Chapter 4: Break In
"What the…" Rogue gasped, she grabbed a hold of Gambit's arms and yanked him up, and took to the sky, pulling him through the air with her.
"Sounds like there's trouble…" Remy stated.
Rogue dropped Remy in front of the glass doors leading into the building, and she rushed through herself, running through the twisted hallways, the alarms were going off like crazy, louder and louder. Rogue was determined to find the source of the trouble and headed down the direction of the hallway leading to the main research laboratories, the closer they got to the laboratories, the louder the sirens became.
"Remy! Do you have a card key for this door?!" Rogue called over the sound of the loud alarms, she gestured towards an electronic door that needed a card key to be swiped through a little box on the wall to gain access past the door.
"No…" Remy stated, "Fuck it, just break the door, Chere…"
"Remy!" Rogue gasped at him, "that's destroying property!"
"So what?! Alarms are going off, there's obviously trouble…"
Rogue slammed her fist through the Iron doors, and they buckled, but only very slightly, she tried again, even with her immense strength the doors were barely giving into her at all.. "Shit, these are heavy duty!" she despaired, she tried again, and nothing even happened.
Remy sighed, "okay, stand back…" he warned, "give me a card from the pocket of my coat…" he ordered.
She remembered the cards in the pocket, she reached in and pulled a card out, and handed it to him carefully, making sure their bare hands did not brush against each other, she then stepped back.
Remy focused his energy on the card, and the card began to glow a brilliant white-yellow, he slipped the card between the two doors, and let go of it with speed and precision, leaping out of the way, landing on the floor and raising his arms over his head as a massive explosion caused the doors to cave in, along with part of the brand new walls. Rogue held her hands over her ears and fell to the floor to duck as pieces of brick and debris flew past she and Remy.
"That was DEFINITELY destroying property," Rogue mumbled, and she got up, and yanked Remy up also, they stepped over the pile of rubble and the two destroyed doors, and down a small corridor towards a normal glass door – which was locked also, Rogue elbowed the door hard in the frame, causing it to fly open, the lock broken, but the glass still in place. She and Remy spilled into the dark laboratory, Rogue located some light switches on the wall and flicked them, light flooded the large room.
The laboratory was wrecked, papers scattered everywhere, glass jars and test tubes broken everywhere, all kinds of chemicals spilled across the floor, Rogue looked all around her, "looks like someone's broken in…" she was gasping for breath from all the rushing and commotion, she leaned forward a little, trying to catch her breath.
Remy looked around helplessly, unsure of what had happened. Three large white rats were roaming around the floor, having obviously escaped from a knocked over cage that was lying on the floor.
Rogue picked up a half broken jar that had once been filled with some sort of clear liquid – perhaps water – she looked at it, "we're too late…" she looked around the laboratory again, trying to locate where the criminals might have escaped to, but no one was there.
There were two other doorways leading into the Laboratory, both seemed secure, Rogue checked them, "all locked," she stated, "How did they get in?!" she demanded.
"I dunno…" Remy was confused.
"Stop RIGHT there!"
Moira MacTaggert was standing at another doorway, holding a very dangerous looking rifle, she was in a nightgown, her hair mussed, she looked angry.
Rogue looked at Moira confusedly, "what?!" We didn't—" Rogue realised there must be some kind of misunderstanding, surely Moira did not think she and Remy had done all this damage.
"Shut up! Hands in the air!" Moira kept the gun pointed at them, she looked deranged and determined someone was going to pay for the injustice that had been placed upon the brand new laboratory.
Rogue dropped the glass jar, it shattered on the floor loudly, she placed her hands in the air, along with Remy.
"Moira, what is happening?!" Hank McCoy dashed through the doorway behind Moira, and looked at the laboratory with a look of shock and horror on his monstrous face, "oh my—" his voice full of apprehension, his eyes falling to the floor where important documents and reports were scattered, and shattered glass, the rats crawling near his feet.
"Your students dismantled nine months of work whilst left unsupervised That's what!" Moira shrieked in devastation at Hank.
Rogue gaped, "Hold on, we didn't do this!" she stood with her bare feet amongst the glass – due to her invulnerability the glass did not slice into her flesh. "Me and Gambit were down the beach when we heard the alarms goin' off…" she tried to explain, she put her hands down. "We literally just got here two seconds before you did!"
"How bad is the damage?" Hank looked around, "is anything missing?"
Moira took a quick look around the laboratory, still clutching the gun tightly and determinedly. "Several chemicals have been stolen…" Moira noted, she could see several things were missing from the shelves that she had known were burdened with chemicals and acids only earlier that day. "And a few other pieces of equipment…"
"We haven't took anything!" Rogue cried, "I told you! We just got here!"
Hank walked over to a small digital panel on the wall, he typed in something to the number pad and the alarms suddenly stopped, the silence that followed left a strange ringing in all of their ears.
"Surely there should be security cameras in here?" Hank asked of Moira. "We can watch the security footage to find out who was behind all this…"
"No! We haven't even had a CHANCE to get the security cameras installed yet…The laboratory isn't fully finished, yet!" Moira despaired, "all of our work is ruined, Hank…this is going to set us back another six or seven months worth of work…" she looked close to tears.
Hank looked at Remy and Rogue, "did you have anything to do with this?" he asked very lightly of them, his voice was not full of blame, but full of query.
"Hank, we swear…" Rogue held up her hands in defence. "Me and Remy were at the beach the whole time, she grabbed a hold of Remy's arm and turned him around, showing that there was damp sand sticking to the back of his navy sweater, "see…"
Hank nodded, seeming to believe them.
"You don't believe them…" Moira looked at Hank incredulously, her mouth forming a perfect 'O' in shock.
"Moira, they're good kids…" Hank replied, "They'd have no reason that I can see to want to destroy the lab…and you have no proof that they did, with no security cameras we have no proof they had anything to do with this!"
Moira looked at him, "I don't believe you! You can clearly see the damage, and it didn't do itself…isn't this MESS proof enough?!" she gestured to the room which had once been an immaculate fully socked laboratory, and was now nothing more than a ghost of what it had been.
Rogue looked at Remy now, concern etching on her face, mirrored in Remy's, they kept glancing back and forth to each other, then to Hank and Moira, confused.
"Kids, go to the living room upstairs, I will be up in a moment to speak with you…" Hank looked at Remy and Rogue sternly, it seemed that he and Moira were about to have more disagreements that he did not wish either of them to be around for.
Rogue and Remy didn't need to be told twice, they quickly left, walking down the same hallway they had come in through – stepping over the broken doors, down the hall in the laboratory, they could hear Hank and Moira arguing about who could have possibly done such a thing, voices were being raised louder and louder, and Rogue felt slight tinges of guild despite she knew she herself had nothing to do with this break in.
"What do you think happened?" Rogue asked of Remy as they walked along the corridor together, still stepping over pieces of debris from Remy's explosion of the doors.
"No clue…" Remy seemed confused, he kicked a solitary brick that had been lying in the floor – having been propelled down the hall from the explosion – off to the side of the wall.
"Moira sure has a bad temper," Rogue admitted.
"Yes…that she does," Remy replied.
Remy was silent the rest of the way up the hall into the main lobby of the centre, they began up the winding staircase. They entered the living room, and they turned the lights on and sat down. Just then, Kitty and Kurt came in, both in their night clothes, hair mussed, eyes sleepy.
"Guys, we heard alarms going off, what's going on?" Kitty asked with a yawn.
"Someone broke into the Laboratory – and now me and Remy are the main suspects," Rogue said bitterly.
"Why would someone want to break in?" Kurt asked curiously.
"I have no clue," Remy rubbed his bearded chin unsurely, "Hank is going to be coming up to speak to us soon, you two best be gone," he added.
"But we want to know what's going on exactly," Kitty tried.
"We'll fill you in later," Rogue assured, and waved them off.
Kitty and Kurt left together, leaving Rogue and Remy deep in thought, neither could think of anything to say for the longest time, Remy sat in a chair, silent, his expression full of confusion. Rogue remained on the couch, still wearing Remy's leather coat. It was Rogue who finally broke the silence, realising they'd been sitting there for almost half an hour without an exchange of words.
"LeBeau, you're quiet, what's on your mind?" Rogue asked sullenly.
"Nothin'," Remy retorted, "Just confused…still…Moira was so quick to pin it all on us – she didn't even want to hear our side of the story…"
"She's human, isn't she?" Rogue asked quietly, as if this were to prove a point, that if Moira were a mutant also, Remy and Rogue wouldn't have been blamed for the wreckage, and that Moira was biased.
And then came a voice from the stairway leading into the living room itself, "I'm afraid she is."
