Up ahead he saw Compass standing by a tree. "What was da-." Compass made a strangled noise deep in her throat and punched the tree beside her. The thing shook under the impact. When she pulled her hand back there was an imprint of her knuckles in the tree and her hand was covered in chips of bark and bleeding. She slid to the ground and leaned up against the tree.
"I didn't choose this you know. Becoming Compass. Garret," She took a deep shuddering breath. "Garret knew what he was signing me up for the moment he saw me." There were tears in her eyes that were threatening to spill over. "No one will remember me. If I were to go stand in front of my parents right now, do a DNA test; still they wouldn't know me. Who I was before was erased from minds of people." she laughed bitterly, "Once my work is done here, you'll forget me too. It's one of her gifts." she spat the last word.
"Petite we have your hand looked at." She looked down at the hand in question. Blood covered most of her fingers bruising was already starting to form. She snorted,
"It doesn't matter. I can't feel it and I can't die. Not until this," she gestured to her eyes. "Is passed onto the next person." It was then when she looked up at the sky that was stained red with the setting sun that he noticed another bruise blooming on her jaw line. Remy opened his mouth then closed it. Everyone died, didn't they?
"Ho-?"
"Fate, puts a bit of herself in us. So even if my head were cut off and my body burned then my ashes spread to the wind I would still come back. It take decades, but I'd still reform. There are faster ways, but they are unsettling, best to let it heal naturally."
"Dat why you can't feel?" she dropped her gaze from the sky and stared at him.
"You know don't you? About who I was." Remy ducked his head in shame.
"Found out just a little bit ago." she grunted
"I'm sure you noticed yesterday was the five year anniversary of my death." Remy's mouth went dry, he nodded, not trusting himself to speak. "During that five years Fate makes us endure every kind of pain that is. Mental, physical, emotional, everything. We are tortured nonstop for five years in order to prepare us for the roll of Compass. By the end our nerves are fried."
"Why?" he was only just grasping the vague idea of what she was saying. He had been tortured once or twice so he knew a thing or two about it. Looking into her eyes there was a hollowness that more than proved her words. He swallowed, why on earth would anyone do that?
"What connects all people?" Remy was about to ask what that had to do with anything then he understood. Compass saw the exact moment he understood and nodded. "Pain, everyone experiences pain, struggles with it inside of them, lashes out because of it. Pain connects and separates us all. What would this world be if we understood each other's pain?" So Fate would put the pain of the world on such a young woman's shoulders. This wasn't right. "No one said it was right. Sacrifices must be made. Or that's what she tells us. Garret and the rest of them swallowed it."
"Then why do what she wants?"
"I don't have a choice. She puts a bit of herself in us before she drops us back in the world. It allows her to force her-." Compass gagged and reached up at her throat desperately clawing at her neck. Her face turned red. Remy dropped to his knees beside her.
"Compass! What's happenin?" she didn't answer but continued to struggle against some invisible hand strangling her. Then Compass sucked in a deep breath and coughed. She sat there dragging in air to her starved lungs before she muttered,
"You wonder why I think you're a ragin bitch." Remy's eyebrows drew together in concern, maybe something happened to her brain.
"You weren't talkin to me, were ya?" She laughed and coughed some more, shaking her head no.
"Her punishment." Remy started to stand and said,
"Tell ya what. Let's trade. A question for a question ad we will both answer honestly." Compass looked at him like she wasn't sure if she was going to laugh or cry.
"What's to stop you from lying?"
"My honor." she snorted
"Isn't there a saying, no honor among thieves." Remy laughed.
"Suppose so. But I was also a hero. I swear on ol' Gambit's life I will be honest." Compass's gaze searched his face. He could see the need for one small thing in her life to be hers to control.
"Alright." she thought very carefully before asking, "Who's Anna?" Remy froze. He had expected her to ask about her own life not his. Now he wasn't sure if he regretted his promise or just found the whole situation amusing. "Last night you were talking in your sleep and you kept saying her name."
"Jealous petite?" he could tell right away that the joke went over her head. He wondered if that was a side effect of being tortured. She shook her head no but looked very thoughtful.
"You say her name like I hold my wedding band. Like you're broken or incomplete without her." Remy blew out a breath and held his hand out to Compass. She took it and heaved herself off the ground before continuing off in the direction she had been walking. He stuck his hands into his pocket and thought about the best way to explain the answer. Of course her first question would be the most difficult.
"Anna is a mutant. She is incredibly gifted, but her gift is what people call a double edged sword. She could take the powers, memories, everything with just a touch of exposed skin. She had no control over it to begin with so no one wanted to be near her. Her life wasn't the greatest to start off with. Her mom was grooming her to be part of a evil gang. Something happened and she ended up going to the X-men. There she found a home, family, sanity. She is very passionate, very kind, a beautiful woman. Strong, and stubborn to boot. And she's the woman that makes this life worth livin." Compass smiled sadly.
"Michael was like that for me. He saved me from my own demons. Gave me strength and shielded me even when I didn't know I needed it." She wiped the tears from her eyes. "I can't even join him without passing this curse onto someone other fool first." She sucked in a deep breath and seemed desperate to change the subject. "What's your next question?"
"It's actually two in one." Compass shrugged.
"I'll just get two questions when it is my turn again." Remy grunted then pulled his pack of cigarettes from his pocket. He lit one with a charge of kinetic energy. "That's bad for you, you know?" he laughed to himself.
"Last night you were so scared ya ran out of dere. Yet today you put down people who were twice your size and probably did mean more harm dan Luke. What happened last night and why could fight today but not den? I saw the look on your face last night. If you'd have power we'd been taking Luke to de hospital or the morgue." Compass seemed to consider her next words very carefully, but she explained as best as she could.
"Our minds work like a computer. Memories are like files. You don't have all of them open at once right? You're not remembering everything you know at this very moment."
"Aye." he wondered where this is going.
"If our memories are files, then there are triggers that allow us to remember things. Like a short cut to a file. Things like smells, actions, textures, tastes, emotions, anything that makes you remember something else."
"What's dat gotta do with last night?" Compass gave him a look like he was an idiot.
"Last night I had very little by way things I could remember on my own. But when Luke reached out it took me back to a memory from my own past that was very powerful and one that very traumatic to me. I was basically stuck in the past where I had no real power to stop what was happening. So I ran."
"What about the Pit?" he prompted.
"I'm not always strong. Things like that happen when they need to or when Fate allows it. A man could come up to me right now and hold a gun to my head and there would be nothing that I could do to stop him from shooting me. The power of Compass usually only works when Fate directs it to. She will give us nudges and power but she won't spell out what she wants from us. It tends to be fairly straight forward. Help him, give her advice, save those people, stop that person." Remy turned the information over in his mind he didn't doubt her, not a word of it. Yet he still was having a tough time wrapping his mind around the idea that Fate existed. He supposed having seen purgatory the fact that Fate was a real being shouldn't surprise him. "My question." he winced and prayed she'd ask something about herself. That pray was answered in a weird way. "What's the most valuable thing you've ever stolen?"
He sighed in relief. Ticking down the very long list of things he had stolen, some of which he had destroyed. Yet his mind couldn't help but turn to Rogue. Anna, he thought. Closing his eyes he could see her perfectly and it made him ache to hold her. He stopped mid stride and looked up at the sky; the sun was setting and dark blue was pushing out the red and pink.
"Tell you the truth I'm not so sure if I stole it. Her heart." Compass didn't ask whose heart, he suspected she already knew.
"Which brings me to my next question, why aren't you with her now?" He had known the moment the words left his mouth that this would be her next question. It still was a sucker punch to the gut that left him with a profound ache. Damn this kid, he thought to himself.
"We are both stubborn and stuck in our ways. I said somet'ings I'm not proud of and she always seemed to t'ink so little of my love fer her." Compass considered his words for a minute.
"Anna is Rogue of the Avengers right?" Remy nodded. "I know a little bit about her. Did a case study on nature versus nurture with her as the subject. I don't think you're quite right. Your love is the ultimate gift to her. I think she believes she is unworthy of the love you give her freely. She suffered much and was viewed as monster for a long time. So it make sense she that would probably still views her powers as monstrous even after gaining control." Remy opened his mouth to argue but Compass plowed on. "That kind of thing has a profound effect on a person. It leaves scars." she looked at him before looking forward again. "Both of you seem to have such scars. Take it from someone who has endured hell and studied what that can do. Such things permanently effect everything we do, think, say, and feel. Point is, I think she love you and you love her. If that's the case then one of you is going to have to sucked it up and go to the other person first."
"Even if I'm always the one?" Compass glanced sideways at him.
"If what you have is what you say it is, then you won't give a damn how many times you have to be the first to speak up. But if your pride is more important." she let that thought trail off. Remy glared at her.
"Is this Compass speaking or Ava?" she thought about it then said,
"Both." he grunted and a few minutes later compass said, "I have a favor to ask."
"What's dat?"
"Can you either get your father to call off the two people following me or can you make them stop?"
