Chapter 9
The instant Jean had pulled them out of the here, Gambit had broken away. Her power was stretched too thin to cover him and manage the physical dimensional shift. He had felt her stop the pull but he no longer cared. He'd gotten his one chance and he was running. His mind fled from his body as fast as he could. At first he didn't care where, he simply ran, erecting the most powerful shields he could to not only conceal his presence but to camouflage it. Being one big blank psychic spot was as bad as being out in the open.
He didn't know how far he went, didn't know how long he ran. Time had no meaning here. Wherever here was, that is. As far as he could see, it was a featureless landscape. It was simply a nothingness. He discovered that if he thought about it, willed it, things would appear, but they were only the constructs of his mind, they existed because he wanted them to. It was kind of a self-created mirage, or the ultimate in virtual reality. He'd have been happy with a plain old fashioned sign that said "home."
He couldn't risk sending his mind out, or calling. He didn't know yet how to filter his call, wasn't sure where to aim it either. Every so often he would get a sense of a presence calling for him but it was mixed, he couldn't identify it, wouldn't answer.
Until Rogue had called. He had known it was her. He'd recognize her mind, her love, anywhere. He had tried to go to her but she'd disappeared as quickly as she came.
Then they had found him. Jean and Lian. Two women in the same mind/astral body. He knew it must have happened last week when Jean and Storm went to Virginia. He didn't know how Lian could be alive, though given the visions he'd had, maybe she wasn't completely alive. She certainly hadn't been active until she had snagged Jean. Why they'd both be after him he couldn't guess. He hadn't even thought that Lian would go after him, they'd only met twice, both that one night in Cairo, IL, the same night he'd met Storm. He couldn't have made that much of an impression, could he?
'Oh, but you did...' came a voice out of nowhere. He started running again, heard her laughter and the baying of hounds. 'There were promises made, lover, and I intend to collect on every one of them... We both do.'
He cursed whatever it was he'd done that night. He might have used his mind to try and influence them, but doubted it. Body language was more subtle and ultimately made more of an impression. He'd been so busy trying to get himself and Storm away, he hadn't assessed his enemies properly. Granted he'd never met anything like the Shadow King at the time, but he was careless. Should not have been merciful and missed with the cards the first time, and definitely should not have tried to charm this woman.
'But you did...' The laughter and the hounds, closer.
He kept running.
****
'Gambit!' Rogue called, waited for an answer. She turned to the part of her that was the professor and said, 'There's nothing. Why won't he answer?'
She felt his hesitation, knew the possibility he did not want to voice. It was strange to be all one like this and separate, too. There were five of them, she could see them, could see herself. They looked like they did in real life, except the professor wasn't in a hoverchair. He had told her this wasn't exactly the normal astral plane, but it was far enough away from the physical world that physical limitations were removed.
'Call him from the heart, child, like you did last night. Maybe then he'll answer,' Julia said.
She wasn't sure she could do that with these people so much a part of her. Last night she'd reacted instinctively, her heart calling out to him without her mind to set the limits. Now...
She felt the urgency and the worry in Julia, knew she had to do it. Bare her soul. 'REMY!'
Even running, hiding, he heard her call. It was something that came from her soul, instinctive, even primitive, and he had to respond, couldn't have stopped himself even had he really wanted to. 'Rogue.' Her name was a whisper and a shout in his mind. 'ROGUE!'
'He's there,' she said, her heart making a permanent home for itself on cloud nine. He did love her. She'd felt his response, as deep and as honest as her own. The other parts of her had fastened on the call and they could all feel him now. They ran.
Jean/Lian heard her call, heard his response and knew anger. Here was the blasted girl trying to take their prey. But the five would not have him. They had come too far, Gambit belonged to them. The part that was Jean ached with desire as she remembered the kiss and the secret daydreams she'd had since she'd met him, the part that was Lian reveled in the desire and something more, the remembrance of promises, the promise of surrender, hers and his. The possession. They would use his response to these intruders to track him, then they would have him. 'He is ours.'
He had a better sense of Rogue now, knew that she was not alone. He identified the professor, Psylocke, Revanche, and surprise of surprises, his mother. They were coming for him, they would take him home. His mind ran to meet them.
Jean/Lian fastened on his mind, smiled. They had him.
They all heard him cry out, felt the struggle to flee, felt the ties binding closer. 'No! We were so close,' Rogue said, went faster.
The professor tried to hold back, knowing they would meet Jean/Lian and unsure they were ready for the combination, especially since the pair now had Gambit. But he was overruled. The other four parts of him were eager for battle and rushed headlong.
Jean/Lian did not run. They did not have to. Together they were strong. With Gambit, they were invincible. The power it took to keep him under control was more than made up by what he gave. His was truly a phenomenal mind. They would teach him to use it as they saw fit, after they had dealt with these piddling would-be rescuers and sated themselves. They must sate themselves, they had waited too long.
They saw the five approach and laughed. They had one hand on Gambit's head as he knelt in front of them, raised the other. Gambit raised his own hand and a card appeared there, a giant card that began to glow. He tossed it. The five tried to run but there was no place to go. It exploded with a force that shook the ground.
'That's a physical power, Gambit shouldn't be able to manifest it here,' Psylocke said as she picked herself up.
'This isn't the astral plane as we know it. It might be the mental equivalent of where their bodies were when Kurt pulled them out,' Charles replied. 'We can't fight their combined strength--'
'We can't leave him!' Julia and Rogue flared together.
'Ah got some physical power of my own,' Rogue added, 'He caught me off guard the first time, but now Ah'm ready for him.'
'Are you now?' Jean/Lian said. 'Are you really? You don't even know the half of what he can do.'
Gambit raised him hand again and this time there was no card. There was simply a large red arrow that grew as it left his hand and hit them all.
Rage. Contempt. These things somehow made solid smashed into their minds, through hastily constructed shields that could not hope to hold. The end result was agony. Next came a sickly yellow arrow that was fear. It awakened every nightmare, every memory, everything and everyone they had ever been afraid of, the terror impossible to bear.
'We can't win against this,' Charles whispered, fighting to protect his mind, keep even a fragile shell about him, 'why haven't they pulled us out?'
****
"These readings are going wild," Scott said. "Everything's elevated, pulse, respiration, and brain activity's off the scale. We have to pull them back."
"But they might be nearly there," Storm said, glancing from the five still forms to the two in the cryo tubes. "If we pull them out..."
"Something's definitely happening, I can't tell what, but I can feel it from Betsy," Wolverine said.
"But..." Scott let it drift, eyes on Jean. "We'll wait a little longer, a few more minutes."
****
Jean/Lian laughed at the twitching figures, glorying in their utter defeat. They were resilient, a few of them were still moving. The twins, Psylocke and Revanche, and Rogue. One more assault should end them. What should it be?
'We can't fight them together,' Psylocke whispered, trying to make it so only Revanche would hear. There was an imperceptible nod.
'How?'
'A diversion...'
In that moment Gambit acted. He stood, but instead of running, he took hold of the entity that was Jean/Lian and kissed them. It was the last thing they would expect him to do, and it was the one thing they were not guarding against. They had concentrated on keeping him from running, on using his power for their own ends, not on preventing him from fulfilling their desires.
Rogue had barely a chance to work up the outrage when Psylocke and Revanche moved, one drawing the frontal attack, the other raising her psychic blade and slashing through the disoriented defenses to pierce the Jean/Lian entity.
They were lost in the kiss, pent up desire demanding release. Their minds enmeshed, all three drowning in the joining, the fulfillment of the deepest dark desire of the soul. They sensed Revanche attack, hastily erected a TK shield but it was flimsy, all were too caught up to react properly. They stopped her still, but Psylocke got through. All three screamed.
Gambit had hoped this would happen, he hadn't expected to be caught in it, but he had been somewhat prepared. His mind fled back on itself, freed of all control. Lian acted in self preservation, abandoning Jean who was the visible focus of the attack.
The professor saw the attack, saw Psylocke's psychic blade find it's mark, heard the screams, saw the three separating, saw Jean falling as Gambit staggered back, saw a shadow that must be Lian pull away. They mustn't get back together. A chance like this would not come twice. 'Jean,' he called, 'Gambit, we can escape...'
He felt Gambit respond, take a step towards them. A TK wall appeared to block him. Charles could not hide his shock. 'Jean!'
He heard her sob and the wall dissolved. She began to crawl back to them.
'All my pretties running at once?' boomed Lian's voice. 'Can't have that.' She sent a wave of pure pain through them that was as debilitating as Gambit's arrows. The five of them, already battered and mostly spent in the first part of the battle could not withstand it. Jean was too drained in body and spirit.
That left only Gambit. And he was mad. 'You made one mistake, Lian. You gave me a chance t' practice.' A whole fleet of arrows shot out of his hands, pierced her body.
She cried out, half pain, half pleasure. 'Oh, lover, your touch is magic. How do you like mine?' Lightning flashed from her hands, striking at his mind. His shield kept most of it away but some got through, staggering him anew. Her power was tremendous here. She was mistress.
And she kept battering into him, forcing him to focus all his power on defense. If only he'd had a little more practice, maybe he could have fought better. As it was he could barely hold his own. His reserves were weakening, while hers seemed stronger with every attack. His shields were going. But he would not, could not let her win. It wasn't just him, it was Rogue, and his mother, the professor, Psylocke, Revanche, even Jean. Once she'd beaten him she would have them all, then nothing in the universe would stop her. The shields were cracking.
In desperation he reached... felt the six minds around him, took their strength, and still reached for more, sent his awareness out without thought for protection, abandoning his shields and reached...
He felt the X-Men at the mansion, felt the hundreds in the town, the millions in New York, the hundreds of millions across the country, the billions across the globe. He felt their hopes, their dreams, their fears and darkest desires and weaknesses, their strengths, their lives and their deaths. He gathered them all within him, overflowing with the immensity of it. Then he channeled it all at her.
Her eyes widened in horror. She could not handle the enormity of what he'd given her. Too much corruption, too much greed, too much perversion, she was bloated with it. Then came the hope, the genuine joy and love, the true giving. They were poisons, too many, too immense to fight.
They saw her shadow body expand grotesquely, filling their vision until they thought it would swallow them. Then it was pierced, polka-dotted by a thousand arrows of light that spread until they covered her body. A huge yawing dark that might have been a mouth opened to scream and she exploded, all the more awful for the utter silence of it.
Charles reached for Julia, felt her take his hand. 'What did he do?' she whispered.
'Fed her the totality of a world,' Charles said, a touch of wonder in his mind.
'Why-why isn't he moving?' Rogue asked.
Charles focused on Gambit, saw that he glowed with a light so pure it hurt his eyes to look at it. The totality of a world. And he couldn't let it go. It would consume him as it had consumed Lian.
'He's not letting go, is he?' Julia whispered. 'He doesna know how...'
Charles tried to reach him, but he was one insignificant mote in the whole of Gambit's awareness. He was one tiny voice crying a way home and he was lost among the thousands who died, among the first wails of babies entering this world.
'I can't reach him... There are too many others.'
'I can't lose him now!' Julia said her fear strong and sharp, and tried herself. Nothing.
Her sorrow shuddered through Charles, demanding that he do something. His gaze fell on Rogue and a glimmer of an idea hit. It communicated itself to the girl even as he thought it. 'If you love him, do it, otherwise he will be lost.'
'But, Ah could--'
'He's already dying, he cannot hope to maintain this. Do it, Rogue. Now.'
'God, Remy, forgive me,' she whispered, and ran for him. Her touch brought a fraction of his mind back as he recognized the love of the woman he loved. The part of him that was still linked to this place took hold of her as she pressed her lips against his the way they had both dreamed of doing since they first met.
For Rogue there was the sense of the kiss but soon there was something more. There was everything more. She started sharing in the vastness of his awareness, feeling the edges of his power stretching everywhere, through every living thing on the planet and still going beyond. For an instant she felt the heart of a sun. She couldn't hold it. She would burst before she could contain it all. In that moment she didn't care. She was the sun and she was five billion people and she was loved and in love.
'Rogue!' cried four mote voices. 'Rogue pull back.'
Pull back, she thought, how can you pull back from this? Why?
'You'll die, you'll both die. Gambit will die.'
Love can't die, she thought. I am the heart of a star.
'Rogue!'
So insistent these voices. And now there was a tug, too.
'They're pulling us back. Come home, bring him home.'
'Home...' the word echoed in her mind. The tug grew stronger, pulling her away from him. Their contact broke and sanity returned. She saw Remy's face, paler now but still shining with the light of the world.
'Let them go,' she cried. 'Come home with me.'
She was still one voice in the billions, but she had been the heart of the star with him. He focused on her face, trying to draw her name from the thousands.
'Rogue...'
He was staggered by her wordless pulse of love, felt his spirit following her, leaving the vastness behind. The awareness of the others faded. There was only her. And home.
****