Eh...this update took a bit, yes, it did...Sorry, I was in an odd mood...it's like, I knew what I wanted to write, but I couldn't get my brain to actually make the effort to let me write it...so...I finally banged my head against a hard blunt surface and it allowed me to...

A/N: Document manager hates me...sooo...the formatting here, which I usually seperate the "scenes" with lines, will have no such lines today. I hope we can still get the gist and enjoy the damn thing...I hate this site...

Chapter Twelve: In the Evening By the Moonlight

They floated near the bottom of the clear blue Genoshan Bay. They'd only been dead several days, but already the fishes and few sharks that populated the waters had taken pieces. It'd be several more days until the bodies were bloated and softened enough for the bigger fish to get the large bites they preferred. In the moonlight that somehow filtered down into the deep shadows, the man and woman almost danced in the current.

I'd sent them to that fate, that late-night-all-you-can-eat-fish buffet. I'd known that as soon as they knew what I intended to do, they'd balk and try to stop me. They were both powerful and talented enough that they could have. They both knew my own weaknesses, and knew how to use them against me. It was another aspect of mutate life. There is always a mutate out there who is ready and willing to take you down if the Leader asks them to. I'd spent two years finding out who was my anti-thesis, and seducing them to my cause, only to plan the entire time to take them out when given the chance.

Shadowcat assisted me, and indeed, she is a good assistant. When the female was fatigued from helping me to contact Xavier, she turned from me, resting her hand on the canopy of the boat, and for once wasn't on guard. Funny how searing mental agony can allow such a thing. Within seconds, I'd removed a dagger from my sleeve and buried it in her neck, she died within seconds.

The male, sensing the same agony of his mate, came to his feet, but even as the female died, he too staggered. Shadowcat reached out and slid her phased hands into his chest, removing his heart. He too was dead within seconds. Together we pushed them overboard.

It's funny how their faces in that deep blue grave come to me in this dream. Almost as if I'm there. Sage's eyes are still open, small black hooks on her cheeks coming off and reaching for me. Bishop still clutches his heart, or rather where it should be, but when he moves his hands, millions of fish come from the crevice and surge at me...

Rogue wakes with a small squeak, stifling it quickly with her hands. Adrenaline pumped throughout her body, making her jump when Remy slid his arm around her waist. He was still asleep, his movement subconscious at best, but Rogue slithered from the bed, uncomfortable with the claim she imagined at the touch.

She drifted around his quarters, picking up his shirt as she did so. After slipping it on, she took a seat by the one window in his room, and stared into the impressive visage that greeted her through it. The Earth, so whole and clean from so far away. Here she was, risking her life to save it. Why?

There were other worlds, other galaxies, other universes where she could go should the Earth be destroyed or become uninhabitable. Some would ask why such a woman as she would willingly go to bat for humanity, when most of humanity didn't even like mutants.

Maybe that in itself was the answer. She willingly fought for Earth, because she herself was part of humanity. Earth is home. Rogue had long ago stopped fighting the affection she had for this great blue planet. She'd swum in all the oceans; she'd been on every continent. She'd claimed much of the planet as her's, at least in some little way. How could she turn her back on something that would, if not stopped, run over the Earth, cover it in blood, and change everything?

Eventually, no matter where she stayed on the planet, the mutates would come. The mutate population wasn't small, or feeble, as some might believe of it. In three years, almost a million mutates had been created. A million. Not all of them were even in Genosha. Through subterfuge, read spying, she'd learned that there were several other islands around the world where Citadels identical to the one in Genosha had been built, and all for similar reasons. Mutating.

Remy stirred on the bed, his eyes opening, and she knew he instantly saw her from the way those red eyes lit on her. She cocked her head, watching as he stretched and slid to the side of the bed to sit.

"Morning, chère."

"Ah don't think three am counts as morning."

"Close enough. Wha' you doin' up?"

"Ah'm not tired."

Remy grinned lasciviously, ogling her legs where they stretched in front of her. "Remy can help you wit' dat."

"Go back to bed, swamp rat. Ah don't feel like faking anything."

"You insultin' my bed skills, chère?"

"Ah can only hope to puncture that overinflated ego, boy."

Remy pouted and feigned pain in his chest. "I hurt."

Rogue laughed. "Ya're not. Ah, however, am hungry."

Remy grinned again, just as carnal as before. "Once again, darlin', Remy can help you wit' dat."

"By going and getting me somethin' to eat from the kitchen?" Rogue asked hopefully.

Remy sighed. "Dat I can." He stood, unaware, or most likely, comfortable in his nudity. Rogue appreciated the image he maintained as he did so, of the battle-hardened ex-thief turned good guy, but still just a bad ole boy. She also appreciated that battle-hardened, scarred, but still perfect body he used to project that image. She'd spent almost an hour finding and enjoying every one of the scars on his body. It was only turnabout, since he'd spent an hour enjoying all the little freckles he could find on her body.

He pulled on a pair of jeans, and kissed Rogue on the forehead before leaving for the kitchen. She could read from his surface thoughts that he intended to bring back some fresh fruit and cheeses, which sounded fine to her. The wine he also intended to bring wouldn't be drunk by her, but she didn't let him know that she'd listened to his thoughts.

Remy had always been a hard mind to read, Xavier had said so himself many years ago after one of their first fights with the Acolytes. Couldn't get deeper than surface thoughts, he said. He was right in one aspect, in that your run-of-the-mill telepath couldn't get deeper than that. Rogue wasn't one of those.

During the fervent love-making, she'd imprinted his deeper thoughts, in two-second intervals so he wouldn't notice. It was one of the reasons why he was more tired than she. She had, however, gotten the information she wanted from his mind, and rising from the chair, and all the nostalgia that lingered there, she dressed, finally intending to carry out one of the more finite agenda of her intentions.

However, even as she turned to leave, she found her hand lingering on the warm and jumbled bed sheets. She hadn't even been with a man other than her mate. It had been interesting to say the least. For it to have been with Remy made some small girl-ish still young part of her heart sing. Then, like usual, the woman part of that heart beat down the girl, and made Rogue turn from her whimsiness, and go into the hall, heading for the elevator, and to the top of Avalon, to the computer/monitoring center.

She gasped into the darkened room, her scrambling for air drawing him into consciousness and becoming aware of the uncomfortableness of sleeping in a chair. Not that he hadn't already known that from the many nights he'd fallen asleep over a new painting or drawing.

Shadowcat lay in his bunk, twisting in the sheets in some nightmare. Piotr rose to go to her, grasping her arms as he gently shook her, trying to wake her. His hands slipped in their grip, so covered in sweat she was. Shadowcat grit her teeth as she shook and tossed her head about, trying to dispel images apparently lodged their and causing her distress.

Piotr once again tried to wake her, shaking her harder, even picking her up into a sitting position, but it was to no avail. Finally, he left her to the nightmare, and pressed a button on the small console near his bed. Immediately, a sleepy Beast appeared.

"Yes?"

"Dr. McCoy, Katya needs help," Piotr said to the monitor as he struggled to control the now flailing limbs of the small woman. For a figure so petite, he learned, she packed quite a wallop.

Beast slipped on his glasses and struggled to see as much as he could through the small came through the viewport in his own room. He didn't like what he saw. "Can you get her down to the medical bay?"

Piotr nodded. "I'll try."

They severed the link, and Piotr tried to take Shadowcat into his arms, but she was moving too much, now completely trying to keep him from touching her. She was crying, her eyes closed, but screams of terror emitting from her mouth. Piotr wanted to be gentle, but found that it was impossible.

He transformed into his mutant metal skin, and with a small prayer, lifted her from the bed. The touch of the cool metal on her skin calmed her greatly. It worried Piotr, because the last time someone had calmed down so at the touch of his mutanity, it had been his father, who in the peaks of a winter fever, had died. It had thrust Piotr into the man of the house position, and created untold of toil on his young soul.

He walked through the halls, as fast as he could without jostling Shadowcat terribly. Within minutes, he'd reached the medical bay, and was greeted by Beast, who directed him to lie the mutate on a nearby bed.

McCoy immediately began to check her vitals and was immediately upset by what he saw. Upon seeing the worry on Piotr's face, McCoy smiled and tried to reassure him. "It's a fever, bringing on delusions. With medication, she should be fine and awake." McCoy didn't mention the rapid fluctuations in her blood pressure, nor the almost seizure like brain patterns the diagnostic machines were telling him about. "Why don't you go and find Rogue? I'm sure she'd like to know about this."

Piotr nodded, but was reluctant to leave Shadowcat. When McCoy swished the curtain around her bed shut, he had to accept that he was unneeded at the moment, and with a small nod to himself, set out on a mission to find Rogue...

...who was currently on Level One of Avalon, the communications and monitoring station. Built with the best technology available at the moment, it had been pathetically easy to get into once the command code had been gleaned from Gambit.

It had also been quite satisfactory to knock Jubilee unconscious once she'd gained access. Jubilee had been the monitor on duty, so Rogue had used a small electrical overload minimized and centered over Jubilee to knock her unconscious. She was glad it had worked, given the explosive nature of Jubilee's abilities.

After dragging the girl from the seat, Rogue had pulled herself over to the large console that took up the entire room and set about doing what she'd came up there to do. It took several minutes, but she was finally able to get through.

On the screen, a large three foot by five screen, static appeared, before clearing and giving a face to a voice Rogue had spoken to for many months. Long dark hair matched with lightly tanned aristocratic features, which included deep azure eyes and a luscious mouth. Yes, she'd contemplated doing him, but damn, who wouldn't? He was not only a powerful mutant, but was powerful in the world too. He was also one of the few civilians "in" on her plan, since his resources had been needed to assist.

Rogue smiled broadly and leaned back in her seat before greeting the man. "Hello, Shaw."