The Jean Grey School, Westchester, New York
The Past, Three Weeks Ago
With the shock of having found a dead clone in Gambit's apartment, plus continued efforts trying to locate the genuine Remy LeBeau, Rogue had forgotten about the strange old man in the news stand, the one whose newspaper had seemingly predicted the future. It wasn't until later, frustrated with her inability to find a trace of Gambit or the mysterious redhead accompanying him, that Rogue recalled the enigmatic gentleman. He had told her something, hadn't he...about it being too late to help Gambit, but that "the boy" still needed her? Rogue could barely remember the exchange. She thought to return to the shop and question the man further, but when she arrived at the alleyway, she found the shop closed. She stood on the front step of the shop and rattled the door latch. The door was locked. Rogue leaned close to the glass. The window had been soaped and what little she could see of the room beyond told her that the shop had been closed for some time.
She stood back from the shop window and put her hands on her hips, glaring at her own distorted reflection in the glass. What had the shopkeeper been talking about? Of course the man had to go and vanish right when it was most inconvenient, just like Remy LeBeau. Rogue knew of at least one place she could go to find plenty of youngsters, The Jean Grey School. She could at least start there and hope for a clue. She had a sinking suspicion in her gut that told her that she already knew what "boy" the man had been talking about.
When Rogue arrived at the school she found it to be involved in slightly-more-than-usual chaos. With some alarm, she followed a firetruck through the school's front gate and onto the grounds. Rogue saw the cluster of students on the lawn surrounded by a protective circle of adults. Logan was among them, looking not at all happy about the firetruck's arrival. Rogue parked her car some distance away and walked across the soggy turf towards the students. A second emergency vehicle was already parked before the main entry on the school's curved driveway. Several firefighters stood about, dressed in their bright yellow reflective gear, staring in bafflement at the school and all its various towers and appendages. They seemed particularly perplexed about the giant ice mountain that perpetually surrounded one wing of the school. When Rogue finally reached the other staff members, it was to see Logan embroiled in a discussion with a taciturn fire marshal.
"This has got to be the most disorganized evacuation I've ever witnessed," the fire marshal said. He was wearing a blue uniform, a hat which concealed his eyes, and a disgruntled expression.
"It's a false alarm," Logan answered. "One of the students pulled the fire alarm. You don't need to be here."
"Pulling a fire alarm without an emergency constitutes a felony in the state of New York," the fire marshal told Logan. "Are all the students and staff accounted for?"
Logan surveyed the student body and scratched his head, his expression a picture of irritation. Rachel appeared at Logan's side and whispered something into his ear. Logan now looked agitated. Rogue felt herself cringe as the fire marshal waited with increasing disapproval. He wrote something down on his clipboard.
"Missing?" Logan erupted. "What? The both of them?"
"Well, I told them to use the buddy system!" Rachel answered.
The fire marshal snapped his pen down onto his clipboard. "I'm citing you in violation of several fire codes," he said. "You can expect heavy penalties. Now, no one is to enter the building until I've cleared it." He then began to turn and start for the school, but not before glancing up in Rogue's direction. The man ducked his head and quickly looked away.
Rogue began to make her way through the milling students towards Logan and Rachel. They were joined shortly by Hank.
"Why would they go running off?" Logan asked.
Rachel gave a half-shrug. "Well...teenagers. You know. Do you need to sit in on one of Remy's sex-ed talks?"
Logan threw his hands up in the air. "Forget it! Go find 'em! We can't afford any penalties!"
Rachel held her hands up defensively. "Relax, will you?"
"What about our other – absentee, shall we say?" Hank said in an undertone.
"He can't have got far," Logan said, his eyes scanning the nearby forest. "Not in his condition. It's possible he hasn't left the house, let alone the grounds."
Rogue looked away from the three teachers to the school. The fire marshal had disappeared through the open front door. It was probably unwise to let a human wander around without first warning him about the various "hall monitors" they had throughout the school. She looked over to the other firefighters. It appeared that two of them were conferring amongst themselves, staring up with trepidation at the school. It didn't seem like they were willing to follow the fire marshal. Logan and the other two teachers were discussing plans for how to recover their missing students. Rogue headed towards the building. No one directed her to stop as she climbed the front steps and passed through the door.
Once inside, Rogue looked to the hallways leading right and left, then across the foyer. She glanced up the ascending staircase. The house was uncharacteristically silent. She started across the foyer, searching for where the fire marshal had gone. She heard a door close softly from somewhere towards the back of the foyer, beneath the grand staircase. She hurried towards the sound. Rogue came to the stairwell that led down to the lower floors. She opened the door to the landing. Rogue leaned over the metal handrail to peer down the staircase. She saw a shadow pass by on the landing below. The figure paused, examining the mandatory placard diagramming the floor plan and emergency exits that hung by the door. Where was he going? Rogue wondered. She waited until the man had vanished from sight before she followed. At the bottom of the staircase, Rogue put her hand to the door latch. She slowly opened the door a fraction and peered out. She saw the fire marshal standing at the center of the corridor, facing away from her and carefully studying his surroundings. He was no longer wearing his hat and blue coat. Rogue saw that he had discarded his appropriated clothing under the staircase. Rogue scrutinized the man from where she hid behind the door. The man was now clad in a half-trench over dark denim trousers. Rogue could see that he was an older man, his long hair shot through with gray; he was physically fit with broad shoulders.
The man seemed to come to some decision because he began to slowly walk down the hall. Rogue felt a sensation of familiarity; she recognized his way of dress, his gait and the way he carried himself. The man very much resembled Remy LeBeau in all but stature. The man had turned a corner at the end of the hallway and Rogue followed. She paused at the end of the corridor to see where he would go next. He passed into the infirmary. Rogue crept carefully down the hall. When she reached the infirmary door, she peered through the window to see the man inside. He was looking at a clipboard he had taken from a plastic holder on the wall, the one nearest to an observation room. He replaced it and picked up the next clipboard. Apparently, it was not giving him the answers he was looking for because he put it back as well. There were four clipboards in all and he checked each one. The man turned and scanned the rest of the room. He spied a plastic tent-covered area and proceeded towards it. There he found another clipboard. He scanned the papers clipped there, flipping through them. Rogue stepped into the room.
She put her hands on her hips and asked: "So, fire marshal, where's the fire?"
Jean-Luc glanced at her sidelong, his face partially concealed by the raised collar of his coat. He did not show any surprise at her appearance. "I'm no expert, but I'd say: where dere'ssmoke."
"What're you doin' here, Jean-Luc?" Rogue asked and took a few steps towards the man. She bore no animosity towards him, but she knew him to be a secretive and manipulative person.
Jean-Luc replaced the clipboard back into its holder. "I'm lookin' for my son," he said.
"You and me both," Rogue said. "Why would you think he'd be down here?"
"I got a call," Jean-Luc began, "tellin' me he was sick." He turned towards the quarantined room. "And he wasn't out on de lawn wit' de rest of the staff."
"Sick?" Rogue repeated. Apparently, she was not in the loop. She watched Jean-Luc push aside the plastic curtain. There was a warning sign posted at the door behind the curtain. "Jean-Luc, Ah don't think you should go in there."
He ignored her and pushed open the swinging door. "I have to see him," Jean-Luc said.
Rogue let out an exasperated breath and started after him. She caught the door as it swung back towards her and pushed it open. She found Jean-Luc standing in an empty room. He looked at the empty bed with the uncoupled restraints, the tousled bedclothes, and the broken medical equipment.
"He's not here," Jean-Luc said, mostly to himself. He turned to Rogue. "Where is he?"
"Jean-Luc, Ah didn't even know he was sick," Rogue said. "Ah have no idea where he is."
Jean-Luc's blue eyes flicked around the room, finally coming to rest on Rogue. "De chart said he has chronic meningitis. I got no idea what that even means. It said he had a seizure. Something about a puncture. They operated on him."
This came as a surprise to Rogue. "Oh, mah goodness," she said, feeling a sensation of dread. "Well, we've gotta find him. He's likely contagious. We can't have him infect the other kids."
Jean-Luc's gaze narrowed on her. "D'ya think my boy's such a dummy that he'd go about risking the lives of children?"
"Of course not, Jean-Luc but –," Rogue began.
"Somethin's happened to him, that's plain as day," Jean-Luc told Rogue and brushed past her into the infirmary. "He's been taken!"
"Ah sincerely doubt that," Rogue was close on his heels. "Run off again, more like. He might not realize how bad off he is. He's just a little kid."
Jean-Luc abruptly turned. "What in God's name are you talkin' about?" Jean-Luc asked, his expression cross. "He's nearly thirty years old!"
Rogue's mouth opened to retort, but seeing the confusion on Jean-Luc's face she gathered herself for a better response. "Nobody told you about – about Remy?" she asked.
Jean-Luc's face became still and his eyes grew cold. "I was told he was sick," he responded flatly. "That he asked for me. That's all."
"Maybe we should sit down a sec," Rogue began tentatively.
"We don't got time for that," he snapped.
"Jean-Luc," Rogue said. "Remy's – uhm... How do Ah...? Well, he's a little boy, no bigger than yea high." Rogue held her hand out flat to demonstrate young Remy's approximate height.
Jean-Luc's brows came together. "He's a boy? But – that's –." Jean-Luc seemed at a loss for words. Suddenly, he said with exasperation: "What'd you people do to him dis time?"
Rogue raised her hands defensively. "Nothin'!" she answered. "We found him that way. He got lost in time or some such!"
"I don't...," Jean-Luc began, then his eyes seemed to lose focus.
"Now just think for a second," Rogue said. "Was there ever a time when Remy was a boy that he up and disappeared?"
"Well – there might've been more'n a few times he'd go off on his own."
"And you never thought t'ask him where he went?" Rogue asked.
Jean-Luc looked affronted. "I don't appreciate your tone," he answered. "And I'm not gonna stand here and let you patronize me." With that he turned and began to stalk from the room.
"Jean-Luc, wait," Rogue pursued the older thief from the room. "We'll find him faster if Ah help you look for him. Where would Remy go, if he was hurt or scared, when he was little?"
"Mattie's house, I suppose. But that's not an option," Jean-Luc said and came to the elevator. He pressed the button to call the car, then turned to look at her. "Where's de highest point in this place?"
"Not countin' the security platforms, Ah'd say the bell tower," she said.
"Then we'll go to de bell tower," Jean-Luc said as the bell chimed, announcing the elevator's arrival. He stepped into the car and Rogue followed.
"So when Remy would...go off on his own...ya didn't worry after him?" Rogue asked.
"Of course I did," Jean-Luc answered, staring forward at the closed elevator doors, his arms crossed.
"And he never told you where he ran off to?" she continued.
Jean-Luc let out an impatient sound. "He'd likely have some story or another," he said. "Though I suppose there was one time..."
"Yeah?" Rogue prompted.
Jean-Luc glanced at her. "Once he seemed to have vanished out in de bayou for a couple days. He told me he fell and hit his head. Pretty sure he was lying."
When the elevator let them off on the top floor, Rogue walked him toward the spiral stair to take them up to the bell tower. Jean-Luc continued: "Not long after that, he ran off again. We found him at de local hospital. Very sick. I blamed myself. I sent him there t'do volunteer work. He must've picked up somethin' while he was there. Mattie healed him. He swore he'd rather die than see de inside of a hospital again."
The pair emerged into spring sunshine. The landscape spread out below. The students and teachers were clustered on the lawn. In the distance a breeze stirred the budding trees.
"I thought he might have been up here," Jean-Luc murmured to himself.
"You haven't seen the adult Remy anywhere, have you?" Rogue asked.
"With my own eyes, no," Jean-Luc replied. "But I spoke with someone who's been keeping him company. The last I'd heard, he'd gone off to a doughnut shop and now that shop manager is dead. I'm more'n a little worried."
"Now we have two Gambits to worry about," Rogue said, her hands braced on the stone railing, her eyes scanning the scenery below.
"One turned my hair gray, with two, I'll find myself bald."
Not far into the trees beside the lake, a blast of red light arced into the air. Trees stirred vigorously as if in a localized storm.
"That looked like Cyclops' power signature," Rogue said. The blast was followed by two explosions.
"Remy?" Jean-Luc speculated.
"We gotta get down there," Rogue said and turned toward the front lawn. "LOGAN!" she shouted.
"Dieu, you've got some lungs on you, girl," Jean-Luc said, holding a hand over his ear.
Rogue waved her arms as Wolverine spotted her in the bell tower. Now realizing the missing students they were looking for were Scott Summers and Remy LeBeau she shouted: "The lake! They're by the lake!" Trusting that Wolverine's super-hearing would pick up her words, she spun to head down the staircase. However, Jean-Luc had already vaulted the belltower's balustrade and was running toward the roof ledge. In the distance, she could see the young Jean Grey and Scott Summers running from the forest.
"Ah miss flyin'," Rogue said to herself and skiddered after Jean-Luc. She halted at the roofline and watched the thief scale the corner quoins on the school's facade like a ladder. "And invulnerability would be nice too."
~oOo~
Remy heard the explosions and his elder self shout: "That's a goddamn order!" He stumbled to a halt, breathing hard. What was he doing, running away? He couldn't leave Jean to that monster. With a staggering start, he turned back. No coat, no weapons. His eyes cast around for something to throw. Pinecones? Rocks? He seized handfuls of forest debris and ran to the clearing. Remy came to a stop at the last few trees and bushes. There was an intense flash of light. He held up his arm to shield his eyes. When he lowered his arm and blinked spots from his vision, he saw that the clearing was empty. He walked forward slowly.
"Jean?" he asked, his heart filling with dread. Did Sinister take her? In the center of the clearing, he turned slowly to scan the trees. "Jean!" he shouted.
"They've gone," said a voice. Remy shivered. The pale man now stood before him. Remy changed his stance, holding tight to the pebbles in one hand, feeling the charge grow.
"Vanished!" announced another voice. "With my precious Number Five!" Remy glanced sideways. A second pale man stood to his left. Remy groaned in despair.
The two Sinisters looked at one another, and then returned their gazes to Remy. "Are you going to simply stand there, idiot? Grab the boy!" one Sinister commanded.
"I do not take orders!" declared the foppish Sinister.
The other pale man moved forward with inhuman speed, reaching a hand to grab Remy by the arm. Remy responded by letting the fist full of charged rocks fly into his face. It did not deter Sinister in the slightest and Remy found himself being held by an arm in midair. His feet lashed out, kicking ineffectually at Sinister's midsection.
Seeing his more motivated doppelganger take Remy prompted the other into action. The second Sinister came forward. "Give him to me, I will finish this nonsense!" Remy's other arm was seized.
"Aaugh!" Remy screamed, finding himself in a nightmarish game of tug-of-war with him as the rope. At a total loss as to what to do now, he screamed: "Help! Help me!"
To his ultimate surprise, two blasts of red light struck the pair of Sinisters, nearly at the same time. Remy felt as if his arms were going to be ripped from their sockets as the force of the blasts took the two Sinisters to the ground. One Sinister had released his arm entirely and seemed worse off than the other. Remy yanked himself free of the second and scrambled backwards like a crab, scrabbling away from the two men. Though he was fearful of taking his eyes from his opponents he cast a glance backward to see the source of the two blasts. Scott stood just to his right, his visor glowing with his recently used powers. On Remy's other side stood Rogue, red light swirling from her eyes. Behind them there came the sound of running through the undergrowth. Several voices called out: "Over here, they're over here!"
Remy looked back towards the two pale men. One seemed to have completely deteriorated, his remains a smoking ruin. The other was slowly standing, his face a mask. With the arrival of rescuers, he seemed to admit defeat and simply vanished, as if he were stepping sideways into space. Remy searched around fearfully, as if there could be yet another pale man hiding in the forest. Instead, he saw a familiar figure striding toward him.
"Poppa?" he squawked, hardly daring to believe his eyes. He climbed to his feet as his father stopped abruptly, staring at Remy as if he'd seen a spook. Indeed, his father's hair did seem a lot grayer than Remy remembered it. "Poppa!" he said. "You're here, you came!"
"Remy," Jean-Luc finally said, and came forward to embrace him. "My God, it really is you!"
Remy felt as if he could weep with relief. He held his father with what strength he could muster. The only thing keeping his tears in check was the sight of Wolverine appearing, along with the huge woman Joanna, Kitty, Bobby, Hank, several students who seemed eager to join a fight, and even two firefighters. "You came t'help me?" he murmured wondrously to himself, unable to believe it.
Jean-Luc held him at arm's length, his blue eyes searching Remy's face. He shook his head in disbelief. "I don't know what you did to end up here, Remy," he said finally.
"I want to go home," Remy said, his voice wavering.
Jean-Luc put his hands to Remy's face. "You're burnin' up with fever, son," he said.
Remy sank to his knees and Jean-Luc followed him until they were both kneeling in the grass. Remy rested his forehead on his father's shoulder and closed his eyes. There was a small crowd gathering around them now. There were so many voices, people asking questions, postulations about Sinister's whereabouts. He heard Jean say: "I'm so sorry, we should never have gone off. I didn't know how sick he was!"
"Can I stay at Tante's house?" Remy mumbled. He felt the strength fade from his arms. His father held him more tightly. Remy felt himself fading. Without the energy sustained by near constant fear, he found himself boneless and weak with relief.
"I don't think you'll make it that far," Jean-Luc told him and stood, carrying Remy in his arms as if he were a small child. Jean-Luc turned to the people gathered around the clearing. His eyes found Rogue's. Jean-Luc's voice was desperate. "What can we do? He's dying."
Rogue rushed forward, followed closely by Wolverine and Beast. "The infirmary -," Hank began.
"He needs a healer," Jean-Luc responded.
"Ah know," Rogue said. "You said... Tante Mattie healed him, when he was sick. Ah can take him there. Take him back."
"Rogue, a physician," Hank insisted. "Let's take him to the infirmary now."
"What're you thinkin', Rogue?" Wolverine asked. Rogue silently thanked him for trusting her.
"Ah know how to get him back home. In the right time, in the right hands." Rogue looked down at the young Remy's strained face. His dark eyes opened slowly to look at her.
"It'll be okay," she told him softly, and moved his hair from his forehead. Then she leaned forward and gently kissed him, in the little furrow between his brows.
~oOo~
New Orleans, Louisiana
The Past, Eleven Years Ago
It was raining when Rogue arrived. It was for the best, as the storm drove people into buildings and cars and Rogue's sudden appearance went unnoticed. Lightening flickered in the sky and thunder rumbled. Rogue was between two of the wings that made up Charity Hospital. She held Remy in her arms. He was unconscious, his head lay against her shoulder. He'd lost consciousness after Rogue had touched him and borrowed his powers. His memories played like a forgotten television screen flickering at the back of her mind.
Rogue took a few steps toward the emergency room entrance, her tread awkward under Remy's dead weight. She'd borrowed Frenzy's strength to help bear his prone form; young Jean's telepathy to maintain her anonymity. She needed to make sure Remy was left in good hands before his powers to time-travel faded. She didn't think she'd be able to touch him again without stealing the last of his ebbing strength.
An emergency vehicle was waiting at the ER entrance, red lights flashing on the wet pavement, headlights cutting through the rain. Rogue hurried over the EMTs, who were packing away equipment into the back of the vehicle.
"Help," Rogue said as she moved toward them. The pair, a man and woman, took one look at the prone form in her arms and snapped into action. The gurney inside the ambulance was pulled forward, it's legs protracting to hit the pavement with a sharp snap. Rogue placed Remy onto the cot.
The EMTs jogged inside the hospital through the sliding glass doors, wheeling the gurney. Once inside, Rogue looked about the lobby, getting her bearings. Jean-Luc said that Tante Mattie was usually in the pediatric ward. Today a child would be brought to the ER, and Mattie would come here instead.
With the arrival of a new patient, one of the nurses stood hurriedly at the nurse's station. She signalled to another. They wheeled a second gurney from the back room, banging it through a pair of swinging doors. The EMTs transferred Remy to the new bed. Rogue looked down at him. He looked ghastly pale under the fluorescent lights, his eyes dark and sunken.
"What happened?" the nurse asked.
"He's very sick," Rogue told the nurses, and with Jean's powers, placed the thought "chronic meningitis" into their heads. "It came on suddenly. He had some kind of fit and passed out."
They began wheeling the bed into a hallway. Rogue followed alongside.
"Patient's name?" the second nurse barked, and Rogue provided all the details she could. "Relation to the patient?"
"Ah, uhm, Ah'm a friend of the family," Rogue stammered. "Ah was takin' care of him for a bit. His momma's here though. In the hospital. Mattie Baptiste. She's a volunteer?"
The two nurses exchanged a look. "We know her," the first nurse said. "This is her boy? Her Remy?"
The second nurse was monitoring Remy's vitals. She called out a series of orders. They were joined by a young man in surgical scrubs. He helped the first nurse steer the gurney bearing Remy into a room with several other people, all surrounded by curtains hung from tracks in the ceiling. The man in scrubs pulled the curtain closed before Rogue could enter. The first nurse stopped her at the door.
"We'll have Mattie down here in no time," the nurse said. "Family only, I'm sorry."
"But-," Rogue began. "How can Ah-."
"You've done everything you could," the nurse said. "He'll be in good hands. We'll do everything we can for Remy."
Rogue wrung her hands. "He'll be okay," she murmured to herself. "He's gonna be just fine."
The nurse was leading her away, back to the lobby. "You can wait here. I'll let Mattie know you're here, so she can update you on Remy's condition."
Rogue knew she couldn't afford to wait. "Thank you," she said. The nurse gave her a quick smile and turned to leave. "Wait!" Rogue said and the nurse paused. "Ah have something of his." Rogue twisted the diamond ring she still had on her finger.
The nurse looked at her curiously as she accepted the ring. "An engagement ring?"
"It was his mamma's," Rogue lied. "Ah mean, his birth mother."
The nurse shook her head a little, still confused. But Rogue was walking away. She could tell by the fading of Remy's thoughts she didn't have much time to return to the present.
Once outside, she took one last look at the enormous hospital. It seemed every light burned in every window. Emergency vehicles rushed past, spraying water from their tires. Staff members rushed between the two wings, ducking their heads from the rain. In the future, Rogue's present, this building would be dark and empty, shuttered by a terrible storm, government ineptitude, and a society that ignored the basic needs of the people who needed the most help.
Rogue hadn't suffered the injuries or sickness Remy had. She had access to his full powers, better control. It was not hard to find the golden thread that tied her back to her place in the present. With a deep breath, she claimed the thread, pulled the surge of power into herself and sent herself forward, leaving a space in the air where no rain fell. For a second, the ghost of her form hovered there and then that too vanished.
