DISCLAIMER: No hope of me ever owning X-Men. :D

to everyone: thanks for the hits! this story is catching up to my other one:D

Rogue awoke to Gambit's arm draped around her waist. Her eyelids were heavy as she tried to regain her bearings.

She remembered putting the Cajun into bed. She could remember hearing Jake drop his keys on the night stand so Gambit could drive it later. She remembered laying down underneath the covers, closing her eyes for just a moment, letting herself slip away for a few minutes.

And now waking up with Gambit's front pressed protrudingly into her back caused her eyes to jolt wide open. Rogue jolted up and ran into the bathroom.

Had he realized the danger that he'd put himself in? No. O' course not. He was drunk. And in a partial coma state.

So really she was the one who put him in danger.Why was she acting so stupid lately? Everything little thing that she did was putting those around her at risk. And all of those risks were slowly adding up. Tabby was gone. It still hadn't hit her. The girl that she had danced around with, kicked some ass with, talked forever with was now dead. And she wasn't coming back. Yet Rogue still expected her to come strolling through that door at anytime. Hand in hand with Evan. Their absences were clearly noticed. Students who had been close to them, like Amara, were now silent and solitary.Rogue felt tears come into her eyes.

"Dammit." She said, shaking them off.

She splashed cold water on her face and forced herself to wake up. She needed to tell Gambit about all of the information that she'd found on Project Gabriel. They were all in something deeper than they'd ever expected and two of their team members were acting as major veins of information for Legion, no doubt.

Rogue took her place back at the foot of Gambit's bed. She watched him sleeping, feeling a bit like a stalker or a creep, but her brain was refusing to let her take her green eyes off of him. Putting her hand on his back and giving it a slight rub, she attempted to wake him. "Gambit," She whispered loudly. Hangovers were never a nice thing to wake up too, especially when you had the additional headache of having your life force sucked out of you lingering about. "Gambit!" She said, louder this time. She gave him a hard shove.

Gambit reacted fast. Jolting up, he took hold of her wrist and used it to bend her arm at an impossible angle. Rogue's reaction time, almost as good as his, made her body fling swiftly away from him and around to face him, letting her land a hard punch to the cheek.

She had hoped that the Cajun would come to his senses faster than he was, as he dove quickly at her, tackling her just around the waist. Rogue braced her hands on his shoulders and tried to push him off from his pinning position, but instead had her wrists grabbed and tacked to either side of her head, unable to move, much like the rest of her body.

Panting from the sudden adreneline in her system, she glared up at him. "Would ya mind getting off, Swamp Rat?" She spat angrily.

"What de hell were y' doin'?!" He spat back, lips dangerously close to hers.

"Tryin' to wake your drunk ass up. Now that my job is done, you can give the predator act a rest and quite acting like your gonna devour me." Her eyes narrowed even more as anger poured into her heart. The rush of fear for him was proving to be harder to control. Rogue hated having such close contact with anyone. But with Gambit it was even worse. She'd already zapped him once. And she did not want to do it again.

"Gambit. Get. Off." Her eyes widened as he smiled at her and brought his head closer.

"De last time we were like dis, y'were armed. 'T seems like I got de advantage now, non, chere?" He said, recalling their incident in the store parking lot where she had shoved a needle in him repeatedly.

"I'll show you advantage, ya pompous ass!" She said gritting her teeth and writhing beneath him.

Gambit's eyes filled with a different emotion. They were no longer blazing with the heat of anger and rage. Nor were they glaring at her with icy shards of revenge and malice. They were vacant and smoldering with something that looked dangerously close to lust. "Be best if y'would stop movin', mon petite. Y'might get results dat y'weren't expectin'." He growled.

Rogue could feel the energy around them sizzle. Her heart began to pound in a way that she had never felt before. Rogue had been attacked by terrorist organizations, kidnapped by madmen, and tortured in a small cell in a government base. But never had her heart pounded this way, producing flames that licked their way from her chest and out, making her fingertips tingle and her toes curl. "Swamp Rat, I ain't jokin'." She choked out in a strained voice.

Remy felt her heart pounding beneath him. His chest pressed to hers, legs tangled and hanging off of the edge of the bed. He knew that she was feeling the same undescribable way as he was. He wasn't a virgin. He knew what horny felt like. But this simply wasn't that. He wasn't antsy because he wanted to have sex, or wanting a quick release. He was lusting after Rogue, the curvy and hard edged vixen that had managed to capture his heart.

"Neither am I, chere." He said, just before crushing his mouth to hers.

He was prepared to feel the awkward pain of having his energies drained. He knew what would be the consequence of this one moment where he simply couldn't control his desire. An quick black out would be looming on the horizon as the price of this wonderful kiss.

But he didn't feel anything. He didn't feel the violent pull on his mind, or the rapid drowning of his conscience. He quickly pulled away to look into Rogue's eyes and gauge her reaction.

His wonderful eyes, red on black, gazed back into hers. She could see her scared reflection in his onyx eyes and realized that she wasn't the least bit bothered. His lips felt amazing on top of hers. Was it bad that she wanted more?

Almost sensing her lack of hesitation or negativity, Gambit brought his head down gently for another kiss. This time he worked his mouth slowly over hers, savoring every moment that he got to touch her.

As his expert kiss brought out a reaction from Rogue, neither of them questioned how it was that they were able to feel each other's warmth for the first time in their span of knowing one another. She'd gotten hugs, but carefully planned, he'd gotten fights, but acutely choreographed. They'd been so careful not to touch that they had never really looked into what was behind the contact that they shared.

But now as they laid on a three star hotel bed, entwined and engulfed in the other's presence, they realized how wonderful it felt just to be able to lay their lips on the other's mouth to share a kiss without a toxic danger. Gambit's hands began to wander. Un-gloved and uncensored, he roamed about Rogue's body, all parts of a tan porcelain skin that were accessible to him. He grazed over her stomach, fingers teasing with feather light touches as her worked his way up. One hand cupped the back of her head, hair draped around his callous fingers, while the other found a resting place at her hip, where he couldn't deny the urge to pull her closer to him.

As their kissing became more passionate, the touching became more desperate. Rogue's hands locked around his neck and roamed up and down his back. She could feel her heart increase its pace, pounding harder and harder in her head until all she could hear was her ragged breathing.

What could this lead too? Rogue had to stop it before it got out of hand...but just after one more minute.

Aura sprinted down the halls, bangs and booms following her in echo form as the fight raged on downstairs.

Ever since Legion's attack, everyone had been on edge. Emotion's were running high and tense because of deaths and injuries. But most of all there was a sense of hurt pride. They were the bloody X-Men and they couldn't feign off an attack long enough to get everyone out safe. And now they were destroying the hotel lobby because Pietro was an idiot and pissed off Wolverine.

It appeared that old alliances died hard in this town, with Wanda and Pietro working with Piotr and John to beat on Wolverine and a few other of the X-Men who'd been team members for years. Damn them all to hell. Of course they'd all bloody fight in public. Idiots. How the crapper are we supposed to take down a highly advanced and expertly trained combat team if we can even fucking restrain ourselves from KILLING on another?! She thought, searching for Gambit's room number.

An empath would be most useful at the moment.

1962...1964...1966! She didn't bother knocking. She'd stolen the key from Pete a full two hours ago, just in case she wanted to find Rogue. Jake had told her that "there'd been no answer from Rogue's hotel number, nor at Gambits, but he'd left her in there to go fetch the beautiful bike for her, so she'd most likely be in there."

She swiped the key and waited for the green light.

"Rogue?!" She shouted as she flung open the door. And her eyes landed on what had to be the most shocking sight of the week.