Chapter Two: Blues for Mama

The conference room was dark, only two figures inside with a smattering of lamps to light it. Neither welcomed light, preferring the dimness to the vulnerability light caused. Too often they had to disappear in the light, and mutates were usually more comfortable in the dark. It's easier to hide your sins that way.

"Are you sure they saw you?"

Shadowcat sighed and leaned back in her chair, pulling her legs close. In that position and that lighting, she was almost a child again. Her eyes were strong and intense under the hair that cloaked her, and no one would make the mistake of saying it. "Yes. I think Storm recognized me."

Rogue leaned forward and started to touch Shadowcat's knee, but froze in the motion. Shadowcat wasn't comfortable with touch. "Careful who ya say that to."

Shadowcat laughed bitterly. "Don't you think I know that? Maybe better than you?"

Rogue's smile matched. "Ah'm not the one doing stealth missions, now am Ah? Cyclops is in with the leader, but Jean isn't. She likes to be in on everything. She's probably listening now."

"Has it gotten worse?"

"Yes," Rogue stood and paced in front of the draped windows. Dark outside them, dark inside, and surrounded by beasts all around. "Psylocke was taken last week. No word, telepathic or otherwise."

"How's Warren?"

"His partner is missing in action, and no one will tell him anything. How would ya feel?"

"Disjointed. Lost. Alone."

"That was rhetorical, doll."

Shadowcat smiled and lowered her legs to the ground. She stretched and removed her outer coat. Underneath her maroon bodysuit shimmered. "Sorry. I always did like to answer questions-..."

"...-better left unanswered," Rogue finished, unconsciously rubbing the scars wrapped around her wrists as she did so. Tonight was evoking odd emotions in her, things that shouldn't be rising to the surface, things she'd tamped down on long ago. "It's the 'what-if's that get me."

"What?"

Rogue realized that she'd been speaking aloud and smiled reassuringly. "Cyclops said he wanted ya to run a sim."

"I'm not in the mood. I want to go check Wisdom," Shadowcat argued, knowing it was futile.

"Cyclops will check the roster; ya'll get me in trouble."

"You're always in trouble."

Rogue nodded and picked up a helmet-like object from a side table. She handed it to Shadowcat and did touch her shoulder this time. "It'll be over in a minute."

Rogue walked to a small control panel in the table while Shadowcat placed the helmet on her head. With a few taps of her long fingers, a simulation mock-up of tonight's mission was being broadcast into Shadowcat's mind. It was not the fairly normal mission parameter that Shadowcat was going through that was important. It was the wavelength used. Somewhere, in a room deep inside this building, a spook was on the same wave and was reading deep into Shadowcat's mind. While the virtual reality required all resistance and effort from her, the spook (read telepath) was seeking out every secret, every thought, and at the same time comparing the subject's mind to earlier mind scans, to be sure that no outside sources had been tampering inside.

The sim itself lasted only moments, though for Shadowcat it'd seemed like days. She removed the helmet, and set it aside, pushing a sweaty tendril from her forehead. Simulations take a lot out of a girl.

Rogue swore. "They found something."

Shadowcat jerked to her feet. "What! But I haven't!"

Rogue was typing fast, hoping to belay any actions taken. "They're sending security."

"I haven't thought anything!"

"Wait! Shut up...Ah got it!"

Even as stomping feet signaled the arrival of security, Rogue was canceling the order, using a sustained burst of theta waves directed on the wave length of the helmet to scramble the spook on the other end. The spook would have a head ache, but they wouldn't remember.

The door opened, and a tall man stepped in. "Is everything alright in here?"

Juggernaut. Former X-Enemy, current security-goon.

"Fine. Dismissed." Rogue wasn't to be ignored, and they did her bidding. Sometimes being one of the most powerful mutants in the world wasn't a bad thing. Of course, it also meant that in some circles she was of high interest, and it was those circles that Rogue spent most of her time avoiding.

"What was it?" Shadowcat asked, not to be left in the dark.

"The ghost picked up on some latent rebellion. Ah told you to watch your thoughts, Kitty! Now is not the time to be caught. They're relying on us."

Shadowcat bared her teeth in a silent hiss. "I know that. Not all of us can be unreadable like you...it was Storm! Why us? And not her? Not them? Why us?" She looked as if she would cry, something definitely not approved of by standard control.

"He thought we were the elite, and they weren't. We get the fun, they got nothing," Rogue whispered, the argument an old one. She turned to Shadowcat and spoke solemnly, the adrenaline still rushing and her worry coming to the surface. "Ya only have to last two more days. Two more days, and it's all over, Kitty. All of it."

Promises made before, and broken again. "My name is Shadowcat."

"And mine is Rogue, we live how we live because we have to. Soon, our choice will be clear," Rogue whispered, and the comfort was over. She had to believe that Shadowcat could do this. "Can ya handle the pressure?"

Shadowcat nodded. "You can trust me."

"And Wisdom?"

"His injury will sideline him, but I have no reason to see why he won't hold."

"Go to your quarters, be ready at 1000. We leave then," Rogue started, but stopped suddenly. "Ah feel...tingly."

Shadowcat knew instantly what she meant, and changed the subject. "Do I need to do anything else?"

Rogue shook herself out of her reverie, and nodded. "Yes, ya can go now."

Shadowcat rushed out, heading for the medical wing, brushing past Jean as she did so. A back glance proved that Jean had been heading for Rogue, but there was nothing Shadowcat could do now so she continued away.

"Can Ah help you, Jean?"

"Are you going to tell me what that was about?" Cold, piercing, a voice so changed that most wouldn't recognize it from its former life. Jean walked idly around the long table, stopping near the window to lean on and study Rogue's face.

"What?" Rogue asked, not looking at Jean, instead cleaning up the minimal mess she and Shadowcat had made during debriefing. Mutates never left evidence.

"Fine, don't tell me. I'll find out eventually. Secrets are only kept among the dead."

Rogue smiled politely but artificially. "Ya do that."

"How's Archangel?"

Rogue froze in the doorframe. "The loss of one's partner can be damaging. Ah'm sure you know better than Ah how he's doing."

"I do...would you like to know?"

"Mutates care for no one but themselves and their partners."

"Yes...but once you were his friend...maybe some of that lingers..."

A trap, Rogue recognized. Jean was good at weaving them, and even though she wasn't looking at her, Rogue knew that a slightly maniacal grin danced across the woman's face. Don't trust.

"No. It doesn't," Rogue replied, turning her head so that she could see Jean's silhouette against the window from the corner of her eye.

Rogue started to leave again, but Jean's voice stopped her, again. "The perfect mutate, right?"

Rogue turned all the way this time, giving a cold stare for cold stare, and evil grin for evil grin stance. "Ah try."

The silence was cold, and not comfortable. The two mutates recognized the other on an elemental path and knew that nothing could be done to stop one another. Mutually, they agreed to let it go.

"Good night, Rogue."

"Good night, Phoenix."

Rogue turned and left the conference room, nay, the Citadel. It was late, and she was weary. There had been a lot of activity today, and with her own partner off on a solo mission, she'd been left with administrative and control work. Test, process, and assign. The day's work was heavy but patterned. There was only three days until the Leader's complete plan came to fruition. The world would know. The world would realize.

Rogue turned onto the pathway leading to her home and was startled to find that a light was on inside. No one should have been home.

Placing the few folders from her interview with Shadowcat down, Rogue called up a ball of psionic energy, stabling it in the palm of her hand as she slowly opened the unlocked door. Inside, a blare from the television announced the score of the Green Bay Packers versus Chicago Bears game. Apparently, yet again, the Packers had lost.

"I just lost twenty dollars. Damn Packers."

The energy faded into the air as Rogue recognized the voice of her partner, Sunfire. "Sunfire! Ah thought ya were in America! Ya scared the dickens out of me!"

Sunfire grinned as he rose to greet her. Rogue loved his grin, she loved everything about him. He felt the same.

Sunfire pulled his partner close and kissed her. It was deep, gentle, and utterly sparkless. One did not deny one's partner though. Rogue loved him, but not as she had loved others. She loved Sunfire as the Leader dictated, not as her heart did.

"How was work without me?"

"Boring," Rogue replied as she retrieved her folders and shut the door. "Ah'm hungry."

"When aren't you?"

"When Ah'm eating."

"Should I feed you?" Sunfire asked, holding Rogue's hand as he dragged her into the kitchen.

"Yes...ya should...omelets, chef! Three cheese and onion and potatoes."

"Anything else?" Sunfire asked sarcastically. Rogue did admit that as he sauntered around the kitchen he was attractive. Any red blooded woman would delight in his tall, Oriental yumminess, but while she delighted, she didn't want it like other women. At least, she didn't want him. Someone else called to her, and had for a long time.

"Are you ready for completion?" Sunfire asked idly.

Rogue tensed. Was he baiting her, like Jean? He didn't know of the real plan, he wasn't involved. It had been a condition of the plan she herself had set, that Sunfire never know until it was too late. Had she tipped him off? Had someone told him?

"It's only three days. And all this will be worth it! They'll bow to us, Rogue! We'll be famous, and powerful."

Rogue smiled and sipped at the orange juice he handed her. A mild mental scan proved that he was still in the dark as she wanted him to be. The way he had to be.

You see, Sunfire wouldn't understand. He'd see as betrayal. Mutates are loyal only to mutates. Rule number five.

He didn't understand.

None of them did.

Rogue wasn't a mutate. Nothing would change that. Rogue was a mutant.