Marvel owns the X-men, no profit is to be made from this work.
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"Rose!"
The dream was forgotten as he woke, just sand in his hands bleeding out between his fingers as he clutched at the memories that had been stirred. The room was dark, familiar, and all at once reassuring in some way he couldn't explain. Looking around, Logan found he wasn't alone, a sad smile meeting him in the dim light that spilled in from the window.
"Close but no cigar sugah, try again."
"Marie..." Logan whispered, reaching out with a shaky hand just to tell himself she was real.
"Bonus points. I woulda also accepted Rogue, but at least that lets me know where about yer marbles are." Marie chuckled, her laughter was forced, her smile trembling on the very verge falling into a frown.
Cupping her cheek in hand, he brushed away a tear with his thumb, stroked her gentle in an apology he couldn't give a voice to. Her hand found his, held it in quiet forgiveness of his mistake, leaning in to say her own sorry words and sorrow with a kiss. Dim the light was, hidden in the shadows was an invitation to return to all their dreams, the morning could wait just a while longer.
He held her as his lifeline, his past dragging him down into turbulent waters, struggling against the swelling tide fearing he might lose himself to his past coming down all at once in a crashing wave. The room was a reminder of his dreams, a haunting as a spectre in the corner of his eye, ignoring it and letting his Rogue become his world. Her eyes fluttered and fell, her fugue of fatigue a lullaby to sing her to sleep, the tension bleeding out of her at last. He cradled her as she slept, listening to her shallow breaths, letting her warmth chase away his chills.
"Sweet dreams." Logan whispered in the twilight.
The darkness behind his lidded eyes was welcome once more, made safe by having her in his arms. They could play their guessing game in the morning, they still had time to sleep on all their doubts and worries.
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Hiding more than just his red on black eyes behind the knock off shades, Remy walked the streets of Lowtown that were every busy. His pride liked to think he let Rose hit him, but he wasn't a kid anymore and so he accepted the truth that he would have been hard pressed to fend her off. At least not in any way that would still have him welcome to come around for a drink.
"Gotta take your lumps." Remy chuckled, Rose just another lady in a long line that had taken shots at him, from punches and kicks...to bullets and buck shot.
His time down in the kitchen hadn't been for naught, people tended to talk in a kitchen, that was a lesson from a lifetime ago. He heard a few interesting things, the most interesting a bit of gossip about some girl Creed had been seen with. It fit with everything he'd heard from the lovely Rogue and the ever irritable Logan. It just didn't fit with his memory of the man who had taken so many to the cages, himself included.
What did fit was that there were dead bodies piling up, bodies of boogeymen even a boy from New Orleans like himself had heard of. The people that talked about them, the haunted ones sharing their tales of these monsters, they were mistaken to be the lucky ones. They had run into the Hand and lived, but all it took to know the truth was a look in their eyes. They were already dead, theirs was the slow death of never knowing just when their fate would finally catch up to them.
"Only one thing you find in Madripoor..."
Leave it to Logan to get him caught up in this kind of trouble again, Three Mile Island had been bad enough, the fact that it had been personal then took the sting off it like a chaser after a strong shot. Now it was too late for him, too late ever since the moment he stepped off that plane with a ghost at his back. There were people in Madripoor who remembered Patch, told stories of him Remy would have believed to be bullshit had he not seen what the man could do.
If the Hand were boogeymen hiding in the shadows, then it was better to throw his lot in with some real monsters. The only problem was that one was laid out in a lady's boudoir and the other was nowhere to be found. But just maybe there was one more to be found. He knew the man by reputation alone, a Merc for hire known for his mouth.
"Now why don it go surprising me that the Deadpool be friendly with Creed."
"Then by all means why don't you enlighten me to your lack of disbelief?"
With a smile that had ladies throwing themselves at him, Remy turned to see that he had picked up a very talented tail in his wanderings. Nowhere else in the world made police like Madripoor. Men like Tai were works of art, fruit so sweet and ripe you couldn't tell they were very nearly rotten.
"Coffee?" Tai asked with a take out cup offered.
Of course it was just as he liked it, that one time Remy had spent with the man sporting some very pretty bracelets he had asked how he took it, and men like Tai didn't forget the little details. They walked together in easy silence for a spell, all but the brightest stars had flickered out and faded away with the dawn.
"So I guess everything happen as I hear it, neh?" Remy asked after a sip.
"Do I need to remind you just how a police interrogation works Mister LeBeau? I bring you a cup of coffee and then you answer my questions."
Tai was playing nice, if he really wanted to interrogate him then he'd be in a holding cell. So that meant that he wanted something from him, Tai wasn't a man who asked for favours. He was a man who gave them away without you realizing it until he came to collect, all your sins laid bare in his tight smile.
"Lets just say if he be who I think he be, then maybe I see him one time before. Him, Creed, and the man you call Patch."
That had been a card he'd been planning on keeping up his sleeve, Patch wasn't a name you threw around without consequence. But just maybe Tai didn't know, that in and of itself would buy him some time. Regardless, he wouldn't want to play poker with the man.
"Maybe I will answer your question with a question of my own, do you know this woman?"
As far as police sketches went it was right up there with the kind of police Madripoor put out, a work of art. He wondered if Tai had sketched it himself, just the kind of dedication the man had to ensuring there were no misunderstandings or loose ends with a case. Everything he heard about this Jubilee had Remy think he might like to go out drinking with her sometime, the only problem being that Creed seemed to have beaten him to the punch.
"She look like someone I see in a picture once, but I never have the pleasure. Maybe you go for something stiffer than coffee, the Princess Bar still be open, what's a little fire to somebody who be thirsty?"
It was sounding less and less like a rescue, the lady in the drawing looked like she was ready for an evening out until some boogeymen came jumping out of the shadows. Even still he wasn't wrong, the only thing you found in Madripoor was trouble. It was getting out of it that was the trick.
"Just maybe I shall." Tai mused, neatly tossing his coffee cup into the trash.
Still enjoying his, Remy walked on down the street ignoring the police chief. He thought to warn the sweet Southern Belle of the company she was about to receive, but really she struck him as a lady who could take care of herself. It'd just buy him some more time after all.
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Snorting blood, Victor lashed out at his little Lee and sent her back down to the mats. They were marking the gym in more than just sweat, they were damned well painting it in his favourite shade of red. Bruised ribs and a dislocated shoulder had her getting serious, but she still wasn't ready, not for what he had in mind anyway. It was all foreplay and heavy petting, remembering a moment before the black came, a moment where she had her legs wrapped around his neck looking to either snap it or starve him for oxygen one way or another.
"Jimmy taught ya well."
He had her by the throat and he wasn't about to let go, not until she made him. It wasn't to say that all her efforts didn't hurt, it'd be a sorry son of a bitch who took the beating she dished out without being forced to let go. He was through screwing around just the same, it was time to push her to cross some lines. On the verge of passing out she finally stepped up, forcing him to let go in a searing moment of having his tendon and muscle burned through.
He howled with his beast, suffering the pain and knowing deep in his gut the one truth that kept the red at bay. She'd been marked and claimed, his beast might hurt her in its own ways, but there was a line it'd never cross. He let her think otherwise just the same. Again she proved she could kill in this safe moment when it was just him, knowing he'd always get back up for more.
Sucking a sharp breath as he came back from the black, he saw her clutching a fifty pound plate that had his blood and gore all over it. She was radiant in her rage, a goddess standing over him, her breathing ragged and skin sweaty. Sucking at her crimson stained teeth to spit, she ran a tongue across her split lip that only urged him on.
He let go of some slack and let his beast loose, yanking on that leash only as he had her beneath him with her hand pressed to his chest and the other caught tight in his grasp. For the first time she looked to have a bit of real fear of him and he'd use that, she should be afraid of him, he had a nasty past full of bad habits and dark urges.
"Ya got ten seconds till I break it..." Victor growled, punctuating his threat by twisting her arm right to the threshold.
"Let go of me!"
"Nine, eight, seven..."
He lost count as she tried, he'd give her an A for Effort but that was all. Muscle and meat were burned down to the bone where her hand had been, the stink of ozone and burnt flesh heavy in the room. It was a moment of horrible inspiration, taking her free hand in his and holding it against his breast to feel the beating of his heart below.
"Hotter!"
The beast was tugging at his chain but not for the usual reasons, it was trying to get away and drag him off their mate, it was seeing its master again in so very long and knowing to turn tail and run. Victor ignored the awful whimpering of the cowed animal that didn't know why all this was going on, didn't know that to help someone sometimes you had to hurt them.
"Five..."
The pain was nearly unbearable, it was enough to put him off a nice rack of ribs for a while as his own were cooked all too slowly for his own liking.
"Four, hotter!" Victor snarled, reminding her of his threat with what had to be at best a sprain and at worst a hairline fracture.
Her scream was endless, it joined his own howl of pain and those last three seconds didn't matter anymore. Instinct had him wanting to tear free of her, to put as much space from the pain and him as he could. Instead he endured it all for her sake, if she could do this to him...
He came back from the black and the only thing to greet him was the feeling of his nose broken by a heck of a punch. Blood and barbeque was all he could smell, but something soft and broken fell against him with mewling sobs. Men like him didn't have time to see all their lives flash before their eyes as they died, all they got was a highlight reel full of red.
"Don't ever do that to me again!"
He wouldn't have to, he trusted her to know the seriousness of the fight they were in, he trusted her to do what had to be done and decide just how far to go. He felt new skin crawling over exposed muscle that left him with a powerful itch, the severity of his injury told in the pale white of his barrel chest. He gathered her up in his arms, remembering to be gentle of her arm after a yelp of pain.
"Lets see about getting cleaned up, then we can go enjoy a few pops in the sauna."
It was another bath without any wanton urges, proving he could be gentle after all the awful things he'd done and forced upon her. Ice meant for their beer eased away the ache of her arm.
"It's not that bad." Jubilee whispered, running a hand along her forearm as if to prove it.
"Devil's own luck." Victor chuckled, pressing a kiss to her hand that was tiny in his own.
He ran his fingers over her bruised ribs, heard a hiss of pain that couldn't be hidden behind some bullshit bravado. Turning his touch away from her injuries, her next gasp wasn't one born from pain. He let his little Lee set the pace, let her guide his hands to where she longed to feel his touch. His sins were forgiven, the few she could absolve him of, and that was good enough for him.
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