AN: I didn't expect to be able to have this out so soon but I was too excited at finally being able to write it.
And now for something completely different......
O-o-o-o-O
Somewhere in upstate New York.........
O-o-o-o-O
"What do we have here?"
"Car accident, Doc. Jeep vs brick building. Building won. No sign of broken bones or injury other than some cuts and possible head trauma. The guy was lucky; he wore his seat belt."
"Right. Paula, start taking info. Native American male, mid to late forties, height looks to be around six feet. No ID on him."
"There's no registration in the car, and the VIN's been scratched out. The plates are probably stolen. I'll contact police to check for any reports of theft."
"Good lord, what the hell is this?! Paula, take this down. Patient seems to have lost his right hand and leg; replaced by some sort of robotic limbs. I've never seen anything like it."
"Sheesh. That's freaky, Doc. Do you think he's one of those mutants?"
"I don't know, Matt. Even if he is, we still have to treat him. We have no legal right to turn him away. Besides, it doesn't look like he's going anywhere any time soon. Paula, you start on those cuts and I'll check out his head."
"Yes Doctor."
O-o-o-o-O
The first thing he was aware of was that his head ached. Actually, pounding was a much better description. It started out as a throbbing in the front of his head and just spread out from there. He groaned, and shifted. It was then that he noticed that he seemed to be laying down and that over half of his body ached. Apparently moving isn't such a good idea. He thought to himself.
His next thought was, Where the hell am I? He supposed he should open his eyes, but he wasn't quite sure if he was ready for that yet, so he left them closed and tried to assess his situation.
Last thing I remember, I was driving..... Oh God, wherever I am, I've gotta get out of here....they'll be coming......
It was this thought that made him decide to open his eyes. He didn't know where he was, or how much time had passed; they may have gotten ahead of him, or maybe they've found him and he was right back where he had started.
Finally opening his eyes, he found himself staring up at a ceiling; the white, commercial type of ceiling patterned with all those funky shaped little holes that gave a person something to count if they were really, really bored. The kind found in offices. Or hospitals.
Not finding anything else of much use on the ceiling, he took the plunge and turned his head. To his left he saw a chair, small table, and medical equipment that included a heart monitor. He was apparently in a hospital. That was good. He supposed that he had been in an accident, probably while he was driving; which wasn't good but definitely better than the alternative of having been recaptured. He didn't even want to think about that. It was a lucky chance that he had been able to get out; he wasn't sure he'd be able to manage it again if they took him back.
A sound from the doorway made him turn his head in the other direction.
"I see you're awake." said a woman in the doorway wearing a nurse's uniform. She looked to be in her mid thirties and had a calm voice.
"Unfortunately." he muttered. "Where am I? What happened?" he knew those were the usual questions people asked, but they were the usual questions for a good reason.
"You're at County Hospital in Plattsburgh, New York. My name is Paula. You were in a car accident; apparently you lost control of your car while going around a steep curve and hit a building head on."
He decided not to mention that it wasn't really his car, but he figured the nurse already knew that if they had done any investigating, which they definitely would have done since he didn't have any sort of ID on him. His driver's license and Department of Defense badge were back at the place he'd recently left. Unfortunately his copies were back home in Dallas, as he hadn't expected to be stranded in New York. It didn't really leave him with a lot of options. He could call his coworkers at the DoD, but he didn't have the time to waste going through the questions and debriefings he'd be subjected to. He supposed once he got out of here he could go to Xavier, but that was probably very high up on the list of places they'd look for him, and despite everything that had happened he still felt uncomfortable getting Charles involved in this. This was his mess; he'd take care of it, like he should have done years ago.
He never should have listened to her. Yes, he'd had every reason to believe that she was right, but he should have ignored her warnings, taken what was his and gotten the hell out of there. He didn't though. And now he was paying for it. She was probably paying for it. It had been so long, anything could have happened by now.
"So what's wrong with me, other than the massive headache I've got?" he asked finally.
"Well, other than a mild concussion, and some cuts and bruises, you're in remarkably good shape." the nurse said. "The doctor did have some questions though; your hand and leg....."
"I work for the government." he interrupted. "It's classified, I can't talk about it." It wasn't classified, really, but he still didn't want to talk about it. It opened the way for too many questions he wasn't ready to talk about. Glancing down at his body, he moved his bionic limbs and found that they were able to move without difficulty. He'd wait until he was alone to check out the circuits.
The nurse looked disconcerted. She was probably really wondering what was going on now.
"Alright." she said hesitantly. "Can you at least tell me your name?"
He nodded. "You can call me Forge."
O-o-o-o-O
The nurse checked his vitals, asked him a few questions about how he felt, then returned a little bit later with painkillers and some food. After he ate, Forge laid back against the pillows and waited for the painkillers to kick in. His mind was telling him to get out of here, he had too much to do and a search to get underway, but he knew that he was in no condition to drive and he was no use to himself, no use to her, if he left and hurt himself again. It was frustrating though. Two fucking years. He had no idea what had happened since then, and especially what had happened since about eight months ago. He had to find out, before he found out. He had to get out of here.
Along with dulling the pain, the pills also made him tired, and as he drifted off to sleep, his mind drifted off back in time, to how he had gotten into this situation in the first place.
Two years ago.........
Forge was slammed against the wall, his head rapping sharply against the metal the wall was made of. He wasn't surprised that the guy would have a completely metal building. The hairy mutant that had just tossed him like a rag doll snarled from across the room. He tried to move forward but found himself going off balance as the metal of his right hand and leg suddenly became cemented to the wall.
"I would really reconsider your answer to my request." said the man in the doorway. Erik Lensherr, also known as Magneto, had grabbed Forge while he was in Washington D.C on DoD business. He had no idea where he was now, just that it had been a few hours by plane. Now he was in a metal building somewhere while Erik tried to commission him for a job he had no intention of taking.
"No way." he spat, and sank awkwardly to the floor, his trapped limbs sliding with him as he rubbed his head.
"I don't understand why you're being so difficult." Erik said calmly. "With the power you can help me achieve, we can help mutantkind defend itself against the war that's coming. And you know it's coming just as well as I do."
"No, if you do this you'll just make them more determined to fight us." Forge said. "We need to reason with them. Give Charles a chance."
Erik shook his head. "As much as I respect my old friend, Charles is a fool. They can't be reasoned with. Our only solution is to fight, it's us or them. And you will help us."
Forge leaned back against the wall. "What makes you so sure I'll help you?"
Erik smiled, but there wasn't a trace of pleasantness in it. "Because otherwise I would need to take a little trip. To Mississippi. There's a young lady there who I've never met, but I've wanted to for a long time."
Forge felt like his blood was turning to ice in his veins. no..........
His panic must have shown on his face because the older man's smile turned cruel. "Did you honestly think I didn't know? Did you think I wouldn't find out what Destiny was hiding from me? I've known all along. Raven told me right from the beginning, in fact the child was promised to me. Destiny told her about the power the girl would be capable of, and Raven promised to train her for me. After she died I was told that the child had died with her, but I found out later that Irene lied."
Forge was horrified. Irene had lied to him. "No.......she said you never knew...." he said quietly.
"Destiny can be quite manipulative when she wants to be." Erik said. "Is that why you've stayed away all these years? Did she tell you that you had to stay away, or otherwise I'd find out? I keep an eye on them, probably more than you do, and we've rarely seen you visit. Tell me Forge, does your daughter even know you exist?"
Forge just groaned and turned his face away. If he could he'd strangle Irene right now. And Raven. He couldn't even begin to describe the anger he felt towards his dead lover.
"Why have you left her alone?" he asked finally.
"I have no time to raise a child, and Destiny seemed to be doing an acceptable job of it so I left the girl where she was. Then she had her accident. I really don't have much use for a blind girl, and I wasn't completely sure if and when her mutation would show up, or even what it was, so I've left her alone. What is her mutation, anyway?" Erik asked curiously.
"Hmph. Like I'm really going to tell you." Forge said.
"No matter. I'll find out eventually. The bottom line is, you're going to do what I say and build my little project, or else your daughter is going to work for me, blind or not, and I can't promise that she will remain as innocent as she is now. Other than Sabertooth here, my Acolytes are all young men, and I can't watch them all the time." Erik said, more than a bit of a threat in his voice.
"What happens if I finish this project of yours?" Forge asked warily.
"If I'm satisfied with your work, I let you go. You can take the girl and go wherever you want. Destiny stays though; I've been needing to have a little talk with her for several years now."
"How can I believe you?" Forge asked.
Erik shrugged. "You're going to have to trust me. You have no choice. So what is your answer?"
"Fine. I'll do it."
"Good. You'll start tomorrow." Erik said, and left the room, Sabertooth following behind him.
After the door closed, his metal hand and leg collapsed beside him. Forge closed his eyes and leaned his head back against the wall.
Rogue........I'm so sorry........................
O-o-o-o-O
He woke up in a panic, the memory running through his head. His headache had diminished to a more bearable level, but frankly he'd rather experience that pain than go through the memory of the past two years again. Erik didn't make a habit of being cruel to him; in fact as long as he did his work Forge was treated fairly well, but he was under guard at all times and locked up in his room except to work. The only time he had been treated roughly were the times he had tried to escape; on those occasions he had been given some 'alone time' with Sabertooth. Even then though he wasn't allowed to be injured too seriously; he was needed in relatively one piece to do Erik's work. Sabertooth however over time found ways to cause him great pain without severe physical damage.
And so time had gone on, Forge's work on his assignment going well enough to keep Erik satisfied. Until about eight months ago.......
The door to Forge's room ripped off its hinges with a horrible metallic squealing sound. It crashed into the wall near his bed, leaving a crater behind. In its wake walked in Magneto, the unholy white glow of his eyes giving away his anger.
"WHERE IS SHE?" he demanded, and dragged through the air by his metallic limbs, Forge was thrown against the wall next to what used to be his door.
"What?" he asked, trying to ignore the aftershock of the blow that was still going through most of the right side of his body.
"Rogue and that damned pre-cog." Magneto ground out. "My Acolytes make random visits to Mississippi at least once a year. This time they discovered that your daughter and her foster mother had left; they up and moved and nobody knows where, people just know that Rogue left a young man lying in the hospital in a coma before she disappeared. Now where IS she?"
"How the hell should I know?" Forge demanded angrily. "You've had me locked up here for well over a year and a half now. I have no idea where they might have gone." And he really didn't know, he realized as his mind raced, trying to think where Irene and Rogue may have gone. Irene had no living family that he was aware of. And she had kept Kurt and the X-Men a secret from Rogue her entire life so he doubted she would go to New York now. Besides, the last he knew she was still determined to keep Rogue away from both Magneto and Xavier. So where were they?
"Hm......maybe you don't." Magneto conceded reluctantly, the glow in his eyes fading slowly. "From what I've seen over the years I get the feeling Destiny has allowed you very little of your daughter's life."
"It's none of your damn business." Forge snapped. He didn't want to admit how easy it had been for Destiny to talk him into going along with her wishes.
"I'm going to find them." Magneto said. "And if I find out that you lied, that you knew where they went, I will have Sabertooth rip every inch of skin from your body." With that he turned around and left the room; the door that had been laying on the floor rose into the air, straightened out and reconnected itself back into the door frame.
Forge's bionic limbs released from the wall and he sighed, not for the first time missing his own flesh and blood. He couldn't dwell on that though, there were more important things to think about. Irene and his daughter had disappeared somewhere, and Erik was now engaging in an all-out search for them, while he was stuck here useless, unable to try to find them.
What had happened to make them leave? Destiny wouldn't just up and move for no reason; she and Rogue had lived in that little town in Mississippi for all of the girl's life, and she felt safe there. It was too damn frustrating. All he knew was, he now had to try harder than ever to find a way out.
O-o-o-o-O
The months after that had been hell, Forge remembered as he laid in the hospital bed. As Erik's project neared completion, he made his captive inventor work harder than ever. But even while he worked, Forge kept his eyes open for an opportunity to escape. That opportunity finally came a day or so ago, when Erik brought one of his children to his base. Forge had known of Erik's son Pietro; the young man was one of his Acolytes, and a rather annoying one at that. He hadn't known that the man also had a daughter. He had been working that day when he suddenly heard the sound of screams and an explosion from the room next door.......
Forge was usually guarded by either Sabertooth or the stoic young Russian giant known as Colossus. Today was Colossus' turn to guard him, but when the commotion began he left Forge's side and quickly went to the other room, apparently forgetting his duty to watch over the escape-prone inventor.
Forge followed the other man at a distance, and when Colossus stopped in the middle of the room, his attention completely on the cause of the commotion, Forge snuck in behind him to hide behind one of the open doors. They were now in the hangar, where a plane, a helicopter, and a few large, round metal balls were parked. Down at the other end of the hanger the main doors were still open; apparently everyone had been too distracted by what was going on to close them.
In the middle of the hangar were Erik and his Acolytes, trying to circle a young woman who couldn't be much older than her late teens. She had coal-black hair cut very short, wore pale makeup and dressed in red. Bolts of blue energy shot from her hands at the people trying to surround her. Her attention was mainly focused on Erik and Pietro.
"I'm going to kill you Father!" she shouted, firing a blue bolt at him. Erik managed to duck out of the way, not without getting a corner of that ridiculous cape he wore singed though.
Father? Forge had already been surprised when meeting Pietro that Erik had managed to procreate once, now he finds that the man had managed it a second time.
The girl in red looked at her apparent sibling Pietro, and smirked. "And don't think that you'll get away either, brother dearest." she said, and fired at him as well. Quicksilver was too fast for her though, and dodged her easily.
This was his opportunity, Forge realized. His way out was right down at the other end of the hangar; he may not get another chance like this again. He was trying to think of how to sneak past everyone without getting caught when a startling thing happened. While ducking his head out carefully from behind the door, he caught the eye of the girl in red. She looked at him for a moment, then winked at him before turning around to run towards one of the one of the other doors out of the hangar. Erik and the Acolytes took off after her at a run.
He wasn't sure if it was because he didn't look like the others or why she did what she did , but not stopping to debate his good luck, Forge ran as fast as he could out of the hangar, making sure to get out of view once he was outside. He found outside to be a quiet, wooded area, with a large enough space cleared for the base and a small runway. It made sense for Erik to set up shop in a tiny area though, given what he was up to. Looking around, Forge saw a few vehicles parked around the hangar. Finally settling on a Jeep, he hotwired it and sped out of the area as fast as he could go, ignoring the occasional explosion that could be heard for a distance as he left.
Man, talk about your dysfunctional families, Forge thought to himself now. He hoped the girl, whatever her name was, gave her father hell. As for himself he needed to get going; there was a girl somewhere out there who had every right to give him hell, and as soon as he found her, he'd let her.
O-o-o-o-O
After experiencing dizziness and collapsing the first time he tried to get up, the doctor sent him right back to bed. It took another two days before he was able to get up and function properly, then another day before the doctor would release him. Forge found himself fortunate in that his insurance company was able to do an authorization for payment of his hospital bill over the phone, otherwise he would have been stuck. He lucked out again when he managed to talk his bank into releasing funds for him to travel with. The first thing he did was buy new clothes, then a bus ticket out of town. His disappearance most definitely would have been discovered by now, and Erik would have his Acolytes cover the local airports, as he would be expecting Forge to fly straight to Mississippi to begin his search. Forge had no intention of doing that though. His plan was to take a bus to Albany and steal a vehicle for the drive to Dallas. As much he didn't want to, he'd never make it through airport security without some kind of ID, and buses and trains were too slow. He didn't think Irene and Rogue were still in Mississippi. His best bet was to go home and see if any kind of message or letter had been left for him. Part of his agreement with Irene was that she would keep him informed on any major events or changes in Rogue's life. So if they were moving, she would have had to try to contact him in some way before leaving.
The bus trip to Albany was uneventful; Forge spent most of the trip reading a newspaper, trying to catch up on what had been going on in the world since he had been captured. It was mostly the usual politics and wars, sprinkled with celebrity gossip. Violence against mutants was escalating though, and some states, such as Louisiana, were trying to pass mutant registration and other similar laws. It almost made him wonder if Erik was right about an inevitable war. Then he remembered what Erik wanted to do, and decided that it would just make things worse.
Once in Albany, he bought something to eat and caught a cab to the airport. Long-term parking would be his best bet; the owners would be gone for awhile which would delay the reporting of the car as stolen. Wearing a baseball cap and sunglasses to cover his face, he tied his dark hair back into a ponytail and searched the mainly deserted parking lot. With a backpack of new clothes slung over his shoulder, he looked no different than any of the other hundreds of people in the airport that day. Finally he found a small, nondescript looking older model car. Peeking through the window, he saw that it had a nearly full tank of gas, which meant he wouldn't have to stop to fill up until he was out of state. The parking card in the window indicated that it had only been in the lot for a little over three days. It was perfect.
When he had built his bionic hand and leg years ago, he had built the hand to be a little more special than the ordinary hand, more special than the average artificial hand for that matter. It had a computer interface with USB port, meaning he could connect into most computers, and had built some special weapons of his own design to be used with it also. But one of his favorite additions was what he liked to call the "Swiss Army Knife" function. Out of the thumb he could produce a tiny pair of scissors, while his index finger produced either a thin stilletto blade, or at the suggestion of one of his former sargeants when he was designing his new limbs, a standard lock pick. He used this to pick the lock on the car, then tossed his backpack into the rear seat before climbing in. Some of his old Army buddies hadn't exactly been upstanding citizens before joining the service, and one of the things they had taught him was how to hotwire a car; Forge now used this skill and was soon pulling out of the parking lot after having paid the parking fee for the car having sat for the past few days. A little while later he was on I-90 West heading towards Buffalo; he wanted to avoid going through the larger cities to the east where he might be spotted.
With making only the bare minimum of stops for food, fuel and restroom breaks, he managed to make it to Dallas in about a day and a half. The first thing Forge did was stop at DFW Airport, where he left the car he'd stolen in long term parking. Even if law enforcement somehow tracked him to Texas, airport parking wasn't really a common place to stash a car. He doubted the car was really valuable enough for them to consider being worth the effort to track this far anyway.
Forge then took a taxi into downtown Dallas, where he had converted the top three floors of an apartment building into a penthouse. He liked to call it the Aerie, because of the view he had from there. In an upper corner of the wall near the doorway, there was a secret compartment where he kept a spare key. He was thankful for this now as he used it to enter the first level. Going inside, he noticed that the place had an abandoned look; he supposed two years of neglect would do that. Everything was covered with a thick layer of dust, and the plants he had near some of the windows were long dead.
It also looked like it had been thoroughly trashed. Apparently Erik's Acolytes had been there looking for information on Rogue and Irene.
It's a good thing I don't have any pets he thought absentmindedly to himself. Looking around again he didn't even try to pick anything up. He just left his backpack on one of the couches and walked over to where one entire wall was built out of high-tension glass. Looking out over the city, it just felt so odd to be home again. There had been many times over the past two years where he thought he'd never be here again. He didn't really feel relief, or much satisfaction to be back in Dallas. There was just a knot of anxiety in his stomach; one he'd been feeling for eight months now. Yes, he was away from New York, he was home again; but he couldn't stay. There was too much to do.
With a sigh, Forge walked away from the window and went to his safe, which was hidden in a compartment in his bedroom closet. Within he kept a spare copy of his driver's license, DoD badge and passport; along with spare cash and some traveler's checks. Also in there were copies of his apartment and car keys, and the key to his post office box. His work for the government was often classified, so he received his mail at a secure box at the regional post office, which was a couple of blocks away. He went there next after grabbing the ID's and spare keys.
His mail box was stuffed full of a variety of magazines, bills, various letters and junk mail. He wanted to be alone went he started reading anything in the bundle, so he kept himself from going through it, and despite the tightening knot in his stomach, forced himself to return to the Aerie before touching anything. Once there though, he collapsed on the main couch and started searching through the letters frantically. There had to be something there, there just had to be. Finally he found it, a thin envelope with a Mississippi return address, dated over a year ago. Before he opened it though, he looked through the entire bundle to see if there were any others. He found a total of three, the second and third letters though having an address in New Orleans. Grabbing the oldest one, he ripped open the envelope to see what Destiny had to say for herself.
Dear Forge,
For all my visions, some things are beyond my sight. I never expected to be writing this...................malignant brain tumor.........................less than 20% chance of survival, but I haven't told Rogue of this. I will continue to seek treatment...........................................St. Michael's Hospital, New Orleans.........................................all she has left. Please come immediately.........................cannot leave her alone...............will be able to do as you want now, I just hope you remember what her future is if you don't choose wisely.
Irene
Forge glared at the letter in his hands, crumpling it into a ball. Of COURSE I'm all she has left, you BITCH!! he screamed inside, the knot in his stomach twisting impossibly tight. What did you expect? You cut her off from her family, from everyone; all in the name of protecting her from a man we should have taken out years ago!
Tossing the paper ball aside, he reached for the next letter. It was similar to the first, telling of the failure of her treatments to do any good, and begging him to come as soon as possible. Finally he opened the last, fearing what he might read.
Dear Forge,
I don't understand your silence. You have every right to hate me, considering what I've done, but I need you now; no, she needs you now. I won't deny that I never wanted it to come to this. All I wanted was for Rogue to live a normal life; free from the dangers of mutant politics and warfare. I had hoped that someday Erik would either be defeated or made to see the error of his ways, and I could let Rogue come to know her family. The visions have come stronger than ever now, and I fear what will happen to her once I am gone. I know I don't have much longer; I spend more and more time sleeping since the treatments are almost as unbearable as the cancer itself. I'm checking myself into the hospital long-term tomorrow, and I don't expect to leave. Please come. Tell Rogue anything you want, just please come. I just hope that someday both of you can find a way to forgive me.
Irene
Forge just stared at the letter. Considering the time that had passed since this was written, he had no doubt that Irene was dead. But where is Rogue?! His throat was so tight he couldn't swallow. What could have happened to her? He didn't know what Destiny's final arrangements were; she came from old money so there wouldn't have been any problem with funeral expenses or anything like that, but he didn't know who would have handled it. Irene had kept a lot of things from him over the years, not just his child. Probably some law firm somewhere. It didn't really matter. What mattered was that there was a seventeen year old girl out there who had no idea that she had anyone in the world other than her now-deceased foster mother. And this girl had now been most likely abandoned for at least a year, considering he didn't know of anyone else Irene would have confided in.
He slumped back into the cushions of the couch, trying to somehow relax and lose the knot of fear inside that was threatening to paralyze him. It wasn't working.
Instead of crumpling this letter up like he had done with the last two, he folded it up and slid it into his pocket; he wasn't sure what he would tell Rogue if....when he found her, but he wanted to keep this to try and help him explain to her why Irene had done what she had. Of course that led to an interesting question; what was he going to tell her? Was he supposed to just walk up to her and say, "Hello Rogue, I'm your father, and I abandoned you because your foster mother had visions of you dying at the hands of a maniac?" Oh yeah, sure, that would really go over well. She had no idea what was going on regarding mutant warfare other than what was shown on the news. She didn't know about her brother, didn't know about Charles Xavier, didn't know about the X-Men. And she definitely didn't know about Erik Lensherr. No way was she prepared to live in a situation like that. Sure Rogue knew judo; Destiny had sent pictures of her in her gi and told him about how well she did in her lessons, but to try to go up against Magneto's Acolytes? It was the judo that had given him the idea to make her an adamantium cane; despite all of Irene's efforts he'd had the feeling that his daughter may get caught up in the mutant struggle, and wanted to make sure she could at least try to fight back. Forge had managed to call in several favors and got his hands on some true adamantium. Not even Wolverine would be able to make so much as a scratch on that cane.
Leaving the crumpled balls of paper where he had thrown them, Forge got up from the couch and went into the bedroom. The Acolytes had been in here too. The bed was wrecked, and drawers from his desk and dresser were laying on the floor, with papers and pictures strewn everywhere. His eyes fell on a picture near the desk, and carefully picked it up before sitting on the bed. It had been taken at Christmas; Rogue had just turned ten years old the month before and she was standing in front of the tree, holding the gift he'd made for her that year. Irene would send him pictures and letters, telling him of the things going on in Rogue's life, and he would either send money for presents or make things for her himself. When she was six he'd made her an extremely realistic mechanical dinosaur which she had loved; there was also the adamantium cane when she was thirteen and the vocal clock when she was fifteen. The year she was ten though, he had made her a music box. It had a medieval couple dancing on top, and played "Scarborough Fair", it made him sad though; Raven had loved it because she said it summed up their relationship; they had asked impossible things of each other like in the words of the song. The couple didn't simply twirl though, like other music boxes; instead they spun and danced so well that it looked almost real.
He wondered if she still had it.
It was okay though, Forge told himself. If she didn't have it he'd make her something else, something better. He'd make her whatever she wanted. He had started working on something a couple of years ago, but then Magneto had kidnapped him and, well, everything went downhill from there.
But before he could make her anything, he had to find her first. He wasn't sure what he'd do when he got down there, but he could think about that on the way. Sliding the picture in his pocket he grabbed an overnight bag for the trip to New Orleans, trying to shove away the image of a happy little stripe-haired girl dancing around a Christmas tree.
O-o-o-o-O
Anyone wanting to see Forge in this story should visit his profile on marvel dot com. It's the second picture down on the left. I have also discovered the perfect image of Remy for this story. It's the avatar on abril4's profile, and is absolutely drool-worthy.