First story:
(Logan’s memories)
A particularly hairy figure, possibly Logan or an ancestor of his, stands high on a rock, watching the action down below. A savage tribe of strange creatures is fighting another, and also taking down a ferocious Sabretooth tiger. They are called The Lupine, though he doesn’t recall exactly how he knows that. Logan is having difficulty deciding if this is a memory, a dream… a flashback? Recently, he has come by a whole load of memories that had been lost to him for many years. If what he sees is real, then this memory, or whatever it is, is important. For the life of him, he doesn’t know why.
He concentrates on two fighting beasts, one black and one blonde, which he’s named Pup and Blondie. This memory has been going on long enough that he’s actually given them names. He watches as Pup strikes Blondie a fatal blow to the chest. Logan can’t understand their grunts and growls, but he doesn’t need a translator to know a murder when he sees it. He knows he can’t worry about this now. He has his own Sabretooth to worry about.
(present - Westchester County)
Wolverine stands on a small cliff side, looking down at the entrance to the Xavier Institute for Higher Learning. He thinks about how the problem being the best at what you do, is that there’s always someone out there who thinks they can do it better. As he strolls purposefully towards the door, he recalls how there used to be lots of people like him – mutants. No more. Now there’s just a handful left, and most of them live there at the mansion. The lights almost went out for homo superior. He thinks about the term. ‘Superior… right.’
He uses one of his adamantium claws to pop open the lock and enters the mansion. Inside, he finds Rogue standing there, as if on sentry duty. She’s in charge, and she knows why Logan is there. Logan tells her that it’s nothing to do with her. If she wants to make it between themselves, she can choose a different night. Rogue knows him well enough to leave him alone.
Wolverine makes his way to a room where Sabretooth is reclining; a drink in one hand and the Spice Channel on television. Wolverine wastes no time in telling him to get up. Creed asks why he would do that, but Wolverine reiterates his request. With Creed’s failure to do as asked, he is soon defenestrated, landing on the soft grass outside the mansion. Logan then somersaults through the broken window and lands feet away from Sabretooth who’s pretty angry by now. He informs Logan that he lives at the mansion now. He’s protected. Logan snikts his claws. He knows full well that Creed is a killer. He admits to himself that he’s also a killer, too, only he doesn’t enjoy it like Creed does. This time, however, though he’ll hate himself in the morning, he’s going to enjoy himself.
The two of them go at it, claws at the ready. They both take slices out of each other, but their respective healing factors clean up the minor damage quickly. As they tussle, Creed asks Logan how many times they’ve danced this dance. How many times has he left him for dead? Logan thrusts his claws into Creed’s shoulder and replies that, if he’s ever left him for dead, and he ain’t dead, then he’s never done the job right. Creed throws Wolverine backwards and says he’s going to rectify that tonight. Tonight, Wolverine’s gonna die!
Wolverine flips back towards him, using his legs to slam Sabretooth against a tree. He swipes at the larger man, but misses, and Creed grabs Logan’s head and smashes it into the tree instead. Blood splatters from his face and Creed follows up by clamping his huge hands around Logan’s neck. He lifts him clean off the ground and taunts him about the fact that, if the X-Men now have him on their team, what do they need Wolverine for? Logan begins to pass out from asphyxiation, and his mind wanders back in time to a small cabin in a snow-covered wilderness.
(Logan’s memories - Mount Logan)
Logan walks bare-chested through the snow carrying a pile of wood for the fire. He wonders why he’s having this memory in particular. There aren’t many times in his life that he can call happy, but this is one of them. A snowball hits him on the back of his head and he turns to smile at its thrower. Silver Fox is standing there, wearing Logan’s boots and a coat. When Logan asks if she’s naked under it, she tells him that’s for her to know and him to find out. Logan drops the logs and embraces her in a passionate kiss. As they lock lips, Sabretooth watches them from a raised position nearby, nonchalantly monitoring them, hands in pockets.
The hairs on Logan’s neck stand up, and he knows that he is there, yet he does nothing. With him standing there downwind, he knew he was there… watching. Maybe he knew, and wanted Creed to know what he had and what he didn’t have. Logan was arrogant to think he wouldn’t act on it. Returning to the cabin one night, he opens the door to discover Silver Fox almost naked, seemingly dead, and with Happy Birthday scrawled on the wall in her blood. Has he suppressed this memory, he wonders; the memory that in some way he may have been responsible for Silver Fox’s death?
Later, Logan carries Silver Fox’s body into town and attacks Creed in a bar. Logan is rightly furious. Creed killed Silver Fox. There is no doubt about it. His scent is everywhere. The two men fight a brutal fight, but Creed manages to overcome his smaller and more inexperienced opponent. Sometimes, thinks Logan, a man who has never been beaten down starts to believe he can’t be beaten down. That’s when a man, no matter how just his cause and how righteous his thinking, has lost. That’s what happens to him. As he lies on the floor, Creed utters the Latin phrase, ‘Quod sum eris.”
(present)
Creed asks Logan what he just said. Logan cricks his neck back into place, rather painfully, and asks what Creed meant by the phrase. Creed is surprised by the question, wondering why he’s asking now, after all these years. He tells Logan he can go to hell, but Logan replies that he’s been there, and he has a feeling they’re gonna be sharing a room together down there sometime.
Logan swipes at Creed, asking why that is. He slashes his face with his claws, adding that Creed isn’t his father or brother or clone. Why is it that they can’t seem to get rid of each other? As Creed misses Logan, who leaps over his attack, he tells Logan that he still doesn’t get it. He has all his memories back, except he can’t remember the one thing that would explain it all. He then digs his claws into Logan’s chest and he growls in pain.
Creed informs him that it’s Latin. Quod sum eris means ‘I am what you will be.’ “No matter where you go, no matter what you do or don’t do, it can’t be stopped. You are going to become… me.” Logan replies that he’s insane, and that their conversation is over. He places his hands underneath Sabretooth’s jaw, but Creed warns him that if he pops the claws, he’ll tear his heart out. “Ok,” replies Logan. “Let ‘er rip.”
Second story:
(flashback)
With his memories restored, Wolverine recalls his first fight with the Incredible Hulk, back when he wore a yellow costume and worked for Canada’s Alpha Flight. He’s sure he’s told this story dozens of times, and each time it’s different because he remembers something different about it.
This is where it all started for Wolverine. He was in thick with Department H and owed Heather and James Hudson big time. They took him in when nobody else would have, or should have. He had to practically beg Heather to take the stupid whiskers off his cowl, like wearing a cowl wasn’t embarrassing enough anyway.
Back then, somebody thought it was a good idea for Canada to have a super team, and Alpha Flight was the result. Logan didn’t think he needed a mask then. He didn’t know who he was, never mind anyone else. He thought it strange that they wanted to make him a superhero after everything he’d been through, and he was the one they called psychotic? He wasn’t that impressed with his moniker, either - The Wolverine. The Wolverine… as if there he might be confused with another. The dialogue he came out with during that first fight was partly what the Canucks had put into his mouth. Mind you, it doesn’t really matter who he works for: Canada, Xavier, S.H.I.E.L.D. or Weapon X. There’s always some jackass making him say something he normally wouldn’t.
As he remembers the fight with the Hulk, he wonders which was the crazy part. Was it that he thought he could actually take down the Hulk, or that he wasn’t afraid to try? As he recalls being grabbed by the Hulk’s massive firsts, his memories suddenly change. Instead of the yellow costume, he appears in a more modern-looking black and gold costume, being ripped in two by the green giant.
(present)
Wolverine sits up with a start. Was that a dream? A memory? Sometimes he can’t tell the difference. But, he thinks, what the hell was that uniform? As he wanders across the snow-covered wilderness, he mutters, “I hate Canada…”
