SUMMARY: Logan adopts a puppy. Remy endures.
 

*
It's a Dog's Life
by Scorpio
*
 

"'ello, Xavier's School for Gifted Youth. Dis is Remy LeBeau. How may I help
you?"

~Rems? Hey darlin'. Is Scotty there? I've got a bit of a situation here.~

Remy frowned. It must be bad if Logan was referring to their team leader as
"Scotty". His lover was nothing if not predictable and easy to read, at least
once you got to know him well enough. You could judge Logan's mood or a
situation by how he addressed Scott Summers. "Cyke" was used when Logan was
in professional mode and he wanted to discuss business. "One-Eye" was more in
the nature of a pet name that Logan pulled out when he was feeling playful.
"Summers" indicated that Logan was two steps away from blowing his top
because *something* had pissed him off. The name "Scotty", on the other hand,
usually meant that the shit had already hit the fan...and now it was time to
deal with the splatter.

"Er...hold on cher. Remy'll get him fo' you."

~Thanks darlin'.~

With a grimace, Remy put Logan on hold and then transferred him to Scott's
office extension. Not sure what was going on, but worried nonetheless, Remy
pulled his lucky deck of cards out of their special pocket on his trench coat
and began to shuffle them even as he wandered from the Communications Room
and into the hallway beyond. He wanted to have a cigarette to soothe his
suddenly anxious nerves, but he was stuck here until his replacement was due
to come on shift. Suddenly, his comm-unit crackled to life and Scott's voice
echoed through the room.

~All available X-Men meet in the War Room. Out of uniform. We have a
situation, but not one that requires use of force.~

Remy jumped a little even though he'd been expecting a call to the War Room.
The 'out of uniform' comment was uncommon, but not very much so. Stepping
back into the Communications Room, Remy entered a code into the main computer
system and forwarded all incoming communications to the War Room. Then, he
turned on his heals and headed for the War Room as well.

He met up with Storm on the way there and flashed her a smile. She grinned
back at him even as they walked into the War Room together. Once inside, they
separated and headed to their customary seats. Scott was standing in front of
his looking annoyed.

"Listen up people. As many of you know, Logan had driven down into Salem
Center today in order to have the fender on his jeep repaired."

It was only due to years of gambling and practicing his poker-face that kept
Remy from squirming when all eyes in the room suddenly tracked to him as
Scott paused in his narrative. Behind his sunglasses, he rolled his crimson
eyes. That fender was *not* his fault.

"Anyway, as some of you might remember, across the street from the
auto-repair shop is a strip-mall style shopping center. One of the stores is
Slate Pet Supply and Dog Grooming Shoppe. When Logan was waiting for the
repairs to be made to his jeep, a gang of high-school students trashed the
place, beat up the owner and his wife and then set the store on fire. The
reason they gave for their actions was that the owner's teenage daughter had
recently manifested as a beta-class mutant and they were expressing their
opinion about mutants in general and Lisa Slate in particular."

Gasps, growls and a general cry of outrage swirled around the table at that
news. Remy was oddly divided. While he was glad that no one had attacked his
lover personally, he also felt bad for the girl and her folks. At least if
those kids *had* gone after Logan, he could fight back and defend himself.
Better than most people on the planet.

"Logan was able to run the kids off and get the Slates and most of the
animals out of the building before they got hurt. The fire department was
called and the fire is under control. What Logan suggested, and what I agree
with; is that we help the Slates out as best as we can. Lisa Slate should be
brought in for testing to see exactly how she is mutating. Once Hank
determines that her health isn't being effected in a negative way, we can see
about getting her into the Massachusetts academy. Even if she's not a
powerful enough mutant to become an active member of Gen-X, being in a school
that is mutant friendly to the point of having a program set up specifically
to help train her in her extra abilities would probably make her, and her
parents, feel better about what's happening to them."

Nods of agreement went around the table even as Storm spoke up to add in an
idea of her own.

"That is an excellent suggestion, Cyclops. I would also recommend that we put
some effort into finding out why these young boys feel the need for violence
against mutants and put a stop to it. Salem Center has always been a very
tolerant community. Most of the long time residents are aware, at least on
some level, that there is a strong mutant population living among them and
there has never been a real problem due to that fact."

Scott paused for a second and then nodded his head.

"I agree. I'm going to take Hank and Jean down to meet up with Logan and the
Slates. We'll do the recruitment angle. Why don't you organize everyone else
to see if there is a pattern forming to the anti-mutant sentiment here in
Salem Center or if this is just a random attack brought on because of Lisa
Slate manifesting publicly? We might have to take steps."

And with one final nod of his head, Scott swept out of the War Room, Beast
and Jean right on his heals. Remy looked around at the remaining X-Men and
got a bad feeling in the pit of his stomach. Something was going to happen,
and he wasn't sure that he was going to like it.

*

The girl was green. Oh, that wasn't to say that Lisa Slate wasn't pretty.
Remy had met plenty of women who's skin and hair ranged all sorts of odd
colors and in many cases, the unusual color *added* to their allure and
beauty. However, it wasn't the mint green girl that had captured his
attention. It was the absolutely beatific smile gracing Logan's face as he
carried a soggy, dirty, tangled ball of patheticness in his arms as he strode
over to Remy.

That sense of something bad about to happen intensified.

"Look darlin'. Ain't she great?"

Remy stared at the...thing his lover was craddling in his massive arms. It
wiggled a bit and Remy noticed a little black nose and two brown eyes that
blinked at him out from under a tangled mass of dirty fur.

"Ah...cher? Wha'...wha' is it?"

Logan blinked and frowned.

"It's a puppy, Rem. A Golden Retriever. The Slates had a bunch o' them in the
store. Their dogs just had a litter a bit ago an' the puppies were just
recently weaned. They had brought them ta the store in the hopes o' sellin'
'em. They gave me this little one as a thank ya for savin' 'em."

Remy looked at the sodden mass and grimaced. How to get out of this?

"Ah...more a cat person, me. Maybe we can trade dis thing in fo' a kitten?"

Logan scowled and pulled the puppy closer, curling his shoulder up and around
as if to shelter the thing from a blow. As if the IRS themselves had seized
his offshore accounts, Remy knew that the 'bad thing' was here to stay.

"Sprinkles is *not* getting traded in for a *kitten*."

Logan managed to get a lot of scorn into the word kitten, but that wasn't
what grabbed Remy's attention. It was the fact that the pathetic ball of dirt
had the most stupid name ever slapped on a hapless animal.

"Sprinkles, cher?"

Logan's scowl grew darker.

"Lisa named her, Rem. She was a wreak; her parents all beat up an' their
store burned down. I needed *something* ta distract her. So...I let her name
the dog."

"Uh huh."

Logan just snorted at him and bent over to place the soggy smoke stained
puppy on the ground between them. The puppy sniffed around a bit and waddled
over to Remy. He tried to picture what Sprinkles would look like after it had
been bathed and it's fur was clean and fluffy. It probably wouldn't seem
so...distasteful then. Remy was about to give in and offer to help his lover
wash the thing when Sprinkles sniffed at Remy's boots and then lived up to
her name. Logan chuckled even as Remy stood there in shock, a growing puddle
of yellow expanding around his boot.

*

Remy ignored the sound of tiny paws on the concrete behind him and continued
to work on his Harley. He was a firm believer in a tune up after so many
miles or whenever he rode her hard during an encounter with some random bad
guy. Yesterday, his trip into the city to scout out the location of a job for
Scott had been interupted and he'd abused his beloved baby. Now she just
needed a little Cajun TLC.

It was when he was reaching for his wrench that he heard it. An oddly
slobbery sounding *crunch*. At first, the noise confused him, but then he
connected it to Sprinkles. Logan's puppy was teething, and as such, she felt
the need to chew on anything that she could find and fit in her mouth. As
annoying as the puppy was, he didn't want the little thing to hurt herself by
choking, so he turned around to see what the fur ball had found this time.

"Ahhh!"

Remy lunged for his $120.00 designer sunglasses and came up with a worthless,
useless, drool coated handful of chewed and cracked bit of plastic. Sprinkles
looked up at him with big brown eyes and wagged her tail.

"LOGAN!"

*

Remy set the elevator to stay on his floor until he unlocked it. Turning, he
picked up one of his laundry baskets and set it in the hallway. Then he
turned and grabbed the second one. Flicking off the lock so that the elevator
was released, he quickly stepped out into the hallway. Leaving the first
basket of clean laundry where it sat, he carried the one in his arms to his
and Logan's bedroom. Setting it on the floor by the bed, he left the room and
headed back to where he had left the first one.

Turning the corner towards the elevator, Remy saw his basket waiting for him.
It wasn't alone.

Several of his recently cleaned shirts were scattered on the floor and laying
on her back in the middle of all the warm clean clothes was Sprinkles. All
four of the puppy's paws were up in the air and her head was tipped back to
expose her throat. All in all, it was an adorable sight. Well, as long as it
wasn't *your* clean clothes that were now covered in long golden blonde dog
fur.

"LOGAN!"

*

Remy was really looking forward to tonight. It wasn't that they were doing
anything special, just dinner and then playing pool at Harry's. However, it
was going to be just him and Logan. Not that he didn't enjoy it when the
whole gang went out together, but it was nice to just be alone with his
lover.

Tucking his shirt into his jeans, Remy zipped up and then reached for his
belt. He slid the leather end into the first belt-loop even as he turned
slightly to try and locate his boots.

"grrrr..."

Remy turned his head to look over to the side. Sprinkles' front end was
lowered almost to the floor and her back legs were stiff and straight so that
her hind quarters were up in the air. Her tail was wagging hard with
excitement. Remy was clueless as to what was going on to get *this* reaction
out of the puppy.

"grrrr..."

Then Sprinkles pounced.

With a high pitched growl that would probably sound like Logan's when the
puppy had grown up a bit, Sprinkles dashed forward and latched onto the other
end of Remy's belt with her jaws. She then leaned back over her hind quarters
and tugged.

"Hey!"

Remy's quick reflexes allowed him to grab the belt before it was ripped away
from him. He gave a good hard tug on it even as Sprinkles braced all four
paws on the floor. Hardwood being what it is, Sprinkles slid towards Remy.
She didn't let go, however. Instead, she growled louder and shook her head,
the vibrations traveling up the leather belt and into Remy's arm.

"Let. Go."

Sprinkles ignored his demand and tugged back on the belt again just as Logan
sauntered out of their half-bath and chuckled lightly.

"Playin' Rem? I thought ya wanted ta go out tonight."

Remy looked over and glared at his lover.

"I do. An' dis ain't playin'. De dog attacks me an' you accuse Gambit of
playin'. Dat's nice, cher."

Logan frowned and gestured with one beefy hand towards the growling puppy
hanging off the end of Remy's good leather belt.

"She ain't attackin' ya. She's playin' tug o' war with ya."

Remy rolled his eyes and jerked harder on his belt. Sprinkles held on and
tugged back again.

"Coulda fooled dis Cajun. How you get her to stop?"

His frown deepening, Logan walked over and picked Sprinkles up. Without a
care, he reached into the dog's mouth and pried her jaws open with his own
fingers and removed the belt from it. Sprinkles whined unhappily even as Remy
grabbed up the buckle end of his belt and eyed up the gobs of dog slobber and
teeth marks with distaste.

"Ya really don't know much about puppies, do ya darlin'?"

Remy shook his head.

"Told you dat. Never did like dogs, me. Doubt dat you'd find a t'ief dat did
like 'em. De terms 'Cat Burglar' and 'Police Dog' didn't just *happen*, you
know. Dere's a reason fo' dem."

Logan shook his head and grinned like a maniac. Turning, he set Sprinkles
back on the floor and scooted her off towards the little doggie bed they had
set up in the corner of their bedroom.

"Finish getting dressed, Gumbo. I'll take ya out an' ya can forget all about
it for one night."

Remy pouted and considered being a pain in the ass, but then changed his
mind. There was nothing that he could really do about it beyond learn to live
with Sprinkles...somehow.

*

~Um...Gambit? You might want to come down here to the east yard.~

Cyclops' voice crackled over his comm-unit, pulling Remy's attention away
from his desperate search. He reached out and pulled another box of stuff out
of the closet before he reached up and tapped his comm-unit.

"Cyke? Can dis wait? Gambit has a problem here. His bo staff is gone. I t'ink
someone stole it and when I find out who took it, I'm gonna kill 'em. I
worked *hard* to earn de right to carry dat staff."

~Ah...that's what I'm talking about, Gambit. I have it down here. It seems
that Sprinkles thought it was one of her bones. She buried it in the yard.~

Stunned shock slammed into Remy's chest like a solid fist and he fell over
onto his ass amid the wreak of his own neat and organized closet. His bo
staff, his cherished pride and joy. A weapon that only a Master Class Thief
had the right to carry and weld. It was a symbol of his status within the
Guild, physical proof of all that he had learned and labored for.

And that *dog* had buried in the yard like it was some used up corpse.

Remy whimpered.

*

Remy sat on the back porch and watched Jean, Rogue, Betsy, Storm, Warren and
Bobby play volleyball. While he had no desire to mess up what he had with
Logan, he didn't see anything wrong with sitting back and admiring the view.
In fact, Remy was certain that if Logan were here at the Mansion, he'd be
sitting beside Remy and enjoying it with him.

The only thing that marred his enjoyment of the whole thing was Sprinkles. In
the absence of her beloved Logan, she had latched onto the next best thing.
Her master's lover. She had spent the morning following him around like
a...well, like a puppy.

Remy could admit that she was a beautiful dog. Long silky golden fur, big
soft eyes and she just bubbled with enthusiasm and happiness. Everyone adored
her. It wasn't even that Remy *didn't* like her. He just...didn't understand
her. At all. She was a big, clumsy, chewing, slobber machine that didn't ever
listen to anything he told her. She was...

~bonk~

...spilling over his bottle of beer and happily slurping up the amber liquid
pouring out onto the porch.

"Argh! No! Sprinkles, no!"

Reaching out, Remy grabbed up his beer bottle and pulled it away. Sprinkles
ignored him and kept drinking. He tried to shoo her away, but she just
shifted over a bit and kept lapping up the spilled beer. A tiny voice inside
of Remy's head wondered if beer was bad for puppies. He didn't think his
lover would be happy to come home to find out that the dog was ill. How would
he explain that anyway? 'Sorry, cher. I didn't mean to poison your dog.' Oh
yeah, that would go over well.

Mild panic building up inside his chest, Remy scooped Sprinkles up into his
arms and hurried to the Med-Lab. Hank would know what to do.

*

It was Thursday night. Poker night. The night when Remy sat down at a table
and fleeced his lover, Hank, Scott, Warren, and Bobby for their money. It was
a tradition...one of his favorites. Better than Sunday night pot-roast, no
matter how much Logan insisted the opposite.

Already grinning in anticipation of the upcoming event, Remy reached into the
special inside pocket of his trench coat where his 'lucky' deck of cards
lived and grabbed a big old handful of nothing. His lucky deck was...gone.

A frown of confusion stealing over his face, Remy turned in a slow circle
even as he tried to remember the last place where he'd pulled the deck out of
his pocket. Like a light coming on inside his head, he recalled shuffling his
lucky deck while listening to Jeannie lecture him and Bobby about chasing
each other around the house in a game of full powers tag. He winced just
thinking about that fiasco. It wasn't like he *meant* to bust that vase, and
besides, it wasn't his fault. Bobby had started it, Gambit had merely
finished it.

Mentally reviewing just how unfair that particular lecture had been while
reassuring himself that he really *wasn't* to blame, Remy made his way into
the formal living room. And there, on the polished end table that was
conspicuously vase-free was...only one single card out of a deck of 52.
Reaching out, Remy picked it up.

The ace of spades.

If Remy were a superstitious man, that would have given him the shivers.
Frowning in confusion, he turned around to leave again when something caught
the corner of his eye. Turning back, Remy bent over slightly and peered
behind the large overstuffed leather wingback chair. And gasped in horror.

There, in a patch of warm sunshine was Sprinkles, laying in the middle of a
pile of chewed up, bent, slobbered on poker cards. His *lucky* deck of cards.
Ruined. Destroyed. Murdered by a fluffy puppy with cute brown eyes and a
waggly tail.

"LOGAN!"

*

~WOLVERINE!~

Cyclops' voice echoed endlessly in the tiled space of the men's locker room,
effectively drowning out the sounds of the showers. Grumbling about bad
timing and his distinct lack of TK, Remy strode bare-ass naked out of the
shower and over to the intercom panel. Irritated, he pushed the button harder
then needed.

"De homme ain't here Scotty. Y' missed him by 'bout an hour. He won't be back
till Monday. You did know that he's gone to visit de petite at de Academy dis
weekend, oui?"

A muffled curse was his answer and Remy grinned. Idly, he wondered what his
lover had done to cheese off their team leader this time.

~Fine. Then *you* get up here and clean up Sprinkles' mess. And do it. Right.
Now!~

Closing his eyes and leaning back against the cool tile wall, Remy tried to
figure out how he'd gotten himself into this situation. He didn't even like
dogs. In fact, he distinctly remembered asking for a *cat*. Yet, somehow,
whenever Logan wasn't around, Remy became Sprinkles' owner by default.

Feeling more weary then anything else, Remy pushed the intercom button again.

"Wha' she do dis time?"

~She shit on the Persian rug in the Professor's Office.~

Remy's eyes widened in unmittigated horror. Oh, this was bad. Beyond bad.
This was not only gross, but it was going to hurt his wallet too.

Rushing through the remainder of his shower, Remy practiced all of the curse
words that he knew in both French and English.

*

"Ahhh! By the Goddess! NO!"

Like rats fleeing from a burning building, X-Men spilled from the Mansion at
a dead run and headed for the north garden at Storm's cry. It was with equal
parts relief and amusement when they discovered that the source of the Wind
Rider's anguish was not an attack by one of their many enemies, but a curious
and enthusiastic mud covered puppy in full digging mode.

Sprinkles had systematically dug up the majority of Storm's mums and was
halfway through the pansies as well. The garden that had once been Storm's
pride and joy was now a torn up, muddy mess filled with damaged and dying
plants, raggedly dug holes and haphazard piles of dirt strewn about.

Sprinkles herself looked like a sodden and pathetic dirt monster. The
normally golden and silky long fur hung in mud coated stringy tangles from
her muzzle, ears and underbelly. Remy didn't even want to think about the
state of her paws.

Silencing Bobby's snickers with a glare, Logan strode into the once
immaculate garden and scooped up Sprinkles.

"'Ro darlin', I'm real sorry about this. I tell ya what, let me clean
Sprinkles up a bit an' then I'll take ya down ta that new Lawn an' Garden
Warehouse ya been wantin' ta visit. Ya know, the one with the nursery
attached?"

Remy silently cheered his lover on. He loved Storm like a sister, but she did
have a bit of a temper on her. The promise of new plants seemed to be calming
her down. At least, if the fact that the sun was starting to once more poke
through the boiling dark clouds overhead was any indication. She was still
scowling, however, and her arms were crossed over her chest.

Logan swallowed, glanced sideways at him quickly and Remy felt that little
tingle of apprehension that warned him that something bad was about to
happen.

"Come on now, 'Ro. Don't be too angry with Sprinkles. She's just a pup."

Storm didn't relax her stance...or her frown.

"Remy will stay here and...uh, clean this mess up a bit. Ya know, get it all
set up for planting while we're out at the plant store."

Betrayed! By his own lover! Instantly, Remy's jaw dropped down, the words to
refuse on the very tip of his tongue. He bit them back, however, when Storm's
eyes locked onto him. Instead of flatly refusing, he found himself nodding
his head stupidly in agreement.

"Sure t'ing. You know dat Remy'd do anyt'ing fo' his Stormy."

Storm just regally nodded her head once.

"Fine. Remy, once you are done removing all of these...damaged plants, you
will find some fresh fertilizer in my gardening shed. Please use it to fill
in the holes Sprinkles dug up and level out the ground once again. Oh, and do
not call me Stormy."

Remy tried not to let his shoulders slump down dejectedly as he envisioned
spending the rest of the afternoon knee deep in chemically enhanced cow shit.
He glared at Sprinkles evilly.

"Oui, Stormy."

*

Remy was a firm believer in the use of lots of cheyenne pepper when making
his infamous four alarm chili. The creation of this dish often resulted in a
lively debate over whether or not it was too hot. The division seemed to be
split along the gender lines with the men all firmly on Remy's side. Despite
the fact that Remy sort of enjoyed being the instigator of a reoccurring mini
battle of the sexes, he really only made his chili for one reason and one
reason only. Logan liked it. A lot.

However, as he stood there in the middle of the night with his head hanging
out of their bedroom window to try and gasp in some blessedly fresh air, Remy
swore on all the Saints that a) he'd never make his infamous chili again and
that b) he was going to kill Bobby Drake.

Turning his head slightly so that he could glare at the gassy little fur
coated fart machine and the man that was obliviously snoring through this
biochemical attack, Remy marveled once again that Logan could sleep through
Sprinkles' chili farts with his heightened senses when Remy's own eyes were
watering and his sinuses were threatening to sue him for abuse. And what
demon had possessed Bobby into thinking that it was a good idea to feed a dog
a bowl of screaming hot chili, anyway?

Sprinkles let loose with another sonic boom and Remy stuffed his head back
out the bedroom window again.

*

Grinning, Remy threw the tennis ball one more time. The little fuzzy round
object zipped across the sky to land behind a bunch of bushes. Like a golden
blur, Sprinkles dashed off after it, her tail wagging almost as fast as her
long legs were running. With a burst of enthusiasm, she dived into the bush
after her favorite toy.

A flash of pride washed over Remy as he mentally patted himself on the back
for starting to get the whole 'dog as a pet' idea. This game of fetch was
sort of fun...once you got passed the whole slobber on the ball thing. He
just made sure that when he took the ball back from her that he grabbed it
with the fingers that were covered by his glove. He also had to keep in mind
to *not* charge the stupid thing, which wasn't as easy as it sounded. It was
a force of habit to charge up stuff before he threw it, but he hadn't blown
up his lover's dog yet, so that was a good thing.

The bushes rustled violently for a moment and then with a flash of golden
fur, Sprinkles raced back over to Remy's side, her tail wagging so hard from
side to side that she nearly knocked herself off balance. Chuckling at her
antics, Remy reached down and stretched out his hand, palm up. Prancing
slightly and obviously pleased with herself, Sprinkles leaned her big head
over Remy's hand and opened her jaws. A wet plop hit Remy's gloved hand.

There was just enough time for the mini thought, 'dat's not de ball' to flash
through Remy's mind before he looked down to see a dead baby bunny sitting in
the palm of his hand. It had been a long time since his gross-out factor had
been tested, but this whole situation had managed to do just that. Eyes
locked onto the bloody mess in his hand and his face twisted in horror, Remy
did the only thing he could. He screamed.

"LOGAN!"

*

It hadn't been a *very* difficult mission, as far as those things go, but
Remy still wanted nothing more than to peel himself out of his uniform, enjoy
a nice hot shower...preferably one with a wet soapy Logan in it, and then
slip into bed and sleep for the next twenty-four hours. He was actually
headed in that direction when his comm-unit crackled.

~Wolverine. Gambit. Get down to the kitchen and get your dog. Now. And clean
up the damn mess.~

Coming to a stop and slapping his hand up against his face, he began
muttering dire threats in French even as he turned on his heal and followed
his lover back down the stairs and into the kitchen. As soon as they stepped
through the door they both came to a complete stop in order to stare about
the room in shock.

Sprinkles stood with her tail between her legs and her head hanging low in
the classic 'I'm a bad dog and I know it' position. All around her, the
contents of the overturned garbage can lay strewn about. Coffee grounds,
orange peels and apple cores lay mixed with broken egg shells, empty pasta
boxes and some slimy brown substance that Remy didn't want to try and
identify. Half of the stuff had bite marks in it.

"Rem? I'll sweep this mess up if you'll fill up the bucket with hot soapy
water."

Nodding and sighing, Remy took off his trench coat and hung it over one of
the kitchen chairs. He then grabbed the bucket from Logan when his lover
pulled it out of the cleaning supply closet set off to one side of the room.
Taking it, he walked through Sprinkles' mess and over to the sink. Remy
turned on the water to hot and began to fill it. He was just about to add
some of that Mr Clean stuff when he heard a harsh gagging sound behind him.
Spinning around, he watched with an odd sense of unreality as Sprinkles
suddenly threw-up all over his beloved trench coat.

Remy whimpered.

*

Somehow, he'd never really thought that it'd all end this way. Not that he'd
ever underestimated Mr. Sinister after getting burned so badly by the
scientist, but he had always figured that he'd go down when he was alone. Not
when he was surrounded by his teammates. Yet, here he was, bent over
backwards across the ugliest piece of garden statuary on the Mansion's
grounds with one of Mr. Sinister's hands wrapped around his throat while his
other hand prepared to stick him with an injection of some unknown chemical.

Out of nowhere, a streak of gold flew in from behind Sinister and slammed
into his back, knocking him off of Remy and onto the ground. Growling,
snarling and snapping in his face, Sprinkles stood on Sinister's chest with
her hackles raised. With a hollow chuckle, Sinister swept her away with one
large arm. Sprinkles went sailing through the air and slammed into a nearby
tree.

"Sprinkles! No!"

Not even thinking, merely reacting, Remy was suddenly flinging a double
handful of charged playing cards directly into Sinister's face. Then a blast
of blinding red light sizzled passed him to slam into Sinister's chest and
Cyclops was there beside him. Together they hammered at him while the rest of
the team tackled and destroyed the remaining Marauders. Finally, Sinister
turned tail and ran, opening a tesseract and stepping through it.

Ignoring his team leader, Remy ran directly over to the unmoving mass of
golden fur. Gently scooping Sprinkles up in his arms, he turned and dashed
for the Med-Lab. After handing her over to Hank, he paced back and forth in
front of Logan.

"Darlin'. Calm down. She's gonna be fine. Hank's takin' care of her right
now."

Remy shrugged slightly.

"You don' understand, cher. She saved my life. Sinister was dis close to
stickin' me wit' one of his crazy potions when she just leaped onto his
back."

A slight grin crossed his face for a moment.

"You'd 'ave been proud of her, cher. She was all growlin' and flashin' her
teeth, just like her master, oui?"

Logan snorted and nodded.

"Yeah. She's a good girl, our Sprinkles is."

A light went on in his brain and Remy realized for the first time that
Sprinkles was *their* dog...not just Logan's, but *their's*. What's more, he
suddenly understood what made 'dog-people' prize their pets so much. It was
that devoted loyalty and bravery, the willingness to step between their owner
and danger, no matter what the cost. *That* was what made all of the other
stuff worth it.

Then Hank was there, a toothy smile on his furry blue face.

"Gentlemen. I'm pleased to announce that our brave little canine friend is
going to be just fine. She strained a ligament in her front left leg and
bruised a few of her ribs, but that is nothing that a few weeks of TLC and
rest can't take care of."

Remy let out a big sigh of relief.

"Oh, merci Dieu."

"Would you like to go in a see her? I've given her a little something for the
pain, so she might be a bit sleepy."

Remy didn't even wait for Hank to finish speaking. Walking passed him, he
pushed open the door to the main Med-Lab and strode directly to the Golden
Retriever curled up on a soft blanket in the corner. Kneeling down, he
scratched her head behind her soft fluffy ear.

"How's Gambit's little furry heroine, eh?"

Sprinkles lifted her head and looked at him with her big brown eyes. Then she
stretched her neck forward and licked him up the side of his face, coating
him liberally with dog drool.

"Ewww!"

THE END