Title: Rogue's Hunter Rewrite

Author: Knife Hand

Feedback: Constructive feedback appreciated, flames unappreciated

Spoilers: First Three Seasons of Buffy and the original X-Men Movie.

Rating: M

Disclaimer: I do not own Buffy or X-men, obviously.

Summary: After losing everything at Graduation, Xander finally finds his power and it still marks him as an outcast. Now he must travel clear across the country to find a place where he will fit in, and maybe even a new family.

A/N: This is a complete rewrite of my original Rogue's Hunter from 18 years ago. While the broad strokes are going to be the same, it will be a different, and hopefully much better, story.

It was barely dawn and Xander was sitting cross-legged on the grass in the grounds of the school in front of the main building, watching the sky turn from black to pink to red and on through to blue. After so long fighting the dark, watching the sun rise was a pleasure he indulged as often as he could, and certainly more so since Graduation. Once the actual orb of the sun peaked over the eastern horizon, the moment of enjoying passed and he moved. Rising to his feet, Xander's hands ran automatically over himself to check his weapons. He was never without a weapon anymore… or more accurately he was never without several weapons. He was not wearing his jacket, so almost all of his weapons were visible.

The shoulder holster with his pistols and magazines was in place, but this time the sheath at the back of the holster which held his Machete with the hilt between his shoulder blades and the blade down his back. Not only was it a dependable weapon, on a few occasions it had saved his life by acting like spinal armour. His three knives were in place on his left hip, right ankle and the small of his back. There were also a pair of stakes at his back on either side of the knife there. On his right hip were what, on first glance, looked like three unsharpened stakes, but at second glace the forward length had a longer and wider sheath indicating a blade attached to one end of it.

Taking a broad stance, Xander deftly drew the three lengths in a single motion and in two more deft moves connected the three lengths together to form a spear, which he held motionless at an angle in front of him. The shaft of the spear made of hardwood with the head of the spear being steel plated in sliver, as was the heavy and slightly sharpened butt plate on the bottom of the spear, making it effective against several species of Demon as well as Vampires. The connecting mechanism was a simple rotating locking system making the weapon very sturdy when assembled but also easy to assemble and disassemble. Xander had found the spear amongst Giles' belongings when he had cleaned out the Watcher's apartment after Graduation. It had been in a stack of packages, mostly books, that had not been sorted since the Watcher had received them.

After almost a minute standing completely still, Xander began to move in a rapid series of thrusts, blocks and sweeping strikes. Anyone who was familiar with using a spear would not recognise the style because Xander had no real formal training. He had found a few beginner instruction pamphlets in Giles' gear, which had shown him a few basic stances and moves, but most of his style had developed the hard way, in combat, and then he had developed the training moves to hone the attacks and defences that had worked in battle.

Lost in the motions of his training, Xander just reacted when he heard the scuff of a shoe behind him, turning with a strike that he only just managed to pull at the last second. Rogue was standing there, having stepped back to avoid the strike but not panicking and the blade only a few inches from her neck.

"Sorry." Xander said, withdrawing the spear and planting the butt on the ground. "Kind of a reflex reaction."

"Hey, ya didn't stab me through the chest with claws, so no harm." Rogue replied. "I only came out because all the other students were staring and wondering who you are."

Looking over at the mansion, Xander could see the faces of dozens of children and teens staring out of windows at him. The only adult Xander could see was Logan, who was standing at the open door to the mansion in the direction Rogue had come from. Logan seemed amused. Xander followed Rogue across the lawn and into the mansion.

"Nice moves, kid." Logan said as they passed.

Rogue led him to a large dining room that was quickly filling with teens. They got in line and picked up trays of food from the counter before Rogue led them over to sit with three other teens. One was a dark haired boy, one a blond haired boy and the other a brown haired girl.

"Hunter, this is Bobby, John and Kitty." Rogue said. "Everyone this is Hunter."

"I'm Iceman." Bobby, the dark haired boy, said. "They are Pyro and Shadow Cat. So, Hunter your birth name or your real name?"

"It's what my prey called me." Xander replied. "Before they… go to pieces."

"Yeah, well I think that spear would assist with that." John, AKA Pyro, snarked.

"It does tend to drive the point home." Xander admitted.

"Xander, Marie." Storm, the dark skinned and white haired woman from the day before, called from the entrance to the dining room. "The Professor wants to see you."

In the three weeks since Xander's arrival, Xander and Marie had begun hanging out a lot. Marie also hung out with her other friends, Bobby, John and Kitty, often with Xander, or rather Hunter, sitting on the periphery not really contributing. He finally understood what it was like to be Oz, being accepted in a tight nit group of friends only because you were associated with one of the core members.

Xander and Marie also spent a lot of time together alone as well. They studied, as the Professor had given Xander a series of tests and decided to get him up to speed with areas he was weak in; watched tv; exercised together; and just hung out together chatting. The main thing was that often Marie would remove either her gloves or would wear a shirt that left most of her arms bare, rather than her usual long sleaved shirts, and they would sit with the skin of their hands or arms touching each other.

It was Logan who found them together, sitting back to back studying with Xander bare chested and Marie in a sports top, their panted legs out in front of them simply enjoying the feel of human contact. Logan did idly notice the scars on the boy. One looked like someone had bitten his shoulder, a large round scar in his bicep and a number of small scars on his torso that looked like they came from either knives or claws.

For the first few days Logan and Xander had metaphorically growled and circled each other in regards to Marie. To Xander, who had always had as many or more female friends as male, Marie was a friend who had a need that only he could safely meet, so he happily did whatever was needed to help, like he had with cracking jokes and getting donuts for Buffy. To Logan, Marie was like a little sister and he would do anything to look out for her. Once Xander and Logan had made it clear to each other that Marie's wellbeing and choice was both of their top priority the two had gotten on much better. Hell, at times, Logan even liked the Kid.

"Hunter, The Professor wants to see you. Rogue's invited too, if she wants to come." Logan announced before leaving Marie's room.

Both Xander and Marie hurried to get fully dressed before they made their way through the halls to the Professor's Office.

"Ah, Xander, good." Professor Xavier said as they entered. "Good to see you too, Marie."

The red-haired Doctor Jean Grey was standing beside the Professor.

"Xander, we have finished our examination and determined most of your power set, though additional powers may manifest later." Professor Xavier explained.

Both the Professor and Doctor Grey had been doing both medical and psychic examinations on him to try and figure out his powers.

"Physically, you are in top shape. You have slightly elevated muscle density and muscle twitch speed and a minor healing factor, though none of those are anywhere near Wolverine's abilities." Doctor Grey began. "There is no evidence of your Mutant Powers enhancing your reaction speed, but you are at the upper end of the hand-eye reaction speed scale for regular Humans. Not unprecedented but extremely rare."

"Not really that surprised by the reaction speed, I guess. You can't fight things that are about four times stronger and faster than a regular human without good reaction speeds." Xander mused.

"Your main power, however, is a bit of a counter to Marie's." The Professor continued. "You have the ability to transfer your own energy into another. Mostly you have developed an unconscious block on this ability but with training you will be able to do this at will. This ability also comes with a kind of defence to the unwanted addition or removal of life force energy from your body. This automatic defence is what prevents Marie's powers from draining you."

This also made a kind of sense to Xander, his mind flashing back to that night down in the Master's Lair. He had basically stopped performing CPR on Buffy's body, simply sitting there with his hands on her chest and he had felt slightly tired, under the devastating feeling of helplessness, when her eyes had just snapped open. It also kind of explained Ampata, the Incan Mummy Princess who was stealing life force from students to survive, but she did not drain him.

"We will give you a full breakdown of the test results, along with a summary, and the Professor will develop a training plan for you." Doctor Grey said.

Xander nodded and without another word, led Marie out of the office and back to Marie's room where Marie took Xander in her arms, sat them both down on her bed and just held him. This time it was Xander who needed the comfort.

TBC….