Chapter 10

Gambit would have liked to have made Rogue the priority over the weeks that followed. Unfortunately, necessity dictated that he get his affairs in order. Although he attempted to make time for Rogue – being quite familiar with her routine – he found he hardly saw her. He was extremely frustrated by this as he had been rather looking forward to having an actual relationship with her by now, instead of still admiring her from afar.

Rogue would have liked to be able to say she had complete control over her powers now. Sadly, her absorption tendencies were erratic. If she deliberately attempted to absorb someone she could. If she deliberately tried not to absorb someone, she could touch them without any problems. If she wasn't concentrating, or got distracted or someone touched her without warning, however, there was a 50-50 chance of absorption and Rogue found it highly frustrating. Still, her friends were supportive, encouraging and helped her to practice.

"Whoa," Jubilee said as she shook off the dizzy spell.

"Sorry," Rogue replied quickly, pulling her shirt back down over her stomach.

Rogue had reached up to get the coffee out of one of the top cupboards. Her shirt had lifted up in the process, baring about two inches of skin about her waist in the process. Jubilee hadn't been able to resist the urge.

"No, no," Jubilee said. "I was the one who decided to poke you in the ribs. I knew getting absorbed was a possibility."

Rogue grinned at her.

"Well," she said. "At least it was only a possibility and not a certainly, right?"

"Exactly," Jubilee said cheerfully. "Just like one day your powers are going to behave themselves and not turn themselves on at all without your express permission."

"I sure hope so."

"I know so."

"Thanks Jubes," Rogue said. "Coffee?"

"Yes please. I need a little pick-me-up after a near-coma experience," Jubilee joked.

"On second thoughts, no caffeinated coffee for you," Rogue teased her.

"Aww."

"Marie! You have a visitor," called her boss, Adam, from the front of the garage.

"Coming," Rogue replied as she grabbed a rag to wipe her hands on.

"Make it quick," Adam advised her.

Rogue gave a nod and turned the corner to find Gambit standing there.

"Hey chere," he greeted. "So you go by 'Marie' around here, hein?"

"It's the name I wanted to go by at the time, seeing as how I was cured and all," Rogue replied shortly. "What the hell are you doing here?"

"Just wanted to see where you worked," Gambit replied with a shrug. "Putting a place to the name and all that."

"That's nice for you. Go away," Rogue snapped.

Gambit blinked, having not expected that reaction at all.

"Chere –" he began.

"Seriously, must you follow me everywhere?" she demanded. "Can't I just have one place you don't have anything to do with?"

"It wasn't my intention to intrude, Roguey –"

"I don't care what your intentions are," Rogue retorted hotly. "Beat it, Swamp Rat. And don't let me catch you here again or I'll take to that pretty face of yours with a monkey wrench and a pair of pliers!"

"There a problem?" asked Adam, entering the room once more.

"Non, non," Gambit replied, his hands up in the air. "I was just leaving. Didn't mean to bother you, chere. I'll see you later."

"Don't remind me," Rogue muttered as she headed back out into the garage.

"Who was that?" asked Adam.

"House mate," Rogue replied darkly. "Won't leave me alone."

"Huh. He gives you any more trouble, just let us know."

"Thanks, but I can take care of it myself."

"With a monkey wrench and a pair of pliers, so I heard," Adam replied with a slight smile.

Rogue allowed herself a giggle.

Gambit was in the garage at Xaviers when Rogue returned from work. Rogue didn't even look at him as she pulled off her helmet.

"Rogue," he said as he pushed off the hood of the car he'd been sitting on and made his way over to her.

"I'm not talking to you," she informed him as she strode towards the door.

"Then why did you just talk to me?" Gambit asked, moving quickly to close the distance.

"To inform you that you're wasting your breath," Rogue retorted, stepping out into the hallway.

"Doesn't sound like it to me."

Rogue ignored him. Gambit sighed and moved up along side her, his hand going to the small of her back automatically.

"Chere," he said seriously, "if I had realised you didn't want me there, I wouldn't have gone by."

Rogue pressed her lips together and walked faster towards the stairs. To her irritation (partly because she liked it), Gambit kept up. As Rogue ran up the stairs, Gambit followed but was forced to drop his hand before his fingers fell somewhere he knew she wouldn't appreciate.

"Rogue, please," said Gambit as soon as they hit the top of the stairs. "It's been over a month since we got out. I've been trying to have a conversation with you all this time and, well I thought I'd been just missing you all the time, but evidentially you've just been avoiding me. Come on, Rogue, what did I do?"

"What did you do?" Rogue said, turning on him. "What did you do? I'll tell you what you did!"

Gambit reeled back slightly under her angry glare.

"You stalked me for two years," Rogue said as she poked her finger at him, her voice getting louder with every word. "You've been in my bedroom and because that zapping thing conked you out, you've been sleeping in my bedroom. You invaded my personal space, invited yourself to my personal time and to top everything off, the same day we met you invited me into bed with you. Why do you damn well think I've been avoiding you?"

"Well, now that you mention it, I suppose those are quite reasonable grounds for avoiding someone -" Gambit began.

"Damn straight they are," Rogue said, turning her back on him once more. "At least I knew you never followed me to work. Until, of course, today, when you just had to show up there too."

"Je suis desole," Gambit replied, walking around in front of her. "I just wanted to talk to you, chere. You've been so important to me - me and Forge - these last couple of years. Without you we never would have escaped that lifeless hellhole and for that I will be eternally grateful -"

"So, what? You express your gratitude by propositioning me? Like I should be honoured to sleep with you?" Rogue snapped.

"Well, now that you mention it, there are some women out there -"

Rogue started to backhand him, but Gambit caught her wrist with two millimetres to spare.

"I jest," he said hurriedly. "Can we just say that my social skills are a little rusty and start over?"

He didn't actually think that, but it was plainly obvious that he hadn't exactly handled their first meeting very well. He wasn't used to making bad first impressions on women. Somehow he needed to turn things around.

"Rusty? Is that what you call it?" Rogue demanded as she jerked her hand away. "Non-existent more like it. I don't care what you do. You've intruded on my life quite enough as it is. Just leave me alone."

"Has anyone ever told you that you're gorgeous when you're angry?"

Before Rogue could think of a reply (no one had ever told her anything of the sort; they usually made themselves scarce), Gambit had wrapped one arm about her waist, cupped her face with his other hand and kissed her lips gently.

"I grew up on the streets of New Orleans," Gambit said quietly, taking advantage of her stunned silence. "I got by mostly by picking pockets and scrounging for food. I spent rainy days in the library, just to get out of the cold. I learned the Dewey Decimal System by heart by the time I was six. At eight I met my best friend, Bella Donna. At ten I was caught trying to pick the pocket of the head of the New Orleans Thieves Guild, Jean-Luc LeBeau, who adopted me as a result -"

"What makes you think -" Rogue began sharply, in an attempt to regain control of the conversation.

"Incidentally, Bella Donna was the daughter of the head of the New Orleans Assassins Guild," Gambit went on as if she hadn't said anything. "The two Guilds had been at war with each other and when our fathers saw how well we got along, they decided to marry us off. When I was fourteen I was abducted by Stryker. I was stuck there for two years before I succeeded in escaping. On my way back home, I met Stormy. She was only eleven or twelve at the time. Cute kid. Now she's older than me, go figure. We went on a crime spree all the way to New Orleans. She became almost like a sister to me."

There was a fond look on Gambit's face and Rogue had the impression he was remembering that much younger Storm.

"Two days after my eighteenth birthday, Logan came looking for me. He found out I had escaped from Stryker's island and he wanted me to take him there so he could kill 'everyone I hate in this world'. And quite frankly, I think the guy still owes me because Victor Creed's still alive and kicking, and no one could give me a definite answer on Stryker's dead or alive status," Gambit said cynically. "A week after that, I was getting married. Or I was supposed to. Bella Donna's brother, Julien, hated my guts and took exception to the wedding. He challenged me to a duel to the death. Guess who won."

Rogue said nothing. She only held his gaze.

"Marius - Belle's father - he was a little upset as you can imagine. Bella Donna talked him and the Assassin's council into having me exiled instead of executed -"

"Wait, you were being punished -"

"- in order to preserve peace between our Guilds. It was a full exile. I can never return to New Orleans, nor am I allowed any contact with my family. I spent the next few years of my life stealing, gambling and, well, sleeping around. So pretty much everything I was doing as a teenager only without any family or mutant experimentation involved. One day I finally accepted Stormy's invitation to visit her here, where she had given up a life of crime for control over her power and the chance to fight for mutant rights," Gambit said with a slight smile. "I only meant to be here for a week."

"And you stayed here twelve years," Rogue finished.

"And that's my life story," Gambit said with a nod. "In addition to stealing, poker and women, I also like motorcycles, cooking, pool -"

"Star Trek," Rogue offered slyly.

"Shh, don't spread it around," Gambit replied, grinning at her. "It's supposed to be my guilty secret."

"This coming from a professional thief?" Rogue queried.

"Oui. Me being a thief isn't that big a secret, chere. I need to get paid somehow," he pointed out.

"Well, I suppose that makes sense -"

"Actually it makes dollars. Lots of lots of dollars. And occasionally pounds, francs and yen."

"- in a very twisted sort of way," Rogue finished, giving Gambit a cynical look. "Also, that was a horrendous pun."

"I try. So, Roguey, would you do me the privilege," Gambit said, noting the smile that quirked at Rogue's mouth, "of letting me take you out this Saturday?"

"Now why would I want to do a thing like that?" Rogue drawled.

"We seem to have started out on the wrong foot, and I would appreciate it if you would let me do something about this low opinion you have of me," Gambit replied sincerely.

Rogue sighed and was silent for a moment.

"I think you're a creep," she said finally. "But, I suppose to be fair, you couldn't exactly knock on my door and introduce yourself like a proper gentleman. Very well. Just make it count, Swamp Rat. I may not give you another chance."

"Okay," said Storm as she stepped into Forge's lab where Forge and Gambit were waiting for her the following day. "What is it that you wanted to show me?"

"This," Forge replied, indicating a set of floor plans and schematics on the table.

"It's way past time security around this place got upgraded," Gambit said firmly. "We don't want a repeat of the Stryker invasion."

"Agreed," said Storm. "So what did you have in mind?"

Gambit and Forge talked Storm through the first part of their upgrade plans, primarily focused around the new sensors and defences.

"Now this is the best part," Forge said cheerfully, "when any one of these alarms gets sounded, the mansion will go to yellow alert. If it's more than one, red alert."

"And if a travelling salesman shows up at the gates, that's blue alert," Gambit joked.

"Idiot," said Forge. "Now obviously when one of these alerts goes off, we need to make sure everyone knows right? Which brings us to the next part."

Forge pointed to one of the schematics.

"We install these computer interfaces throughout the mansion," Forge said. "There's a light panel here which'll glow when we go to one of the alerts. We'll have an actual alarm noise as well, of course."

"And the best part," Gambit said, "is that we can do everything from these interfaces. Answer phones. Open the gates when no one's in the office to do it. During an alarm we can instantly check what triggered said alarm."

"And when they're on standby we can use 'em for school notices. No more pin boards," Forge added.

"Pin boards are so last decade anyway," Gambit said with a grin.

Storm looked at Forge and Gambit with a bemused expression on her face, down at the plans, and then back at her friends.

"This is all part of some diabolical plan to turn the mansion into a starship, isn't it?" she asked them.

"Any similarities to Star Trek are purely coincidental," Gambit said.

"Yeah, right," Storm replied. "Well, I'm not sure about the answering phones part, but the rest of it sounds good. I want a full plan on how you expect the human aspect of the new security to work –"

Forge handed her a wad of paper stapled together.

"Thank you," said Storm.

"We had a lot of time on our hands," Forge admitted.

"Just not enough paper," Gambit added. "Or writing implements."

"I'm thinking of programming a notepad into my cybernetic arm," said Forge.

"We've been spending all this time trying to get our thoughts on paper," Gambit said with a nod.

"You can imagine how hard that was for Remy," Forge added with a pitying smirk. "Thinking is such a chore for him."

"I know," Gambit said with a melodramatic sigh. "Trying to dumb down all my ideas so that anyone can understand them is a real pain in the a-"

"Ahem," Storm cut in, "I'll look over this and get back to you, but I imagine we'll go ahead with it. Any estimate on how long it'll –"

Forge cut Storm off with another sheet of paper.

"That also has all the things we'll need too," Forge said.

"Good," said Storm. "I'll let you know. Oh, and by the way, going ahead with these plans does not give you two license to rename the med lab 'sick bay', or the elevator 'the turbolift' or the danger room 'the holodeck'."

"Why would we want to do that?" asked Forge innocently.

Storm gave Forge a look that clearly said "pull the other one" and soon departed.

"I think she knows us too well," Forge said as soon as Storm was out of sight.

"Oui," Gambit agreed. "You know, she didn't say anything about renaming the med lab 'the infirmary'."

"True," Forge agreed. "And that's what they call it in Deep Space Nine. She didn't say anything about renaming the office 'the bridge' either."

"Or renaming her room 'the Captain's Quarters'."

"Or renaming the dining hall 'the mess hall'."

"Or the kitchen 'Quark's Bar'."

"That's a great idea!" Forge said. "I really want to call it that now."

Gambit chuckled.

"I kind of want to rename my lab 'Engineering'," Forge went on, looking around. "I don't think it's quite big enough though."

"We'll just have to get you a bigger lab," Gambit said. "Hey what do you think about naming the hanger 'the docking bay'?"

"Better idea," said Forge. "We can call the hanger 'Docking Bay 1' and the garage 'Docking Bay 2'."

"I like. We should start referring to the Blackbird as a runabout. Or better yet, the Delta Flyer."

"That's brilliant!"

There was silence for a moment.

"We are such huge geeks," said Gambit with a sigh.

"Yeah," Forge agreed.

"Sad, isn't it?"

"Yep. What do you think we should rename Cerebro?" Forge asked.

"I have no idea," Gambit replied. "The warp core?"

Forge laughed and Gambit grinned at him.