Ten Miles Across the Limit

There were very few cars on the road; unsurprising, as it was the middle of the day on a Wednesday. Rogue drove fast with the sunroof open, listening to hip hop because it was good for driving and it was the only musical genre on which she and Pyro could agree.

Pyro was looking out of the window, singing under his breath along with the radio. They were a few hours away from their most recent hideout, which she didn't particularly like. Rogue missed the ocean, and found nothing at all appealing in the flat, uninspiring Midwestern landscape.

The scenery on their trek home was the same, mile after boring mile. Another farm, another modular home dealership (where she was from, they were called "trailers"), another truck stop with enough lighting to land a Learjet. Between it all were flat fields dotted occasionally with cows and bales of hay.

Boring.

"How long do you think we have to stay here?" Pyro asked, as if he were reading her mind. Rogue wondered what it was like where he was from originally. She thought he was from Connecticut, but she didn't know for sure.

"Don't know," Rogue said, watching the speedometer climb up to nearly eighty. She forced herself to slow down to avoid getting pulled over. She's seen Pyro's way of dealing with cops, and they were supposed to be traveling "under the radar."

That likely didn't include explosions.

"We almost there?" Pyro asked, and Rogue looked at him exasperatedly. "What?" he said, stretching and drumming his fingers on the dashboard.

"Are you just going to ask me questions the rest of the way? Like, annoying ones?"

"Yeah. That was my plan." He grinned at her. "They shouldn't send us out to do stuff together that requires a car ride home that's longer than two hours. I have too much energy and you're too quiet."

Rogue laughed, liking the way the breeze felt in her hair. "Afraid I might kill you and leave you on the side of the road?"

"Ooh, tough girl," he mocked. She could see his Zippo clutched in one hand, as if the silver was molded to his very flesh.

"If you're gonna torment me with questions, at least make them more interesting," she said, rolling her neck back and forth. Her muscles were stiff after so much driving and sleeping the last two nights in rest stop parking lots. Who said being the villain was glamorous?

Who said we were the villains? Erik's voice was a slight whisper in her mind. It made her smile.

"Okay. But whatever I ask, you have to answer," Pyro said evilly, smirking at her. He wasn't as good at smirking as Erik was, so she just rolled her eyes.

"I don't make those kinds of promises, Pyro." She gave him a sidelong glance and then sighed. "Fine. Go."

"You still have the hots for Logan?"

Of all the things she expected him to ask, that was not it. "That's a weird question. I mean, do I still think he's hot?" She grinned at him. "'Course I do. Don't you?"

"Well, yeah. He has claws," Pyro responded, as if that should be obvious. "Bobby thought you were in love with him."

"Everyone thought that. I had a crush on him, I admit it. I had him in my head." She shook her head. "But no, I didn't love Logan. I mean, beyond anything platonic for saving my life." There was still guilt, a little, at how she'd repaid him for that. She wondered what would happen if they ever saw each other again, but forcibly pushed that thought from her mind.

Pyro shrugged, either unaware of her brief mental angst, or nice enough not to bring it up. Knowing him, it was likely the former. "Fair enough. Your turn."

"You ever kissed a girl?" she asked, feeling ridiculous. She wasn't used to sharing—or soliciting—such confidences.

"Yeah. Lucy Thomas. Eighth-grade dance. I thought I liked her, but I think I liked her boyfriend." Pyro smiled briefly. "She tasted like cigarettes."

"Kissing other boy's girlfriends?" She smiled despite herself. "Why doesn't that surprise me?"

"We'll never know, because now it's my turn." He clicked the lighter a few times before proceeding. "You and Bobby ever get beyond first base?"

Rogue hoped the sunlight coming in from the window hid her blush. "No, never."

"Never? God, I almost got past first base with him when we played basketball." Pyro grinned, the edges tinted with malice, though she didn't think it was directed at her. "Sucks for you."

"Yeah, well. What can you do?"

"Don't know. Does it bother you, about Magneto?"

"Hey," she said, affronted, swerving a bit to miss a deer lying in the middle of the road. "Isn't it my turn?"

"You said, and I quote, what can you—"

"Hypothetical!" Rogue interjected, waving a gloved hand. "I want to hear about you kissing boys." She grinned. "Who was the first one?"

Pyro smirked. "Lucy Thomas' boyfriend, eighth-grade dance."

Rogue threw her head back and laughed. "You're impossible. And are you lying to me? Boys don't kiss other boys in the eighth grade—do they?" At his look, she gave up. "Guess I went to a boring junior high school."

"Yeah, well, we all can't go to schools with sexually confused fourteen year olds," Pyro said wisely, and Rogue giggled. "Now, answer my question."

"Does what bother me about Magneto? That he tried to kill me?"

Pyro shook his head. "Nah. I figured you'd worked that out already or you wouldn't have joined up. I mean, since—you know. He likes guys, too."

Rogue thought about that. "Not really. It's sort of hard to explain it, but—he's in my head, right? And he's a lot older than I am, so logically I know he's…um…been around more." She winced at how that sounded and kept going. "I knew about him and the Professor after Liberty Island, so I've known about that since I got here, before we…you know." She absolutely could not use the phrase "hooked up". It sounded so…wrong.

"Did you ever tell anyone? About Magneto and the Professor? I didn't know that until Mystique told me." Pyro flipped his lighter open and shut again, rubbing his palm over the top. "Bet that would shock a lot of them."

"No. I didn't. It just…not something you bring up in conversation. 'Hey, did you know that the Professor and Magneto were lovers?' I think I almost told Kitty once when she was asking if the Professor went out on dates ever, but I didn't."

"Why?" Pyro was looking at her curiously.

"Don't know. I'm good at keeping secrets, I guess," she said with a shrug.

Pyro actually gave her an affectionate pat on the head, likely remembering that she'd never mentioned to Bobby how his best friend had had a crush on him. "Yeah. You are. Your turn."

She cautiously asked her next question, because she really was curious. "Does it bother you…about Gambit? Liking girls?"

Pyro shrugged. "Sometimes. Not usually. I mean, he obviously likes guys, too." He smiled, and Rogue resisted pointing out the sort of dopey look he had on his face. Pyro was clearly enamored by his lover. "But it's… what if it's a phase," he said, and she heard the undercurrent of worry in his voice. "Then what?"

She was touched he was sharing confidences with her, and knowing Pyro, it might have been the reason he brought all this up in the first place. God forbid he just ask.

"One time I asked Erik if it bothered him that I was so much younger than he was, since it's not…very acceptable," she said slowly, thinking best how to phrase what she wanted to say. "And he said that we weren't human, and that human laws didn't matter or apply to us. Maybe liking one gender is a human construct, too. Maybe we've evolved past it. Do you ever…" she blushed, suddenly unable to ask. If Pyro didn't like girls, she didn't want him to feel like that made him any less a mutant. "Never mind. It's your turn." She concentrated very hard on the road.

"It's okay, Rogue. You can ask." He flicked the lighter briefly, the flame sparked up quick and hot. She could feel a small brush of heat on her cheek. "And I don't know. Gambit said—" he cut off, coughing. "He said if I wanted to try—with a girl—we could, um, you know. Find someone."

She raised an eyebrow as she saw him blushing from the corner of her eye. "Yeah? Who? Mystique?"

"Um…" Pyro grinned suddenly and then winked at her. "I'm sure that's who he meant."

Flustered, she couldn't look at him. "And, it's your turn!"

"Did you love Bobby?"

"I thought I did," she said quietly, slowing down as the speed limit changed to sixty. They were nearing a town, which was good, because they needed gas and Rogue was tired of driving.

"You know, you never acted like yourself around him. You were always really quiet."
Pyro braced his feet on the dashboard. Rogue remembered that she used to do that in car trips with her mother, but she was always told to stop because if they got in an accident she could break her legs.

She resisted the urge to point this out to him. "I am quiet. Even around Magneto."

"Yeah, but you're more…I don't know. Yourself—at least, the you I know since you came here. You don't seem so tense, even though you sometimes look like you're terrified of Magneto."

Rogue scowled. "I'm not terrified of him. Why would you think that?"

Pyro shrugged. "Hey, it's okay. Maybe you like that. You do whatever he says—"

"We all do whatever he says," Rogue interrupted, slightly miffed, but Pyro laughed.

"Dude, Rogue. I do whatever Gambit wants, okay? Hello, you're not the only subby bitch in the car."

At that, she turned around and hit him on the shoulder. "Ah! I can't believe you just said that." Her face felt like it was on fire. She'd been hopeful that Pyro's little game of twenty questions wouldn't be to ask her horribly personal things that made her blush. Not because she cared about him knowing, but she hated that he'd feel superior at how uncomfortable she got discussing it.

"Watch where you're going, and whatever. You know it's true. Trust me, I recognize the type." He laughed, fingers rolling the lighter, which glinted in the late afternoon sun.

Rogue couldn't look at him, but suddenly she started giggling. "Oh," she said, laughing harder. "If you're right—and I'm not saying you are--then I guess that explains a few things."

"Yeah, like why Bobby would have made a lousy boyfriend for either of us?" Pyro started laughing, too. "Cause he wasn't dominating enough?"

"Well, then, why'd you want him?"

"Cause he's hot?" Pyro responded dryly, as if she were being obtuse on purpose.

"Yeah, he is," she agreed, because there was no sense lying about that. "I had a crush on you when I first got to Xavier's," she said suddenly. She thought about what he said, about being dominant. Pyro could be assertive when he needed to be—Boston was a clear example of that—but she'd never use the word describe him. "Though it went away after I got to know you."

"Gee, thanks," Pyro said dryly, but he smiled so she knew he wasn't offended. "Maybe you picked up on the whole 'I like boys' thing earlier than you think you did."

"Or maybe you're too much of a subby bitch for me," she said sweetly.

"Probably, and likewise. Hey, can we stop? Your driving is making me sick because you pump the gas too much, and I need a Dr. Pepper. I'll even buy you a Coke for playing the answer game."

She glared at him for the disparaging remarks about her driving, but took the next exit anyway, headed towards a QT station. They went about filling the car up and purchasing sodas with the expertise of those who have been traveling together for a while—a well choreographed routine.

Once they were settled in the car and Pyro had complained about how far she put the seat up, she looked out as the sun began to dip below the horizon. It was sort of prettier at night, the landscape, if one could ignore all the billboards.

When it became full dark, she shivered a little as the temperature dropped.

"Want me to close the sunroof?" Pyro asked, turning to her. "You look kinda cold."

"Only if you want to." She liked the caress of the wind on her bare skin, even though it was chilly.

"I have a high body temperature, remember? But if you want, my jacket's in the back."

Rogue reached back and pulled his leather jacket up front, curling beneath it, though she pulled the gloves off and tucked them next to her in the seat. She liked the feel of the leather, soft between her hands. "Thanks," she said, smiling easily at him.

He smiled back. She'd rarely seen Pyro so relaxed. "No problem."

Rogue propped her feet up on the dashboard, just like her mother always told her not to, and tilted her head back to look up at the stars.