes off running.

Logan, seeing that he pierced Ben's shoulder tries to fight for control again, only for the man in the laboratory turning up the dial on the signal being transmitted into Logan's brain.

Logan quickly rips himself free from Ben's hold and starts to chase Kitty again.

Ben seeing that his shoulder is bleeding badly with the blades removed turns his undamaged arm into that of heatblast and shoots a small stream of flames at his wound, cauterizing it from both sides while screaming in pain, making Kitty look back worried only for her to see Wolverine catching up to her.

"She screams scared for her life as she runs through the woods with Wolverine chasing her, cutting down any tree standing between herself and him as he runs after her.

Kitty phases through a stone wall and comes out on a small ledge leading into a deep crevice, she manages to stop in time but would have almost fallen down.

She takes this chance to catch her breath and slumps down against the wall crying to herself, thinking Ben's dead or at least badly hurt.

While this is going on Kurt continues to dodge Sabretooth, leading him through the woods, teleporting again and again to get away from the angry mutant.

With Logan, he climbs the top of the wall Kitty disappeared into and looks down into the crevice, not seeing any sign of her and starts to get control back, thinking about Kitty.

"Kitty, no." Logan says painfully and Kitty phases through the ground, appearing behind him. Logan turns around and is holding himself back from skewering her. Kurt teleports behind her and grabs her saying "We're popping out of here."

"No, wait. I am reaching him." Kitty says and takes off Logan's mask.

"It's me Kitty. Remember, half pint. Please try we had breakfast together just this morning, look whatever they did to you you're fighting it. You can win. Don't give up." Kitty tells him while he's growling in pain, trying to stay in control.

Logans slumps down on his knees, feeling his control increasing.

"Wrong move." Sabretooth yells tacking Logn off the ledge. Logan quickly throws him off himself once they land and then runs back towards the mountain with Sabretooth going after him.

"We have to go after him, but what about Ben?" Kitty says not knowing what to do.

"Let's go." Ben tells them, coming out of the woods behind them and turns into his aliendog like form, partially to track the two men, partially to not be too obvious that he's hurt and partially because he doesn't need the distraction of a conversation right now.

"You heard him, let's go." Kurt says teleporting them down to Ben who's running on all fours sniffing for Logan.

Kitty and Kurt run after Ben while Kitty's wondering what happened to Ben since the last time she saw him his shoulder was run through by Wolverine's claw.

"Sabretooth, where is Wolverine?" The doctor asks the mutant, while he's sitting at the control panel.

"He's entered the lab." Sabretooth tells him, arriving at the clawed open entry hatch and follows his old nemesis.

"Get down here and protect me." The doc yells scared as Logan is slicing through the last door, entering his control room.

Kurt teleports himself, Ben and Kitty into the lab, landing right in front of Sabretooth.

"Touch me and you'll find yourself transported two miles into the woods." Kurt warns the man while Ben still in his wildmutt form and Kitty take off headed to Logans location.

"Don't make me do this Logan, you're too valuable." The doctor says turning up the dial to max. in addition to that he presses a button, releasing the automatic defense system, which are four robots with tentacles, that try to contain Logan. He manages to destroy two before the other two constrict him, stopping him from fighting against them.

Ben and Kitty run into the room and Kitty sees the computer, displaying things about Logan and says "I see the problem." While jumping into the computer, phasing through everything and breaking it, causing numerous malfunctions and an alarm to go off while fires start to flare up and spread uncontrollably.

Ben jumped at the machines and uses his strong claws to rip apart one of the two holding Logan captive before he jumps at the other and bites through the metallic appendage constricting his mentor, who then gives the machine the finishing blow.

"You caged the wrong animal bub." Logan warns the doctor, advancing on him with Ben.

"Stop, this place is gonna blow." The doctor yells.

"Let it, Kitty leave." Wolverine tells her and Ben shifts into his Diamondhead form.

"Not without you two." Kitty says trying to reason with the two men, when Kurt teleports in suddenly.

"Get her out of here." Ben tells him, gently shoving Kitty over to Kurt.

"Noo." Kitty yells scared and gets teleported outside, to a safe distance.

"Project weapon X has been terminated." Wolverine tells the doctor and Ben quickly hits his hands into the floor, erecting as much crystalline constructs he can around himself and Logan, covering them in a crystalline dome when the whole place blows up.

Outside Kitty and Kurt see the explosion and have to shield their eyes from the resulting shockwave and sit down depressed on a log at seeing the destruction and thinking their friends are done for.

"Kitty, maybe they made it, Ben can phase through things afterall." Kurt tells her reminding her that there is still hope.

"We shouldn't have left them." Kitty says tears falling freely out of her eyes.

At the lab Ben takes down the constructs once the danger is gone and tells Logan "Now you're glad I came along huh?" cockily.

"Don't get ahead of yourself kid." Logan groans and falls down unconsciously.

"Great, now I get to drag him back to the plane." Ben scoffs and turns into humongusaur, picking up Logan by throwing him over his shoulder and leaps out of the rubble, headed for the plane they arrived in.

After around 5 minutes Kitty and Evan who are still slumped down on the log see Ben make his way towards them with Logan over his shoulder.

"Oh, thank god, you're alright." Kitty says running over to him and hugging Ben's massive leg.

"Uh Kitty, could you let go for a second?" Ben asks in his deep grumbling voice.

"Oh, sorry." She says embarrassedly.

"Don't mind it, just wanted to shift back to human, Kurt do you mind taking us back to the plane?" Ben asks the blue furred teen, who happily hops over to them and teleports them back to the plane, where Kitty asks him "Hey Kurt, can you give us a moment? Maybe take Logan into the blackbird." She tells him, pulling Ben to the side.

"What's up?" Ben asks her once they are alone and turns to face her, only for Kitty to jump at him and throw her arms around him while giving him a deep kiss.

"I'm so glad you are OK, you have no idea how worried I was. What happened to you guys anyways." Kitty says rambling.

"I made a crystal dome, shielding us. What was that kissing about?" Ben asks her shocked.

"I'm sorry, I know you're with Rogue but I just like you so much and seeing you get hurt because of me I got so worried, I couldn't stop myself." Kitty tells him feeling somewhat guilty for kissing him.

"You like me? Sorry, I didn't notice it. At first I thought you were only being nice to me because I sacred you with how I look and what I can do." Ben says awkwardly.

"Don't be silly, granted the first time I didn't handle it well and freaked out but after that I slowly started to fall for you." She confesses embarrassedly.

"You know we'll have to tell Rogue about this right." Ben tells her.

"Yeah and don't worry, I'll tell her that I kissed you and you were innocent in this. I don't want to break you guys up afterall, I just couldn't stop myself." She tells him and they make their way back to the blackbird, where Kurt starts to fly them back and Ben joins Logan in the land of the unconscious along the ride, getting Kitty to freak out.

|Later that day|

Logan wakes up with a grunt and shoots out of his bed.

"Relax my friend, you're back at the Institute. You're safe." Charles tells him, having waited beside the man.

"What about the kids, how are they?" Wolverine asks.

"All fine, Kitty has been in here numerous times checking up on you two after your surgery, we removed the chip. Is there pain?" The professor tells him.

"Yeah, but I'll manage, wait two?" Logan asks looking over to his right, seeing Ben lying on the mattress beside him.

"You just said they are all fine." Logan says worried.

"And they are, he's just exhausted." Charles tells him.

"What about his shoulder?" Logan asks feeling guilty, since he can remember everything that happened while he was being controlled.

"It's going to be alright, he's quite smart you know, cauterized the wound so he won't bleed out. He'll make an excellent X-men one day." Charles says proudly.

"Yeah, yeah he will." Logan agrees.

|Meanwhile with Kitty and Rogue|

"Rogue, I have to tell you something." Kitty says worried about how her friend is going to react to the news, having taken her to their room once they were sure Logan and Ben are alright.

"What is it?" Rogue asks.

"You see, during the trip Ben and I… I mean… I sort of, kissed Ben." Kitty tells her, preparing herself for an attack from her roommate.

"OK." Rogue only says.

"Huh? You're not going to hit me?" She asks surprised.

"No, I've known you like him for a few weeks now and I thought about if we can find a way to resolve the problem… I guess we'll have to share him." Rogue tells her, feeling somewhat uncomfortable.

"Wait what? Share him?" Kitty asks stunned.

"Well I know that you both mean much to each other and to be honest, I don't mind sharing him with you all that much. I've grown close to you as well." Rogue tells her.

"So, you are being serious right now and not just playing the evilest prank in history on me?" Kitty asks still not believing her.

"Look, would you rather we both fight over him and he decides to date neither because he likes us both?" Rogue tells her, showing that she has been giving this some thought.

"No, but I mean, I don't know what to say…" Kitty says.

"Just tell me if you're on board or not." Rogue tells her.

"Of course, I'm in. I'm just shocked you're being so cool about this." Kitty tells her excitedly.

"Well I've had a long enough time to think about things. But just to warn you, this probably won't be a walk in the park given how competitive we can get." Rogue tells her.

"No kidding." Kitty agrees laughing.

"So, you in?" Rogue asks Kitty one more time.

"Definitely." Kitty says happily and hugs the brunette.

"But what about Ben, do you think he'll be on board with this?" Kitty asks her.

"Yeah, if it's you I think so. You two may not have noticed but whenever you two are alone it's already as if you were dating anyways." Rogue tells her, making Kitty blush embarrassedly.

|An hour later- infirmary|

Ben wakes up with a groan.

"Oh man why do I feel like I carried a car down a mountain?" Ben asks, sitting up slowly.

"Well sorry, I'm not a lightweight like the other pints around here." Logan says, leaning against the wall next to his bed, drinking a beer.

"Logan, good to see you're OK buddy." Ben tells him happily and winces when he tries to move his left shoulder.

"Huh? Ah right." Ben says quietly, looking down at his now bandaged shoulder.

"Kid, I'm sorry about that. I never meant to…" Logan begins to apologize.

"Hey, no worries at least Kitty got away safe, plus given that you had a chip in your head I'll let you off without giving you a beating." Ben jokes, trying to get Logan to lighten up.

"Sure, sure kid. Anyways, there are two ladies who are waiting to see you, I'll tell them you're awake." He tells him.

"Two huh? Oh crap." Ben says to himself, remembering that Kitty and he kissed.

"Hey Ben, how are you feeling?" Kitty asks sitting down on the left side of his bed.

"OK, I guess. What about you? Did you get hurt?" Ben asks her, getting a headshake no in response.

"Ben, good to see you awake again." Rogue says sitting down on his right side.

"Yeah, listen Rogue. There is something that I have to tell you…" Ben says guiltily and sees the smirk on both girls faces.

"She told you already?" Ben asks surprised.

"Yeah she did, and we came to an agreement." Rogue tells him, leaning closer to him.

"An agreement huh?" Ben asks worried.

"Yeah, an agreement." Kitty replies leaning closer to him as well.

"What kind of agreement?" Ben asks his eyes darting form one girl to the other.

"We're going to share you." They tell him simultaneously.

"HUH?" Ben shouts surprised.

"Yeah, we're both going to be dating you." Rogue tells him.

"And you were on board with this?" He asks her doubtfully.

"It was my idea." Rogue tells him.

"Come again?" Ben asks stupefied.

"Look I know how close you two are and how close Kitty and I are and sharing you is the best solution, plus it sounds exciting." Rogue tells him.

"OK, wait and you're just assuming I'm going to be OK with this?" Ben asks.

"Yeah." Rogue replies.

"Rogue, are you really sure? I mean just a few weeks ago you were jealous that I'm training Kitty…" Ben asks her.

"Yes babe, I'm sure. Now be happy and glad you have such cool girlfriends." Rogue tells him and gives him a kiss.

"Can I?" Kitty asks uncertain and receives a go-ahead motion from Rogue.

Kitty wastes no time and pulls Ben into a lip-lock.

"Wow, you two are really going at it, too bad I can't exactly join in." Rogue tells them, laughing at their stunned expression.