*Disclaiming of all claim*
U Can't Touch This
a FanFiction
It's not polite to steal someone's memories, powers, and life force. Especially if they're going to obsessively love you for it afterwards.
Chapter One
All things considered, the Xavier Institute for Higher Learning was a rather tranquil place, so when its mansion doors were suddenly blown off their hinges by a mad-raving southern woman armed with a baseball bat…
…Well, things kind of spiraled out of control.
Rogue's accent had a tendency to get real thick anytime she was overly emotional, nervous, or horny. In retrospect that's probably why things escalated as quickly as they did; since nobody could understand what the hell she was ranting on about! The bat brandishing hadn't helped much either.
Rogue waved the thing in the air, screaming for students to stay indoors at all costs and nervously slurring together a string of curse words. By the time Ororo had sprinted onto the scene and assessed the damage, (apparently Rogue had driven a 2000 Toyota Prius through the front doors) she was able to recognize Syrin's unconscious body drooling noiselessly in a heap of plaster and rubble.
"Rogue!" the weather witch practically choked. "What is the meaning of this? Why is Syrin unconscious?"
"I was forced to shut her up- violently!"
Ororo's gaze flicked from the goose egg sized bruise over the redhead's eye, to the baseball bat. Understanding began to dawn on her. Her eyes nearly bulged out of her face and for a minute she forgot the no-touching rule and shook Rogue roughly by the shoulders.
"Ouch! Damn girl," the southerner whined, breaking out of her hysteria with a wince and sobering to explain. "Awl' right, start getting' ev'ryone `ta safety! I got this Gawddamn stalker on my heels and I don't know what to do!" Another thing Rogue tended to slip into whenever she got emotional, nervous, or horny was talking way to fast.
Ororo just blinked, then took a long, meditative breath,"Rogue?"
"Yes Ma'am?"
"I need you to carefully -and calmly - explain to me what has happened here."
"Oh, Er… well Ma'am I `sorta dove my car through the front doors."
Again Ororo could only blink. "Why?"
"Because I'm bein' chased by the gawddamned Brotherhood!"
Ororo painfully tightened her grip on Rogue's shoulders, forcing the younger women to meet her hard stare. "Rogue," her voice thundered. "Why is the Brotherhood after you?" Her unnaturally blue eyes bore deep into the other girl's face, leveling her with the hardest no-nonsense glare Ororo could muster.
Rogue gulped. "Well, Ma'am you see… They're all in love with me."
Ororo blinked.
Her slender brows knit together in frustration as she processed the facts:
1. Chaos. Utter chaos.
2. There was a car-shaped hole gaping through the destroyed front doors.
3. A student was unconscious, cracked across the head with a baseball bat.
And apparently, this was all because 'the Brotherhood had fallen in 'love' with Rogue.'
The air surrounding them suddenly super-charged with electricity... and impatience.
"They fell in love with you?" Ororo mocked.
Rogue's features screwed together in an anguished expression. "Yes Ma'am I believe they did."
"In love?"
"Yes."
"With you?"
"YES!"
"So you drove a car through the front doors?!" The weather witch was trying, but failing, to get a grasp on the situation's limited logic.
Rogue thought about it for a second. "Actually Ma'am, it was a Prius."
Thankfully, a large gasp distracted Ororo from electrocuting Rogue to death at that precise moment.
Emma Frost strode onto the scene in her pointy heels, surveying the wrecked exterior wall and the two X-(wo)Men standing over Syrin's unconscious slump.
"WHAT THE HELL HAPPENED IN HERE?" She shrieked. Her stiletto's wobbling over the settling clouds of dust and wall bits as she stomped her bony legs towards her teammates.
Ororo gritted her teeth, piecing Rogue with a dagger like glare. "Apparently this one drove a car though the mansion!" she stated with venom.
"I already told you! It was a Prius!"
"-And then she knocked Syrin unconscious! With a baseball bat!"
Frost groaned, her manicured fingers mashing into the sides of her temples in effort to rub away her fast growing headache. "What I want to know is why this all happened." The icy-blonde hissed.
Rogue bit her lip and glanced at Ororo, but she found no sympathy in that stony face so she squared she shoulders and repeated her story.
"I drove a Pruis,-" she said, shooting her own indignant glare at `Ro. "-thorugh the wall `cause I didn't have time `ta parallel park! The gawddamned Brotherhood is on my heels so we need `ta get the kids outta' here before they arrive! Let's all just hop on the blackbird an-"
"The Brotherhood is after you and you led them here?" Emma cried, aghast.
"… Sorry?"
Emma's whole body trembled with fury. "And just why is the Brotherhood so intent on you in the first place?" she asked.
Rogue opened her mouth to explain, but Ororo beat her to the punch.
"Apparently," she ventured, sarcasm lacing her words, "They have all fallen madly in love with Rogue."
Now, Rogue was a mostly smart girl, and she certainly knew when she was being made fun of. "Not all of em'," she defended, to which Frost actually snorted. The black hearted bitch…
Emma Frost composed herself enough to manage a smile, but not in the happy sort of way. She never smiled in the happy way. It was more like in rueful distaste. "You mean to tell me," She stated slowly, the way someone speaks to an idiot, "that you destroyed all of this because you're being hunted down by lovesick members of the Brotherhood." She gestured towards the gaping hole where the mansion doors used to be just as a poorly timed chunk of drywall fell to the ground with a dusty puff. Emma scowled at it, than at the stripy haired girl who blushed with embarrassment.
Rogue threw her gloved hands up in exasperation and fought the temptation to use her bat on some blonde and white haired skulls. "Why can't ya'll believe me? I'm tellin' yah the Brotherhood is comin' and we need to get all the students evacuated! Like right now! So let's go, rapido! Andale,andale! Arriba, arriba!"
Ororo and Emma shared wary looks of distrust. Neither woman budged.
Rogue sighed. Fine, she thought, it's up to you and me trusty bat! She didn't know what she would've done, but all that mattered was in that exact moment they heard Avalanche's Russian voice calling them out with menace.
"SEND OUT THE ROGUE OR I VILL LEVEL PRECIOUS SCHOOL INTO DUST!" He boomed.
The weather witch and the telepath's eyes widened and Rogue was rewarded to see the haughty sneers wiped off their faces.
"See?" She crowed over the dumbfounded women. "I told you so!"
Ain't nothin' better than being proven right.
"I told you" Rogue cheered, feeling smug. "I was right but ya'll didn't believe me!'
"Now's not the time, Rogue!"
"Tch! I'm still right..." she muttered.
By now the entire school was aware of the fact that a potentially catastrophic member of the Brotherhood had targeted their home. The ground began to shake violently, almost as in applause to the new mutant's presence while the mansion walls swayed in a sleepy motion, like the hypnotic rocking of a charmed cobra.
"Wait… You're not gonna' give me over to em' are you?" Rogue asked, panic alive beneath her wide green eyes.
"I'm seriously considering it," Emma snarled. The younger women had the decency to blanch. Partly because she actually believed that Frost might make good on her sudo-threat, (but mostly because she suddenly remembered: this was the women they trusted to teach the kids ethics? Rogue visibly shuddered.)
"I didn't mean to!" Rogue wailed. "I didn't know my powers could work that way! Don't let em' take me back to that Ol' bastard! He's so… old, and wrinkled, and…Ugh!" She had literally started gagging while the other women stared at her in confusion.
"You mean Magneto?" Ororo asked, putting the pieces together.
"Yes!" This time Rogue actually did manage to sob. They could still hear Avalanche from beyond the threshold of the school's walls. "YOU VILL NOT HAND HER OVER? FINE! THE BROTHERHOOD VILL DIG HER BODY OUT OF RUBBLE!"
"What do we do about him?" Emma hissed. The first order of business had to be stopping the demolition-crazy-Russian-bulldozer-man currently threatening the school's foundation.
"I will face him," Ororo interjected. The frustrated wrinkles marring her face smoothed as a calm sense of resignation overcame her. She stoically rose to her feet to meet the adversary. Her eyes began to glow with an inner, white-hot fire as her powers levitated her off the floor. Tensed and poised, with her legs pointed underneath her and her arms raised skyward to that comfort and power she sought from the grey clouds, Storm seized the phantom tails of wind and redirected their currents to whip her long white braids like the living snakes of Medusa, billowing at her fingertips and rustling her clothes. She looked fearsome, like a vengeful goddess/Headmistress to whom only blood could satisfy. For a split second, Rogue actually felt sorry for poor Avalanche. The guy had this whole 'medieval pirate' thing going for him and had a tendency to wear a lot of metal…
Ah well. He probably deserved it.
She heard the lights sounds of their scrapping, then a deafening ZAP!, and an AAIIIIIEEeeeeeee!, and she knew instantly who had won the five second fight. Rogue could still hear the high pitched note of Avalanche's squeal ringing through her ears as electrical currents thrashed his body, just beyond her view. Ouch, she thought, poor guy…
Confident in Storm's ability to handle herself, the leftover women jumped to their feet, running through the school's infinite winding parlors and hallways clear to its opposite end at the mansion's hind exterior. Once there, they found Scott Summers, aka "Cyclops", completely donned in his black X-Men leathers and visor. When the Mansion walls had started to sway he'd immediately began organizing the partial evacuation of the student body. Students had gathered by the basketball court where the iconic Blackbird was rising from its metal sheath beneath layers of concrete, to be effectively used as a super-stylish getaway van should things take a turn for the worse and the school had to be abandoned.
"Cyclops!" Emma called out to him. He jogged over to their position, the visible bottom half of his face looked relieved to find them both seemingly unharmed. No limps, blood, or otherwise missing appendages…
"Emma!" He called out. "Rogue-? When did you get here?" For the last year or so Rogue had been acting as a liaison for the school, picking out new recruits amongst the countless mutants she came across on her day to day. Her job was to give aid to all mutant (and human) kind and offer the 'Xavier solution' to anyone who's mutations made 'blending in' impossible, or who lacked the necessary control to live safely around others.
While the Mansion was still 'technically' her home, she now mostly lived out of motel rooms and Camper Trucks. The other X-Men saw her a few times during the month, usually when she was escorting a new mutant to the school, but she never stayed more than a week. Just long enough to make sure the kids she dropped off were well-fitted. Otherwise the X-Men heard from her though sporadic and impersonal phone calls, which had grown fewer and far between in recent months.
Emma, prompt and objective, patiently gave him the run-down on the situation. "The Brotherhood is after Rogue," she explained quickly. "We're still trying to understand why."
"No! We DO know why! I told you why!" Rogue complained. She was alarmed by how quickly the urge to whollop on Emma could take over.
The blond scoffed, "Oh right, because they're all in love with you."
"Yes!" Rogue huffed, "because they're head over their gawddammed heels!" Emma just rolled her eyes, but Cyclops' jaw looked utterly perturbed. She sighed, she knew she'd have to explain herself again, so she sucked in a deep breath and let her story finally come out.
"Ya'll know I've been lookin' for a way to, er, 'fix' the whole skin thing right?"
They nodded.
She took a deep breath… and fought the urge to split her face with a grin.
" I did it." I confessed to them simply. Triumphantly.
The visor made it impossible to tell for sure, but she thought she saw Cyclops' eyebrow lift. "You… Did it?" he asked. He sounded confused, but also… eager. And full of hope for her. Rogue couldn't suppress the shy ghost of a smile that quirked her lips.
"Yeah Scott, I did it. I can control it now. Always could actually, I just didn't realize it." Slowly, hesitantly, she peeled the soft leather glove from her right hand. Then, asking permission with her eyes, she reached that hand towards his face- towards his exposed skin. He blanched, but then nodded with the almost imperceptible tilt of his head. It was all the invitation she needed. The Rogue sucked in a deep, measured breath and touched the pads of her fingers to the tip of his nose.
One second passed, then two, then five. "Got'cher nose." She laughed, tweaking it. Cyclops looked relieved and let go of the breath he'd been holding. It came out in a whoosh.
"Oh Rogue that's incredible!" he caroled, pulling her into a celebratory hug. Rogue couldn't help herself, she beamed.
Even Emma shared in his dumbfounded excitement. "How-?" she asked, her voice barely above a whisper in her hushed sense of awe.
Rogue's tinkling laughter lite up her face and she practically reverberated with excitement. "Ya'll know how I've got those ghosts in my head?" she asked, tapping a finger lightly to her forehead.
They nodded.
"Well, it turns out Magneto's mind was a wonderful teacher. I sort of just learned from his memories and adjusted his technique to work for me." She giggled. "It was easier than I ever dreamed it could be!"
They gaped at her, Cyclops appearing mildly alarmed. "You just, used their memories?" he asked slowly, "the different consciousnesses didn't overwhelm you?"
"At first they did." She replied honestly. "The Professor taught me to keep everything that wasn't 'mine' compartmentalized. I used to try to lock their presences away in an imaginary 'basement' my head. But that didn't work out to well, I mean, haven't ya'll seen what happens when someone tries to cage the Wolverine?"
Scott winced at the picture she was painting. She smiled sadly at him, she could tell by the thin line of his lip that he regretted the violent personalities she'd been forced to share brain space with.
"When I gave up tryin' to keep em' call contained," she continued, "-and I let em' loose, they all just sort of faded away on their own. They're kind of like memories that way. If I think of them they resurface, but they don't ravage my head anymore."
Nobody said anything for a while; a heavy silence hung around them as they considered the leaps and bounds Rogue had advanced in her ability. Emma was the first to break the silence with a new question.
"But the skin- how…?"
"Yeah, about that." Rogue blushed. "First time it triggered while I was…" the blush intensified. "Kissing. It was my first kiss and Xavier figured it was probably all the excitement ta' set me off. I was really messed up for a while 'cause he wound up in the hospital and I knew it was my all my fault. I'd somehow sucked the life right outta' him. I had all these new memories and feelings that shouldn'ta belonged to me. It was scary."
"The second time was when Logan accidently nicked me that first night at the mansion- Remember? I didn't even know for sure if my powers worked since I was too afraid to try anything. But I can remember thinkin' I was dyin' and then remembering Logan's nifty ability to heal…"
She coughed. "Ya'll get the picture. So that brings us to the third time: with Magneto. By then I'd just assumed it would happen again. I'd always assumed. One tiny touch and WHAM! I'd suck em' dry! And I guess since I thought that way it sorta' happened that way. But that's not actually how it works. I have to want it. It's kinda like flip-switch actually. If I turn it on, it's on. But I can turn it off now too!"
"I suppose that makes sense." Emma replied dubiously. "But it still doesn't explain how you managed to turn the Brotherhood into crazed lover boys."
"Oh right! That part! Well, while I was tryin' ta' figure out how to reclaim some of the powers I've borrowed- like how when I first touch someone I can use their abilities? It takes a lot of focus and poking around their memories to remember how it feels for them when they use their mutation. I think all that poking around somehow… triggered something."
"What sort of trigger?" Cyclops wondered.
"I don't know. But I was channeling Magneto when it started. Later he just found me and started actin' all love sick and was spouting poetry and shit, so I laid him real low."
"You what?" Scott choked.
"Ohmuhgawd Scott! Not 'laid' as in sex, laid as in I beat the shit out of em'! That's why he's sendin' his goons after me steada' comin' here himself."
"Oh," Cyclops blushed, embarrassed. However that nagged to question, "How'd you manage to defeat him?" He knew from experience what a tough old buzzard Magneto could be, and frankly it astounded him that petit little Rogue could come out of their clash the victor.
A wicked grin curved at her lips and scrunched up her nose. "I kicked him in the gonads." She gloated.
"-Really, really hard!"
"Oh," he shrugged. "Well that'd do it I guess."
She was still grinning, her nose scrunched up in evil delight as she remember the satisfying scream he's made. When from out of nowhere, she was bodily hurled off her feet and carried away bridal style from her shocked teammates. She screamed in outrage before recognizing the all too familiar face of the man whose lithe arms held her against his chest like a cage.
It was the speed demon himself.
Quicksilver.
AN: I don't think Avalanche is supposed to be Russian. I'm taking liberties since I happen to like the accent. My Math teacher is Russian, buff, and bald. He makes numbers sound epic.