Happy Saturday to you all. Thank you all so much for the lovely reviews/alerts/favorites. I very much appreciate hearing what you all think. And it's a great encouragement. I hope you all continue to enjoy it.
We have ploy development and relationship development in this chapter. Hopefully it's not cheesy. Remy was feeling rather flirty when I wrote this.
As always I own nothing. I'm just playing with the X-Men for fun. Let me know what you think!
Layla
It was nearly ten when Scott and Kurt came to see him. Logan had been hoping he could slip out the following morning before those two noticed Rogue was missing. Apparently that wasn't going to happen. He gave a couple of quiet instructions to Kitty and Piotr and pulled the other two into Xavier's office. "What's on your mind, Shades?" he asked.
Scott crossed his arms over his chest, concern written clearly on his face. "We haven't seen Rogue since just after the attack on Essex's lab, and no one knows where she is."
Kurt spoke up, his tail dancing around behind him agitatedly. "I am afraid she is avoiding us because Essex's work reminds her of what happened with Trask."
Logan addressed the first problem while he came up with a story that would suffice to keep the two of them, and everyone else as soon as they realized Rogue was gone, happy until the issue of the Marauders had been dealt with.
"Stripes's fine. She's working a special project for me. That's why she isn't at the mansion," he said.
Kurt looked relieved, but Scott simply looked confused. "You sent her on a mission without any back up?"
Logan internally grumbled at Scott's comment. Trust Shades to pay extra close attention when Logan didn't want him to, but he calmly answered with a half truth. "She was in a unique position to handle this." Namely that she'd left without telling anyone, but telling Scott and Kurt that wasn't going to help anything. Logan continued, "Sending someone with her would have made things harder. But she's picked up some outside help, so she's not doing this alone anymore." Again, no need to tell them it was Gambit she was with.
That seemed to further calm both men down, at least until Kurt's curiosity spiked. "Can you tell us what the mission is about? I'd like to help her if I could."
Logan fought not to roll his eyes as Scott nodded. Both the Elf and Shades were defensive and protective of Rogue to begin with, but they were also as curious as Kitty and Amara when it came to secrets. "I'll let her tell you about it when she gets back. If you two want to help her with this, then you can make sure no one else finds out about it. If someone asks, tell them she's out running errands or something. But keeping this discrete is the best thing you can do right now," he said, putting enough edge into his voice to let them know he meant it.
Xavier rolled silently into the room, having overheard Logan's comment. "Logan is quiet serious about this. And correct. The most important thing you can do for her is keep anyone from noticing that she is gone."
Both Scott and Kurt eyed the adults suspiciously, not feeling at all reassured about Rogue's safety if they were that serious about keeping this on the down low. Scott spoke hesitantly. "But you're sure she's safe? We can always bring in the team…"
Logan cut him off. "This isn't a situation for the team. Staying off everyone's radar is paramount for this."
"If you're sure that's what's best…" Scott said hesitantly.
"It is." Logan's look and tone leaving no room for argument.
Both Scott and Kurt nodded wearily and left, exchanging concerned looks as they did so, no doubt they would be keeping their ears to floor for information until Rogue returned. Logan sighed. He'd have to reiterate the importance of silence to Kitty and Piotr again before he left. If Scott and Kurt got even a whiff of Gambit's involvement they would, without a doubt, go running into the middle things, trying to protect Rogue.
Making sure that Scott and Kurt were well out of earshot, Xavier turned to face him. "You know I trust you completely, but why is it you are so set on not using the team? These are the types of situation they have been trained to handle."
Logan eyed his friend for a long moment before answering. "I first ran into Arclight six years ago, during the break between school years," he said, remembering the three months he always spent away from the school while Jean and Scott spent the summer with her parents. "I bumped into some runaways in Ottawa. They said something about mutant teens being taken off the streets. Not having anything better to do, I looked into it, figuring it was just that the kids moved around to avoid being picked up."
Logan sighed and looked Charles in the eye. "They weren't. There was a buyer in Southeast Asia that wanted young mutant teens. A real pro. I never did figure out who it was or why they wanted the kids, but Arclight was taking the kids off the street and selling them to whomever it was. Making a nice profit too," he said with a disgusted grimace.
"I spent the rest of that summer tracking her. But she was good. She knew how to move the kids and move'em fast. I managed to pull two or three of them before she sold them, but the kids were spooked and just ran. I don't know what happened to them. But I did finally catch up Arclight."
He paused, clearly frustrated. "Sliced her head clean off. I know I killed her, Charles. Even Sabertooth couldn't have survived that. But she'd managed to cover her tracks to the buyer by the time I finally ran her down. I put out feelers to every place I could think of to see if the buyer continued to want the kids. But I never heard a word. Nothing from anywhere."
"However the hell she managed to survive that, the last thing I want to do is give her the names and faces of more mutant teens to offer to that buyer. She already knows about Gambit through Essex, and there is no way Rogue won't be involved since she went to New Orleans to warn him. But I won't risk those two finding out about the rest of our kids. If we've managed to stay off her radar this long, I'm not going to go and wave the team in front of her."
Xavier pressed his fingers together in front of his face, taking in Logan's explanation. "Yes, I can certainly understand keeping the children out of this. You are absolutely right in this matter. But my question now is how do you intend to handle the Marauders when you meet up with them?"
Logan shifted his neck uncomfortably. "If it were only me and Gambit, I'd say we just kill them. I can't imagine the Cajun complaining to too much if they don't survive. And I know Rogue can handle it if that's what we have to do. But I don't want to put her through that if I don't have to. I will if it has to be done, but …"
Xavier gave him a tight smile. "I assume that's the other reason you don't want the team involved?"
Logan nodded. "Like I said, Stripes can handle it if she has to. Some of the others, I'm not so sure. Scott and Kurt in particular would have a problem with it. Red could go either way. Same with Half Pint and the Tin Man. Laura won't even blink. That's why she'll be the one to fly in and pick us up. She can handle whatever eventuality happens and help with the clean up. And the younger kids, no way."
Xavier nodded, his features pinched in obvious concern and frustration. "Well my friend. I know you will do everything you can to protect Rogue. And though there is little I can personally do to help you besides keeping things running smoothly here, I have one suggestion that might be useful. Let's go talk to Hank. He has a particular serum that might be applicable to your problem."
Glad that Xavier wasn't challenging the possibility that he might have kill, Logan nodded and followed down the med lab. If Blue Boy had something that could be useful, he was all ears. Rogue had been through enough without having witness the brutal deaths of two living mutants, even as bad as those two were. If there was a way to spare her that he was willing to at least consider the option. Killing them was always there. It's not like his claws were going anywhere.
They both woke up feeling like the devil was on their tail. They left Vicksburg at six am, hitting the highway fast and hard after Rogue grumbled while they checked out that if Remy didn't plan on stopping until they'd hit Memphis, he'd better feed her before they left. Remy did just that, both of them grinning on her award winning performance.
They hit Memphis by ten-thirty, buying gas, a map, and some fast food with Anna James's credit card. By eleven they were headed east on I-40. It was a solid six hours from Memphis east to Knoxville. They left Nashville at little past two, still ridding as fast as they could without attracting attention.
But they hit rain on the Cumberland Plateau. It was heavy enough to force them to stop completely in the tiny town of Monterey. The impressive mountain storm prevented them from either going back to the larger Cookeville or continuing farther east.
They found only one tiny local motel with its vacancy sign still lit and pulled the bike off the highway. Rogue ran into the front office to book the room while Remy went to park the bike around the back of the hotel out of sight. She pulled her helmet off and shook out the rain from her hair, grumbling about helmets that were no good in wet weather.
Tucking the helmet under one arm, she entered the office, ignoring the amused and entirely too interested glance of the college kid minding the desk. She gave him a smile that was more correctly described as a grimace and asked flatly about a room.
The guy at the desk looked her up and down before answering. "Only one room left. You're lucky you got here when you did. Some golf tournament in Cookeville has everything booked. The room has one queen bed. Will that work or do you need additional accommodations?"
Half afraid he was going to offer to provide those additional accommodations himself, Rogue readily agreed to the room. She and Remy had slept in one bed the night before. 'What was one more night?' she asked herself and then promptly ignored both her blush and the growl from her mental Logan.
She was handing over the bills to pay for the room when Remy entered, shaking water out of his hair. She gave the annoying desk clerk a bland look as he flirtatiously recommended places for dinner. He handed their key over with a clearly disappointed look as Remy leaned haphazardly next to Rogue on the counter and smirked at him from behind his sunglasses.
Ignoring both men, Rogue took the key and stormed back outside into the rain without looking back. She located their room, at the far end of the drive in complex and opened the door. She made no effort to hold the door for Gambit and heard his muffled but amused curse as he caught the door before it hit him in the face.
"Looks like you've got a new admirer, chérie," Remy teased as he stepped inside. Rogue waited for him to realize how many beds were in the room. He didn't disappoint. "But apparently you like me more."
"Can it, Cajun!" she snapped, willing the blush she could feel on her face to fade. "It was the only room left."
Remy chuckled and let it go with a quick quip. "At least we won't have any nightmares," he said and headed for the bathroom.
Rogue rolled her eyes at his words.
After leaving the bar the night before they'd both crashed, in separate beds. But her nightmares had returned, waking them both almost immediately. Without a word, he'd simply tugged on full fingered gloves, pulled her into the bed with him, and they'd gone back to sleep. He'd startled them both at some point during the night, muttering in angry French, but he'd stopped when she'd spoken to him. He'd settled back to sleep after tightening his hold around her waist. Exactly why they were good at calming each other after a nightmare wasn't something she was inclined to think too much about. Even if she had spent most of the drive doing exactly that.
She pulled off her soaked jacket and ballet top. She replaced them with Mercy's sweatshirt quickly, before Gambit could come out of the bathroom, and spread the two soggy pieces of clothing out on the table and chairs to dry.
Gambit exited the bathroom shirtless, but headed straight for his traveling bag and pulled out the long sleeved t-shirt he'd been sleeping in.
It took Rogue several blinking seconds to find her voice. She was so accustomed to people avoiding being near her without multiple layers of barriers that his nonchalance stunned her. And he wasn't exactly hard to look at either. To distract herself from doing just that she dug through her bag, pulling out the burn phone and her book.
"Once the storm lets up Ah'll call Logan. Let him know we didn't make it all the way to Knoxville," she said drawing Remy's attention away from the TV and the giant crack of thunder outside.
Remy nodded, pointing with the hand holding the remote at the television. "Doubt he made it all the way either, chérie." The meteorologist on the TV was helpfully pointing out the storm system situated over western Virginia, West Virginia, and eastern Kentucky and Tennessee.
Having nowhere else to sit that wasn't being used to dry clothes Rogue settled next to Gambit on the bed while he flipped channels. It didn't take long before she was absorbed in the world of Sir Gawain. What the book lacked in vampires and werewolves, it made up for with sorcerers, shape-shifting witches, and battles. The book was a novelization of the old English tale of Sir Gawain and the Green Knight, a story Rogue had enjoyed when they read it in literature class.
She was firmly entranced in the battle ranging on the walls of Pen Marhas when Gambit's laughter interrupted her. Blinking as she returned to reality from medieval England, she looked at Remy with an eyebrow raised in annoyance. "What?" she asked, none too politely.
Red eyes glinting with mirth, he asked, "Anyone ever told you that you make faces while you read?"
Rogue blushed, reaching out and smacking him with her book. It was a habit that she was unable to break as she made the faces without realizing she was doing so. She did the same thing when watching TV. It was horribly embarrassing whenever someone realized she did that. "What, the TV not entertaining enough for you?" she snarked, not answering his question.
Gambit gave her an amused, slightly sheepish look. "You're cute, and there's nothin' on."
Rogue just stared at him for a moment. He thought she was cute. She was torn between quiet excitement at his open admiration and annoyance that he felt 'cute' was an appropriate word to describe her. A lot of different words had been used to describe her in the past. Cute wasn't one of them. Cute wasn't the look she was going for. Kitty was cute, not Rogue. But she couldn't quite shake the thrill that he thought she was cute.
Rogue shook off her musings, mentally slapping herself for having such a moment. Aiming to reclaim her self-respect, she taunted Remy. "You have your cards. Entertain yourself. Without botherin' me." She gave him haughty glare and returned to her book.
Gambit's chuckle didn't let her get very far. "More fun if I have someone to play with."
Rogue looked at him flatly, unimpressed. She wasn't stupid enough to walk into the double entendres lingering around that remark.
Giving her a sly smirk, he pulled out his deck of cards. A couple of lazy looking shuffles and he dealt them each a hand of Texas Hold'Em. "Know how to play?" he asked lightly.
Surprised that he was pushing issue, Rogue set her book down. "Not really. Ah've watched Logan play a few times, but that all."
He flipped all the cards over face up and patiently walked her through the rules of the game, explaining what and why he would bet given his cards and doing the same with hers. One at a time he laid out the remaining cards, finally dealing the river. Rogue asked a few more questions, orienting herself to the game.
They played a few friendly hands, Gambit wiping the floor with her each time. By the fifth hand, Rogue was getting the hang of the game and able to at least make reasonable bets and decisions. They played a few more hands before Rogue's attention span began to wane.
Gambit switched the game to gin. Intended for only two players, it held Rogue's attention longer.
Sitting side by side at the head of the bed, feet stretched out in front of them, the discard and drawing card piles set neatly between them, Rogue uneasily eyed Gambit.
If she discarded her eight of spades, she was relatively certain the sneaky Cajun beside her would pick it up, placing him that much closer to gin. She just didn't know how much closer. Would it just be one more card, or was he waiting on that card in particular? But unless she dumped the eight, she couldn't draw a new one. And she needed either the six or ten of clubs for gin or a five or lower of anything to be underneath the down card.
Gambit returned her appraising stare with an entirely too smug smirk.
Finally making her decision, she discarded the eight of spades. She drew. The six of hearts. Keeping her face impassive, she masked her frustration at getting a worthless card.
Remy calmly picked up her eight of spades, and with a totally unrepentant grin, flipped his discard face down on the pile and lazily announced "gin."
With a growl, Rogue threw her cards at him.
Remy laughed. "Not my fault, Chérie. Luck of the draw."
Rogue glared, but humor was shining in her eyes. That was the second hand in a row he'd won. She was down two games to one. "Best three out of five, Cajun. Ah refuse to lose to you again."
Gambit grinned teasingly at her. "So then I just have to win one more."
She elbowed him in the ribs. "Can it, Swamp Rat. Deal." She gestured at the spot between them they were using a card table.
Gambit amiably complied, his thieving hands dealing the cards with ease. Drawing the first card, he decided he didn't want it and discarded it. "You keep coming up with new nicknames for me. You're not careful, I'm gonna think you might like me."
He said the words offhandedly, as though he wasn't fishing for information on what she thought of him. Or he could just be trying to make her blush. She'd noticed he enjoyed getting that reaction out of her.
Unwilling to give away the information, especially since she wasn't entirely sure exactly felt about him and his too smooth smiles now that they were together again, she countered with a snort while she drew her own card. "Just how long have you been calling me 'chérie'?" She distinctly remembered him calling her that when he'd sneakily conned her and Kitty into following the Brotherhood when they went to free Pietro from police custody.
Gambit slid an amused glance her way before picking up the three of hearts she'd rejected. "It suits you," was all he said.
"And Swamp Rat fits you." She picked up the jack of clubs he didn't want. Nine, ten, jack, and queen of clubs. That was her four set. She'd been dealt the two of hearts and spades. And had a nice little run starting with the eight and nine of diamonds. Another two, either diamonds or clubs, or either the seven or ten of diamonds and she'd gin.
They played in companionable silence for several minutes. Remy discarded the two of diamonds, but picked up the four of hearts she dumped. He had a run of low hearts. A few more useless draws, though she picked up and dumped the queen of spades just to keep Remy guessing, and she drew the ten of diamonds.
With a Cheshire cat grin she flipped her discard face down. "Take that, Cajun."
Remy grinned, but dipped his head in acknowledgement. "Well played, chérie."
Rogue dealt the next hand.
She must have jinxed herself. She wound up stuck waiting for the ace of hearts while Gambit pulled the last card he needed. It wasn't a pretty hand for either of them, but he pulled it out in the end. Not so gracefully conceding defeat, Rogue groused teasingly the whole walk to the only restaurant near their little hotel.
It was another little dive, but it lacked the menu of their previous night's location. Two less than fabulous burgers later and they wandered back to their hotel. It was dark and still raining, but the thunder had moved on.
After changing into her borrowed long sleeved t-shirt and leggings Rogue called Logan. The storm had held him up too. He was stuck in Wytheville, Virginia. They made plans to meet up in Johnson City, Tennessee the following morning. Logan would beat them there by a couple of hours, but he was planning to use the time to scout out possible locations in the surrounding forest where they could plan their battle with Scalphunter and Arclight.
Gambit discretely checked in with Henri and the Guild. It looked like they had roughly a day on Arclight and Scalphunter. The Guilds had 'given in' that morning and passed on the information that Gambit and Anna James were headed north on a job. If their luck held and the two Marauders followed the trail of Anna's credit card, they should hopefully be no closer to them than Memphis if not farther north on I-55. Both wished they'd been able to put more distance between themselves and Memphis, but they had no control over the weather. And while they could have ditched the bike and picked up a car in larger city, Monterey wasn't offering much help in that regard. They wanted to avoid attention, especially from local police.
They settled into bed, Gambit flipping channels on the TV while she read. Eventually she pulled herself out of the book, knowing they needed to leave early to put more distance between themselves and the trailing Marauders. With a sigh she settled on her side, feeling herself relax as Gambit turned off the TV and wrapped an arm around her waist. Trying not to think about how much it felt like the routine of a well established couple, they both drifted to sleep.
Aww. Aren't they cute. Next time we'll throw Logan into the mix and see just how he affects our duo. Stay tuned for more...
On a completely off the topic note. I learned to play gin with father and grandfather when I about seven. I completely suck at poker, but none of my friends in college would play gin with me because I nearly always won. That said, I can count on one hand the number of times I've beaten my grandfather. He turns 92 next week and is dying of cancer and old age. But he can still beat me at gin! It's pretty cool. And one of the things I will miss the most about him when he's gone. We've have a lot of fun playing over the years.
And what's totally crazy is that he tells of riding a train from New York to Chicago in the early 50's where he and this guy spent the trip playing gin using pennies to bet on hands. At the end of that train ride my grandfather owed him 10 dollars (betting in pennies!). I cannot imagine the skill level of that guy. But I was feeling nostalgic as I wrote the gin scene, thinking of playing with my dad and losing to my grandfather. :-) I love you, Grandad.