A/N: I can't believe how long it took me to finally write this. I usually manage to write on the weekends, but I've been swamped with unbelievably random and insane events and haven't had a spare moment to sit down and write until today, though I had been getting about ten sentences in here and there. And, in honesty, I really shouldn't be writing this. I should be studying for the SAT, which I haven't even looked at yet and it's on Saturday, or catching up on homework. But I'm not, since it kills me not to write as much as it kills me not to read. Oh, I went through a whole shipment of library books, too, including some X-Men graphic novels, so that's partly responsible too. I read so many Terry Pratchett books it's surprising this didn't come out Monty Python-esque. But, anyways, once this next crazy week or so is over I'll be able to write more. I've been aiming for weekly, but I missed last week by a longshot. Anyway, apologies, and I hope you like this since I had fun writing it. Though I hope it doesn't seem redundant. But, even if it does, the plot'll be majorly twisting sometime soon, so that's okay. This chapter was just screaming to be written. Anyway:
enchantedlight- Hmm, I suspect this update wouldn't be considered soon… thanks for continuing to review!
abril14- glad you like long updates, since I tend towards that, though this, admittedly is shorter than most, though I got across everything I wanted to in this chapter. Your wondering'll be answered very, very shortly. Remy really deserves a rest, I know. He's not really going to get one. Though he did get his shower. For all the good that's going to do... anyway, thanks for reviewing!
Mrs. Rogue LeBeau- thank you for your review and compliments, especially the ones in capital letters! And, yup, it is. Like a bad penny, there's no getting rid of some people so easily. Interesting speculation on injuries…. Yeah, Rogue would definitely have trouble hotwiring a bike unless she absorbed someone with the know-how, of course… but I'm not going to be too terribly cruel to them.
ishandahalf- Poor you, being that tired- and sleeping on floors! Hmm, same situation Remy found himself in. Yet you still found time to read and review my story? Golly gee. I doubt I'd manage that. And I like the word droll. It's a fun word, particularly when drawled out. Yeah, Pyro's off his rocker. But he's so much fun! Yeah, crossbow- my little cousin's really into archery right now, and it turns out they're not only super dangerously scary now and easy to fire but a piece of cake to get. He wants one. He's eleven. He'll never, ever get one or I'll hightail it out of state. And the gerbil next door stole the bunny's crack, it's all his fault. Anyway, always glad to see your review, thanks a lot, and plus I was thrilled to see you have a new story up, yeah!
Neurotic Temptress- hey! I was very impressed you read my story, since I'd just been reading several of yours, which were really good and funny and it's always fantastic to find a bunch of great stories like that, since I seem to spend half my time on the prowl for good reading material. I play catch-up with fic tons. One of the first stories I ever read on fanfiction was under Harry Potter and had about 99 long chapters, which I dutifully read only to find it wasn't done yet! It's a startling experience. Anyway, sorry for the stall on Ch.7. Insanity abounds. And teachers who like to give homework and projects and tests all on the same day. And thanks lots for the compliments on my plot, though that's partly because it tends to take over and spiral in all kinds of directions it wasn't expected to in the mind-stages. I have to make it sit down and behave. And, god, I really do love to write- thank you so much for your comments on that, I appreciated it immensely. And on that note, I really appreciated the criticism as well. I need that. Yeah, I checked on the comma thing. See, I tend to breeze through them when I read them, and I suppose it is just my style. Though I tried to cut back on a few, but that tends to mean more periods, which is even more of a break. Yeah, the passport thing, I'll have to amend that- I didn't mean the ticket taker forgot to check hers, just that she was glad she wouldn't need one- but really, that was me, being clueless and having only just picked up you need only money, period, for a train ticket- which surprised me, especially with the crazy security they have these days. And I'll amend coach to couch as soon as I have the time. In typing this chapter, I noticed I made the same mistake for no apparent reason. I can't figure it out. But, thanks again for your review!
Purity Black- Wow! You reviewed my story, yeah, which I appreciate especially because I really like your story And I Feel Fine, very much! (Case you couldn't tell). Glad you liked my view of Belladonna (I just like spelling her name better that way, though I know it's actually Bella Donna in the comics, but that doesn't look as good to me), since she's fun to play around with, since, she is, after all, an assassin and Dangerous, plus I needed her to seem real, with motivation and all, not plastiky. So, glad you seem to think I succeeded. And I had a difficult time figuring out the way I wanted to tell chapter 2 in, so I'm glad that went over well- yup, I read the comics as much as possible, and Cody got off a little too easy in Evolution, making Rogue's angst a little more difficult to rationalize. But thanks again!
Heather- Hope some of your questions'll be answered in this chapter, and they'll see Logan… sooner or later, thanks greatly for your review!
UncannyAsianGirl- Ah, your review was greatly appreciated. Have to admit, I was kind of waiting for it to see what you'd think of my chapter. Sorry I didn't answer quickly, but I seem to have trouble properly responding to reviews until I'm done with a chapter, so I'm nearly done with my response and will send it out as quickly as possible, but definitely don't go thinking I forgot you! I'm just pressed for time and getting kicked off my own computer. And thanks so much for recommending my story! I should just make you my official promoter. Again, thanks!
P.S.: If anyone notices a distinct lack of French in this chapter, that's just 'cause I ran out of time, though I really did intend to use it in some places. Sorry for that.
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Some claim dreams are the garbage of the mind, the product of the unresolved problems and scrapped thoughts of the day. Irene would have disagreed with the theory, but Rogue fully subscribed to it. It would explain why her current dream was full of jukeboxes with large teeth playing Creole tunes because a certain annoyance kept putting cards into the slot to make them play. The jukeboxes were circling a small table, at which many people were seated. Most had their faces in shadow, saving a few. The Cajun, sitting a few seats over, handed something to Cody- or was it Bobby? the features kept shifting around a pair of blue eyes- who gleefully placed them in Rogue's hands. The two dolls of cloth with the shape and features of Barbie dolls bore great resemblance to Ms. Darkholme and Irene. Carrying on a conversation that she couldn't hear the words of with the woman who'd given her the bomber jacket, Rogue carelessly plunged a pin into the two of them again and again. Two figures at the table toppled over backwards and began writhing on the floor. The cards Gambit had dealt them skittered back towards his hand. He promptly fed them to a jukebox, which began to spurt a constant stream of water that turned slowly into ice as it pooled on the floor. A minute sled skittered down it.
Cody- it was now definitely him - watched with her antics with the slim piece of metal with an uncharacteristic blank expression, and tapped her shoulder. She turned. For a moment Rogue was uncertain whether she was looking at a grimy ceiling or at his hazy features, but then the dream was back full force. The table was now somewhere about the regions of the ceiling, as were the chairs. The jukeboxes bobbed around them. A large pink coat attempted to jump at her from out of nowhere, but one of the jukeboxes snagged it and started to chew before it reached smothering range. Someone with purple hair handed her a miniature sword to decapitate the dolls with, but Cody intercepted it.
Indignant, she turned to him, but he was disintegrating into nothingness. Instantly, he evaporated completely. Gambit caught the tiny sword before it hit the ground, shrugged, and dangled it over a doll of Belladonna. This doll was actually moving and screaming.
Rogue tried to grab the sword back to get Irene first, but he refused to let go, eyes flashing as a tug-of-war ensued. He opened his mouth to say something, from his expression probably an obscenity, but only a soft click emerged. Although quiet, it echoed ferociously in her mind as Gambit and several of the others fading, leaving only those she actually had absorbed. They all seemed to be reaching for a piece of her, their faces drawn and vampiric to an extent that alerted some small corner of her mind that this was a dream, not the actual psyches. It all seemed real though, even the clustering jukeboxes with snapping jaws seeming valid although out of place.
Her arms windmilled as she tried to back up from them, and suddenly she was in a sea of darkness with bellowing voices rising and then fading in her mind.
Brow scrunched in confusion, she tossed and turned right off the bed. With a hard, distinctive thud, she landed on the floor. Head throbbing with unfinished sleep, she muzzily watched a crossbow arrow bury in the pillow her head had rested upon mere seconds before. It twanged innocently back and forth, stuffing pouring out the opening in the pillowcase that was now firmly pinned to the bed.
Rogue's eyes opened wider as she found herself looking straight up at a too-familiar blonde woman with a pistol crossbow cocked and aimed directly at her heart. The soft click she had heard in her dream sounded again as Belladonna locked another bolt into place.
She blinked rapidly, unsure whether she was still asleep, but determining that the towel her hands were tightly wringing felt too real, she flung the white fluffy thing directly at the face of the woman before her. She squirmed into the tight space under the bed, on her side so as to get all her body in at once. A bolt embedded itself instantly behind her with a twang. She thought at first it was in the floor, but as she yanked her leg forward, Rogue realized with some horror that it stuck out of the leather bottom of her boot. It had very narrowly missed her foot. She scowled as she tried to figure out where to go from here, realizing she'd just put herself in a lousy, not to mention dusty position. Damn. She was awful fond of the boots. And her life, for that matter.
Her back was firmly up against the springs of the mattress, and it hurt to move. This space wasn't designed to be crawled under. She edged over as far as she could as a bolt was shot lazily after her, perfectly aimed straight underneath the bed. Rogue's eyes followed it with horrified fascination as it skimmed past her to hit the wall. It bounced off, the end of it whacking lightly against her.
"Gambit!" she shouted furiously in the direction of loudly running water and to make matters worse, rather loud singing. There was the slightest intake of breath from above her, and a set of heels became visible as they stalked to one side of the bed. Rogue eased herself to the other end. "Hey! Gumbo! Your girlfriend wants her stuff back!"
As Belle lifted the bed skirt hanging over the end, preparing clearly for a killing shot, Rogue scrambled out from under the bed in a desperate attempt to get out of range. She kept tumbling in a clumsy somersault, knowing surely that Belle would stand and hit her now and thinking it best her vital organs remain protected. Since the woman wasn't making small talk, she doubted the assassin had a friendly kidnapping in mind and thought it prudent to try to protect the soft spots which would bleed most readily. Still, she would have been hit somewhere had not, at that moment, the bathroom door slammed open.
Both women froze.
"What de hel-" he cut off, staring at the completely dust-covered Rogue, turned entirely the color of a pale moth, and Belle, who seemed to have forgotten she held a crossbow in her hand.
Dripping wet, his hair looked almost black as it clung to the planes of his shocked face. It fell into his eyes, concealing whatever their expression might have been. He stepped back a bit, clutching the soaking towel he had wrapped around his waist as a drowning man would a life preserver. The ever-present smirk was completely wiped from his face, and his mouth parted slightly in a surprised little 'o'. It softened his expression, giving him a confused, boyish look that didn't quite suit him but looked nevertheless not in the least out of place. Rogue tried, immensely annoyed with herself, to train her eyes on potential exits or barricades, rather than on the thin sheet of water sending small rivets of rain down his toned frame. She succeeded with little effort, hurling herself behind a small circular table and knocking it down to duck behind in the time it took for either Remy or Belle to regain any semblance of composure.
A few too many years of finding himself in a rather similar situation with the young woman before him now in an angry state took over Remy's mouth before his mind caught up. "Look, dis isn't what it looks l-" He remembered in time to jump behind the door, slamming it as two bolts at once thudded into it.
Rogue, sheltered behind the table, looked for a projectile to hurl. Spying one of Remy's boots, she chucked it over the tiny table with a mere peek over. Naturally, Belle side-stepped. Her features, whatever emotions they might conceal, had gone, carefully, studiously blank.
Without so much as a blink, she cocked the small crossbow. It was far from the wooden mechanisms of medieval times. Rather, it seemed to be made of some kind of high-quality plastic or something, and was colored in the army camouflage tones so often favored by hunters. It fired almost silently, Rogue noticed with dismay, and awfully quick.
You don't wanna mess with that, a voice noted in the back of her head suddenly. Rogue recognized it as Cody's. That's a pistol crossbow. Not for hunting deer, that. Up close and personal. And yah don't even need a license to get one.
Rogue ignored it. Her heart rate was high enough without voices in her head stressing her out more. If Bobby piped up, she'd be tempted to bash her own head out. Partly to deny Belladonna any satisfaction she might gain from doing so. "Gambit! Get back here!" she yelled, lifting the table slightly to snag the arrow which would have darted directly over it to get her.
Belle rolled her eyes. "Here dat, cher?" she called mockingly, as she swung her crossbow to train on the door her might emerge from, alternating between shooting casual shots at Rogue. "De lil' river rat t'inks y' some kinda hero. Guess she doesn't know what kind o' batard y' are, hmm?"
A smoldering card slid under the door as a response, heading directly towards Belle. Expertly, she shot an arrow into it, tearing it. It exploded in a burst of flame before it even neared her. Rogue, not in the slightest surprised, blew a still damp strand of white out of her eyes as Belle began to laugh. She wondered how close she could get before the woman shot her. On consideration, as the woman clicked another bolt smoothly into place, Rogue doubted she could manage to stand straight before receiving a pleasant little dart from Cupid over there.
"Oh, you'll talk ta him but not ta meh," Rogue called sardonically from behind her pitiful shield. "Awful polite, that. What am ah, chopped liver? Yah think-" She cut off in time to dodge a bolt which thudded into the wall behind her, then picked up again in a forced tone, "that yah'd pay a bit more attention to the gal yah're meant to kill." Under her breath, she muttered, "An' if yah sneakin' out a window, Remy LeBeau, ah'll hunt yah down ta the very ends of the earth, whether ah'm dead or alive."
Belle scoffed slightly. "Y' not even worth de time o' day t' me, girl. De swatter don't make conversation wit' de fly."
"If she's realleh bored she might!" Rogue shouted back, relieved at the slight pause in firing of bolts. She wondered how many the woman had, and what other weapons could be, literally up, her sleeves. Peeking over, Rogue noted with a wry note that Belle, naturally in all black, had gone for a black jacket of some sort of jeans material with multiple pockets, a really short black shirt and sheer black stockings. And she swore that was a touch of shiny lip gloss. This was a little too scary to comprehend, but obviously she wasn't dressed to kill just to take out Rogue.
"An' y' don' strike me as a 'femme' with a particularly active social life!"
"It isn't my company y' should be concerning y'self wit'," Belle suggested, eyeing the door skeptically. "Y' don't have de slightest grasp 'bout who y' new boyfriend is. T'ings he's done. Ask him about Paris, why don't y'."
Rogue considered, then noticed that while Belladonna was speaking, she'd been coming closer. One more step or two, and she could just lean over and hit Rogue right between the eyes. "Remy! Have yah gone and drowned or are yah too much of a co-"
The door blew up. Before the smoke finished expanding, much less cleared, a shadowed figure had lunged from within to tackle the assassin in an attempt to wrench the crossbow from her grasp.
Rogue poked her head up, as Belle screeched in frustration as Gambit tried to pin her hands to the floor. She threw him off, springing upright without the use of her hands and trained the crossbow at his head. Grinning, he tossed a card at her, then neatly tumbled swiftly in Rogue's direction. He tilted his head at her, eyes flashing as they caught the light under his sopping wet hair. "Hurt?" he asked her mildly.
"What in tarnation took yah so long?" she growled in response, hurling his other boot at him.
He took on a defensive expression. "Y' have any idea how difficult it is fo' a body t' get a pair o' pants on when a body's soppin' w-" He spun around in time to narrowly clap his hands together on a dagger heading straight at him. Somewhat shocked, he dropped it with a self-satisfied expression. It faded when he noticed the spreading fire from the explosion of the door, and Belle, hair tumbling out of its neat twist in static strands, advancing towards him with a deadly expression.
"Get de bike," he told Rogue out of the side of his mouth, tugging on the boot she'd thrown at him and with his eyes fixed on the other.
She stared at him with supreme annoyance. "How, dumbass?"
Pained, he considered. "Get outside, den. Y' in de way."
She opened her mouth to angrily retort, but he was shouting something in French to Belle that made her run towards him in what seemed to be an angry charge. Gambit, startled, began to charge cards which seemed to magically appear in his hands, but was thrown off further when she flipped over his head. The crossbow was jabbed against his back, but both had momentarily forgotten Rogue. At once, she shot her leg out, tripping Belle up and sending the crossbow bolt into the ceiling. Although she regained her balance at once, it allowed Gambit time to throw a hesitant punch that collided viciously with her cheekbone. The assassin, to her credit, hardly even staggered.
"Go!" Gambit shouted over the background noise of Belle's insults and the growing crackle of a small fire. "Wait fo' me outside!"
Rogue, stumbling upright, shot him a glare as she poised to sprint. He was trying to get his hands on Belle's crossbow, presumably to blow it up. "Yeah? An' if it's not you who walks out?"
Belle managed a rather nasty grin in her direction at that, before serving Gambit a headbutt. He clutched his nose, then rammed his open palm against hers. He pulled back enough for a spinning kick aimed at her throat that unfortunately missed.
"Den good luck!" he shouted at her as she raced towards the door, taking advantage of the moment. She paused only to snatch her bomber jacket and his trenchcoat from the couch.
Once outside the door, she didn't race down the stairs towards the motorcycle as he probably anticipated she would. Instead, Rogue hung about the door, dark green eyes intent. She wasn't about to miss this, nor was she about to be caught unawares. She delved into the pockets of his trenchcoat, hoping to find some form of weapon beyond just cards and cigarettes.
"C'mon," she muttered, shaking a card pack empty but for the Jokers. Pulling out a pack of cigarettes, she chucked it over her shoulder without even pausing to check the brand.
Gambit was very carefully backing up towards the bed, eyes wary as he charged a card and Belle yanked knives from what seemed to be a very full utility belt. He looked her up and down. "De stilettos are overkill, don't y' t'ink?" he asked calmly, ducking one knife and hurling himself across the bed to crash on the other side to avoid another.
Smiling in the way that always scared him a little, Belle kicked one shoe off, catching it smoothly and popping the heel right off. From the long, thin heel she withdrew a shorter, thin dagger.
He blinked as he propped his head up on the bed. "Forgot dat penchant of yours." Springing up, he threw one and then the other, but Belle and he had spent too many hours sparring for her not to see that coming. The dagger pierced the card, both exploding in a burst of shattering light that forced Remy to cover his rather sensitive eyes with his wet sleeve and lean back to avoid shards of metal. It bought her the time to lunge forward with another small dagger in a forward spear thrust to his stomach.
Automatically, his hands shot together and in front of him, forming an X-block which caught her hands and caused a shadow of a butterfly shape to appear on the opposite wall as the flicker of fire from the corner lit their fight. He reached to clasp his hands around hers and force her to drop the knife while hopefully breaking a few fingers in the process, but with slippery agility she slid her hands back. The dagger clanged to the floor, but her stocking foot swept it into the air and back into her hand just as Remy pulled his arm back.
Belle's right hand rocketed forward in a perfect punch towards his chin, but he stopped it with an in-block by sweeping his forearm down and parallel to his body. He lunged closer with a hook from his left, but she ducked and swept his legs out from under him as she used the floor as leverage for an extremely low spinning kick.
Toppling backwards, he tucked himself into a backwards somersault and sprang up, reaching for another card in his sleeve. Unfortunately, he remembered the rest were tucked in his trenchcoat, so Gambit settled for a roundhouse kick at the approaching Belle. Straight blonde hair brushed against his face as the assassin knocked it aside with a sharp block to her left.
The thief recovered his balance by letting the force of the hit to his leg carry him immediately all the way around. Planting his foot firmly, Remy turned his head to look at her from the body angle giving her the least opportunity to hit possible. "Just like de good old days, non, Belle?"
Her hands curled back and she shot the hard flats of her fingers toward his throat in a cobra strike. He leaned way back to dodge it, having to drop all the way down to the floor to avoid the knee she aimed at his family jewels. "Which ol' days would dat be, LeBeau?" she spat at him, bending to strike at his face in ridiculously fast movements as he rolled to a crouch. "De ones when y' ran around on me? Stole from m' family an' made a fool out o' me? Or de days after y' took mon frere away, hmm?"
"Delicate way of puttin' it," he told her, aiming a heel kick at her and withdrawing it just before she managed to snatch it and trip him up. His red eyes followed the gaze of her blues, which had ticked over to where the crossbow had glided across the floor. He grabbed her wrist before she managed to stretch over to it. "Plannin' t' have me send 'em y' best in hell?" he asked bitterly.
Furiously, she aimed a strike at his damning eyes. "Ain't dat where de devil belongs?"
His stare burned into her as she tried to leverage his strength against him to flip him. "It is said t' be de den o' murderers," he offered flippantly, looking at her pointedly as she failed to manage it. He'd learned too much about her style from their sessions on the mats in what seemed like ages ago.
"And thieves," she hissed, but before she even finished speaking she's stepped her leg straight against his, pushing back into a flip. Remy's arm would have been wrenched and probably broken at the same time by this move had he not at last hurriedly released his grip on her wrist.
Just outside, Rogue was having difficultly properly snapping out the thin cylinder of metal she'd found tucked in the trenchcoat. She cursed quietly at it as she threw her hand down once more, hoping it would snap out. It didn't. Annoyed, she lifted the bo staff. She was vaguely familiar with them, having been taught the primaries of the use of a wooden one on one of many of Ms. Darkholme's instructive visits. She knew some of them could unscrew or snap out but couldn't seem to find the mechanism. Rogue hit it against the wall in desperation, half-expecting it to snap out. She gave up and poked her head through the doorway, figuring she'd wasted enough time. Remy and Belle were countering each other blow for blow, she noted, with more fluidity and a hell of a lot more fury than she herself had fought Belle with.
"Gumbo!" she called loudly. Distracted, his head jerked over, interrupting the rhythm. Belle, her hand luckily empty of any knife, socked him in the nose. Furiously, he shot a glare at Rogue while clutching at the blood and shouting, "By dose!"
Rolling her eyes, Rogue tossed the unextended bo staff into the room. Remy's eyes followed it, looking at her with an annoyed expression when it passed by him and then an ever-so-vaguely amused one as it managed to hit a surprised Belle in the head. He lunged forward to grab it. With the touch of some unseen button, it snapped out.
Immediately he drew it back in a cross-strike from over his shoulder and whapped Belle in the nose. Drawing it back, he turned it to strike straight across her side, but Belle ducked. The whish of it passing through the air could be heard even over the now-slightly larger fire crackling over the wood near the bathroom entrance.
Springing onto the bed and using it to propel herself over his head, Belle reached for something at her belt but suddenly found herself shoved against the wall by the force of the horizontally held stick and very close behind it, Gambit.
"Y' sweating, chere," he told her in a tone of voice that wasn't very friendly.
Her hands seemed to be pinned against the wall, but that didn't lead him to relax his guard any. Remy LeBeau had been many things, but he doubted he'd ever been naïve. "Vous l'imaginez," she assured him venomously as he roughly pushed his staff against her shoulders. "Sorry, cher, y' not dat good."
His features stayed though his gaze hardened even more, despite the darkly wet hair falling into his eyes. "Never had any problems wit' performance b'fore-"
"Oh mah Gawd!" Rogue's voice snapped impatiently from the doorway. "The wicked witch of the South's trying ta kill yah and yah makin' innuendos? Jeeesus Chr-"
"Knock dat off!" he yelled at her without taking his eyes of Belle's hands, which were held back in mock surrender. "Wasn-"
Belle's legs shot up and back as she immediately skidded down the wall. She kicked back to strike him hard in the stomach, sending him flying back with a distinctive oof. Her hands dropped to her belt and came out twirling what looked like miniature bo sticks. She twirled them, crossing them together with the skill of practice.
"Ah, not de kendo sticks," Remy groaned, planting his bo and leaning his weight against it to come elegantly back to his feet. He managed a mock bow before countering her simultaneous strikes from above and below with a quick spin of his long staff.
The clatter of metal against metal rang out as they slashed at angles at each other, both glaring fiercely from behind their bloody noses, which ever so often they had to pause to attempt to wipe. Rogue, meanwhile, was counting how many cards Gambit had left with some concern where she leaned in the doorframe and methodically dropping his cigarettes over the railing behind her. The night was terribly dark, and no one had yet come to see what the noises were. She suspected the clientele of this place might be accustomed to such scenes, or were just following the age old sensible policy of keeping their noses out of other people's business.
Something blew up with a terrible sound, and she looked up in time to duck shards from one of the kendo sticks. A few bits of shrapnel scraped her here and there, but Belladonna was scraped all across her face and hands and looked absolutely fervid with anger about it.
She held the other kendo stick like a club and brought it down at his head. "Y' idiot!" she screamed. "Y' know how expensive dese t'ings are!"
Remy nimbly dodged, face darkened and eerie in the red glow now surrounding a portion of the room. "Yes!" he shouted at her in return, spinning the bo staff in a rather useless but showy figure eight to keep her at a distance and knock her hands aside. "Damn well bought 'em for y', didn' I?"
She took that in consideration and then hurled a smoke bomb from her belt at his face.
He shut his eyes and waited, listening carefully and turning the staff slowly in a defensive manner. Something brushed against his foot, but he kicked it aside and it shot towards the door. Remy heard a slight cough and rapped Belle hard in a smooth stroke across the back. "Dat wasn' very bright," he informed her tightly. "Seein' as I'm awful comfortable wit' smoke."
There was a slight scraping sound at the door, followed by a low whistle.
"Tol' y' t' go, Rogue," Gambit sighed, then leaped back as through the smoke a figure brought a recovered dagger at his throat. Shrouded by dusky smoke, Belle's slow smile made him gulp ever so slightly, drawing a pinprick of blood at his throat as he did so.
His reflexes were excellent, Remy knew. He also knew his throat would be cut twice over before he'd ever get his staff up to knock it aside, and she'd be expecting him to try to pull something like falling limply backwards because that was what he'd always done in such situations under more playful circumstances. He tried to think fast.
Wavering at first, another figure became apparent as she moved slightly into the room. "'Scuse meh," Rogue said politely. There was a soft clicking sound as a crossbow was loaded. "But ah think the shoe's on the other foot at the moment."
The dagger neither wavered nor lowered. Belle's pretty face twisted in an unpleasant sneer. "Lil' filles shouldn' play wit' toys dey don't understand."
The still hazy figure bent to pick up something on the ground, coughing slightly. There was a sudden, more menacing click as she apparently must have managed to ease another bolt in, something of an advanced trick. "You'll find ah'm full of surprises," Rogue responded, voice made slightly more raspy by the smoke. "Merci, sugah. This is an awful shiny toy. What'd it run, two hundred, three?"
Remy eyed the knife at his throat, then Rogue. He would have laughed, had he not felt certain Belle would have readily dragged the dagger across the neck of which he was very fond if he did. Since she hadn't yet, he assumed she didn't hate him as much as she thought she did. Which, really, wasn't much comfort.
"Y' really t'ink y' gonna fire dat?" Belle asked incredulously. "An' risk hitting y' new friend?"
Rogue shrugged, becoming more clear as the residue from Belle's little surprise cleared but the haze from the growing fire becoming more apparent. "Everybody's gotta die sometime an' according ta you, his is up. So it doesn't really matter one way or the other, does it? Actually, he might thank meh if ah miss yah- mah way's prob'ly faster."
"Don't discuss my death as if I'm not in de room!" Remy hissed, having tried to raise his staff only to find another dagger pointed in a place that made him hope she'd slice his throat instead of the lower spot.
Rogue ignored him. "Point bein', yah think ah care? Ah'm on the run, you've stabbed me once more than ah'd like already, the weather royally sucks, an' mah hair could very well dry in ringlets. Lady, if ah was you, ah wouldn't mess with me."
Remy would have shaken his head had not such a movement cut his throat. Belladonna stifled a laugh, but Rogue stayed silent this time, bow held level.
The assassin cleared her throat delicately. "Then, it seems we're at an impasse," Belle said smoothly.
Rogue smiled pityingly. "If you think that, you're really not as familiar as you should be-"
She fired perfectly into Belladonna's left shoulder, sending her staggering back with what was nearly a screech and taking her a few necessary steps back from Gambit, "with mah so-called family."
In a flash Belladonna had daggers in her hand again as they shot from her jacket sleeve and hurled them at Rogue before the girl could even blink. Gambit, instinct and the little voice in his head that sounded suspiciously like Tante Mattie forbidding him her gumbo ever again, dove forward as fast as his reflexes would allow.
They were shot low, because Belladonna knew Rogue would instinctively duck, which of course she did. Gambit, practically flying vertically, knocked one aside and felt it cut into his hand; the other, however, propelled forward and past his grasping figures. He heard a gasp from Rogue but couldn't look. Belle was through playing games and holding back, and now he'd really have to step it up. Where the hell were his cards when he needed them?
Belle lunged forward, hands slashing almost too quickly for him to follow. Ignoring his scraped hand, he flipped backward. His eyes glanced desperately for his bo staff, which he'd dropped when he'd gone for the daggers. Spotting it in the growing fire, he grabbed it. He squinted in pain, tossing the heated metal stick from hand to hand as Belle returned, unsheating from the deepest pocket of his jacket what he knew to be her last pair of. He recognized these blades at once. They were her favorites, and the last time she'd used them, one'd been spilling blood from a wound narrowly close to his heart. They were supposedly tipped with admantium and had been a gift from her father for sweet sixteen. He believed it, as it had cut straight through his bone.
He almost opened his mouth to comment, but didn't. The time for talking was long done. He tilted the bo back across his shoulder and slung it down in a gesture that seemed easy but was truly vicious. She scraped the blades along it, producing a grating sound.
Remy, keeping his staff locked, withdrew one hand with the speed of a thief to tug ferociously on the length of her hair. Her head jerked involuntarily back, but her hand came back almost as swiftly. His own calloused palm, clutching a thick hank of blonde hair of lighter and darker tones, was back on the staff by the time her dagger reached its former spot. He tossed a vicious half-grin off the side of his mouth.
"Diable," she taunted distractingly, whipping one dagger around to narrowly avoid his arm. "Some hero, non?"
He jerked the staff straight forward, forcing his own chin back to avoid the returning opposite end. The bo struck her squarely between the eyes, though, throwing her off.
Her kick came up precisely, clipping his chin and hurling him back against the wall. Hooking her elbow around it, she ripped the bo out of his grip. His palms stinging, Remy countered her strikes as best he could with his forearms, but was unprepared for her to leap up. Hooking her legs around him, she shoved him back against the wall. Her daggers curved behind his ears and her knees pinned him tightly back and limited his leg movement. His earlier bruises weren't helping any, either. The lock seemed innocent enough, but her elbows curved around each arm, preventing them from moving anywhere.
Her wrists resting on his shoulders, she leaned close with flashing blue eyes. His breath was coming more quickly than hers, and he was plainly out of energy. Sullenly, his head banged back against the wall from her weight.
"Goodbye, Remy LeBeau," she said in a tone equal parts satisfied and regretful. Her blue eyes danced with the thrill of a predator. "Il y avait un temps quand je vous ai aimé plus que la vie lui-même," she told him softly, with the faintest hint of lingering emotion.
"Once upon a time, non, Belle?" he said flatly, voice betraying nothing but a slight crack in tone.
"Oui, cher. Adieu."
His eyes were on something else as she moved her daggers closer. "Belle…" he muttered in what seemed to be a whisper or a groan.
She paused, her head cocking the slightest margin.
He met her gaze harshly, red blazing against black. "Y' ought t' know better den t' wear nylons."
At this, she looked down at her black sheer stockings glowing a devilish shade of pinkish red, giving him time to shove her off him. Dropping to the floor, she scrambled to get them off as quickly as she could manage, but she wasn't fast enough.
She screamed as the explosion seared her creamy skin, not devastatingly but painfully. The daggers tumbled from her hands as she let out a soft whimper, falling to the ground.
Regretfully, Remy picked up the bo staff, face blank, and almost gently, knocked her mercifully out. His gaze fell on her form, looking for all the world like a crumpled doll, emotions hidden. "Wish 'twere so easy t' talk in de past tense fo' me, Belle," he muttered under his breath, before with a start remembering. Dropping the bo staff with a clang, he scrambled over to the fallen girl by the door and nearly tripping over the fallen crossbow. He bent, patting her cheek as carefully as he could with his fingerless gloves.
"Hey, chere," he said quietly, shaking her slightly and trying to clear the bundle of trenchcoat and bomber jacket she clutched tightly off so that he could find the wound. "Hey, pretty Rogue, don't be dead, non? Don't be…." He cut off, frowning as he found no evidence of a tear in her shirt. He lifted her shoulders up slightly, and uneasily, reached for the hem of her shirt to see if it had merely missed the fabric.
Her hand shot out, catching his at once only to release it like a hot potato.
"Rogue?" he tried again, rather relieved and angry. She didn't blink, only muttered and reached her other hand up toward the back of her head.
"Mon Dieu, y' alive or not?" he demanded of her, shaking her somewhat more roughly.
Her dark green eyes fluttered open with annoyance and alarm as her head was rattled back and forth thanks to his jostling of her shoulders. "Ouch," she said indignantly, squeezing her eyes tightly shut before opening them again. "Knock it off, will yah?"
"How de hell aren't yah dead?" Remy shouted, looking around for a spot on the wall or floor where the dagger might have hit if it missed. He could have sworn it was heading right at her….
"No call ta sound so disappointed," she managed woozily. "Gawd, mah ribs-"
"Gawd, mah heart!" he mimicked, dropping her back. "What, y' got some kinda healin'-"
"Pen's mightier than the sword, Remy," she said dizzily, gesturing to the pile of coats.
Confused, he picked up his own trenchcoat, swinging it over his shoulders in something of a huff, and looked at the bomber jacket on the floor suspiciously, as if it might be lead-lined. Kicking it, he jumped when he felt something solid impact against his boot.
Surprised, he picked up the immensely thick red leather book Rogue had been lugging around, which now had a dagger reaching about three-fourths of the way through it, all the way to where the hilt had gotten caught on the thick cover. He fingered the edges of the uncut pages and stared at her. "Bet m' life dat's papyrus, chere."
"Don't call me that," she said with a sigh, rubbing her head and placing a hand against her chest, where the book must have slammed against her. "An' it's not. It's made of palm leaves or somethin', Ms. Darkholme'd send different empty books t' Irene when she'd go on business trips. That might be one of the Malay- Holy…! She dead?"
Remy didn't follow her stricken glance. "She prob'ly wishes," he muttered. He stared at the book in his hands, shaking his head. "Irene, dis y' mere?"
"Mah guardian," Rogue corrected, trying to sit up rather than flop back. "Ah… probably ought ta have warned yah. She can see the future."
Gambit blinked at her, then shrugged. "Lots o' women down in N'Awlins do dat, chere. My Tante Mattie e'en likes t' claim she can see de loves o' mine n' mon cousins lives in her jambalaya- ahhhhh. Y' mean dat's her power? Y' mean-" His gaze turned over to Belle, and hardened slightly. "Damn!" He shook his head in disbelief and handed the book and the dagger in it to her. "T'ings like dat, y' got t' tell me-"
"Gambit, the room's on fire."
"Yeah, I know. C'mon, grab dis bedsheet wit' me an' help me tie her up, 'kay?"
"You're gonna leave her in here?"
He rubbed his forehead in dismay. "Nah, chere. We're gonna leave her outside an' see how long 'fore some good soul calls 911. Right?"
"Yeah," Rogue said dazedly, pulling herself to her feet.
"An' as much as I'm against puttin' firearms in y' hands, y' might wanna take de crossbow."
She stared at him. "What, yah kiddin' meh? It's only got one broken bolt left. 'S dead weight. Anyway, ah hate-"
He sighed. "Lemme guess. Y' against violence dat ain't up close an' personal?"
Rogue shook her damp hair, which thankfully seemed to be drying relatively straight. "Nah, ah got no objections. All for the NRA long as the gun barrel's not pointed in mah direction. Jus' not very good at it. Irene was awful disappointed."
"Whatcha mean, not good?" Remy wondered with a sinking feeling, snatching up his bo staff and adjusting it to its travel size.
"For Gawd sakes!" she snapped. "Ah had ta have the voices in mah head dredge up one of somebody else's skills so ah could damn well save yah life. Any idea how much ah hate that? No? Try groping around in yah head for a little piece that thinks like Bobby Drake so yah can get him ta find the little piece of Destiny left that knows how ta do stuff like that. It's not easy and it makes mah head hurt, and guess what? Ah couldn't even get that. Can't access any of the psyche's skills but Cody's. Ah'm just damn lucky Cody Robbins goes hunting with his father- make that yah're just damn lucky," she corrected him, following him as he ripped off pieces of bed sheets and dragged Belladonna out of the room and down the stairs.
"Who?" he asked in confusion as he knotted her hands together expertly.
Rogue sat down on a step, ignoring the smoke now pouring out of the room. "This boy. Back home. Mah powers kicked in on him. Figure it out."
Remy chewed on a small corner of his lip, not knowing what to say. "Dead?"
"Comatose." she corrected.
He winced. "Hope it was worth his pains-" He forced a gag over Belle's mouth, unconscious though she was and would certainly stay for quite awhile.
"What're yah implyin'?" Rogue demanded suspiciously, holding onto her head and leaning against the stair. "Whatever evil little thoughts are runnin' through y' head, he was jus' tryin' to help meh." She held up her left hand, scabbed over with a cut. He gave her an innocent look, as if he hadn't been thinking anything at all.
Remy, finished, paused to move Belle's hair out of her face, glanced at the burning motel room and shook his head. "T'ink dey'd have a smoke alarm. Body could die in a situation like dat, if he had too much to drink an' left a cigarette burnin'…. " Thinking of that, he reached into his pockets for a cigarette, assured nicotine would help now. Finding nothing but all of his carefully hidden cards stacked into one deck, he glared at her and held out a hand to help her up. Uneasily, she took it and let him tug her upright.
"Yah know what…." she muttered.
He listened, rubbing his ear as they walked down the stairs.
"Ah think it might be best if you drive."
Gambit let out a short bark of a laugh, swooping up several packs of his cigarettes once they reached the ground. Not bothering to worry about avoiding the security camera, he charged an extra piece of bed sheet and threw it to drift casually onto the dirty lens. It went kabang nicely.
The two of them surveyed the black Porsche parked before them, and then wordlessly, Gambit held his hand out for the book. He plucked the knife out, not noticing the pages flutter open as he did so, and proceeded to slash the tires methodically.
"Remy?" Rogue said in a strangely high voice, as she bent to look at the page where the dagger had halted.
"Oui?"
"No, in the book…"
A knot dropped in his stomach, and he hustled over to see what she was staring at with such trepidation. He bent to pick up the pages, turning in the same wind which was piercing his wet skin to the bone.
Tight, meandering script littered the coarse, thick pages. "Latin," he muttered under his breath, casting a glance at the stricken Rogue. Slowly, he turned the page to where the dagger had halted and sharply drew in a breath.
"Dat's me," he managed, looking at a sketch that was undoubtedly himself from the trenchcoat and cards fluttering around it.
She cast him a look that suggested that was obvious, but her heart wasn't in it.
"I'm, uh…. why are all t'ose folk dying and why am I in de center of it?" he demanded, panicked and plainly confused. He jabbed his fingers at the tortured sketches carrying on around him while he stood in the center, hanging his head. "I mean, it'd make sense if dey were blowin' up or somet'in- don' look at me like dat!- but, dis, dis is jus'-"
"That's Sabretooth," Rogue said studiously, staring at the page with as blank a face as she could manage.
"Where?"
"Uh, he'd be the one decapitating the little-"
"Oh." Remy stared, and then with a growing horror began to flip through the book.
"What're you doing?" Rogue cried, trying to stop him.
He held it above her head and began walking in the direction of the motorcycle. "I can' read it," he exclaimed angrily. "Look here, Rogue, what is dis? It's all about you!"
She stopped in her tracks. "It is?"
Gambit, angrily, turned to the front, revealing a picture of a blue woman picking up a child. Flipping a few pages ahead, he found one of a girl who looked an awful lot like her taking the hand of a boy- yet on the same page, the boy was kissing her.
Rogue jumped, pointing. "That never happened!"
"Yeah? An' de other one?" Remy gestured to the rather poorly drawn sketch of a sick-looking boy touching the hand of a girl whose hair had a streak of white in it.
She looked down. "That did."
Gambit dropped it to the ground with a thud, staring at his hands.
Rogue snatched it up, her pulse racing. "C'mon," she said, tugging on him. "Let's get going, c'mon."
"Dere was blood in my hands in de picture," he muttered to himself, looking alarmed. "An angel losin' his wings an' children dyin' an' me in de center of it all like Lucifer himself-"
"Cut the melodrama!" Rogue exclaimed, looking fit to slap him. "Have yah lost your mind? We've got ta go! Look, the woman who wrote this? Ah grew up with her. She's not some kinda all-powerful- argh, look, she didn't see me leavin' comin' in advance, all right? She screwed up, obviously, or ah wouldn't be here with her sending assassins on my tail, right?"
"We're readin' dat damn book," he ordered, pointing imperiously.
"Now?"
"No," he said sheepishly, looking down. "Once we run into somebody who knows Latin."
"Fine, fine!" Rogue agreed, pointing in the direction of the motorcycle. A light was going on in the main entrance of the motel.
"T'ink I'm wicked, chere?" he asked her in a strange tone as they rushed towards the hidden bike.
She shot him a look. "No. At best you're arrogant but well-mannered and worst ah've seen you're a dangerous jackass, but no. Not even Belladonna. Bitch, sure, but wicked? Evil doesn't wear shiny lip gloss. It'd at least have red lipstick, c'mon."
He shot her a disbelieving look.
"What, ah'm not supposed to know make-up? Please."
"Y' don't know a t'ing about me. What I've done. What I'm gonna do. An' y' didn't ask 'bout Paris like Belle suggested."
Stepping on twigs, Rogue hastily uncovered the motorcycle, looking at Gambit, who was shivering and had his hands in his pockets. Frankly, he looked a little pathetic. Really good-looking, she had to admit, but nevertheless a relatively well-meaning sap with dangerous powers and an attitude. "Nothing she suggests can be a good idea," Rogue said in an exasperated voice. "Yah didn't kill her an' you're helping me, whether your intentions are honorable or not. Don't flip out on me, now."
He gave her an indignant look, but his gaze kept trickling back to the motel.
"Aha," she said, with an air of revelation. "It's not the silly picture at all. It's her, isn't it? She really made you feel as if you were some kinda devil when she said it, hmm?"
Remy gave her a grin that wasn't a grin at all. "Le Diable Blanc, dey call me."
"If it helps at all- and I know this ain't sayin' much- you're a far better person than she is," she informed him, one hand on her hip. "Or bigger person, or whatever it is yah say. Whatever her feelings are, she wasn't about to let that stop her from murderin' yah."
His gaze flickered over her face absently, as if he wasn't really looking at her. "Dey're not fond of that word, de assassins," he commented mildly.
Her lips formed a slight pout of disbelief. "What, murder? What do they call it, then, feeding the daisies?"
"Dey prefer inhume," he said, now apparently studying the bark growth on a tree.
Her confusion didn't need to be said.
Absentmindedly, he gestured at her as he searched for one of the recovered packs of cigarettes with the other. "T'ink like exhume, only before yo' buried."
The silence was deafening as she took that in and Gambit barely even registered the loud voices now shouting from the direction of the motel.
Rogue studied his features for a moment. "You must have loved her an awful lot," she said quietly.
He drew a cigarette, and glaring at it extremely intensely, set it smoldering with an air of relief. He drew in deeply and let it rest on his lip. "Loved myself more," he answered cynically. "Wasn't dat obvious jus' now?"
She shrugged, straddling the bike and giving him an impatient look. "Okay, so maybe, if ah'm gettin' the implication right, yah got an overactive sense of self-preservation. Do me more good than an proactive martyrdom would, right? Look, ah'm just impressed yah got out of there relatively alive and unharmed."
He looked up, blowing out smoke, his face surprised. "What? You, impressed?"
She glared at him. "It helped ah got her talkin'. An' shot her. But, yeah. A little."
The corner of his lip twitched up in what might have been the very beginning of a smile, but it stopped. He stalked over to the motorcycle, climbing on as she with reluctance slid to the back, still rubbing the back of her head slightly as she pulled her bomber jacket back on. "Y' know what mon pere told me?" he said suddenly, as he tucked the heavy book she handed him deep into the folds of his trenchcoat.
She waited, obviously not knowing.
"Y' got not'in t' fear from folks who're bad or evil, 'cause de odds are damn good dey'll talk too much before dey kill y', fo' one reason or ano'ter. An' he'd know." He tinkered with a few wires they'd pulled into the open earlier, glancing over his shoulder to see if she was listening. She was. "It's de good men y' got t' fear," he continued. "'Cause dey'll kill y' wit'out a word if it needs t' be done."
Rogue waited a beat, but that seemed to be the end of his quote. "And?" she asked. "Why are yah tellin' me that? Which one are you?"
He didn't answer her first inquiry as he adjusted the wires again, briefly producing a spark. "Neit'er, chere. Mon pere t'ought I was one o' de weak ones. Jus' pointin' out, didn't do anyt'in t' be impressed 'bout. Belle beat 'erself as much as I beat her."
Remy revved up the motorcycle, and her arms slid reluctantly around his waist. "I'm not a nice man, chere," he told her over the roar of the bike.
"Yeah, well, ah need more scoundrels in mah life anyways," she yelled, not having the slightest clue what to say that could ease his pain in the slightest. "And don' call me that!"
He smiled at that, though it didn't quite reach his eyes. "Anyt'ing y' say, chere."
The motorcycle sped off into the night.