A/N: Welcome to chapter 7, the escape begins! I know you weren't expecting this chapter until the twenty-first, but the darn plot bunnies just wouldn't leave me alone. So here you are, the start of Remy and Ivy's escape. I apologize since it is mostly fluff, but it is all relevant. All the action-filled goodness will be in chapter 8, which will probably be posted on Wednesday. So please review for both chapters. -MOTH (Maiden of the Heavens)
I do not own X-men, just the plot for this story and my OCS.
Chapter 7
Two years went by slowly. Days filled with torture and nightmares, almost blurring one into the other. More then once or twice a day, Ivy would return with a long fresh third-degree burn around her entire neck. The electric collar, Stryker had used to force the Earth-Puppeteer to kill her sister, he had grown fond of using it on her, for every little twitch of a mistake she made.
Stryker nearly had her broken, nearly had her shattered like the puppet, he had turned Aster into, but no, Ivy refused. But the only person, keeping her from falling over the edge, was Remy. Always Remy.
She looked at him now, through the holes in the chain-link metal that walled both their cages, Victor Creed had used him as target practice today, the target practice routine had become a weekly ritual, just like Remy's Friday night poker games with the guards. But whatever their madman torturer had injected the Cajun with recently, seemed to rapidly increase his tolerance for pain. Their was not a single bruise, only a long jagged claw mark, across his cheek, that almost reached his right, forest green eye. Still a little bloody, but already turning a light pink. His blinding orange jumpsuit was also covered in blood, but not his own. It was Sabertooth's. Remy had been lucky today, he been able to grasp, one of the buttons on the cat-like mutants shirt, and charged it with the kinetic energy from his fingers. It had sent off a chain reaction that covered the whole shirt, not just the small plastic buttons. The shirt exploded with the charge, making Victor hit the back of the room wall. His chest bloody and dripping nearly showing the muscle beneath, a lot of it splattered onto the Cajun's uniform. But he did not care, he had only smirked in triumph, over his small victory of the day.
His fingers were curled around some of the metal, as her knuckles brushed against the skin of her own. Two of his fingers, were lightly tugging on her dark chocolate curls, like claw pinchers. Her hair had grown considerably longer since their first months of capture. It was flowing a little past her shoulder bones, almost covering her chest. She was also nearly bone-thin. He hated seeing her so skinny, once they escaped, he was going to make sure, she regained some fat on her. His beloved Earth-Puppeteer was almost a skeleton, wearing her own skin for an overly tight suit. He smiled lovingly at her, she was pressed as close to him as she could get. Looking at the stubble he had grown, almost a tiny beard, a small mustache had also grown across his upper lip.
"What?" He questioned, with a smirk playing across his lips.
"Nothing." Ivy replied quietly. "Makes you look distinguished." She smiled a little.
He pressed a kiss to her lips, and then to the side of her temple, the hairs of his grown facial hair tickling her skin. She giggled a little, and kissed him back, softly and swiftly.
How she longed to be closer to him, to have him hold her close, so she could press her face into his chest , to kiss him and not have the bitter taste of metal follow it. But she also longed to see the sun again, to have it's warmth against her nearly albino flesh. To have the grass beneath her feet, and caught in between her fingers. To watch the dawn turn to dusk with all it's beautiful colors. The moon and stars, glowing and sparkling in the night sky.
Ivy just wished to see the earth again, and she wanted to be able to share all her happiness with Remy, to be with the Cajun she loved. She wanted to tell him that too, that she loved him, but every time she thought she had gotten enough courage to tell him, she found herself tongue-tied and her hands beginning to shake and sweat.
"Ivy?" Remy called her name, softly and brushed his finger against her cheek. Her eyes had gone glassy, doll-like, unseeing to the outside world. This happened a couple times a day now, and when he was able to pull her out of it, either she would have tears streaming past her dark-rose pink eyes and start apologizing repeatedly, or she would start screaming, because the memory of killing her only sister, still haunted her.
And no matter how many times, he tried to explain her that it had been an act of mercy, she still blamed herself.
"Ivy? Petite Fleur? Ya know, I'm really startin' to hate when you do this…" The Cajun said quietly, and instead of continuing to stroke her cheek with his finger, he poked it.
The Earth-Puppeteer blinked at him slowly, rejoining the dim orange lights around her that easily meant lockdown, and the screaming pleads of fellow prisoners. Tears did not stream down her cheeks, a scream did not come from the air she drew into her lungs.
Nothing but a small smile breezed across her face, as she looked at him.
"Sorry…" she said softly, she had never smiled when he pulled her out of one of her trances or nightmares.
"What were you thinking' about this time?" Remy asked, and lightly pulled one of her spring-tight tresses, to watch it curl back.
"Freedom. With you." She answered, a blush crept across her porcelain cheeks.
"Ivy…" His response came out in a breathy-whisper, he didn't want to hear her say it. Not yet.
"J-Je t'aime…-I love you…-" The Earth-Puppeteer's voice was shaky, but she had said it. She used up all of her nerve to tell him.
"Je sais…-I know-" The Cajun replied, he could not bring himself to reply, even though he felt the same way. His forest green eyes dropped away from her gaze.
First he wanted to get her, what she desired most of all. Freedom…
"Gambit…" She said in a whisper, filled with humiliation and desperation for him to look at her, to tell her that he loved her back. That the feelings that she had kept welled up inside for him, for two whole years, were not just for nothing.
He did lift his eyes to her for a mere second. She called him by the name the guards had given after he had beaten them at every game. A name meant now for his enemies, not for her to use.
"You don't have to call me that." He muttered and dug his hand into his boot, until two of his fingers snatched up one of the smallest money chips he had.
They had waited long enough.
"We're leavin'." He said and then slid the chip into a small hole in her hands plastic-wire cage, it was charged with kinetic energy.
"Now?" She questioned in a breath, filled with fear, uncertainty, and anxiousness.
The chip inside the plastic encasement exploded with a solid pop, as Ivy wiggled her hands loose from it and stretched her fingers, and rolled her wrists a couple of times, to regain blood flow, ignoring the pain of the dark pink burns that now splotched her fingers and hands. She knew it would hurt, but the agony was very little, compared to what they both used too.
"Now." Remy nodded.
Ivy's pupils became cat-like slits as unburied her treasures. Her precious three apple seeds. She tucked them into the folded hem of her orange jumpsuit, near her ankle. Her eyes showing her the living earth, glistening like diamonds, that still beat within the chain-link metal. Strings dropped from her fingertips, and connected with it. She forced to stretch, to bend and move. Her hands and fingers moving like music conductor, as she was able to manipulate the metal, to curl in a little, so she would not cut herself on the jagged edges, or get her clothing snagged. She bent it more, making a hole big enough for herself to squeeze through.
Remy backed up to give her room, as the Earth-Puppeteer lay flat on her stomach, and using her elbows, dragged herself along the cement, until she reached him. Turning, she faced the hole, and made it reform back to normal.
In a kneeling position, she looked over at him, desperate for his touch. He pulled her against his chest, and wrapped his arms around her. He rested his chin against the top of her head, and let his fingers trail through her long curls, as her head rested against the fabric, listening to his heart thudding beneath.
Kissing her fingers, softly, like a beat of a butterfly's wings, he reluctantly let go of her, as she began to work the metal on the door to his cage, inch by inch.
They still had a long way to go, Ivy stopped her manipulation, as Remy lit up one of the chips, he held between his fingers with dark purple, almost a magenta color of kinetic energy. He sent it at the security lock and let it explode. It crackled and hissed, sparks flying from the wires, that now hung out from the metal all askew. It made a couple of popping noises, before going still.
After he had finished with that, Ivy continued to make a whole large enough for the two of them.
They were going to get out of here. Out of this hell, and to true paradise. And then Remy would tell her, and he would probably never stop telling her afterwards.
A/N: I hope you enjoyed it. Please Review! -Maiden of the Heavens (MOTH)