Disclaimer: I don't own the X-Men. Ilehana Xavier belongs to Corrinth. All other characters belong to me.
A/N: Thank you to all my reviewers out there; you really are all stars.
Scene 31Panic was stalking her, right behind her with every new trick she tried. Every time the chromatography came back blank, every time the centrifuge finished spinning to yield nothing new, panic edged that little bit closer. The emotions Vixen felt from the other side of the infirmary weren't helping. No matter how forcefully she defended her telepathic walls, the torrent of feelings from Blaze and Gambit were an overwhelming siege. Quick as she pushed them away, their emotions swamped her again, dragging the panic closer with every swell of the tide.
She could not find a cure. She did not believe she had ever stood a chance of finding it. Maybe a large, experienced team of pharmacologists and biochemists, in a big well-funded lab with oodles of time could perhaps one day find something that would kill the virus without harming its victim. But Ilehana was not doctor enough to find the miracle that would cure her friend. Gambit was going to die, and Ilehana could do nothing to stop it.
In a wave of dread, she swept all of her pointless research into a large waste bin, notes, test tubes, samples and analysis. The only thing left standing on the work surface was the bottle of virus-containing whiskey. Three quarters empty now, and no way of obtaining more when it had gone, not with the distillery destroyed. Panic gave way to depression, despair, and as Blaze pulled away broken-heartedly from Remy's goodbye kiss, Ilehana left the infirmary knowing there was literally nothing left to do but wait.
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Not minutes later, Wolverine arrived to offer his support, his help, or himself as a punch-bag depending on what Ilehana was up to. The infirmary was quiet, even the incessant machines seemed to be sedated. Gambit seemed to be sleeping, and that had to be good news, right? Blaze was sat on a chair by his bedside, arms lodged against the edge of the bed, face hidden. Logan couldn't tell if she was awake or not, decided with little thought to leave her be. Ilehana was nowhere to be seen.
Damn her, Logan swore, at the same time meaning and not meaning the words. Damn her for cuttin' him out, again. What was it with the women in this place havin' to have everythin' their own way? He'd hardly seen her in days, and every time he tried to help, she was off doing something else already. Or just plain avoiding him. Treacherously his eyes fell on the lone bottle of whiskey. Odd place for a whiskey bottle, on a worktop in a lab... Still Logan supposed if there was one way to get Gambit to take his medicine...
Or maybe it was Ilehana's? He knew she'd been under a lot of stress lately, the mansion's doctor dealing first with Colossus' death, then testing all the staff and kids. Her dad being ill had been damn hard on all of them, but none more than Ilehana, no matter how she tried to hide it. The X-Men were no strangers to alcohol, Blaze no longer drank because of the damage she'd once done to her liver, Cyclops had turned to the bottle when Jean was taken, it wasn't a great leap for Logan to make to see how Ilehana might be tempted.
He lifted the glass bottle off the counter casually, admiring how much was gone. He knew Ilehana could drink, but were things really that hopeless? The liquid told him that it was, glinting sorrowfully, already mourning the second X-Man to fall to the virus. Logan swiped the bottle top with his palm, sending it spinning across the counter in a deft and practiced movement. Here's to ya, Remy, he saluted his dying friend, and took a more than healthy swig.
"Logan!" Vixen didn't mean to disturb Gambit or Blaze, but she hardly had time to think. Her predatory blue eyes only saw Wolverine as he swallowed the contaminated alcohol, Blaze's eyes wide and disbelieving just behind him as the redhead lurched stubbornly to her feet. Guiltily, Wolverine wiped his mouth with the back of his hand. What was she so aggressive about? It was just a mouthful of whiskey for cryin' out loud, why was Ilehana so defensive?
"Logan you idiot! What have you done?" Ilehana yelled at him without regret, cursing his stupidity and her own for not removing the temptation. Is this what the X-Men were being reduced to, a bunch of faltering alcoholics? "That whiskey is carrying the virus! You've just infected yourself!"
The bottle slipped from Wolverine's grasp as he just stared at the X-Men's doctor. It hit the floor and shattered, glass and liquid splattering in every which direction. Gambit groaned but otherwise hardly reacted, Blaze's eyes flicking from her best friend to Ilehana and back to Logan, not wanting to believe what she had just heard. Logan was to die as well?
"Wait." Logan raised a hand cautiously, palm outwards as he tried to make sense of the whole thing. "You're tellin' me I'm infected? I've got the same virus Gumbo has?"
"Yes!" Ilehana nearly screamed at him, "How could you be so stupid, Logan! How could you?" The Vixen would never cry, never willingly betray a weakness, but she could hardly deny the tumult inside her. To lose Colossus was a tragedy, to lose her very good friend Gambit soul-destroying, but to lose Logan to the same demon she could not stop? "How could you?" She demanded again, writhing against his embrace as he tried to comfort her.
"Babe, I'm sorry, I didn't know..." Wolverine couldn't explain why he wasn't worried, just the same as he couldn't understand why Ilehana was so afraid. "Ilehana, look at me..." Vixen did as she was told, appreciating that Blaze was being tactful and looking the other way. His brown eyes held her more strongly than any embrace ever could. "I don't get sick, babe. You just gotta remember that..."
"Shit!" Vixen swore, pushing him away forcefully and diving for an unlabelled draw. "Logan, you're absolutely right! Why didn't I think of that?" She turned back to him armed with a syringe and a needle that must have been ten centimetres long. Had Ilehana gone mad?
"Vix, what are you doing?" Blaze asked, leaving Gambit's bedside barely to place a hand on Ilehana's shoulder. She didn't particularly want to witness Ilehana stabbing Logan to death with a medical appliance if she didn't have to...
"His immune system," Ilehana turned to the redhead, blue eyes enthused and incredibly relieved. It was the last emotion Blaze had been expecting, stopping the fire elemental dead in her tracks. What was Vixen on about? "He can fight the virus! His lymphocytes, his mutated white blood cells, they will fight the virus now it's in him and from them I can manufacture a cure! Blaze if we're quick, we can still save Gambit!"
As if to emphasise the need for speed, in the bed behind them Gambit groaned again, but weakly. He was shivering, but Blaze had the cure for that at least, warming the silver blanket that covered him as she straightened it around him. Could it be true? Could they still save him?
"Then what we waitin' for?" Logan demanded, taking the syringe from Ilehana and jamming it into his own vein, grimacing as he took a sample of his own blood. Vixen took it from him eagerly, starting up the centrifuge one last time with more vigour than she'd managed in days. It wasn't over, and thanks to Logan, it didn't have to be any more of a tragedy...