Curiosity

Chapter 6: Denial

Disclaimer: The list of things which I do not own keeps getting longer. Marvel owns the characters (unfortunately, I do not own Remy LeBeau) I am not affiliated in any way with Marvel (though I do buy the comics) or any of the Marvel employees or creative staff.

Author's Note: Thanks to everyone who's been following my story and reviewing, you guys make my day with those! Deadsnowwhite and lovestoread, gotta love the girl power (and yes, the bike is fairly drool-worthy!) Ishandahalf (i really liked seeing rogue go all biker-babe) – I loved writing that part. Seems like Remy's always got something clever to say, thought it would be nice and evil and fun to shut him up the old-fashioned way!

Something burned deep inside her, igniting a liquid fire that coursed through her veins. His eyes blazed with satisfaction as she moaned into his kiss, her body arching into his.

His mouth strayed to her neck as his fingers stroked down her hips, caressing her inner thighs, wringing a startled gasp from her ruby lips as he played with her, stoking the fire at her core.

"Remy," she whimpered, helpless against the passion he was igniting in her as she was engulfed in his heat and his desire.

"Hmm?"

Rogue started convulsively, sending the book flying across the room and nearly falling off her bed.

"Sorry, didn't mean to scare you! Whatcha reading?"

Kitty had a habit of phasing in and out of their shared room that was unsettling at best, and downright creepy at worst.

"Hey Rogue, I'm back!" Rogue gushed in a ruthless imitation of the other girl. "Hey, Kitty! How was your dance class?" Rogue continued the one-sided conversation, running right over the other girl's bubbly response. "Great! We all dressed up in pink and twirled around. It was, like, really girly! Tomorrow, I have a class on how to use a door so I don't scare the ever-loving stuffings out of my roommate!"

Kitty rolled her eyes; sharing a room with the Goth girl had its benefits, not the least of which being a certain level of immunity to her infamous tirades.

"I said I was sorry," she said lightly, stooping to hand Rogue the book she'd dropped. She nearly fell over laughing when she saw the lurid illustration gracing the cover of the careworn paperback. "Omigod, you're reading As I Lay Burning!?"

Rogue had been pursued by Sabertooth; abducted by Magneto and forced to absorb him in order to give her life powering his machine; she'd been in more tight spots than she could easily count, but she'd never wished that she could just disappear more than she did right now. Phase through the floor, like Kitty, or 'port out in a flash of fire and brimstone, like Kurt. Hell, she'd settle for simple invisibility, or maybe the ability to fly.

Kitty was still laughing, a few tears streaming down cheeks that were almost as red as Rogue's.

"Oh, I've got you now! You thought you like, totally had us fooled, with this bad-ass, mean-girl Goth thing you've got going! And you're, like, such a closet romantic!"

"Kitty. . ."

"You know, we should totally go see this new movie, The Diary, it's about this woman who writes in her diary looking for her true love, and it sends her the perfect man, but then –"

"Kitty!"

"Hmm?"

Damage control, Rogue. Think quick. The thought of sitting through a girlie movie with Kitty was … painful. But thankfully, Kitty had already moved on.

"Like, Jubilee is so going to flip when she hears you're reading Dyce St. John! (1) I'd have figured you were more of a Meljean Brooks kind of girl, all vampires and leather and doomed romance, and –"

"KITTY!" She could fix this. Think, damnit! Trying to pin down Kitty, though, was like trying to nail Jell-o to a wall.

"What!?"

"Check out page 42, might give you some ideas for your next date," Rogue said slyly, smirking at her perky roommate.

Kitty was staring at Rogue as though she'd sprouted another head.

"No? I've got a better idea. Next time ya sneak out with a boy when y're supposed to be at dance class, make sure all ya buttons are straight 'fore ya come sneakin' back home." Rogue winked at Kitty, slipping out of the room as Kitty inspected herself carefully in the full-length mirror.

She smiled softly to herself, filing that bit of information away for future use. She'd had her suspicions for a while, but Kitty had just handed her the proof on a silver platter. That guilty glance down had given it away – she hadn't even been wearing anything with buttons. She wondered how the girl had managed to keep it from Logan. The man had a nose like a bloodhound.

Looks like intangibility has its benefits after all . . . stupid, useless vampire mutation. Oh well; being caught reading Dyce St. John was almost worth the stunned look on Kitty's face. Rogue wondered who the lucky guy was; Kitty certainly had no shortage of admirers. Easy money was on Piotr Rasputin - for some reason Kitty seemed to have quite the thing for Bad Boys – but now that she thought about it, her brother had been spending an awful lot of time around her roommate.

She sighed. Now what was she going to do? She couldn't very well go back to her room – not for a while, anyway. So much for the book . . . and just when it was getting interesting. She'd picked it up on a whim, really – it was hardly the sort of book she usually read. She tried to tell herself she was drawn in by the plot (the beautiful maiden, kidnapped by the evil pirate, rescued then seduced by the rugged hero with blazing eyes). She wondered if the author had put together the plot using one of those magnet mad-lib poetry kits – probably the comic book version, based on what she'd read so far. If it wasn't nominally a historical romance, she'd have been sure the hero was a mutant.

At least she didn't have to worry about running into the Cajun thief; he'd been gone since the day after her . . . incident, taking Storm and Wolverine with him. That hadn't stopped him from showing up at her door the morning after. With breakfast. She winced at the phrase, even in her own mind. She knew his type – though obviously not from personal experience; the man fairly oozed sex, every caress of those hypnotic red-on-black eyes was designed to captivate, every word of his lilting Creole pidgin carefully calculated to charm. He even managed to make those damn clunky metal boots and that tight fuchsia muscle shirt look sexy.

Rogue growled in irritation as she tripped over a non-existent wrinkle in the hallway carpet, stumbling a few steps. She looked around self-consciously, relieved to see that – for once – no one had witnessed her embarrassment. Stupid Cajun wasn't even around and he was making her go all dreamy-eyed and distracted.

It was too bad Wolverine wasn't around for a good sparring session; she supposed the Danger Room sims would have to do, for now. She had some serious frustrations to work out.

Kitty stood speechless in front of her mirror, absently smoothing her hands over the sweater that needed no straightening and wondering just how much Rogue knew. She wasn't still in possession of Logan's abilities . . . was she? She'd seemed like she was back to normal – well, normal for Rogue anyway. But Kitty knew that it was different this time. The stakes were higher. Rogue had put up her walls, again, and they were higher than ever. She had been distant and withdrawn since the incident, hiding in her room and snapping at Kitty for no reason.

The thief was out on a mission for Xavier; he and Storm and Wolverine had been gone for almost a week, and Kitty was beginning to worry. Not about Remy and Ororo, and certainly not about Logan – the Cajun thief looked like he could take care of himself, and she knew very well that Storm could, and Wolverine didn't even bear mentioning. It was Rogue she was worried about. Of course, Jubilee herself was no picnic when Logan was gone on an extended mission (you'd think that having a near-immortal boyfriend whose healing powers had time and time again brought him back from far beyond "dead" would have calmed some of those anxieties, but Jubilee was a law unto herself).

Specifically, she was worried about Rogue's relationship with the Prince of Thieves. Kitty blushed to the roots of her hair when she remembered how she'd been staring at him. But as flattering as his attentions had been, it was clear he had eyes only for Rogue.

Rogue had been almost unforgivably rude to the man, practically shoving him out the door– and after he'd clearly gone out of his way to walk her to her room like a gentleman. He'd likely carried her at least part of the way, she mused enviously, remembering the way Rogue had wavered on her feet when she'd staggered into the room. Forget the fact that half the girls in the manor would kill to be in Rogue's shoes – pursued by the handsome, charming Southern thief – Rogue was making it obvious that she wanted nothing to do with him. She actually managed to seem insulted when he'd turned up at their door the next morning with a breakfast tray and a smile. OK, so it was pushing noon – who cares, when he looked the way he did, hair still tousled and eyes half-lidded with sleep?

Rogue had been far from forthcoming about what had happened in that bar, and about how she'd come to be dressed like a biker version of the chick from Underworld – but Kitty had seen her blush when she'd asked about the Cajun thief, so she knew there was more to it than Rogue was willing to admit. She knew Rogue was attracted to him; that was most definitely not the issue. She was just . . . afraid. Afraid of herself, and of all the things she'd convinced herself she'd never have.

At least she's reading the book Jubilee gave her. She smiled at the memory; Jubilee had developed quite a talent for – well, evil was the best word – since she'd started seeing Logan on the sly. She'd chosen the book to give to Rogue because the hero was conveniently named Remy. Kitty wasn't sure it would work the way Jubilee thought it would – although, Kitty heard Rogue mutter something that had sounded suspiciously like "Remy" when she'd phased into the room.

Kitty flipped through the book, stopping at page 42, her eyebrows climbing higher as she scanned the page. Well, now, wasn't that interesting . . . what were the odds that there was actually something good on that page? She turned the book sideways, cocking her head and trying to wrap her mind around the logistics. She supposed, if you were flexible . . .

Wait, that wasn't the point. The point was, Rogue was actually reading it. And apparently bookmarking some of the choicer passages for later perusal. Jubilee was going to have a field day. Kitty briefly considered the ramifications of disclosing this tidbit, especially given Rogue's almost uncanny insight into her most recent diversion of the male persuasion . . . but only briefly. Rogue was bluffing, she had to be – she had no proof of anything. And even if she did, this was simply too choice an opportunity to let pass her by.

"I t'ink dey're gone now, homme . . . y'can put dose away now," Remy muttered, glancing at Logan's claws, gleaming faintly in the dim light of the tunnel.

Braver men than he would have been cowed by the look Logan shot him, but Remy wasn't about to back down. He kept his poker face, not even breaking stride even as the man growled something incomprehensible and most probably derogatory.

Storm shot him a sympathetic look, shrugging helplessly. Logan was what he was, a force of nature – it was pointless to try to tame him. That was part of why Remy had tapped him for this assignment – that unbridled ferocity, that unmistakably feral glint in his eye . . . this man was clearly dangerous, and Remy had used that threatening presence to bluff his way out of a fight. OK, so maybe it wasn't really bluffing when you held a trump card like the Wolverine – sorta like holding a royal flush, actually – but that didn't mean that everyone would have walked away unscathed if it had come down to a fight. Storm had helped too – her history with the Morlocks had become the stuff of legends, apparently, and that had played no small part in their reluctance to fight.

He smiled grimly. He may have won the battle, but the war was far from over; still, it was a small victory to make up for their earlier failure, and it meant they could go home, for a little while at least. Well, Storm and Wolverine were going home. Gambit would be headed back with them, to his guest room at the mansion – to rest, to strategize, and to wait for their next move. He quickened his step at the thought of a certain fiery-tempered Southern belle. It may not be home, but it was not without its charms.

Storm had clued him in to her mutation, and he had to admit that the thought of having his memories and his powers absorbed . . . it was a little daunting. But then, what kind of thief would he be if he didn't obtain the unobtainable – she was the Untouchable, the ultimate prize, and he could hardly resist the challenge. Besides, he was nothing if not creative . . . and the element of danger only added to the thrill of the chase.

Maybe he was a masochist . . .

No, he dismissed the thought with a smirk, he could hardly help it if he was secure enough in his manhood that being with a woman who could kill him didn't bother him.

'Course, being with a woman who was actually trying to kill you . . . no, he'd broken up with Belladonna by the time she'd gotten serious about that. At least, he was fairly sure that if she'd been trying to kill him while they were still together, she'd have had more success. At the very least, he would have noticed the difference . . . wouldn't he? That knife of hers danced across his mind, and he absentmindedly fingered his throat, wondering if it would have made a difference.

He frowned, trying to push his ex-fiancée from his thoughts. The girl – her name was Rogue, another tidbit from Storm – had an innocence to her that had nothing to do with her status as the Untouchable. She may be deadly, but he'd bet his last chip that she wasn't a killer.

Unlike Belladonna.

Startin' t'worry like an old maid, he chided himself. Belladonna had no idea he was back stateside, and he was going to make sure it stayed that way.

The Danger Room had always fascinated her; she slipped inside, feeling the echo in the cavernous steel room as the door clanged shut behind her. It was just a room, like any other, until its powerful computer stepped in.

This blank metal template could become anything – from a fierce jungle to a bustling metropolis – at the push of a button. She craned her neck, looking way up at the observational window. The Control Room was where the magic happened.

She could program anything she wanted – well, she could if she was sharp with computers like Kitty was. The powerful supercomputer held a vast bank of hostiles – enemies the X-Men had faced, and had collected data on. She herself was in there, as were all of the current X-Men. Shrugging aside the small voice that wondered if they'd uploaded a certain Cajun thief, she pushed her way out of the room and climbed the stairs to the Control Room.

She may not have Kitty's skill with computers, but she knew well enough how to make use of the preprogrammed simulations. There were countless scenarios, which could be configured for the individual players and difficulty desired, as well as individually-tuned workouts specially designed to hone the skills of each of the students.

Rogue hadn't run her training sim since she'd taken the Cure; her lips twisted derisively. Not that her sim was anything special to begin with – her power had never lent itself to open conflict; her preferred strategy was to sneak in while an opponent was distracted with the other X-Men, then render the threat unconscious with a single touch.

She tapped a few keys, setting the program to scan her and adjust itself to her level; she stripped off her gloves, leaving them draped neatly across the back of the seat. She wouldn't be needing them for a little while, and she simply hated getting them sweaty.

Her blood pounded in her ears, singing with anticipation as the door shut behind her, the cityscape muffling the tell-tale clang. For all intents and purposes, Rogue found herself in a grimy back alley, narrow and poorly lit. It could have been any dense metropolis, but she'd have been willing to bet this was a digitized version of New York, the sights and sounds and – she wrinkled her nose – smells were shockingly real. The muted splash behind her, the soft tread of a booted foot – these were real as well. The Danger Room was aptly named – any injury sustained here was real. In training mode, the computer would monitor her status, suspending the simulation before any real harm could come to her, but the broken glass littering the ground could cut her here just as it would in the real world, and that ground would feel no softer in here than out there. She could personally attest to that.

She supposed that's why Professor Xavier had elected to call it the Danger Room, rather than the Happy Fuzzy Cuddly Carebear Room.

She kept walking as if she didn't hear the man stalking her, moving with predatory intent – if a holographic projection could be said to have intent; instinct kicked in as she assessed the situation, sizing her opponent up: he was tall, probably upwards of six feet, and she'd put his weight at just north of two hundred pounds, judging by the shadows creeping closer, the length of his stride, and the impact of his booted foot against the wet pavement.

It barely even registered with her that it wasn't her own instinct she was relying on, that it most likely wasn't even her own frustrated impulse that had sent her down here in the first place.

Xavier frowned, staring at the printout Scott had given him, despite having long since memorized its contents. The training scenarios in the Danger Room were designed to test the students, starting slow and analyzing, then pushing them – benchmarking their abilities and allowing them to hone them.

Rogue hadn't been training since she'd taken the Cure, but that oddity was surpassed by the summary of the training sim. It had started her out slow, an urban environment rather than a standard fighting ring, getting a sense for her situational awareness – always a concern, for someone with no active defenses, for someone so vulnerable to the voices in her own head.

She'd beaten him easily – not that shed ever been weak, not that she'd ever been anything but a strong fighter. She'd taken the man down with ruthless efficiency, leaving him broken and bleeding behind her as she ventured further into the urban jungle.

From there . . . she'd gotten father than she'd ever gotten down before, felling her opponents two at a time, three at a time, outmaneuvering, outrunning, outfighting them all.

Outgunning them too, in the most literal sense of the word. The Control Booth charted power usage, and it had recorded from her just about every power that she had ever absorbed. Xavier had checked, and double-checked the video footage – she was channeling just about everything she had, calling up from memory searing gouts of flame, icy blasts, healing and phasing and even teleporting.

She'd literally ripped her last three opponents to shreds, with an efficiency that transcended brutality or cruelty or even self-defense. And then she froze.

Stopped in her tracks and watched, unblinking, as her opponent's blade streaked toward her heart.

Gambit paced, the restless pacing of a man confined. He wasn't used to the restrictions of a school accustomed to coming and going at his leisure, but the security system was enough to give even his not-inconsiderable skill a workout.

Besides, it wasn't so much that the restrictions could hold him, as that they were designed to. He was a thief, through and through, and he lived for the thrill of breaking the rules, of tasting the forbidden fruit. Craved it, even.

And here it was being offered to him on a silver platter.

Well, maybe not, but the bald man's offer was the next best thing. Working one-on-one with the girl, the one with the sharp tongue and the sharper curves . . .

He smiled, his eyes glowing with promise at the thought of her. If the man who called himself Professor Xavier thought a simple warning would discourage him, an admonition that his students were – what was the phrase the man had used?

Off limits.

His smiled only deepened as he slipped out of his room, shimmying effortlessly down the trellis and settling in for a walk. A man needed to stretch his legs, after all.

And he was never a man for restrictions.

She found herself at that tree again, moving unconsciously to scale the thick trunk and perch easily on a low-hanging branch. The chill breeze was a welcome distraction from her increasingly maudlin thoughts: she'd had a chance to recover from her recent bout of temporary insanity, but she was becoming increasingly mindful of the changes she'd gone through. And it wasn't just Wolverine. Powers or no powers, those voices that screamed silently in her thoughts were taking over. Slowly but surely, Rogue was being drowned out by the clamor of her many victims. But her "episodes" – as the Professor so tactfully named them – weren't what woke her, sweating and heart racing, in the middle of the night.

A flash of fuchsia, a gleam of chrome, bright and searing in her own thoughts. The thief was a recent addition to her disturbing dreams, and a pleasant one at that – except she knew she was deluding herself if she thought she could ever act on those dreams. No, damn him, he was far from the most compelling of her nightmares. She ignored the little voice that called her liar, that whispered seductive suggestions, tempting her with things she knew she could never have.

It was the little things that scared her.

Logan's tree, for one, or her occasional cravings for nicotine and whiskey – also courtesy of the Wolverine. The cravings were one thing, something she could isolate and identify, especially when she found herself with an unaccountable appetite for a food or a drink she was certain she'd never tried – or better yet, one she knew she hated. And then there were the stray thoughts and impulses that she couldn't control, couldn't identify, couldn't even begin to fight – she knew things she shouldn't, was haunted by demons she'd never confronted.

She'd picked up a criminal's habits, casing a room for escape routes as soon as she entered, keeping her back to a wall, noting any objects of value without a conscious thought. At any given time, she could close her eyes and see people and objects as they were, a perfect recall and situational awareness. She automatically sized people up – she had an instinct for danger, and she could pick out a trained fighter from a crowd, could read the deadly intent in every gesture, in the way a man carried himself.

The image sprang to her thoughts, unbidden, of the tall Cajun, slouching elegantly in that trench coat, stalking quietly in those big boots. A dangerous man, for sure.

It wasn't just the skills that were seeping through, though – it was the habits. Even worse, she'd caught herself more than once staring at a particularly well-endowed woman. Apparently, she was a boob man.

The thought disturbed her. She didn't have any particular impulse to sleep with other women – not yet, anyway – but she couldn't help looking, it was like a reflex. She wondered if that was Wolverine, wondered if that would be better than the myriad alternatives; wondered briefly, then realized that she really, really didn't want to know.

It was getting worse, and she couldn't control it, any more than she could control her own cursed skin. She'd touched evil, drawn it deep into her and held it there . . . and she worried it had stained her soul. How long before that stain began to surface, bubbling to the top of her roiling thoughts?

Sabertooth, Magneto, Juggernaut – these men were evil, and they didn't hesitate to kill those who stood in their way. Sabertooth would actually go out of his way for a kill – he savored it, reveled in his victims' terror. They were all in her head, fighting for control and subtly angling for dominance.

And with each day that passed, with every nightmare that woke her with a strangled scream dying in her throat, she could feel them winning.

(1) Dyce St. John: St. John Allerdyce, a.k.a. Pyro, has admitted to writing Gothic romance novels. I couldn't find any canon indicating what name he wrote under, so I'm giving him a slightly derivative pseudonym (most romance authors write under an assumed name). I think the quote goes something like "I write gothic romance, I've got more layers than a parfait!" It was too delicious not to include somewhere. I'm planning on having some fun with it, but I have only vague ideas about how. I also couldn't resist making the hero's name Remy. Set you up there, didn't i? Mwahahahaha!