Black. He was surrounded by it, filled with it. Trapped by it. He lashed out, fighting and clawing and tearing at it, but the darkness just blanketed him, pinning his limbs, forcing its way into his mouth, his eyes, his soul until…

The light was so bright that it felt as if it were piercing the tissue of Remy's eyes as he squinted them open cautiously. His brain was cloudy, memory of what had happened-patchy. He was aware of the fact that his entire body was throbbing with a dull ache, that his head felt as if it had been run over by a Mac truck, and that he was hooked up to more machines than he cared to be. The smell of astringent was thick in the air as Remy took a deep breath, trying to focus and get his bearings. Opening his eyes more carefully this time, he gazed up at the blank tiled ceiling with revealed nothing about his settings. Judging from the softness beneath him, he figured that he must be in a bed of some type

He wrenched the tube out of his wrist with one, swift jerk. Bad idea. The needle attached to the IV tube came out crooked and painfully.

"Jesus!" Remy cussed as the sharp pain caught him off guard. He shoved himself upright with his good arm and another sharp pain ripped through his neck as he did so. Rubbing his hands along his neck, he traced a line of bandages with his fingers, their placement jarring his memory. Him on his knees, a man bearing down on him. His own Bo staff curling around his neck, cutting off his air. Fighting. Pain.

Rogue.

The sudden rush of memories took Remy by surprise and he pushed the information to the back of him mind as he tried to make sense of his surrounding; tried to determine if he'd been taken by the same side that had captured Rogue. The thought of the girl made his heart ache, and he looked around the room he was in frantically, wondering if maybe she'd ended up in the same position. But it wasn't Rogue's body in the bed next to Remy's, but that of another man, wearing red glasses that hugged his face closely. And there was another man in a bed next to him.

"'Dis ain't good," he whispered to himself, looking around frantically, noting the presence of all the medical equipment in the room. He didn't know what was going on, but it wreaked of mutant experimentation. It wreaked of something Remy didn't want to be involved in. Quickly he scrambled off the bed, trying to make as little noise as possible and wondering what had become of his coat and his cards. His movement was a mistake though, as if jerked a sensor off his head.

Immediately a machine behind him began to emit an obnoxious alarm. Panicked that it would alert whoever was in charge here, Remy leapt backward, groping at the buttons on the flashing front panel of the monitor, hoping that he'd hit an off button somewhere, but to no avail. Finding no other option, the Cajun pressed a fingertip against what looked like the main screen of the device and focused. The equipment began to glow bright purple and he flattened himself against the wall as the machine front blew apart, the alarm dying slowly, making an obscene noise at first, and then fading to silence. But it was too little, too late. Just as Remy was breathing a sigh of relief he heard rapid footsteps approaching from the opposite side of the formidable, metal door at the opposite end of the room.

Thinking quickly, the thief ran the short distance to the door as silently as possible. But instead of attempting to open it (for the door didn't have a handle or knob of any kind) he flattened himself against the wall next to hit, hoping whoever was approaching did what he needed. A split-second later there was a slight breeze as the doors parted with a WOOSH and a woman walked inside. She had a white lab coat on over what appeared to be everyday garb, and her high heels clicked against the floor noisily as she strode quickly across the room, staring intently at the empty bed. And just like Remy had hoped, she failed to notice him as she entered, allowing him to slide quickly out the door as she stood in the middle of the room. By the time she'd comprehended what had happened and whirled around, the doors had already closed behind her and Remy.

Finding himself in a metallic and foreboding hall, full of more metal, knobless doors, Remy sprinted to the first one he saw, hoping it functioned as the rest and parted based on motion. It did and he breathed a sigh of relief as he surged into the dark, empty room and heard the doors close behind him. It wouldn't take long for the woman to either a) raise an alarm, b) come after him, or both. He hoped that maybe he been swift enough to at least make her look for a while. Of course, if she'd come out in time to see the door close behind him than he was screwed but…what else could he do. He stumbled around in the dark blindly, not wanting to risk turning on a light but wondering where he had ended up and hoping, by chance, to possibly find either a place to hide or some answers. In the back of him mind he wondered briefly what had become of that wild man that Rogue new, Larry or something. The hairy one who tried to skewer him. He hadn't been one of the men in the lab, but Remy got the feeling that any one of those doors in the hall could have housed a lab just like it behind them.

"Question is," he muttered softly to himself, "is de loss of de wild man a good or a bad ting?" He didn't have a reply to his own sardonic mutterings, but someone had apparently heard his question.

Bright floodlights burst on above him, blinding the Cajun as he stumbled about in a daze. A soft, robotic voice penetrated the air around him.

"Good afternoon. Please enter your security pin number on the keypad to begin your simulation," the voice said in a pleasant tone.

"Quoi?" Remy wondered aloud, rubbing his fist into his eye sockets, desperately trying to clear his vision. As the room around him came back into focus he whistled in surprise. It was the size of a standard school auditorium. Vaulted ceiling, slightly ovular in shape, with a boxy, windowed structure sticking out of one wall. The entire room gleaned, completely metallic, and seemed to have dozens of sliding panels dotting the walls and ceiling. Looking back over his shoulder, Remy spied a keypad by the sliding door. Intrigued, he randomly poked a series of number.

"Incorrect security pin," the voice said in a more curt tone of voice this time. "Please try again." Now most people in this position would probably have stopped screwing around, but Remy being Remy decided to keep punching in numbers. When he finished this time it wasn't the voice that responded again, but a siren. Immediately the lights dimmed and a spastically flashing red light bulb lit the room.

"Incorrect code. Danger Room lockdown commenced. Security breech!" the once pleasant voice screamed over an obnoxious alarm. Remy blanched.

"Oh Merdre!" he cussed. That was bound to attract the attention of hir doctor friend there. He began punching buttons spastically, trying to do anything to make that alarm shut off. "C'mon, c'mon. Shut de hell," he hollered, banging his entire fist down on the keypad. Instantly the alarm cut off.

"-Up?" For a brief moment relief flooded through his entire body. But just for a moment.

'Cause that's when the lasers appeared.

"I was working in… Miami at a NASA recruiting center when I first heard…of her," Carol said in her slow, haunting speech. Rogue leaned back absently against the cold, rock wall of her cell as she listened the story the quiet woman was telling. She'd just spent the better part of the last twenty minutes telling Carol about what had happened to her: her mutation, her trek through New Orleans, the battle with Magneto. Remy. Now Carol was doing the same.

"'Course…that was just my day job. At night…I was acting under the guise of Ms. Marvel. You know…the whole masked defender… bit."

"It was mid-April…when a string of strange murders was…was traced back to an assassin known…only as the Raven," the woman continued, telling Rogue about her how she'd wound up in the cell next to hers. Apparently it was something of a history lesson. "When the police…the police were unable to find any leads in the case, it was requested that I…step in. As it turned out, all the…men who'd been killed were…were members of an underground smuggling ring operating…out of the Miami shipping yards. Their boss, a man…called Papa Brown, was…was one of the…the only surviving members of the ring…left."

Turns out that P. Brown had made quite a…few enemies over his years of business, and someone was…not too happy with him. More and more of his men started to…to get picked off by this mysterious shooter, but each…description of the guy with the gun was different every time. Sometimes male, sometimes female. The police…were at a loss. But I wasn't. During a…a major firearms job that Papa was handling…someone took a shot at him. I'd…I'd been watching him…for weeks by then and…I intercepted the bullet. Then I followed the shooter…to a vacant warehouse 'bout…a mile from the docks. The man, this one was short…stocky, with glasses…and balding, went inside through a broken…window. I didn't follow…just watched from the outside as…the man…proved my theory. Right before my…my eyes the guy turned into a…woman. She had blue…blue skin and yellow eyes. Redhead. The multiple assassinations…had been carried out by…by one woman; a shape-shifter." That caught Rogue's attention. A blue mutant, eh?

"So what's that got to do with anything going on here?" she wondered aloud. Carol continued on, her way of saying 'hang on, I'm getting there.'

"I used my powers to…to stop the Raven woman and…and she was arrested. I wasn't surprised to…to learn that she…escaped during her…first night in…in prison. But she never…came back to Miami…and that was all…all I cared about then. That was ten…ten years ago, so by now I'd figured that…my chances of another Raven encounter were…pretty slim."

But then about three…weeks ago I…I got an anonymous tip regarding a major drug handoff…happening the following evening. Looking back…it was a stupid ploy, but I've…I've become naïve as I…get older. I went and," Carol paused, breathing heavily, but seemed determined to finish her tale. "Instead of finding a…a drug heist in progress, I was jumped by…the Raven, now calling herself…Mystique: the assassin from years earlier. Age had only…sharpened her instincts. She…she knew that she couldn't be take me…down on her own. So she got creative."

"Mystique…Raven…she attacked me with a virus that she'd had modified to effect cells matching…matching only my genetic signature. Released it in a gas bomb. It was brutally…effective. It incapacitated me…almost immediately…and it's been ripping me apart from the inside since then."

"Oh Carol…" Rogue was at a loss for words. "I'm, I'm so sorry…"

"Shhh," the woman hushed her. "Stay quiet. We…we don't want 'em to hear you. When I asked Raven why she'd…she'd come back, why now after so long…she didn't give me a strait answer. All she said was that…the boss didn't want to risk me becoming a…a nuisance."

"What in all hell is that supposed to mean?" Rogue wondered aloud. The same perplexed tone was audible in Carol's voice as she answered.

"No clue. Best as I can…figure is that her boss, this Magneto guy, is planning something big…and didn't want to run the risk that my connection to Raven might…might ruin his plans. Still leaves us…without a clue."

There was a long pause as Rogue contemplated just what that information might mean and Carol caught her breath. Before Rogue could draw any useful conclusion, Carol interrupted her thoughts.

"Look kid…there's something that…that I need you to do for me." That caught Rogue off guard, but she was more than amenable to help a sick companion.

"Yeah sure, anything…" There was a deafeningly long pause during which none of them spoke. However there was an odd shuffling sound coming from Carol's cell. A moment later, a set of skinny fingers wrapped around the narrow bars that separated the to cells, and the two women.

"Look kid," she began slowly, drawing a deep breath. Rogue leaned down closer to the bars to hear better. "I'm…not going to…make it out of here," she began when Rogue interrupted.

"No, don't talk like that!" she exclaimed softly.

"Shhhhh!" Carol consoled. "Look tiger…I'm not afraid of death. It's just another…another risk we heroes have to face. But…but death like this…I don't want to die like this Rogue. Fading from…the inside out, a prisoner. I don't want it to be so…long and arduous. So I'm going…going to ask you for a favor…'

"What?" the runaway demanded, a knot growing in the pit of her stomach.

Then the waif-like hand stretched slowly through the bars, broaching from one cell into the other. It rested lightly on Rogue's covered leg.

"I want you to end it for me Rogue," Carol said slowly. Rogue felt all the air rush from her body, the color drain from her face, the feeling from all her extremities. 'No,' he mind screamed, 'she can't have meant that. I can't…I won't…!' But her companion's words once again filled the air with their pious plea.

"Please Rogue, I want you to kill me."

A/N: Hit the little purple button or Zoe said she's gonna come back and kill me in my sleep. Please, have mercy on this poor author.

Please…

PS- If you like this story, go check out my newest creation called The Long Road Home. It focuses on the younger generation of X-Men, including Remy and Rogue. Go, you just might like it!