Title: These Voices in My Head
By: TriplePirouette
Category: Angst, Rogue POV
Rating: PG-13, slightly disturbing imagery
Disclaimer: They're not mine- I'm a poor and having fun... take pity...
Distribution: my site, WRFA, anywhere else please ask first :)
Summary: Rogue's POV, 'She sighed, closing her eyes. She'd come to rely on the Logan in her head for her strength. "There's just too much noise in my head right now."'
Author's notes: Based on Kelly Clarkson's "Addicted," this took me almost 7 months to write. It came out much more angsty than I initially wanted, but I think the tone warrants it. There's an implied Character Death, as well, so you may want to turn back if that doesn't interest you. Thanks to Jenn for reading and letting me know it's ok to have it be full of angst, and that it didn't need to be all resolved at the end. Also, sometimes the breaks () are large gaps in time, sometimes they're mere minutes, please follow as best you can. It starts pre X-1, then moves through both movies and into my own universe.
Feedback PLEASE at: I love anything constructive! Blatant flames, however, will be disregarded and used to roast s'mores...
The first time she felt someone in her head she thought she was going crazy. It was bad enough she'd almost killed him, but all of a sudden he was in her head, thinking independently of her, and trying to influence her. Late at night she cried in her bed, clawing at her scalp, wishing she could rip him out of there, or make him fade faster. When neither could happen, the pitying eyes of her parents became too much to bare.
Her mother was quiet and withdrawn. Her father barely looked at her, now confused as to how his beautiful baby girl could be a dirty, evil mutant. Protestors and scared friends and family called and surrounded her house, demanding to know what happened to her, why she would do such a thing. When her town, her home, her family, even her own mind, ceased being a refuge she decided to leave and find one of her own.
Draining her savings from three different ATMs and shuddering at the thoughts of a life forever changed, she bought the cheapest bus passes she could and started making her way to the only other place she could imagine, someplace she wanted to escape to: Alaska. The worst part, though, was listening to him in her head as she rode quietly from town to town, praying that no one would sit beside her. He was so confused, and scared, and lost. It made her feel lost, even though she knew where she was going and wanted nothing more than to get there. But he slowly took her confidence away. He made her feel small, and lost, and lonely.
The cloak she picked up at a Salvation Army kept her warm for the most part. She'd stare at the black gloves for hours on the road, tears pricking her eyes when she'd think of the Prom gown they were meant to go with, the gown she would never wear. Every time she took her gloves off she would stare at her hands, feel her own skin, and wonder what it felt like to have that soft skin drain the life out of you. He would scream in her head, and then she'd wish she could drain her own life that way.
When her money ran out and she started hitching rides, she started to believe all of the whisperings David now only mumbled in her head. Quiet nights spent in public rest stops bore dreams of returning home to hugs and smiles, warm beds and love. Most of all, she dreamt of feeling safe again. She wanted to feel safe and protected from the dark, cold world around her. Even more so, she wanted to be safe for other people to touch. Safe for other people to love.
Then, one night in Laughlin City, she felt safe again.
Something about the dark man that she would have avoided before made her feel safe. Maybe it was the soft eyes he tried so desperately to hide under brow and lidded looks. Maybe it was the sheer masculinity that he projected as he fought in the cage: the kind borne out of the romance novels she was so fond of.
Maybe it was because, in a flash of metal, she knew that he was different, just like her.
She should have been afraid of him, but she wasn't. She craved something about him, and she wasn't sure if it was a childish desire to be saved or a womanly need to be possessed by an obvious alpha male. Either way, she followed him that night.
One night, in her bed at the mansion, she looked at the ceiling and wondered what was different. The silence that followed answered her: David was gone. He wasn't in her head anymore. Suddenly, she was afraid. She didn't know what it meant that he was simply gone now. Did it mean that whatever had flipped on in her was flipped off? He left her feeling small, and lonely, and afraid. Suddenly, she craved Logan. She needed to be around him, to feel safe. Maybe to even touch him- just to see if she could again.
She crept quietly from her room and made her way to his. Hearing the nightmare from the hall, she sought to comfort him. And when the three blades slid into her there was no pain. The agony came when she put her hands on his face and felt the pull.
She wasn't fine. She could still kill. At lest he'd saved her from a life of that. And then she was healing, his veins popping out and his mind flowing into hers. She screamed. And when the commotion was over and she felt him in her mind, she smiled.
Logan wasn't like David. Logan was powerful. Logan was self assured. Logan had been around and knew the rules of self-preservation. Logan didn't make her feel like hating herself. Logan made her feel safe. At night she clung to him in her mind, willing him to always stay, even as she ran.
Magneto, or Erik, was intense. She felt his will flow through her like fire, his mind taking over hers even as the residual Wolverine left in her helped her fight for control. But there was a rage, a determination in the influx of energy that she couldn't fight, and simply submitting was the only thing she could do, until she felt the pull of the metal beneath her hands.
She got her wish. She knew what it felt like to be drained by her. The Wolverine in her head howled as she screamed.
The second time Logan touched her felt like a rebirth. It was a rebirth. And for the first time there was as much someone else in her head as there was her.
She loved it.
She indulged in it, drowning in the feral power of the Wolverine and the dominant strength of Logan. At night she'd wait for it, for him to start to fade. He went slowly, over many months, and not ever completely. In her mind Marie created a home for the remnants of Logan, dreaming of a little log cabin where he lived in her mind, and when she felt lost, she'd close her eyes and go there to draw from his strength. But he wasn't alone in her mind.
Just as Logan calmed her and made her feel powerful, Erik caused a craving in her. She tried to push him to the back of her mind, tried to focus on Logan and everything about him being in her mind that made her glad for her mutation, but some nights she couldn't.
It would start with the nightmares. Dreams of bodies that were barely alive, skin and bones being burned alive and tossed into mass graves simply scared her at first, catapulting her from sleep. But soon she'd be forced to watch more, the hold Erik had on her mind keeping her in the clutches of sleep. Faceless bodies morphed from detainees in a nameless World War II death camp to the faces of her friends at the school, being dragged across the lawns of the manor, cuffed and skinny, tattooed and scarred as mutants, before they were tossed into dirt ditches.
Erik stood next to her in the dream, holding her away from the horror, keeping her safe, he told her. "A preemptive strike is needed, my dear," he whispered to her through his devious smile. "To end our suffering by transferring it to them." He smiled evilly as he let faceless soldiers drag an unconscious Logan past her, his arms ripped open where they'd pulled his claws out. "To prove our superiority and get what we deserve..." He held her to him and touched her cheek with naked fingers as she flinched, but nothing happened.
She woke up screaming, clawing at her head in a way she hadn't done for years. Laughter echoed and the pull of evil called. Erik tickled at her brain, trying to make his point by taking over and pushing out the low growl of Logan and seducing her with images of safety, acceptance, and domination. Even as she clawed at her head, silently struggling in her bed, she wanted to give into him.
Hours later, her eyes still red from crying, she watched in the shower as chunks of hair fell down the drain, stuck together by dried blood and scabs. Marie cried out when she rubbed the shampoo through her hair, the open wounds from her nails on her scalp stinging and reopening under the hot water.
Bobby and John were lessons in mutations. It was a rush feeling the coldness course through her blood, replaced quickly by boiling fire. Their minds were far weaker than Erik or Logan, and they faded quickly and easily. Two things stayed, however.
The first was their terror. She'd touched them... drained them... and the fear and loathing and terror that they felt imprinted on her mind during those nights they were running for their lives. She cried alone at night, realizing she was feared by those around her, by those that feigned acceptance and friendship.
The second thing that stayed with her was the thirst. She'd never truly felt the power of Magneto as it was pulled from her by the machine. Logan's gifts were subtle: they enhanced what she already had. She'd never craved more of their gifts, more of their power. She did after she touched Bobby and John, especially John. Now she understood his need to be dominant, to be recognized. She missed the fading powers coursing through her, the feeling of control that she would never have over her own mutation. Most of all, she missed the rush of that feeling as she deliberately and calmly pulled them into her, prepared for the rush that had so often frightened her.
In the forest as they waited for the Blackbird to be repaired, she sat in her tent, awake as everyone else slept, and listened to the laughter in her head, felt Erik's evil smile even though she refused to let him take shape in her mind. He knew that she liked the rush now, and he'd use it against her. She couldn't sleep.
Then, he told her he liked her hair, and the Erik in her head laughed, agreeing. She pulled at her gloves. He wanted to know how dangerous she could be? Wanted to know how addicted she could get to the feel of power rushing through her? He'd find out. But Bobby pulled her back, and she supposed she didn't want any more of him in her head than she already had.
She folded her X-Man uniform and put it back in the white box it had been delivered to her in, practically falling back on the bed. She was so tired, but she didn't want to sleep. She didn't want to let her guard down, let Erik get control of her. She crawled around on the bed, pulling off the lycra cat suit she wore under the uniform, leaving her in her bra and underwear as she crawled under the blanket.
As her eyes drooped she called up Logan and his strength, imagining that she simply walked into his cabin and crawled into bed with him. She could almost feel his arms around her in the weight of her blankets.
"Don't let him get me tonight..." She whispered to the empty room.
She awoke growling, the words "You could be unstoppable..." rolling over and over in her head and the distinct need to touch someone.
"I can't do that, Rogue." The Professor's words echoed in her head. Maybe if she'd told him it was Magneto she'd wanted him to erase, he would have, but her refusal to explain who, or why, had given way to a flat refusal.
As she ran back to her room she wondered if the Professor knew just how big of an urge she had to put her naked palm on his bald head, to suck his life and arrogance out of him.
The second time she put on her uniform, she killed a confused military guard. She gained no mutation, and he was confused and hurting, but the rush of energy excited her. The Logan and Erik in her head pushed the man to the back quickly, not wanting to give up their dominance in her mind.
That night at the mansion she refused all offers to talk. She was fine, and her addiction to touch was quelled for now.
In her dreams Erik pulled the man to the forefront of her mind, showed her his corpse and listed all of the knowledge she got from him. "You could have so much more..."
The next morning after her shower she decided she needed to wear gloves to bed to keep her from scraping at her scalp with her nails. Much more of it and she wouldn't be able to explain the obvious missing sections as a home hair cut gone wrong.
It was harder to control herself now. She wanted to touch. At night she'd roam the mansion gloveless, touching the paintings and the sculptures. She'd run her soft fingertips over the carved wood and wonder what it would feel like to touch flesh and not pull the life out of it. Occasionally she'd come across a spider or other bug, and would watch as her touch killed instantly. Some nights it made her feel powerful, but more nights than not it made her sad.
During the day she got quieter and quieter, twisting at her gloves and resisting the urge to take them off, fighting the fading Magneto in her head and mourning the loss of the little log cabin as Logan became harder and harder to call upon.
All the while she never noticed his eyes on her, concern and sadness filtering through as he watched silently, waiting for the day when she'd come to him with her problem, and wandering the halls behind her at night, inhaling her scent and knowing that something was wrong with her that no one else suspected.
The third time she put on her uniform they fought the remains of the Brotherhood, and Erik was loud in her head. Before she could think she was killing Mystique, her hand on the shape shifter's throat cutting off her air as she pulled across the woman's mutation and memories. "She will teach you how to touch ..." Erik laughed inside her head as his cohort joined him permanently. Rogue fell to the ground, clutching her head and screaming as Mystique asserted herself, shifting the girl's skin at an astonishing rate. She didn't want this- the pain was overwhelming and the noise in her head was louder than she ever could imagine.
She didn't notice when she was picked up in strong arms as she twisted, or how Logan deftly avoided her thrashing skin against his exposed face as he rushed her to the Blackbird, insisting on holding her the whole way back to the mansion.
Logan tried to calm her, gently prying her hands from her hair, eyeing the blood and holding them in her lap as she exploded in tears, her skin now only shifting back and forth from her own to blue and scaly.
They sedated her, and when she woke up in the med bay she refused to talk to anyone. She didn't let them do any tests other than what they'd already done while she was asleep, and that stopped at a simple exam and blood work. Ignoring them all she pleaded with Logan to back her, no longer able to hear him in her head. He agreed with her, though she was sure she could see reluctance on his face as he helped her off of the bed and carried her to her room when her legs wouldn't work quite right.
"Darlin' are you sure you're ok?" He asked as he set her on her bed, tucking a throw blanket around her.
"I just, I just need to be alone. There's..." She sighed, closing her eyes. She'd come to rely on the him in her head for her strength. "There's just too much noise in my head right now."
Logan nodded, and crept out of the room as she turned her back to the door, tears sliding down her face.
"He's not here to help you anymore..." Erik smiled devilishly in her head. The appearance of Mystique had done a lot to revive him. She felt lost and lonely again.
Sarcasm dripped from Mystique. "Awwww, cheer up, I'll show you a trick..."
Rogue closed her eyes tighter, crying herself to sleep as they laughed at her.
She wanted to take off her gloves. She could. And she wouldn't hurt anyone, because Mystique had shown her a trick: she showed her how to control her skin, and now she could touch.
Or so she thought. She hadn't tried yet. But walking around the mansion made it so tempting. But she could hurt someone, and as much as she wanted that rush, that power, she didn't want the pain.
Rogue sat on her hands and tried to listen to Scott's lecture.
That night she went out again, touching everything. She stopped at the foot of the stairs, closed her eyes, and turned off her skin. She didn't think it would work. Erik and Mystique had been far too quiet today. But she leaned down and picked up the spider anyway.
It crawled across her hand gently, tickling as it went.
Her other hand covered her mouth as a shriek left her. She dropped the spider and ran back to her room. She didn't see him duck in the corner to stay hidden, or that he went back to find the spider she'd been holding happily crawling back to his web.
He'd barely made his way back to his room when she knocked on his door. He opened it, surprised at her appearance: her hair was disheveled, face red from crying with fresh tears still hanging on her cheeks, and her hands bare, clasped tightly in front of her. She looked up at him, and reached out a bare hand to him before forcefully pulling it back. He didn't flinch, but felt his gut twist as he watched her fidgeting. There was something terribly wrong with Marie.
He was about to pull her into his room and force her to talk when she spoke in a whisper, "I need you to touch me."
He pulled her into his room and demanded an explanation. Quietly, and with an unsettling amount of calmness, she told him how her mind worked. She told Logan her darkest secrets: how she craved his voice in her mind that was no longer there, how Magneto had been trying to recruit her from within, how the combined minds in her own made her crave touch and the power that she could exert through it, and finally how Mystique had forced her way to the front with Erik, silencing all the other voices and outnumbering her in her own body.
With shaking hands she told him how Mystique had taught her to control her skin, but that with each second that passed she realized it was a trick: she didn't have the control, the Mystique in her mind did.
She cried as she told him about the Professor's refusal to wipe anyone from her mind, and how she wanted to ask him again, this time telling him exactly who she wanted removed.
She nearly hyperventilated, though, when she told him that she couldn't do it, because after all these years she craved touch more than anything, and for all the torture she went through in her head, she'd bare it for a little human contact.
"I need you to touch me," she said again, when she'd finally calmed. Logan nodded and wordlessly reached out his hand, confused but more than willing to do anything she needed. Marie startled and scooted back. "I...I want to touch you," she stuttered, "But she'll turn it back on, I know she will." Marie stood and tried to run from the room, "This was wrong of me."
Logan grabbed her sleeve covered arm and pulled her back to her seat on the bed. "If she turns it on, then you get to have me back up there, helping you out." His fingers gingerly brushed through her white streak, coming as close to her flesh as he could without touching her. "If not, then you still get what you need." His eyes were intense, and she shivered, averting her gaze.
"I can't...I shouldn't have asked you to do this, Logan."
"But you did." He sighed and put a hand in her hair, forcing her to look at him. "And I want to do it. You shouldn't have to do this alone. No one but you can understand exactly how your mutation works, and you're the only one who knows what you need. Don't be afraid to ask for that."
"It's not right, though. They're... I'm... If we touch, and they take that away..."
"Then we'll still know it's possible for you to touch." Before she could object his hand cupped her cheek, and all she could feel was soft skin against skin. Marie moaned and rubbed into his embrace as he pulled her closer to him. His own face replaced his hand, their lips dangerously close as she catalogued every sensation: the smoothness of his skin, the tickle of his stubble, the gentle puffs of breath on her neck. Her arms wound around his body tightly, afraid to continue, but unwilling to stop.
"Anything you need, Marie..." He whispered as his lips barely brushed across hers, their foreheads resting on each other as one of his hands slipped under her shirt. It was in those seconds that she finally felt calm and confident. There were no voices in her head and no space left between her and Logan. It was everything she'd ever wanted.
That's when she felt the pull start, the maniacal laughter in her mind not enough warning to escape from Logan's arms.
Marie punched code after code into the mansion's alarm systems to finally make it out of the compound, her old cloak obscuring her face and the tears there as she slipped away into the night.
It had taken too long to push Logan away from her, and though he was breathing when she'd slowly slipped out of his room, he'd be down for at least a day, if not more. She shook her head as she walked down the dark road in the moonlight, almost as if she could shake the personalities right out of her head. She couldn't, though, and the fighting in there only made her more aware of what she needed to do. As faint as Logan was, he was doing his best to fight the other personalities back. It wasn't working.
She was allowing Magneto to help her shield her mind. It drove Logan crazy, but she knew that they'd start looking for her as soon as they knew she was missing.
She didn't want to be found. She had a plan, and she was slightly amazed she'd been able to keep it from the other people in her head.
"You have to find her!" Logan yelled, sending three more claw marks into the furniture of Xavier's office. It had been a week, and there was not so much as a trace of her personality on Cerebro. The Professor had tried to explain that she was hard to find to begin with, that when a personality in her mind was stronger than her own she could be almost impossible to locate.
"She'll come back, Logan, as soon as she realizes we can help her." The Professor was far too calm, and Logan was sick of staying in one place. They hadn't known how disturbed she was to begin with, and even as he'd tried to explain to them the extent of what she'd gone through, they'd denied that she was anymore than a confused child who would come running home.
Logan knew better, and growled as he left the office, dragging his claws across the walls, leaving his mark one final time. He intended to find her and not come back until he did.
He didn't want to acknowledge the feeling in the pit of his stomach that it simply meant he'd never be back.
It had been hard not to touch that last trucker that gave her a ride. Erik had been adamant that no one would miss him, that it wouldn't be out of the ordinary for someone of that girth to drop dead from a heart attack. Marie simply sat on her hands, reassuring Erik he'd be able to steal someone's life soon.
She was trekking through the Canadian forest, the cold wind biting at her cheeks and freezing unbidden tears when the personalities in her head finally discovered what she planned on doing. It was chaos in her head like she'd never known before. Her hands twisted together in front of her in her gloves that did nothing against the cold as she kept mumbling her mantra out loud, "...step, step, step, step..." She wouldn't let them stop her. This was no way to live.
The tears flowed, caused not by the indignation or outrage of Erik and Mystique, and not for the fear of her own future, but for the heartbreaking pleas coming from her inner Logan. He was begging her to stop, to send out a mental call to the Professor and just stay put, to rethink this, to let him help her. Logan was the only regret she would have. She couldn't live like this anymore, and she couldn't put the people she cared about through this, either.
Her steps started to falter, and she looked around. This was as good a place as any. She crawled over to the base of a large tree and leaned against the rough bark before curling into the fetal position. "You get to have me now, Erik, aren't you happy?" she whispered into the wind.
He was finally silent, and she didn't know how to feel about that. Logan, however, was still quite loud. "Please, Marie, get up, Marie..."
The first flakes of what promised to be at least a foot of fresh snow began to fall, and she choked back a sob. "I can't, Logan. I can't."
"Marie..."
She smiled as she concentrated on the sound of his voice in her mind, closing her eyes for what she knew would be the last time, comforted in the numbness of the cold.