: HOUSE OF CARDS :
PART SIX : COMPLETION
(24) - Gamble -
Gambit's thoughts, Gambit's memories were rising with the tide, they were fighting to be recognised, to be given cognition, but she was fighting back, she was fighting to ignore them, she didn't want to know, she had never wanted to know, but his personality was so strong, so insistent, and she'd only stolen so very little…
Rogue ignored him with an effort and vaulted the length of the Hound pen's perimeter fence with all the graceful poise he possessed, clean, effortless - her limbs had never felt this supple, this agile. It was so easy, so beautiful to be like him, to move like him… She landed inside the enclosure, her heart pumping painfully in her chest. Dread, anxiety, exhilaration, passion… too many conflicting emotions, so much inside her it was going to burst…
Rogue ran to the nearest building and crouched down low by the wall. She had all of two minutes to get out of there before the next guard came round on his circuit, but her mind was swimming, he was dragging her down and a part of her wanted to be dragged down with him…
I'm an expert at compartmentalisation…
You don't know who I am, chere. You don't know what I want, you can't give it to me and you just don't get it…
One day I'll work out just exactly why you keep me around…
I love you, Rogue.
She resurfaced on a breath, shuddering, quaking, pushing him away. One and a half minutes left. She hugged herself tight, feeling her flesh goosepimple under the bodysuit, feeling her skin crawl with perverse delight.
She knew how he felt. She knew…
"Go away," she whispered.
One minute and counting.
You're de flame and I'm de moth…
"Go away," she hissed under her breath.
Silence.
He was gone.
Rogue opened her eyes and got to her feet, her ears pricking at footfalls in the snow and she hoisted herself up onto a nearby windowsill, swinging up elegantly onto the roof of the building just as the guard walked past down below her.
She stretched out, stomach-first, on the flat gravel roof and caught her breath. The stream of memories was quieting; his powers were fading. He'd got her across the fence and into the Hound grounds, but already the codes to the pens were evaporating.
She squeezed her eyes shut and sifted through his remaining memories, forcing herself into the calm composure Mystique had so impressed upon her, but it was an inhuman effort this time, to stay in control. And despite the fact that his personality was disappearing, he was still so strong…
Forget de codes, chere. You don't need 'em. Best t'ing is to draw Rachel to us.
"But it's dangerous…" she whispered.
Whole fuckin' t'ing was dangerous from de get-go, chere. I know what you're gonna do, and you gotta do it before Mystique comes and screws t'ings up for us. Cut all de loose ends, Rogue, we don't need 'em no more. Bring Rachel to us.
"Remy… Ah'm scared…"
No need to be, not anymore. Focus. We're gonna get through dis together. Trust me, chere, gambits are what I'm good at. Just come back to me in one piece…
"Ah will…"
Silence again, this time as hollow and empty as she had felt the day she'd woken up from her coma and thought him dead. He was gone, and so were his powers, his memories, the codes he'd charmed from Anton Simmons' secretary the night before. She couldn't get in the pens now. She had no choice.
She stood, and this time the calm wasn't a front. She knew exactly what she had to. She was resolved to it.
She closed her eyes, cleared her mind, opened it wide in the way Xavier had once taught her.
Rachel, it's Rogue. Ah'm here. Come an' get me.
She opened her eyes again - the world was still and silent about her, not a sound to be heard on the horizon, a quietness that would have unnerved a soul less brave than she.
Rachel, Ah'm outside. Do your job, come out and get me.
Can telepaths read your mind if you think loud enough? She'd never been able to work it out, but it was the only strategy she had left. There was little time left to think now. She jumped off the roof, missing Remy's fluid agility as she did so. To have it now would've been a blessing, but she had to make do with what she had. She ran between the buildings, her boots crunching in soft, fresh snow, her breath catching in the air, thick, tangible, life itself…
Rachel…
Could she be heard?
Rachel…
There was a faint sound in the distance, the howl of something human and yet not so, curdling Rogue's blood, making her halt in her tracks and crouch low against a wall, sandwiched in-between two low buildings. At the end of the alley she could see it - the entrance to the compound, the guard-post rising up out of the snow, looking out over the main gates. If she went out into the open now, she would be spotted. It didn't matter which way she did it, to go out there would be tantamount to suicide, but if it was the only way to draw her quarry to her so be it.
Rachel, Ah'm out front, come an' get me…
That sound again, closer, a howl of pain and rage and suffering and torment, and Rogue blanched, recognising the sound, recognising it in her own self…
It was the sound of the screams she heard in her head every night.
And then there were more of them. More and more, yelps and howls and screams echoing about the barracks… The battle cries of the Hounds, the cries that made every mutant quake with a fear that touched their very soul. They could feel her, they could sense her, they could taste her, they were on the hunt, they were searching for their prey, thirsting for the kill…
Ah've drawn the whole fuckin' lot out…
Her mind was searing white-hot, throbbing with a hideous intensity behind her eyes, telling her to cringe and hide; but she was running, into the light, towards the cold expanse of snow, and destiny, Fate, it was all rushing towards her on some great tide, and she was screaming, over and over…
RACHEL!
She was racing for the gate. She didn't know how or why - the muscles in her legs were bunching and releasing like the wiring and circuitry of a cold automaton and as she ran she could hear the wail of a klaxon begin to rise; they'd detected her, they knew she was here…
Thudding in the snow behind her, little earthquakes pounding away, thick and fast, drawing closer… she couldn't outrun them… She knew it, this was suicide; her gambit, their gambit had failed…
Whup!
Something red-hot and sharp had slammed into her back, or so she thought; there was no pain, just the stark sensation of impact, and she tumbled to the ground face-first. She gasped for breath, tasting snow and grit in her mouth, spitting it out, only just managing to swivel round onto her back, her eyes blinded by sunlight…
Too late. A shape was flying through the air, obscuring the sun, a grotesque shadow, human-shaped, no… animal-shaped, pouncing… What did they do to you…?
She couldn't roll away in time. The thing landed on her with an almighty impact that forced the wind out of her. The body was hard, muscular, solid sinew working with the titanic force of boulders rolling downhill, crashing into every obstacle in their path, and no matter how much she struggled it was like fighting a living, breathing monolith. There was the hideous cacophony of human baying encircling her, buzzing through her ears with bloodthirsty clarity and she knew with certainty that the Hounds were around her, that they were calling Ahab to them, to the kill.
The glare of the sunlight was fading and she blinked once, twice, her breath burning in her lungs. There was a face in front of her - snarling, contorted, every inch the face of the beast; but, to her horror, it was human…
It was Rachel.
Rogue stopped. Everything stopped. The insular, sullen, pretty little face now maimed, etched with ugly black scars, the stamp of Ahab's property; the once long, wavy red locks shorn to the scalp; the studded dog collar marking her out as nothing more than a mere animal, a beast, a nothing.
We are the faceless and the formless, wanting to become something complete and beautiful and whole, striving to become human…
"Rachel…" Rogue breathed, her voice thin, hoarse, barely more than a whisper, and yet she needed to reach out to her, to the girl that lay hidden within this monster, at every cost she must…
But there was no recognition in the twisted face, and this time Rogue felt small hard fingers gripping her neck, pressing into her throat… But she had to try…
"Rachel…"
The face spasmed, only briefly, before erupting, flame-like, into the snarling, spitting, all-consuming rage Rogue had only seen before once, in the eyes of Anton Simmons. The next thing she knew she was being lifted clean off her feet, and the Hounds were baying for her blood, triumph and greed in their voices, calling for their master, calling for him to come… She couldn't allow it. She had to break Rachel's bonds, but those talons were still around her throat, and stars were puncturing her eyesight, she couldn't see, she couldn't breathe…
Rachel, it's me, please, open your eyes, your mind, your heart, everything you have, please break out of it!
The growl that emanated from Rachel's throat was that of the wolf. A second later she had flung Rogue aside with the gesture of having flung nothing more than a rag-doll - Rogue sailed through the air, grasping at nothing, stopping only when she felt her back slam with all the strength of a hurricane against the pen's perimeter gates, metal buckling behind her with the force of the collision, splintering, giving way… She was crashing through the gates, back into the snow, cushioned only by the twisted metal debris, and she felt something long and hard press against her thigh, puncture it, sliding in smooth and liquid… molten lava boring its way into her bones, her flesh, veins and nerves and tendons and atoms erupting as the metal impaled her… …
For the first time she screamed.
Somewhere inside the maelstrom of pain she was seized again and flung aside; but she could barely register it, her mind was still too preoccupied with the agony of her injury. She only vaguely felt herself colliding with the trunk of some tree, heard the distant whooping of the Hounds that were still gathered inside the gates watching on from the sidelines, and her body, slumping into the snow, buckling over the gnarled and twisted roots of trees, retching, bringing up nothing, sick with a nausea that was surging through every fibre of her body…
She felt hands on her collar again, the same small hands that had cradled the head of the dying Xavier, no tenderness now, no softness. Rachel was the cat and Rogue was the mouse. This was sport to the Hound - when Ahab came, he would be the one to make the kill.
So precious little time…
Time…
"Rachel…"
Hit them wit' a memory. Any memory dat means somet'ing to them. Better still, hit them wit' as many as you can. It confuses them, it breaks them…
And somehow it was spilling out…
"It's Rogue, Rachel. It's me. Don't you remember? We were X-Men once. Remember?"
Her vision shifted, focused slowly - Rachel's face was within inches of hers, the scarred face seething, frothing, no recollection, nothing behind the rage…
She dragged the words out of her mouth, syllable by painful syllable.
"Storm… no… the Christmas party. We were at the Christmas party… Storm and Logan were makin' fun of you for kissin' Kurt under the mistletoe…"
The elf likes you kiddo, but you better watch out… Rogue can get very possessive of her darlin' brother…
She couldn't help it. The wetness was already spilling out of her eyes and onto her cheeks, for everything she had lost, for everything she had sacrificed, and Rachel's face was contorting with disgust… A split second later Rogue had been kicked aside, and when she rolled over onto her back she was on the slope once more, she could see the great canopies of trees above her, the calm repose of the forest…
Rachel was standing over her, looking down on her with the bloody grimace of a hunter closing in on its prey. Rogue tried to drag herself up into a sitting position, her broken leg blazing, protesting wildly at every movement, but it didn't matter. The moment she made signs of getting up Rachel was upon her again, pressing her back down into the snow with the taut strength of her body, and…
Thunk.
The head-butt knocked Rogue onto her back, and the world was yellow, fading in and out of focus, and there was blood in her mouth… She swallowed back the bile in her throat, her hands clawing, her arm coming up, her elbow suddenly driving against Rachel's throat, holding her back…
"Ah don't wanna fight you, Rachel…"
Her voice was broken, pitiful, she didn't even recognise it anymore…
"Okay, so we weren't ever friends, but we were comrades… The things we saw… the things we did… The experiences we had together…"
Rachel was snarling, but she held her back, held her back with the last bit of strength she possessed…
Hit them wit' a memory…
It was all flashing in front of her, her life, the lives of so many, the lives of the psyches in her head, an infinite stream such as the one she had seen the moment she'd absorbed Irene's powers, too thick, too fast to pinpoint anything of any use, but all of a sudden there was someone, there was something…
"Xavier," she spat out on a laboured breath. "Xavier… They killed him… Ahab was in on it… He let them kill Xavier… You were there, Rachel… Ah saw you… You saw them kill Xavier… He was beggin' them for peace, but they shot him down instead, right before your eyes… No kid should've had to see that… But you stayed with him… You stayed with him till Ahab came for you…"
No recognition, no acknowledgement on the disfigured face; it was snapping, snarling, but Rogue held it back, searching, scrabbling for a memory, willing it to work…
"Jean Grey… Your mom. She gave you your favourite pair of earrings for your…your ninth birthday. Studs like little red stars. Ah never saw you without them. They reminded you of her, didn't they? After she died. Because you didn't have anythin' else except a whole bunch of twisted memories and regrets that you could never change… And those earrings, they stayed with you, they never changed, they never made you feel bad about the way things turned out, they were your lucky charm, something you could remember her by… Ah know. Ah know, because Ah did the same… Ah hoarded my memories and my little good luck charm because they were the only things that kept me goin'…" Her vision was fading again and she raised her head to the sky, closed her eyes and said; "But it doesn't change anythin', does it? We're still broken. You can't get your mom back, not ever. And Ah can't get Xavier or his dream back. Ah can't bring my brother back to life. Ah can't be innocent anymore, Ah can't start over with the man Ah love and pretend that either of us are the people we used to be. The old Rogue's gone. The old Rachel's gone. But we have a chance, Rae. You just haveta break free…"
There she'd said it. She'd said it all - and yet somehow she knew that it would never be enough. Because she didn't know enough about Rachel; she'd never cared enough to know. They had never confided in one another; there was no memory that Rogue could pull from the past that would ever be enough to break these bonds. She saw that now.
She was going to die.
Her hold broke. She felt it give way under the irresistible pressure of Rachel's own body, felt the vice-like grip of the Hound on her arm, and then a jerk of the hand and her left shoulder dislocated like a twig from a branch; she gasped, pain flooding her senses - coloured lights were flaring across her eyeballs… And the sickening crack of a boot heel in her ribs, her body rolling into cold, wet, slushy snow, all the fight gone out of her…
At last, it was all going to end, it was going to be the way she'd always wanted it to be. She was going to be free…
Like hell you are.
Her eyes flew open.
"Remy?"
He's still there…
Behind her she heard the heavy fall of Rachel's footsteps, closing in on her, second by precious second...
I'm not lettin' you walk away wit'out puttin' up a proper fight first, girl. Been watchin' over you for years, Rogue, and dere's no way you're dyin' on my watch, not if I've got any say in it. Forget Rachel now, p'tit. You only got one option left. You know what to do. Do it.
He was already swimming away, back into the depths of her consciousness - but she needed no more prompting. Just as she heard Rachel pounce she swivelled round onto her back, her wounds no longer any obstacle for what she knew she had to do.
"Ah'm sorry, Rachel!" she cried, and the moment unfurled before her eyes, millisecond by millisecond, dragged out into a seeming eternity, and again she had that feeling, the overwhelming, innate feeling that this moment had always existed - Rachel coming towards her, her reaching out with her right arm; touching the strange, disfigured face, flesh-to-flesh contact, and realising that the Hound was human, she was human…
Their eyes met, and for the first time there was something in that feral stare, a begging, a pleading, saying… Saying what?
Yes.
Do it.
Save me.
Had there been no other confirmation in that one stare, Rogue would have done it anyway.
One deep breath and she pulled.
-oOo-