Chapter 78: Logan and His Bottomless Glass
Silence in the office.
Tony watched Logan help himself to a second glass of iced whiskey, unprompted, and registered this with a look of faint surprise.
Before Matthew could speak, Tony did. "So you're telling me you came all the way here just to adopt a child from an orphanage?"
He was having genuine trouble following the logic.
If you wanted to adopt a child, you went to the orphanage. That was a standalone institution. It wasn't inside a corporation.
And beyond that, why would you bring this kind of errand to the director of a publicly listed company?
There was also the fact that Logan's general bearing had nothing in common with someone who had come to adopt a child. It had considerably more in common with someone who had come to collect something they considered already theirs.
Logan took a sip of the iced whiskey and settled onto the sofa.
The moment he sat down, he felt himself sink in a way his beat-up car seat had never once managed.
He addressed Tony's question with a nod. "That's correct. I'm here for the child named Nikki and nothing else."
"So. When can we start the adoption process?"
"I have all the required documents with me."
He pulled the paperwork from inside his jacket.
From where Logan was sitting, there was no conceivable obstacle to this. Orphanages existed precisely to provide for children who needed care. Adoption reduced the institution's financial burden and gave the child a more stable life. He genuinely could not picture the man in the wheelchair saying no.
That was exactly what happened.
"I don't know what your reasons are for wanting to adopt, but I'm sorry. I can't approve this request." Matthew said it without any particular heat.
Logan frowned. "Why?"
Matthew answered patiently. "Our Nursery provides education, medical care, and general living standards that are well above anything you'd find at a comparable institution. That's intentional. The goal is for every child there to feel like they're actually at home."
"I believe a child raised with this kind of support, with access to better education and a stable foundation, is better positioned to make a real contribution to the world than one placed with a private household, however well-intentioned."
"And additionally..."
Matthew's tone shifted slightly.
"I believe your motives aren't what you've presented."
The phrase landed in the room.
On the sofa, Tony's eyebrow went up. He sat a little straighter.
A thought had arrived, and with it, a visual that he immediately wished hadn't formed.
A man who looked roughly in his mid-thirties. Wanting to adopt a young girl. By name.
In America, this kind of story had a well-known shape.
Tony looked at Logan, and some of what had been open curiosity in his expression had become something considerably less neutral.
"...Now that you put it that way, I'm also not sure about your motives."
Logan said nothing for a moment.
What exactly were these people imagining?
Why were they looking at him like that?
He had helped himself to two glasses of whiskey. He hadn't taken anything.
"To be clear," Matthew continued, "what I mean by impure motives has nothing to do with that."
"What I'm asking is: why specifically Nikki? Which makes me wonder whether you know something I should be aware of." He said it without glancing at Tony. The implication was deliberate.
Logan read the room immediately. This man knew something. The performance of subtlety wasn't going to get either of them anywhere.
"Yes. I do know something." He held Matthew's gaze.
"And since you clearly know something too, then you also understand that she's not entirely safe staying here."
"If her ability goes out of control again because of her emotional state or gaps in her development, that's not something you'd be equipped to manage."
"And you are?" Matthew's expression stayed even.
"She'd be safer with us," Logan said, with a directness that didn't quite become a challenge. "And we're the same kind of people. We have experience looking after someone like her."
"Is that right. Prove it."
"...Like this."
Shk.
A flash of silver.
The whiskey bottle on the table beside Logan separated into four clean pieces and sat there, severed, the cut edges smooth enough that they might have been poured that way. No ragged glass, no scattered shards.
Logan withdrew the claws back between his knuckles, calm as someone putting down a pen, and lifted the remaining section of the bottle to finish what was left in it.
This confirmed one thing: the man had never had good whiskey before in his life. He just kept going when he saw it.
For Logan, producing the claws was about as remarkable as checking his watch. He had occasionally used them to shave. But Tony, seeing it for the first time, went completely still.
In the space of roughly half a second he had assessed what he was looking at, identified that the man in front of him was not a normal person, snapped his faceplate down, and had the repulsor trained at Logan.
Logan saw the repulsor and didn't move. He gave Tony a slow, easy wave. "Easy. I have no interest in going after Iron Man. For the record."
He didn't think much of the name. As nicknames went, it was exactly as bad as he'd said. But this person had been out there helping ordinary people deal with the Devil's Gang. That counted for something. He had no quarrel with that.
Tony held the repulsor where it was for another moment.
Then, reading that Logan had made no move to follow up, he lowered it.
The faceplate stayed down.
He glanced sideways at Matthew, whose expression had not changed in any observable way since the claws came out.
"Matthew," Tony said quietly. "Going by your face... you already knew people like him existed?"
"I just found out," Matthew said.
Tony accepted this and turned to study Logan with renewed attention, apparently looking for whatever it was that set him apart from ordinary people.
Logan, for his part, ignored the scrutiny entirely. He crossed one leg over the other and settled deeper into the sofa.
"So. Can I take her now?"
"I'm afraid not."
"Why? Don't you understand the risk she poses in a city environment?"
"I understand it very well." Matthew gave a slight shrug. "But that's not the deciding factor. What matters is whether she wants to go with you."
"I think you'd agree that a person isn't an object. My permission alone doesn't make Nikki something that can be transferred from one party to another like a transaction."
"If you want to put the question to her, I can have her brought here. You ask her directly."
"If Nikki wants to go with you, I give you my word there won't be any interference from my side."
"And if she doesn't want to, you don't get to push."
"How does that sound?" Matthew looked at Logan with a mild smile.
Faced with that, Logan had no useful counterargument. He gave a single nod.
"Fine. Call her."
"Hold me to it if I change my mind."
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