Chapter 1: Prologue
Chapter Text
The forest is wrong.
Scott feels it before he sees anything—branches snapped too cleanly, animal paths torn open like something paced them back and forth until the ground gave up. The air smells like blood and adrenaline and cold metal, a ghost-scent that doesn’t belong outside a lab.
He adjusts his visor and forces his breathing steady.
Approach with empathy, Xavier’s voice echoes in his head. You are offering sanctuary, not control.
Scott steps into the clearing with his hands visible.
“Logan,” he calls, calm, measured. “My name is Scott Summers. I’m not here to hurt you.”
Something moves.
Too fast.
Scott barely gets to dodge before a blur slams into him—claws screeching, sparks flying as Logan bounces back, low to the ground, feral eyes reflecting red in the visor’s glow. There’s no recognition there. No comprehension. Just panic sharpened into violence.
“Easy,” Scott says, louder now. “No one’s chasing you. You’re safe.”
Logan snarls. The sound isn’t human. He lunges again—this time not at Scott, but at the sound of a bird taking off nearby, tearing into empty air like the world itself betrayed him.
Scott freezes.
This isn’t resistance.
This is fear.
Logan attacks everything—shadows, movement, noise—like if he stops, he’ll be dragged back under fluorescent lights and steel restraints. His hands shake between strikes. His stance is wrong. Injured. Conditioned.
Scott feels something cold settle in his chest.
He’s not listening because he can’t.
Another charge—wild, unfocused. Scott fires a controlled blast at the ground in front of Logan, just enough force to throw up dirt and stop him short. Logan skids back, claws out, breathing hard.
“Stay back!” Scott snaps.
The command cuts through the clearing like a blade.
Logan freezes.
Not because of fear of the blast—but because the tone is different. Sharp. Absolute. No pleading. No warmth. No lies.
Scott sees it then: Logan’s head tilts, just slightly. Like an animal recognizing a handler—but not one who’s enjoying this.
Scott swallows.
Xavier would hate this.
Scott straightens his posture. Grounds his voice. Every word deliberate.
“Listen to me,” he says. “You’re not surrounded. No one’s behind you. I’m the only one here.”
Logan’s nostrils flare. He doesn’t attack.
Scott steps to the side—slow, visible. Gives Logan an exit route without saying it.
“You don’t have to trust me,” Scott continues. “But if you keep attacking everything that moves, you will get hurt. And I won’t let that happen.”
Logan growls. Muscles coil.
Scott doesn’t flinch.
“If you come with me,” Scott says, firm as steel, “no one touches you without your consent. No restraints. No experiments.”
A pause.
Then, the line Scott never thought he’d cross—but knows is true:
“If you can’t stop fighting,” he adds quietly, “then fight when I tell you to. Not before. Not at random. I won’t set you on civilians. I won’t let anyone use you the way they did.”
Logan’s claws tremble.
He doesn’t understand all the words—but he understands structure. Boundaries. A predator who doesn’t circle him like prey.
Scott meets his gaze, unblinking.
“This isn’t a cage,” Scott says. “It’s a leash. And I’m holding the other end so no one else can.”
Silence.
Then—slowly—Logan lowers his claws.
Not trust.
Not peace.
But recognition.
Scott exhales, barely.
He doesn’t feel like Xavier’s perfect student anymore.
He feels like a commander who just claimed responsibility for something dangerous—and alive.
And Logan, still shaking, takes one careful step toward him.
Chapter 2: Chapter One
Chapter Text
The Institute is too quiet when Scott brings Logan in.
Not the peaceful kind of quiet—the kind where everyone is holding their breath.
Logan stays close to Scott’s left side, shoulders hunched, eyes tracking exits, claws half-sheathed like he hasn’t decided whether this place is shelter or a trap. Every passing student freezes when they see him. A girl with sparks dancing nervously at her fingertips. A boy whose skin flickers to glass and back again.
Scott notices all of it.
So does Xavier.
“Scott,” Xavier says gently from his wheelchair at the end of the hall. “That will be far enough.”
Scott stops. Logan stops because Scott stops.
That alone earns Scott a look—sharp, measuring—from Hank, from Ororo, from Jean. Disapproval flickers through the room like static.
“You were instructed to bring him in peacefully,” Xavier continues. “He is a traumatized mutant. He needed reassurance. Compassion.”
Scott doesn’t raise his voice. He doesn’t need to.
“With respect, sir,” Scott says, “that’s not who you sent me after.”
The room stiffens.
“You tasked me with tracking a dangerous, semi-feral man,” Scott continues, precise. “A man who’s been dehumanized so completely he doesn’t recognize himself as a person anymore. Someone who attacks movement because fear is the only language left to him.”
Xavier’s brows knit. “Scott—”
“You didn’t send me to comfort him,” Scott cuts in, still calm, still controlled. “You sent me to contain a threat.”
A few of the younger students have gathered at the edges now, peeking from doorways. Scott sees them. He makes sure Xavier sees them too.
“This Institute is full of children,” Scott says. “Some of them can barely control their powers on a good day. If Logan snaps—and he will, eventually—they won’t know how to defend themselves.”
Logan’s head jerks at the word snaps. His breathing speeds up.
Scott reacts instantly.
“Logan,” he says, firm but steady. “Eyes on me.”
Logan’s gaze locks onto Scott’s visor. The tension bleeds out of his shoulders by a fraction.
The room goes very, very still.
Scott doesn’t look away from Xavier.
“I’m taking responsibility for him,” Scott says. “All of it. If he hurts someone, that’s on me. If he loses control, I handle it. If he needs to be stopped, I stop him.”
“That is not how we do things here,” Xavier says, quietly but firmly.
Scott finally turns his head.
“No,” he agrees. “It isn’t.”
He gestures subtly at Logan—not like presenting a specimen, but like acknowledging a reality.
“But this is how he understands the world right now. Clear boundaries. Clear authority. No surprises. No lies.”
Xavier exhales. “Scott, he’s not a weapon.”
“I know,” Scott says immediately. “But he’s been treated like one long enough that pretending otherwise will get someone killed.”
Logan shifts. His claws slide out with a soft snikt—not threatening, just reflex.
Several students flinch.
Scott doesn’t move.
“Logan,” he says. “Claws in.”
A beat.
Then—slowly—Logan retracts them.
That’s when the weight of it really hits the room.
Xavier watches this, something conflicted crossing his face. Pride, unease, disappointment—maybe all three.
“You’re asking me to allow coercion,” Xavier says.
“I’m asking you to allow containment with accountability,” Scott replies. “No mind control. No sedation. No cages. Just me. Until he’s stable enough to choose differently.”
“And if he never is?” Hank asks quietly.
Scott doesn’t hesitate.
“Then I’ll stay responsible,” he says. “As long as it takes.”
Silence.
Logan glances at Scott, confused—but not panicked. He doesn’t understand the words. But he understands the stance. The fact that Scott isn’t backing away. Isn’t handing him off.
Xavier finally speaks.
“Very well,” he says. “On a provisional basis.”
Scott nods once. Not grateful. Not relieved.
Resolved.
“I’ll brief you on protocols,” Xavier adds. “This will not be the precedent.”
Scott meets his gaze.
“It already is,” he says.
And for the first time since leaving the wilderness, Logan lets himself sit down—right behind Scott, back to the wall, eyes still sharp, but trusting one thing: That if anyone tries to take him again—Scott Summers will be the one standing in the way.
Chapter Text
Dusk creeps in through tall windows Logan hadn’t notice them.
Too high. Too open. Too clean.
He follows the man anyway.
Scott.
He remembers the name because Scott said it like it mattered. Like names were anchors instead of things you lost.
The halls stretch on and on. White walls. Glass. Doors that slide instead of slam. Logan hates that most of all—nothing here makes enough noise. It feels like a place built to watch without being seen.
There are kits everywhere.
Logan slows without meaning to.
They’re small. Some of them barely reach Scott’s shoulder. Others smell like lightning, heat, metal, fear. Power that hasn’t learned its own weight yet. Logan’s chest tightens. He knows this smell. Weapon X kept kits too. Locked up. Labeled. Promised safety and delivered pain.
Every single one of them stiffens when they see him.
Logan doesn’t need to look at their faces. He can smell it.
Fear. Sharp and sour.
He bares his teeth without meaning to. Not a snarl. Not a threat.
A warning.
Scott doesn’t turn around—but his voice cuts in immediately.
“Easy,” he says. Not loud. Not soft. Certain. “Keep moving.”
Logan obeys before he realizes he’s decided to.
That… bothers him.
Scott keeps talking as they walk. Words spill out—rules, places, times. Logan doesn’t understand most of them. Scott’s voice isn’t like the handlers’. No electric edge. No anticipation. No cruelty curling underneath.
That makes it worse.
Because Logan doesn’t know what to do with it.
He watches Scott instead. The way he walks like he already mapped the building in his head. The way his shoulders stay squared, even when fear spikes behind them. The way he never speeds up, never slows down—sets the pace and expects the world to follow.
And the visor.
Logan’s gaze keeps snagging on it.
Red glass. Solid. Unreadable.
His skull aches with memory.
Straps biting into his temples. Cold metal pressed too tight. Voices saying test run like it was a game. Like he wasn’t inside his own body when they turned him loose.
Logan’s breath stutters.
Scott stops instantly.
He turns just enough to look—not at Logan’s claws, not at his stance—but at his face.
“Breathe,” Scott says. One word. An order, but not a threat.
Logan drags air into his lungs. Once. Twice.
Scott nods and keeps walking.
Logan follows.
He remembers the man in a wheelchair.
Something about him is wrong.
Not weak. Not afraid.
Wrong.
The man smelled polished. Controlled. But under it—under the calm—there’s something sharp and old. Something that reminds Logan of rooms with no windows and smiles that didn’t mean mercy.
Cruelty.
Not loud. Not messy.
Refined.
The man had watched Logan like he was measuring a blade.
But Scott had stepped between them without breaking stride.
Logan exhales slowly.
He looks at Scott’s back again.
The visor. The authority. The way others defer. The way fear bends around him instead of touching him directly.
A thought forms, heavy and unwelcome.
Is he this place’s Weapon X?
Not the one in the chair.
Him.
The trained one. The perfect one. The one who learned how to follow orders so well he gets to give them now. The attack dog they trust to keep the other dogs in line.
Logan’s hands curl into fists.
If Scott is—
Scott stops again.
Turns fully this time.
Logan tenses, ready for pain, for commands that scrape his insides raw.
But Scott just looks at him.
“You’re safe here,” Scott says. Not gentle. Not comforting. Honest. “No one’s touching you without your say. Not him. Not me. Not anyone.”
Logan searches his scent for lies.
Finds none.
Only resolve. Heavy. Unyielding.
Scott gestures down the hall. “Your room’s this way.”
Logan hesitates.
Then follows.
The question doesn’t go away.
But something else settles beside it—something unfamiliar and dangerous.
If Scott is a weapon…
Then maybe— for the first time since he broke out…
Scott then stops at the edge of the den. Logan learned the word just recently. Institute. Too many walls. Too many smells. Too many heartbeats. But this door—this one opens to outside.
Scott pushes it open.
Cold air rushes in. Pine. Wet earth. Animals that haven’t learned fear yet. Logan’s muscles tense on instinct, claws itching under his skin.
Scott points. Not at Logan. At the forest circling the place.
“You can sleep out there,” he says.
Logan tilts his head.
Sleep… out there?
No lights. No walls. No straps.
He waits for the rest. The catch. The men with guns. The hum of electricity in the floor. Something.
Nothing comes.
Scott exhales, rubbing a hand over his face. He looks tired in a way Logan recognizes—like someone who hasn’t stopped watching even when their eyes are closed.
“I can’t give you a bed,” Scott says.
Logan’s gaze snaps back to him.
Can’t.
Not won’t.
That matters.
Scott continues, like he’s explaining rules to a wild animal that might bolt if he moves wrong.
“What I can give you is space. You can roam. Hunt. Clear your head.” A pause. “Just don’t go too far. And be back by morning.”
Logan stares.
No restraints.
No guards.
No tracking collar digging into his neck.
Scott steps back. Not away—just enough to make it clear the doorway isn’t a trap.
Then he turns and walks back inside the den.
The door closes.
Logan doesn’t move.
He listens.
No boots lining up outside.
No heartbeat spikes of men waiting to ambush him.
No chemical fear-smell in the air.
Nothing threatening.
Nothing at all.
His nose twitches, confused.
This doesn’t make sense.
Handlers don’t do this.
Handlers test you by locking you in a box and seeing how long it takes you to break. Handlers watch. Handlers punish hesitation and call it disobedience.
This man… let him go.
Logan steps onto the grass slowly, every muscle coiled, ready for the lie to snap shut around him.
It doesn’t.
The forest opens up around him like it recognizes him. He moves through it silently, circling the den once. Twice. He finds no traps. No guards. No hidden enemies.
Just trees.
Just sunset.
He stops on a ridge and looks back.
The den sits quiet. Lights dim. Still.
Scott said be back by morning.
Not or else.
Logan doesn’t understand it. Doesn’t trust it. Not really.
But something unfamiliar settles low in his chest—not comfort. Not safety.
Expectation.
Like the man inside isn’t waiting to catch him doing wrong.
Like he’s waiting to see if Logan will choose to come back.
Logan disappears into the trees—but not far.
And when the sun climbs higher, he keeps glancing toward the den, ears tuned for a voice that hasn’t chased him yet.
A handler who didn’t follow.
A leash that isn’t pulling.
And somehow, that unsettles him more than any cage ever did.