When the next mission came up, everyone went out on some sort of errand or reconnaissance. Rogue went out with Logan on the Recon, Betsy flew the blackbird. Kitty agreed to help Jean, and the others accompanied various X-men.
When Rogue and Wolverine had returned with information for the rest, all met in the briefing room. The table held a simulated three-dimensional map of the land. Logan talked while Rogue just listened. She could barely understand his gruff tones, but knew what he was saying. She could speak Loganese and had been with him to witness the same. The rest listened eagerly.
The smuggling operation had been thoroughly surveyed by Wolverine. Apparently, mutant DNA was being sold on the black market. While it was not the X-men's concern of that, but the means. From where they were getting the juice concerned Xavier. He felt more information was needed. It turned out that some captives were being held by an unknown source. Their powers were being tapped and sold.
"So, we go in then." Cyclops confirmed what they all knew. "Kitty, Kurt, we are going to need you guys to go in first. Storm, Rogue, you'll be above on Eye."
To the rest he gave various positions. The next drop, according to Wolverine, was to occur at 3 o'clock in the morning in a few days. They didn't know when but would be on watch. Therefore, a watch was needed. Then they would mark their target and backtrack until they found the source.
"Wolverine should've tracked them to the den first, then we could just go straight in. instead of all this…foreplay." John huffed at a mediocre dinner with Bobby.
Only one or two of the others were around, the girls eating of to the side at the table instead of the bar. Bobby looked over to his friend with food in his mouth. He swallowed, allowing himself time, before speaking.
"That's the point of Kitty and Nightcrawler. To sneak in. Wolverine is good but not invisible or quick like bamph," he spoke in a low voice, hoping John would follow.
"I suppose. I just wish we could cut right to it." John played with his lighter, resisting the urge to light up.
"Patience, young grasshopper." Jubilee told them as she put her dishes up. "Can't rush it."
"But—" John started before Kitty cut him off, coming from behind. "—but we don't know enough information, so calm down."
"Right." He said in a resigned sigh.
"No," Rogue said as she was walking in to the kitchen, heading to get some of the poor dinner offered.
"Co faire?" Asked the dark-and-red-eyed Cajun following in after her. He didn't even bother to toss an eye around the room, no greeting at all as Rogue gave them half smiles before rolling her eyes at the question placed before her.
"'Cos your crazy," she looked back at him, her hands on her hips.
"Motier foux mebbe, eh?" he laughed at her.
"What is it?" Bobby asked with a derisive look to Gambit.
"He's just bein' a goofy ass." Rogue looked at them. "Thinks this scam is, well, a scam."
"Did you tell Cyclops?" Kitty looked over to the group.
Gambit shrugged.
Rogue spoke again, as if she were his speaker or translator. "He wants someone—" Gambit coughed loudly, "—he wants to either go in undercover, or skip it all together."
"What—Why?" Jubilee asked for all their alarm.
"Don' feel right." Gambit told them from where he leaned on the counter.
"So why did he drop all this on you?" John asked skeptically. "Not Scott?"
"'Cos Wolvie and I saw it up close. I gotta admit, he's gotta point."
"What's that?" Bobby jumped in. "That he knows so much more? What are the rest of us missing that he's on to?"
"Well, I just think with his, er, past," Rogue stumbled over what she wanted to say, "There's probably stuff he might be pickin' up on."
"I guess your right, but we should tell Cyclops." Bobby nodded.
"Let him decide." Jubes nodded. "Now that you mention it, I don't know either. It could very easily be real or fake."
"I think he'd going to want to err on the side of caution, though," Kitty pointed out, "Knowing Cyke."
"I'll go talk to him," Bobby volunteered, striding out of the room.
"I think he's grumpy," Jubilee pointed out.
"Well, I think he thinks Gambit is in on it," Kitty whispered to her friend.
Rogue was sniffing at the food on her plate, while Gambit played a card trick on John, Three-card Mary. Jubilee looked over at Kitty with an eyebrow raised. Kitty simply smiled coyly.
"Think I'll go talk tactics with Nightcrawler," Kitty sashayed.
"Kurt?" Jubilee teased, throwing her voice so Kitty could hear her as she exited.
"You're so mean," Rogue laughed as she sat down next to Jubes.
"Yeh, so?" Jubes laughed. "It does her good to be challenged. And you."
"Me?" Rogue said through a mouth full of food. "What did I do?"
"If you only knew!" Jubes teased her.
"Meeting in, like, 5 minutes," Betsy leaned in the door to tell everyone.
"If I'm late again, Scott will skin me," Rogue stood up, eating quickly.
"Me too," Jubilee hopped up. "Right behind you."
In the Warroom, tired X-ers were scattered about the room. Jean stood alert, Wolverine stalked in, leaning against a wall. Storm sat calmly at the table, but a few seats down from her Kitty fidgeted in her seat. As more gathered, Bobby paced more.
"It has come to attention," Scott started, "That this is possibly a trap. While we always think that about every situation, it is of concern that it might not be a trap."
"If it is valid," Storm translated, "the taken mutants are at risk."
"So what do we do now?" John spoke up before Scott could continue. "Do we go in?"
"I think we must." Cyclops continued. "We cannot afford the risk not to."
"We go in."
Three o'clock came, they thought would come too quickly. But as it turned out, no one slept and it couldn't come quick enough in the end.
Nightcrawler and Kitty crept ahead as Storm and Rogue kept to the skies. Gambit agreed to go in as a buyer, looking for the right purchase. Wolverine snorted in derision at being partnered with him. But then again, as Rogue laughed, his gruff expressions were the same for nearly everyone.
"We can't see or hear anything from up here," Rogue groaned to Storm.
"We've other business," Ororo pointed out.
Down below, the others made the appointment, Gambit and Logan making the deal. Rogue wasn't sure what happened, but when she saw the action break out down below, she and Storm were on top of it. Storm took one side as Rogue took the other, blocking the entrance from reinforcements.
Rogue didn't have time to worry about the rest, having her hands full with five to ten large men. Tossing a few around and or into each other, she turned her attention to the fight behind her. Storm had blocked her way, but was maintaining it as the rest interrogated the men before them.
Kitty had left to walk through the vicinity to see if she could find a sign of caged mutants, and Kurt was gone, presumably with her. Gambit nonchalantly flipped his cards around in a bored manner while Scott and Wolverine made with the small talk. Iceman, Rogue could tell, was doing his best not to pace, intently watching the scraggly dealer instead. The others she knew were around.
"I done told you," the man was rasping at them, rubbing his neck. "There ain't no more. That's it."
"You're telling me there is no more 'juice?'" Cyclops gestured quotations.
Wolverine sniffed him, making it loud and rude. "He's lying."
"Thank you," Cyclops snapped irritably, regaining control of himself a second later. "Now, you will tell me what you know."
"Or he's going to stare into yer brain." Logan laughed. "I'll just cut it out of him." A single blade slide from his knuckles.
Rogue couldn't see the look Cyclops had because of his gear, but she could imagine the gaze he leveled on his teammate. But then he turned towards her.
"Rogue, come here."
Shit. She knew this would lead to know good.
"She will extract the information we need." Cyclops explained.
She came up to the small group and tried not to let her nerves show. Poker face, she told herself, steeling herself stone cold. She stood next to them, unaffected.
"Take off your glove, Rogue."
Slowly she slipped the long sleeve from her arm, quivering and seeing the shaking, but ignoring it. She bit the insides of her cheeks, willing the man to come to his senses, for both their sakes. Even slower, she reached to his forward, trembling slightly but it lessened as she came closer, like his skin was a magnet for hers, all flesh was.
"No, n-no," he stuttered. "Ok-kay, I'll tell you. Don't let her suck out my brain."
But, relieved though she was, she paused her hand, not removing it from his comfort zone. She knew enough about threats by now to play them out. He spilled the truth.
"Th- The mutants was just a scam. We were selling plain plasma." He spoke quickly as if it would change the fact.
"Weren't you afraid they would find out?" Cyclops asked, unconvinced.
"We add something to make it s-seem supernatural."
"What?" The question came out as a dart.
"P-pepper. Cayenne."
Gambit snorted quietly, Rogue took a glance and found the exotic eyes on her. She only knew he was watching her because she looked at him to see his response. Right? Typical, she mused.
The man bumbled on not making much sense, but it didn't matter when Kitty came running out of the side of a wall. "Their there. not close, but there are a few."
"Mutants?" Scott flashed around at her.
He turned back to the man he had in his hands. "Mutants?"
"I, uh, we, uh, Terry was scamming the boss. He wanted to, uh," the man tattled on.
"I couldn't open the crates, I need someone." Kitty told them. "Quickly, there are some more thugs that Kurt's got."
She went back the way she came, knowing someone would follow. Rogue watched Cyclops and Wolverine.
"I'll take him," Wolverine said, grinning wolfishly. He grabbed the man from Cyclops's hand.
"Come, Iceman." The two went in the direction of Kitty.
Rogue grew bored with the man, who Wolverine played with like a cat with a mouse until Storm snapped at him. He grinned wolfishly at her too, and Rogue felt very much out of place. She walked around and tried to remind herself not to chew on her nails. Why hadn't she gone? Why hadn't Scott asked for her help?
Because, Rogue, she told herself, someone needs to stay here.
Like Logan couldn't handle it?
'You know he would just let the man get away so he could hunt him down.' She talked with herself.
He's not being challenged.
'I am not going to respond to that only to say that I'm not going to respond to that.'
Rogue! She reprimanded herself. Pay attention here!
But she didn't have to yell at herself too much, a loud thunderous break alarmed everyone. She looked up and saw the cloud of thick billowing dark clouds rolling overhead. Something had exploded.
Storm was in the air before the Rogue had even looked up. She looked to Logan and he nodded to her to go. He would stay his watch with the coward. The others, Gambit among them were also gone. As she went to air, she saw the quick movements to and from the building. She went down to check on everyone as Storm gathered the rain to ease the fire.
She helped her teammates pulling others along. Kitty held someone by an arm around her. The rest hacked and couched as they came together.
"What happened?" she asked Kitty when she could.
"I don't know. First we were gathering up the baddies, then the mutants, then bam." Kitty gulped for air. "Someone must have tripped something."
"The bad guys are unconscious in the spare run out back, but I don't know who was still in there." Another Xmember told them.
Rogue scanned around and found Scott, going to him for directions. He was talking at various people to hurry up and get the weak and hurt to the blackbird. He looked at Rogue. "Do a head count."
He walked over to another to tell them to have Logan and Ororo join them. Rogue thought through who she had seen. Counting the ones who appeared, she found everyone she thought. She wished John had come on the mission, he would have smothered the flames quickly enough. But Iceman surely had helped Storm, Rogue thought.
"Bobby!"
She hadn't seen Bobby. All the times she took him for granted and she hadn't seen him around with everyone outside of the warehouse. She jumped into the air before she knew it, scanning and scanning again. Surely she had simply missed him. She counted and recounted but didn't see.
Not quite in the sky, she was simply above the others, she looked back at the warehouse. It was still smoking but not at the pace it was. He was inside, she could feel it to her core. He would have stayed inside to make sure everyone got out. She rushed in praying nothing had collapsed.
"Drake!" she called, listening for only a moment before calling again. "Drake!"
"Bobby!"
She didn't hear anything but found a water trail leading to a puddle. His ice would have melted in the fire. She called again, listening quietly for even a twitter. At the sound she ripped the materials away, she found herself thankful for her strength. Throwing steel bars and wood over to empty spots, she called until she heard a response. Digging through the heavy materials, thankful for Carol's strength.
"Drake?" She found him in a cavern of junk, in an ice cave. He was tinged only slightly blue. "Bobby, shug?"
He was conscious enough to respond vaguely, opening his eyes, black and blue as they were. He coughed when he tried to speak.
"Ok, ok. Shh. I'll get you." she murmured as if she were talking to a young kid.
She managed to work more stuff loose, slow progress. But quickly enough Cyclops was at her side.
"I told him not to stay." He disintegrated the trash. "He must've turned back, the fool."
Rogue couldn't spare a pang for Cyclops at the moment, trying to dig her friend out. She knew being a leader was hard, but it didn't matter then. He didn't need to justify himself. When Bobby was free, and hanging loosely from the two, Cyclops scolded him.
"You must listen."
"Scott, I don't think it's the time. He can't even hear you." She could hear Cyclops' own tsk of disapproval over her, but she didn't care. She just wanted to get to the plane.
The rain Storm gathered had turned to a true thunderstorm, one that had been on its way which she had helped. Not one to mess lightly with the weather, she left in place which made loading all the injured to the plane that much more fun in the rain. Once everything and one was loaded she went back to Bobby, where Storm had done what she could of first aid.
"He requires Jean Gray." Storm said. "I believe he has internal injuries."
Rogue turned to leave, upset and unsure what to do, the plane especially full of people, she remained still. Storm quietly told her to watch Bobby as she left to radio ahead to Jean. Rogue sat down. Bobby lay asleep, heavily drugged. Rogue had seen plenty of destruction and death, but it never made it any easier or less painful to take. "Drake."