Disclaimer: Yeah I don't own X-Men, or BtVS. I'm not even going to imagine that I do, because hey let's face it lawyers would foam at the mouth if I even entertained that delusional notion.

A/N: Thank you all so much for your kind reviews.I don't know if I mentioned this before, but this is a slight crossover between Buffy and the X-movieverse. If that doesn't do it for you, I'm sorry. Give it a chance anyway. So there are some slight spoilers for the Buffy series finale "Chosen" in this chapter and probably the next few. Without further ado, here's the new chapter of Shiver...or as I like to call it "How Rogue gets her superstrength in the X-movieverse without absorbing Ms. Marvel"

Life in New Orleans was much more difficult than Rogue had anticipated. There were very few jobs that wouldn't question her choice of attire and lodging turned out to be more expensive that she'd hoped. After a month in the city she'd finally found work at a local music store as a cashier, and decided that she wasn't above squatting in order to stay shielded from the elements. Rogue was just glad the building she'd been staying in had running water in its shabby bathroom. She'd had to adopt a Goth look to make the gloves passable at work, but it didn't really bother her. It wasn't quite the life she'd imagined running away from Xavier's school, but at least memories of John and Bobby didn't haunt her at every turn.

Rogue's routine was fairly simple. Get up, throw on one of her three outfits, apply her Goth make-up, work, eat a PB & J sandwich, go to sleep, rinse and repeat. Every other day she showered at the local Y and on Sundays she went to the soup kitchen for something more substantial than peanut butter and jelly. Once in a while she called Logan from a pay phone to assure him she was okay, but those instances were few and far between. Rogue rarely deviated from this pattern.

That was why it was so surprising when she found herself drawn to wandering through one of the cities many cemeteries on a Wednesday evening three months after her move to New Orleans. The night before she'd been woken up by the strangest dream, where she was in a huge cave surrounded by monsters. Rogue had been jolted awake when a girl with red hair had thrown her a rather nasty looking axe. She'd felt strange and off kilter all day, so she'd called in sick for the first time. Rogue had spent the day walking around the city, trying to get a handle on the way her mutation had evolved seemingly overnight. Her senses were sharper and, if the way her glass had cracked under her touch at the diner where she'd splurged for lunch was any indication, she'd grown exponentially stronger. Neither of those things really explained her sudden urge to traipse around on hallowed ground as she was currently doing.

Rogue rubbed the back of her neck what seemed like the ten millionth time since she'd entered the graveyard. She couldn't shake the feeling that someone was following her. Hearing a twig crack behind her, she spun around quickly only to find that no one was there. "Ah'm going crazy," she said to herself.

A chuckle from behind her made her jump nearly out of her skin. She spun sharply and came face to face with a pale, dark haired man. "I highly doubt that cherie. Now tell me what a pretty girl like you is doing in a cemetery so late at night, hmm?" he asked.

The hairs on the back of Rogue's neck stood up in alarm. There was something that just was not right about this man. Her stomach clenched so hard she could barely keep from doubling over. She frowned at the man. "Can't a girl just take walk in this town?"

Rogue backed up a few paces as the man edged towards her. She shivered as he sent her a cold smile and walked closer to her. Rogue bumped into something hard and a look over her shoulder confirmed that she had backed into one of New Orleans's above ground crypts. A choked scream burst from Rogue as the man reached out to touch her and her stomach clenched so hard she could barely see. Gathering her composure, she straightened up and looked him in the eye. "Ah wouldn't do that if ah were you."

The man's smile didn't fade. "Poor cherie doesn't like to be touched? That's a pity."

Rogue's heart almost stopped when he laid a hand on her neck. She waited for the pull, but nothing came. Her confusion must have shown on her face because the man chuckled. "What did you expect petite?" he asked as his grip tightened on her neck.

Rogue began to panic as her air supply was cut off. Moonlight streamed down onto her attacker's face and she prayed for air enough to scream as his face shifted into an ugly mask of ripples and his eyes glowed a haunting yellow. As he leaned into her neck she noticed something. His hand was cold. Her new senses kicked in as she realized that this man had no body heat. A sharp pain in her neck catapulted her into action.

Rogue clumsily kicked out with her left foot and caught the man in his ankle. He pulled his head away from her neck and swore. Rogue took this moment to grab the wrist of the hand holding her neck and squeezed, hoping it would crack like the glass in the diner. She smiled as she was rewarded with the sound of shattering bones. Her attacker swore again and relinquished his grip, letting Rogue topple to the ground and clutched his broken wrist to him. "You'll pay for that petite," he growled.

Rogue picked herself up off the ground and took off running. She was running faster than she'd ever thought possible, but she could hear the man on the verge of catching her as she took a sharp right turn between the crypts. The footsteps stopped behind her after a ways and she stopped to catch her breath under an old willow tree at the border of the cemetery. Rogue screamed as a heavy weight crashed into her. "I told you that you'd pay cherie," the man growled in her ear as he forced her to the ground. Adrenaline pumping hard through her veins, Rogue brought her head back sharply, colliding with the man's face. She used the training Logan had given her to throw the man off her. Without waiting for him to move away, Rogue brought her knee into his ribcage. As he was pushed away by the force of her blow, she jumped up of the ground.

Rouge grabbed hold of a branch of the tree, shocked for a moment at how easily it came off the tree into her hands and swung out with it. She connected with the man's chest and watched in horror as his demonic face contorted in pain and he exploded into a cloud of dust.

Rouge stood stunned with the branch in her hands as the dust fell to the ground, sparkling in the moonlight.

Hope you liked it. Review? Pwetty pweese? Also...check out my other stories?