Disclaimer: I do not own the X-men, but I do own minor characters of my own creation.

Thanks to all of my reviewers! You guys are super awesome-rific! Yes, I made that word out of thin air lol. XD.

By the time I caught up with Jude, the boy had already found his way to the throne room and appeared slightly saddened. I couldn't blame him for being upset. Anyone would be slightly disturbed after walking in on a scene like that.

"Jude, it isn't what you think. I just got-"

"Rogue," His tone was so bland and detached, that I felt a little-scared standing next to him.

"Yes?"

"You don't have to apologize to me."

"But I-"

"You aren't a prisoner here." He said softly and placed a hand on my shoulder, "Princess or not, you still have free choice in what you do. And if you want to do it with him then that is fine." Jude paused a moment then laughed softly, "Poor choice of words, huh?"

"I don't get you."

"What? Did I say something confusing?"

I shook my head and tried to understand the boy's attitude, "Shouldn't you be angry or something? I mean wouldn't it be logical for you to be mad, or at least a little upset?"

"Do you want me to be mad?"

"Yes." I grumbled a little then added in an exasperated voice, "I mean no. Hell, I don't know!"

"Rogue," Jude placed his hands on my shoulders and gave them a gentle squeeze, "It did make me uncomfortable to see… that-"

"So why aren't ya angry?"

He placed his right-hand index finger on my lips and waited till I relented and shut my mouth, promising silently to be quiet for a little bit. "Rogue, you may be hot-tempered and stubborn," He chuckled as I rolled my eyes at the words, "but nevertheless, I think you have a good head on your shoulders."

"Oh…"

"That, and if he had done anything to upset you, I would get to see you throw him through a wall." We both laughed a bit at his statement. I couldn't help but think the faint twinkle of mischievousness in Jude's eyes came from his mental image of a beaten Remy. A smile broke out slowly on my face as I imagined the Cajun getting that smug smile slapped off his face.

"You know, you look wonderful in a smile." Jude stroked my cheek softly and caused a small swell of nerves in my chest.

"Don't get all emotional on me now, Jude." I swatted his hand away and tried to act reserved again.

"Fine, fine," He chuckled softly then offered me a mysterious smile, "But you better be nice to me or I won't show you the surprise."

"What surprise?" The thought of a girly princess gift was rather unappealing to me.

"Don't be such a stick in the goo, Rogue."

"You mean mud?" I asked with a raised eyebrow. How Jude could be so well educated and yet so simple at times baffled me.

"Something like that. Those Earth phrases are so weird."

"You are such an alien." I laughed at the boy as he stuck his tongue out at me.

"Takes one to know one." Jude laughed and grabbed my bare hand, before pulling me along.

It took a good length of time to reach our destination since the room Jude wanted was down in the depths of the castle. At first, I busied myself by counting how many guards we passed in the halls. But I lost count around thirty-five or thirty-six.

"Alright," Jude smiled and stopped our walk in front of a large wooden door.

"Woo-hoo a big door…"

My sarcastic reply brought out an eye roll from Jude, "If I can't be emotional, you can't be snippy."

"Eh," I sighed and pretended to be put out, "I can't make any promises on that."

The prince opened the door and showed me into the large room. I was slightly surprised to find the place covered in various Earth objects that appeared to date from the stone age to the late sixties. "What is this place?" I ran my hand over an old typewriter's keys, then continued to examine the room.

"It's one of the Earth rooms. All the stuff that has ever been brought from Earth is placed here."

"Isn't that Amelia Earhart?" I pointed to one of the many portraits hanging on the tall walls.

"Oh yes, she loved that one."

"You knew Amelia Earhart?"

"No, I'm not that old, Rogue." Jude chuckled softly and pointed to the corner of the picture, "When she came here ages ago she really hit it off with the Lenox ruler at the time. He convinced her to let him paint her a portrait and once she died, they put it in the Earth room."

"Wow…" I couldn't believe that a mystery that still baffled Earth scientists to this day, could be answered so easily by Jude. As I looked around the room I started to notice just how many lost treasures were in the room. I spotted a few that my History teacher on Earth claimed were destroyed in various natural disasters. If only that man knew every item in our textbook was being kept in a Lenox storage room. He'd probably wet his pants.

Jude held up a record player and examined it curiously, "I don't see why the Earthlings use these. They don't work very well."

"No one uses those anymore." I shook my head and dug through a few other boxes, "Most of this stuff died out in the sixties. Don't you guys have any recent stuff?"

"Well, this stuff was believed to be pretty recent, but now that you shattered that idea, I'd have to say no."

"But I don't get it, you send people to Earth all the time, right? Wouldn't someone have noticed that go-go boots had died out?" I held up a pair of the boots in question and laughed at rest of the bizarre footwear in the box.

Jude shook his head, "Not many people go to Earth. Elizabeth and a few of the other elders go when the need comes, but that is about it."

I had never thought about how much the Lenox residents knew about Earth. I could remember some of the people talking about it being a made up location, but I still believed they knew that it was real. Then again, multiple people claim there is life outside of Earth and they are mocked, so why should this dimension be any different? To these people, Earth was just a place to scare children with in campfire stories.

"Rogue?"

"Yeah, Jude?" I looked up from the dusty box I had been digging through to see him pulling out a dusty record. The boy blew off some of the dust and used his shirt to clean off the rest, before placing the item gently on the record player. After a few scratchy noises, the old speakers started to play a gentle tune. I couldn't recognize it at first, but as the singer began to slowly join the music the song became familiar.

"This is one of my favorite pieces. I've played it for years."

"I know that tune." I stood up and walked closer to him so I could peer down at the spinning record, "It's called, 'I only have eyes for you.'"

"That's right." Jude smiled at me and adjusted the speaker, "I used to come here as a kid and play this song. Alex used to make me dance with her. She always said she'd punch me if I told anyone though." He smiled dreamily and ran his hand over the record player as if that simple touch brought all the memories flooding back. It was nice to hear a little more about the princess, but it did make me feel slightly uncomfortable.

I knew the song pretty well myself, but I had always believed that it was because of how many movies and commercials had used it. Now though, my mind was starting to tread on dangerous ground as it began to imagine a small girl dancing with Jude. "I like old music." I admitted to Jude who snapped rather quickly out of his day dream, "I think I must be one of the few people my age who do."

"Well then," Jude grinned at me playfully, "if you really like this song you can't resist dancing to it." He held out his hand as an invitation.

"Oh no," I shook my head and stepped back, "I already danced enough for a lifetime."

"Figures," He shook his head and took the needle off the record.

"What figures?"

"You are chicken. Rather surprising since you had so many dance lessons and everything."

"I am not chicken."

"Prove it," Jude smiled as he cornered me in this game of cat and mouse.

"You're pure evil you know that?" I looked behind me and saw no one standing at the door and my nerves calmed slightly. "Alright, one dance."

"All it takes is one." He smiled and started the song over.

"What?"

Jude took my hand and smiled down at me as we started to slowly move to the beat of the music.

For the life of me, I don't know how it happened. But as time started to press on one song slowly became two, four, and eventually six. It seemed every time one would end Jude or I would find another record and the whole game started all over again. Somehow along the way, we even began to resort to daring each other to dance. Just going along with the song was far too easy. By the time a new one started one of us had been at least triple dog dared. It was stupid and childish, but it was also a blast. A completely random blast.

I lost track of how many songs we had gone through a while later. There were piles of records all over the stone floor that had been played at least twice each. By the time our last record, that required a twist like dance, finished Jude and I were exhausted. We collapsed on the floor amongst the piles of objects and laughed for a few minutes. As our lungs began to ache out of exertion, we quieted down and sat back to back in the room.

"You're pretty good." Jude finally spoke up and leaned his head back so our hair touched.

"You were expecting anything else?" I joked back causing his body to move as a few laughs escaped. The room grew quiet again, but this time it was rather comfortable. I had heard of welcomed silence, but I had never experienced something like this before. It was as if neither of us needed to say anything at all.

But the silence began to scare my mind as I realized how vulnerable it could look to an outsider. "Jude,"

"Yes?"

"What was Alex like?"

"Alex? Well," he paused as if he couldn't think of how to word his answer, "She's spunky, sweet, intelligent, kind, stubborn, beautiful." I noticed right off the bat how Jude used the first person when he described Alexandria but didn't mention it to him. "Why?" Jude waited quietly as I tried to think of an answer for his question.

"I was just curious…" The boy seemed disappointed with my answer, "You really love Alexandria don't you?"

Jude let out a soft sigh and nodded his head, causing our hair to rub gently, "It's hard not to." He admitted slowly as the muscles in his body started to tense up. I could feel his back against mine harden as he thought about the person who obviously meant the most to him.

In all my time in Lenox, I had never thought that hard about how much this all had to hurt Jude. I knew it was selfish, but I was starting to realize just how much I had worried and focused on my life. Jude had lost the love of his life and was prepared to take on major responsibility for the entire Lenox world. Maybe it was pity that made me do it, or maybe it was something else, but as the emotions started to swirl around my head, my body began to enact its own answer. Slowly, I turned around and wrapped my arms around the tense boy. Jude's hands softly stroked mine as they stayed clamped around his chest. His head bowed and for the first time I watched his true emotions for Alexandria come out…