I want to thank all my reviewers again. Yes, this is a wonderful story. It's read by wonderful and articulate people.

And...DarkWolf, babe...thanks for all the reviews...

Chapter Nine: Please Don't Let Me Be Misunderstood
Rogue watched from the swivel chair at the head of the table as X-Force and the few civilians on Avalon argued. What they were arguing about was really moot, but they didn't know that yet.

"Xavier isn't the Leader! How could he be?"

"I know what I saw, Ms. Lee, and it came from Xavier."

"What about Lucas? Are we going after him?"

Dr. McCoy stepped from the rabble of the arguing adults and looked pointedly at Rogue. "I think it's time for some truth, young lady."

Rogue quirked an eyebrow and smiled. "What makes ya think Ah haven't told you the truth?"

"Your pulse spikes when you lie."

Rogue glared at him. "And how would ya know that?" She put up a hand to stop him from speaking. "Internal sensors calibrated to my heat signature, yes? Ah would say Ah feel violated, but that fact that ya did it makes me proud."

The rest of the audience finally stopped conflicting and took their seats, obviously as eager as McCoy to have the truth. Distantly, Rogue heard the doors of her assigned quarters open and footsteps head this way. Shadowcat had woken up and decided to join them.

"First off, Ah didn't come here to get ya help. Ah came here to use what ya have."

Magneto nodded. "Cerebra."

Rogue smiled. "Yes."

The door opened and Shadowcat stepped in. Immediately Rogue stood up so quickly that the chair fell to the floor as an invisible force whipped through Shadowcat and slammed into Rogue, sending her flying into the window (which was thankfully thick given that they were in space and one crack and they could all die). X-Force rushed to their feet, but that same invisible force pushed them back down.

Shadowcat didn't look like herself. Her eyes glowed with a red fire, and her skin seemed nearly translucent, as if someone was looking out of it at them, as if things were moving in there that shouldn't have been. She lifted her hand into the air and gracefully she floated onto the table. She walked slinkily, nothing like the smooth gait she'd used before. She smiled and it wasn't her smile, but that of someone else. Someone Rogue knew very well. She recognized that smile.

X-Force did not. "What's going on?" Sam asked, his arm around Jubilee to keep her from jumping at Shadowcat as she walked past them on the table.

Magneto answered. "Someone has possessed her."

Storm supplied a guess. "Lucas?"

Rogue shot that down. "No."

"Den who, chère?"

Rogue slowly pushed the telekinesis off her body, and lowered herself to the floor. "It's Phoenix."

Shadowcat/Phoenix laughed. "Always were good at guessing games, Rogue."

"What are ya doing here, Jean?" Rogue stepped up to the table and retook her seat. She wouldn't let this bitch intimidate her.

"I've come to deliver a message."

Silence.

"Well, deliver it then," Rogue said impatiently.

"In such a rush, Rogue! Maybe I'd like to see my old friends. It's been so long," Shadowcat/Phoenix said as she stooped to run their hand through McCoy coif before turning to hiss at Jubilee who toppled her chair over backward in fright. They laughed.

"These people have nothing to do with this. What is the message?"

"The Leader is gone. This is my plan now, and I suggest you stay out."

Rogue laughed. "And what will ya do if Ah don't?"

Shadowcat starved to undulate, and slowly blood began to trickle from her ears and nose. Rogue didn't cave. Phoenix stopped the psychic manipulation she'd been doing to Shadowcat's body. "You don't care if I kill her?"

"Ah was planning on doing it myself, but feel free. She knows the risks."

Phoenix cocked her head but she didn't follow up on the threat. "Maybe I'll just reach out and kill you instead."

She tried. Lord, did she try. Rogue felt as the psychic tendril slipped through her shields, and started poking around. Phoenix had wanted in Rogue's very interesting mind for a long time. Now she had opportunity. Rogue let her.

Phoenix stimulated several psyches, causing physical transformations in Rogue, but she couldn't make her break. Rogue turned blue and furry, then became taller and blonde, then small and bug-eyed, and finally a nice scaly blue. Rogue shook off Phoenix's influence and smiled as Shadowcat/Phoenix pouted.

"Ah have complete control of my body. Ya can't kill me by possession. Ah've dealt with it before."

Phoenix slammed the psychic tendril into Rogue's chest, and the probe was so physically minded that it actually punctured her body. Blood rushed out and down Rogue's stomach, but even as Phoenix retreated in satisfaction, Rogue's body healed the wound.

"This really isn't productive, Jean."

Shadowcat/Phoenix sighed. "Why do you fight me so? Together, we could do some damage."

"Ah don't wanna do damage. Ah want freedom."

"Freedom is overrated."

"Said the slave to the caged bird."

"You remember your Genoshan fairy tales."

"It was more like a poem."

"Don't contradict me."

"Don't be wrong and Ah won't."

Shadowcat/Phoenix sighed and stretched her arms above her head. "I rather like this body. Maybe I'll keep it. I know Cyclops would enjoy playing with it."

"Goodbye, Jean."

"What do yo-..."

Rogue slammed her own psychic prod into Shadowcat (not Phoenix) and caused her to slip into phase, effectively throwing Phoenix out of her mind. Shadowcat shook her head and reconstituted herself.

Dr. McCoy and Colossus helped her down off the table, and when her legs proved too weak to hold her, they escorted her to the infirmary. Rogue watched them leave, then turned her eyes to the stares/glares/ogles of the remaining group. She smiled. "What?"

"Could you please explain, Rogue?"

"Sure thing, Erik! See, that was Phoenix, who the day Shadowcat and Ah were escaping, blew up the Leader's apartment, effectively killing him. Or, at least, his body. As we both know, Lucas is still very much alive."

"Wha' was your real plan, Rogue?" Gambit asked.

Rogue ducked her head. "The real real plan or the one Ah made up to get y'all to help?"

"The real real one."

Rogue sighed. "Ah was going to use Cerebra to sever the link between Shadowcat and her mate, Wisdom."

"Yeah, that much you told the professor!" Jubilee interjected, though she shut up when the rest of the table glared at her.

"Xavier wasn't going to do it."

"Why not?" Magneto asked, he'd known that whatever the tests had told Charles had made him decide to not do it, but he didn't know what they'd told him.

Xavier wheeled himself into the room, mostly-recovered from the possession and subsequent psychic damage, and answered that question himself. "It's highly probable that such action will mean Shadowcat's death."

"Shadowcat is going to die anyways." The table turned back to Rogue. "Her mate is dead, and if she isn't bonded to a new one within 60 hours, her mind will collapse. Literally."

"What does that have to do with the plan?" Sam asked.

Rogue smiled bitterly. "Shadowcat was the experiment. If the link was severed, best case scenario, she'd be unconscious for a while, worst, she'd die. The question was could the link be severed?"

Charles wheeled himself down the room and beside Rogue's chair, but she refused to look at him. "You're going to try and use Cerebra to sever the mental links between all the mates in the Genoshan Army." It wasn't a question so she didn't answer. "Even if it could kill them all."

"Probabilities say that most likely the mutates at category three or higher, will survive."

"And the rest?"

"Collateral damage."

That statement was met with silence, but Rogue hadn't expected anything less. The fact that they'd truly believed that she'd changed so much in three years to not care that someone was taking over the world and planning on corrupting it beyond repair meant that they'd probably never known her at all. If someone was taking over the world, no matter where she was, eventually they'd get there. Rogue had a sense of self-preservation a mile wide which was telling her to stop this foolish mission in its tracks, no matter the cost. She was prepared to do that, even if it means killing herself in the process. After all, even she was partially mated.