I got much love for mah last chapter, for which I'm thankful. It's nice to know mah hard work is appreciated.

Now, most of you musically-inclined will realize that the title of this song is a song sung by the great Lady Day...however, in mah opinion, the version Nina Simone does is better. 'Course, I say that about all the songs she does.

Chapter Eight: Strange Fruit

Rogue woke at precisely six am, Genoshan time, as she had for the last three years. She'd only had about three hours sleep, having gone to bed at 2 am according to this satellite's clock, which was now telling her it was five am. Genosha was one time zone ahead of Avalon. Rogue would use this to her advantage.

Slipping into the same clothes she'd worn yesterday, Rogue briefly stopped to check on Shadowcat. Still feverish, but oddly cold, had produced a clammy sheen on the girl's face. She was murmuring in her sleep, but what she said wasn't needed. Rogue knew what had happened yesterday, having foreseen it during those long months she'd deliberately reached out with her adoptive mother Destiny's powers. It'd given her many probably outcomes for this situation, and she knew all by heart. The fact that Wisdom had died in most of them made it a probably outcome. Rogue hadn't dare tell Shadowcat. Even desperately wanting free of him, the connection and bond between them was there. Shadowcat had wanted to seek another life, but she hadn't wanted to at the cost of her mate's life. The blood of his death was on Rogue's hands, but it was something she could deal with. Shadowcat was fragile as it was.

Rogue slipped out of the quarters they'd been assigned and into the darkened hall, Avalon's only concession to the earliness of the hour. Rogue reached out with her original power, imprinting, and sought out the tags she'd left on these people. It'd been a recent evolution, brought on forcefully by Tessa. Anyone Rogue imprinted or ever imprinted was on her radar. She could sense them near, and could track them through invisible "tags" she'd left behind in their DNA. She knew instinctively where everyone she'd absorbed was and what they were doing. Since she'd absorbed close to a thousand people, sometimes it overwhelmed her. Sometimes, like now, it was an advantage.

Most of X-Force were in what appeared to be their quarters, as they were almost all sleeping. Dr. McCoy was in a lab tinkering with some blood samples he'd taken from Shadowcat and Rogue, Magneto was in a much smaller form of the Danger Room, practicing his abilities (Rogue sensed that age was taking it's toll in that he appeared to have lost much of the control he'd once had), and Xavier was in...Cerebro? No. This one was a lot more attuned and stronger. He called it...Cerebra. That was Rogue's trajectory.

Carefully making sure to short out any monitoring devices in the halls so that he would have no warning of her coming, Rogue proceeded down two levels and inward. Cerebra was in the direct center of the huge satellite. It required a cornea I.D. to enter, something that was easily passed with minimal shape-changing. Contrary to popular opinion, when one took another's form, it required intimate knowledge. If you're just going for a physical likeness, it's easy as pie, but to get the fingerprints, cornea prints, voice, and all of that the exact same takes intense study or information on the subject. Rogue had learned this at Mystique's imprinting. Her mother, now long gone, was an expert in all forms of shape-changing, something most shape-changers these days, young whippersnappers, didn't know and didn't care about.

As the doors to Cerebra opened, Dr. Xavier turned and watched in surprise as Rogue stepped into the room and let the doors shut behind her. "You're up early, Rogue."

"How can ya tell on this hunk of space junk?"

"Avalon is one of the most sophisticated satellites in orbit right now, second only to Dr. Reed's."

Rogue smiled. "Junk."

Xavier sighed, and turned away to face the panel in front of him. "What may I assist you with?"

Rogue slowly joined him in the large circular podium in the middle of Cerebra. "Nothin' much. Ah had a few questions."

"Ah. Well, after all the interrogations yesterday, I imagined you were quite tired. I can answer any questions you'd like to ask now, or we can wait for the rest of the debriefing later. The others have discovered more questions they'd like to ask."

"Well, this question is kinda personal, Doc."

Xavier smiled. "I have time for all my students."

Rogue smiled back. "Have ya told anyone about ya blackouts?"

Xavier felt the smile slide away. "What blackouts?"

"Come, now, Doc. Don't lah to me."

Rogue was sitting on the panel of equipment in front of him, and as he started to turn his chair to leave, she hooked her feet into the wheels, preventing movement. "I have had no such thing, Rogue. I do not know what gave you this-..."

"Impression? It's not an impression, its fact. An important one. They've been happening for about...three years now, right?" Her smile was bitter with knowledge. Last night, in her dreams, she'd figured something out. Something important. Something that had to be brought public. "Let me explain, Doctor Xavier. After rooting around in old files on the network computer y'all handily left in mah quarters, Ah connected a few dots. Three years ago, when we were home alone in the mansion, you were at Muir Island, recovering from extensive mental damage brought on by a mental sojourn to Shi'ar territory. While weakened, the Shadow King attacked and took control of your body. That was the first blackout. Coincidentally, during the period of his possession of your body, we, the X-Men, were taken. The exact same amount of time.

"After consulting more of ya computer files, Ah connected that every time the Leader appeared to the masses of Genosha for his public rallying speeches and punishments, you were either incapacitated or nowhere to be found. Ah found that highly irregular."

Xavier glared. "What are you trying to imply, Rogue?"

"Yes, I'm sure we'd both like that answer," Magneto boomed into the cavernous room from where he was entering the room. He didn't look murderous, yet, but his anger was well on its way to thundering.

"Ah'll come out and say it. Ah think Xavier, the most powerful telepath on the planet, is the Leader of Genosha. Ah think he's somehow mentally projecting the image of the Leader and is planning to take over the world. Ah don' know if he's doing it consciously or if this is some sort of manifestation of his darker personality and subconscious, but Ah know he's involved."

Magneto scowled. "I highly doubt that Charles would..." Magneto trailed off that thought as Xavier started to laugh. It wasn't the normal, slightly reserved laugh that was usually emitted from the paraplegic's mouth...it was loud and abrasive and utterly maniacal. Rogue, sensing a large movement of power rising up from the man, shoved his chair back, where it caught on the edge of the panel and tumbled over. Xavier spilled onto the ground, but he wasn't hurt.

Slowly, because of years of disuse, Xavier stood, weaving. He was smiling in an oddly crazy way, and the voice that came from his mouth wasn't his own. "Very clever, little girl. I should have known you'd be trouble. Should have killed you three years ago when it became clear that the Mutate process hadn't taken to you. I let you live, because you fit into my plans. Now, it's too late for you stop them anyways."

Magneto gathered to him all his power, his eyes glowing with the effort. "You are not Charles Xavier. Who are you?"

Rogue ignored the old mutant and glared at "Xavier". "Ah don't care about your plan. Take the world, Ah don't give a shit. But Ah won't let you hurt mah friends. Ah'll save them, if it's the last thing Ah do." "Xavier" viewed this little vow with mild disdain.

"You don't care if I murder millions of people?"

"Not really."

"You won't interfere."

"Ah can't guarantee that."

Magneto didn't like to be ignored. He'd reviewed the facts in his mind, and had come up with a logical answer. "Shadow King! You face me."

Both Rogue and "Xavier" laughed. Rogue explained. "This isn't the Shadow King. He was banished three years ago, remember?"

"Then who is this!"

Rogue smiled. "This is the one person who ever infiltrated Dr. Xavier's mind so deeply, and he's done it before. Say hello to Lucas, Dr. Xavier's son."

Suddenly, Xavier's eyes, before a nice mellow brown, blazed blue as he slowly clapped his hands. "Very well done. How did you know?"

"Four years ago, you attacked Cyclops and Jean and Dr. Xavier. Ah heard all the stories. Soon after that attack, the good Doctor and Ah were doing some mental cleaning out inside mah head. Ah've been in and out of your father's mind, and he in mine. Four years ago, Ah sensed a taint to his mind, and he explained it was ya. It dissipated with time. For the last three years, something about the Leader seemed so familiar. Ah figured it out yesterday, because that same sense of familiar was on Xavier. It took me a while, but Ah figured it out. Somehow, when the Doc was weakened three years ago, ya snuck in and started ya work. First, ya took what he loved most, the X-Men. Now, ya're working to do the anti-thesis to what he wants, you're taking over and planning on destroying the world. Ya're going to set up the mutates as the dominant species, and any mutant who doesn't want to be in ya own private army will be killed. The baseline humans don't even get that option."

Lucas nodded. "You're a lot more clever than I thought. I assume you used that little fortune-telling gift to figure this out?"

Rogue shrugged. "Actually, it's so simple a child could figure it out."

Lucas shrugged, too, and as he did so, his astral form slipped out of Xavier's body, causing it to fall to the floor with a clang. With a small mental tweak, his body became mostly opaque. He was still only an astral form or he'd probably have become corporeal.

Rogue watched as Magneto stooped to check on Xavier, who was apparently just unconscious. She then turned and asked the question most bothering her. "What about Phoenix?"

"What about her?

"She tried to kill you just yesterday."

"Yes, she did." Lucas remembered that vividly. He'd been mildly surprised to see the beautiful redhead in his quarters so early. She usually made her visits when her husband was on shift, and couldn't seek her out. When she'd used her limited pyrokinetics to lash out and him and nearly kill him, he'd instinctively returned to his original body, now in a hospital ward somewhere in Nova Scotia. On Genosha he'd possessed the body of an older gentleman, whose name he'd never known. That body was long gone, but maybe now was the time to return to his original body. Though it would take several of the tests he'd established to prove he was the Leader, he was doubtless that eventually he'd be back in his old station and overseeing every facet of his beautiful plan. After he killed Phoenix.

Underneath Rogue's hands, a sudden beacon came on. A large screen came down from the ceiling, and it was zoomed in on what appeared to be a map of Australia. From the east, hundreds of small red lights, and several large, were converging on the coast. Rogue knew what it was, but explained for Magneto.

"The plan is commenced. The Mutates are taking Australia."

Lucas watched as Rogue pulled up statistics from Cerebra, using it as if born to it, or at least trained extensively in its use. "According to this, they'll have taken it in two days."

"I guess I must bid you adieu. I've things to accomplish." Lucas waved jovially as he slowly started to fade out. Magneto made one last effort to wrap his magnetic fields around the astral Lucas, but since this was purely a mental image, it didn't work.

Rogue used telekinesis to lift the still-out Dr. Xavier, and started towards the door.

"Where are you going with him?" Magneto demanded.

"Ah'm taking him to Dr. McCoy."

"And then?"

"And then we're calling X-Force together, and Ah'm going to tell you mah real plan."