Disclaimer: I don't own a thing
Title: Born for Bad Luck
By: Peanutbutter
"Boys I'm most done travellin', Lord I'm at my journey's end
B'lieve I'm most done travellin', Lord at my journey's end
Well I been lookin' for me a good partner, bad luck is my best friend..."
(Born for Bad Luck song by Brownie McGhee)
Chapter 15: Victims of Comfort
"No rocket's gonna fly that high
There's no escaping the enemy he's you and I
We poison up our water, we're chokin' on the air
Last stop before it gets too late or is it already too late?
Is it already too late
For the victims of comfort?
Got no one else to blame
We're just the victims of comfort
We cannot soothe the pain..."
(Victims of Comfort song by T. Kimber and K. Moore)
Note: I've got the story out on time. It might be a miracle! Well enjoy.
Smoke curled from the end of his cigarette the smell rushing into his nostrils and down his throat, thick and alive. The smoke animated him, cleansed him, a rush of dopamine to sooth the rushing of his mind. One knee was drawn to his chest the arm holding the cigarette resting against it. The other was stretched in front of him aching dully from the bullet wound. His chest was tight every time he took a breath, but when he leaned against the wall and stretched his torso out a bit it wasn't as tight.
He couldn't sleep. John was snoring head flung back gauze stuck to his face and hair falling into his good eye. He didn't seem to have the problem, but he'd been given drugs to help him sleep and by all means it had been a long time since they'd actually slept. In fact Remy had been fighting sleep a few hours ago, but now, again, he was unable to shut his eyes.
The pills that were supposed to help him rest were still in his hand, palmed when the blue haired doctor tried to get him to swallow. He didn't feel secure enough to be that vulnerable. Not to mention that every time he closed his eyes, his head cradled in the white cotton of his pillow, she stared at him. Sweet round cheeks, brown hair, and blue eyes her fingers grasping desperately at the body of her mother. So he sat on the floor, where his leg ached and his ribs made it impossible to breathe properly, uncomfortable, and in pain, but in no danger of falling asleep.
Remy had made a lot of mistakes, wrong calls, botched mission, all of which had shaped him hardened him, and he had thought himself whole, a rough but finished product. Funny that he had suddenly been pushed into the realization the he was, in fact, far from the finished product had believed himself to be. There were so many instances where he'd made huge mistakes. He was supposed to be past that, past them, but while Sarah haunted his sleep the others haunted his waking hours. They flashed through his mind in quiet succussion, all of them victories at one point and failures in the end.
Belladonna Beabeux had become a part of his life almost as fast as his transfer from the streets to the mansion of Jean-Luc LeBeau. The entire transfer from street thief loner to the second in line to succeed the Thieves Guild had been surreal. All the sudden he had a brother, a father, a future, and in it all had been Bella.
He had loved Bella. Her wild hair, her wild ways, and the way she made him want to settle from the fast moving storm that was his life. She made him want to be free so when his father ordered him to marry her, to play into his ever calculating hands, to fulfill a destiny he'd never wanted, he rebelled. Everyday teenage shit, it just so happened he was gambling with lives with his refusal, his near escape from it all, but in the end he had come back.
Unfortunately there was someone as opposed to the marriage as Remy was. The son of the Assassin Guild leader, Julian, who happened to be Bella's brother hated him. Given Remy had never made it a point to gain Julian's approval. Antagonizing the Assassins had always been a great past time between the members of the Guild. When he finally decided that the marriage that would until the two Guilds was something he couldn't turn away from it had fallen apart.
Julian died before Remy could even register what he'd done. Remy's tuxedo coat was stained with blood, the bow tie and cummerbund Bella had picked out speckled with red. Julian was in a puddle of blood determined face slack, the tips of his fingers barely touching the handle of his gun. Bella fell over the body of her brother, blood was thicker than water after all. It didn't matter that it was self defense. Not even to his father.
The cigarette shook his finger trembling against his leg. He tightened his thumb around the leg of his loose fitting sweats trying to keep his grip on the cigarette loose. His hands twitched despite his effort to hold them still and ashes flaked onto the floor.
Exile was a terrible word.
His father sent him away, though it was never said and never would be, he was telling Remy that he could take care of himself. It was hard to be alone again. While such a shock and strange concept when he was twelve it had become something he relied on. In a few hours he'd lost his hold on reality, his girl, his family, and lastly his sanity.
His powers hadn't been easy to master, but he'd done it, scar marked his hands as reminders. So with everything else gone and his powers going haywire, misfiring, charging everything in sight, charging the bed while he slept, he was going though hell. That was where Essex came in.
He wasn't stupid. He could tell the bastard was thinking about how he could use him, but he had no money, no hope, except for the mutant doctor and from that desperation sprung a deal. Essex would help him control his powers, part of his brain removed kept for Remy's services as payment. It was only after he saw the Geneticists powers change his abilities altered by his 'patients' that he feared what would be done with his DNA. He'd do anything to get it back, had, and if it hadn't been for Rogue his soul would belong to the devil.
He was a thief a little to the left of the law, bending and sometimes breaking a few along the way, but he wasn't that bad, he had his morals, his loyalties, he kept his promises, only they weren't usually to a evil son of a bitch like Essex. People made mistakes, but most of the time they didn't involve a body count like the one he'd caused.
John was turning in his sleep. Remy watched him for a moment, his fingers dancing on the leg of his pants. Things were rushing at him again. The cigarette wasn't helping like he'd hoped. His head swam and she rushed into his mind. Sarah was screaming again. Against his will his eyes slid shut. She swam into view, tear streaked cheeks making his head ache and his throat burn. He pushed her face away only to have it replaced by another.
Genevieve sweet and innocent followed the little girl's fading image. The burn in his throat increased. He swallowed against it and forced smoke into his lungs, despite the impossible blockage. Her face was worse than the little girls.
When he opened his eyes, flooding his sensitive eyes with the dull light coming from under the door and the dim glow of ashes falling off his cigarette, Sarah was back, broken, confused, and lost. He wondered if the screaming voice in his head was anything like the voice's swimming in Rogue's. She still hadn't woken up. She was a lesson he'd thought he learned a long time ago.
She was someone else for him to think about, trapped in her own mind, or at least that was what the Professor had mentioned. He was supposed to asleep during that conversation, but he'd been desperate for information on her, and it was hard to get anything when you were one watch and confinement. He would have gotten more if John hadn't woken up, whining about something or another, the pills really had a way of knocking him out of it. He had no idea where he was for the first half of the day.
She was just on the other side of the wall. Sleeping, though her lids moved constantly, even when her eyes opened, blue, or bright green they never registered a thing. He'd heard the Professor, a burly man with a pleasant, smooth British accent, say she was fighting a battle, trapped in her own mind. He was supposed to be working with her, tending to her injuries, but it was funny he was completely fine, medically, expect for the coma.
"Ahh,"
Remy took a final drag on his cigarette before snuffing out the remains of it on the floor. His fingers cradled the butt between his thumb and forefinger. He flicked the butt toward the trash can by the door and grinned when it fell in.
"Ahh, man I feel like shit."
"Dat make sense," Remy answered his barely conscious friend eyes still focused on the trash can, "cause you look like it."
"I'd insult you, but I think I might die if I talk more."
"De medicine makin' ya sick?"
"No, it's the fact that half my face is stuck under Sabertooth's finger nails. It hurts like hell."
Remy got to his feet and walked to John's side, wincing because his bad leg had stiffened up, the other falling asleep. The bandage over John's eye was barely bloody, only small spots of red on white, the stitches were holding well. John was still ghostly pale.
"What happened? All I remember is getting off the jet."
Remy smirked, "Ya passed out, yelped like une petite fille and fell into de arms of Wolverine."
"I don't believe you."
"But, ya seemed ta like it a lot, snuggled rig't in dere, laid your head on his shoulder." John grimaced, odd through the bandages. He didn't speak but the raised his hands and flipped Remy the bird on both.
"Didn' know you wanted me dat way," Remy raised a brow and dodged the slow moving and half hearted punch John threw at him. "Remy be flattered, but he strictly for de ladies."
Instead of fireing back, something John always did he was silent fingers touching the gauze across his face. "It's pretty bad isn't it?"
Remy shrugged. "A' leas' you didn' get shot."
John snorted, coughed though the middle of the gesture. "I've gotta wear an eye patch."
Remy grinned, "Lucky for you homme, de pirate look is in."
"So we getting out of here?"
Where was the pretext, the beating around the bush, the small talk, then again he was talking about John. He was lucky he got the question with 'fuck' and 'dammit' laced though it.
"Not healed so well, de ribs, dey pinch a bit, and de leg couldn' take a run right now."
"That's why you've got me. I'll just blow them up, clear a path, save you ass, I've been doing that a lot lately." He widened his good eye, his brow raising in challenge, the corner of his mouth curling upward. "I think you're losing you touch."
"Shut up, 'fore I take care of dat other eye."
"Touchy," he paused somewhere between a laugh and got serious. A serious John was never a good thing. "I don't know what they' re going to do. I mean you saw, the bodies, the," he swallowed, "we fucked up to bad to ignore. They aren't going to let us walk away."
"An Essex," Remy added, "He gonna be after us."
"I've seen how the government handles the 'dangerous' mutants." He shook his head. "I'm not going like that."
"De all about second chances right, de X-men like to forgive, non."
"You have to be worthy of that second chance, have a desire to run around in spandex and a cape."
"You did wear dat uniform, leather uni-tard, tres belle." There came another one of those punches, half-hearted and only grazing the side of Remy's arm.
"You don' even know what dat means," Remy defended.
"I know you enough to know you're being an ass."
Remy shrugged, "Dat true enough."
"So we getting out of here?"
Remy's eyes crawled toward the white wall separating them from Rogue. There wasn't anything he could do. He tried to save her, failed, but tried and if they stayed they were going to get thrown in jail.
"She'll be okay."
"Huh," Remy mumbled and pulled his eyes away from the wall. He tried to look indifferent.
"I know the X-Men, I know her," John paused for a moment, "we got her back here. She's home, she's okay. She always was stronger than I pegged her for."
Remy didn't respond to John's comment. He was, thankfully, interrupted by Hanks lumbering and distinct foot falls. He headed for his bed limping as fast as he could.
"Two days," he whispered as he slipped under the covers.
He closed his eyes as light flooded the room. He slowed his breathing as John started a loud protest, whining for more drugs. Even though he wasn't tried he forced himself still, telling his body to relax, his mind to calm and before he was ready for it he slept.
"Rogue?"
Rogue lifted her head tear stained cheeks drying instantly as she wiped an arm across her face. The darkness lifted. There was light again, air, hope.
"Rogue?"
"Ah'm here!" she called joy rushing over her. She knew that voice. It had to be him. She got to her feet ignoring the way her legs wobbled or the fear that was clutching her heart.
He walked into view into the empty room and Rogue was rushed into the past. It couldn't be him. He wasn't large and hairy, strange eyes, strange face. His head was smooth his stature strong but slim, defined where the other had been bulk. She remembered him this way, thought of him in his original form, but it had been so long since she'd seen the Professor as himself.
"I know I look different Rogue. This is my astral projection." He paused for a moment, smiling. "It's how I see myself and oddly enough it's how you still see me."
"Ah can' help it," Rogue started, "you looked like this when I met you."
"No need to apologize Rogue. Though my new body is wonderful, it is wonderful to be alive, I find the comfort of seeing myself as I remember extremely satisfying, even if it is only for a short time."
She swallowed for a moment. "Did I absorb you?"
"No, no Rogue you are safe. You are back at the institute. You are home."
She thought of Carol, her angry blue eyes, and determined voice. By now he knew. He could read minds as easy as breathing. There was no way he didn't already know that she had killed Carol Danvers.
"You didn't kill her Rogue."
The tears were back, they were her constant, annoying, companion, but how could she not cry. Her entire life she had fought against hurting others, defending the defenseless. She wasn't supposed to hurt anyone. It was one of the reasons she'd gotten the cure and the reason she'd come back to the X-men when her powers returned.
"But I did," she whispered, "She remembers. I see it though her eyes. I was awake when I touched her. My eyes were open. I could have stopped, pulled away, fought back, but I didn't! I just laid there and let it happen. I let it happen!"
"It is not your fault, young Rogue. You have always been too hard on yourself."
"But this is murder! How can I be easy on myself."
The light that had flooded the room when the Professor entered was starting to fade, the darkness rushing back over her. She didn't fight it. She couldn't, she didn't have the strength.
His grip was strong, demanding, like the hand that had shown her Remy. She blinked the darkness receding slightly.
"I am not the only one that wants you to fight."
Rogue reached for the the hand holding her but it faded as she reached to touch it. The Professor was still across the room. Who had touched her?
"Wolverine is as protective of you here as he is in life. You sees reason where you do not."
It made sense now, the comforting rush she'd gotten from his touch last time, the bruising grip, as he forced her to watch the events happened just above her consciousness.
"He hovers around you, others are there as well."
She didn't notice the light flooding the area all around her.