Fanfction with Gambit returning after the end of the cartoon has been done to death, but this is my take I wrote years ago. I hope you like it.
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He opened his eyes slowly and sluggishly. He tried to move but his muscles refused to obey. He felt he was going to fall asleep again but the light that came from between the drapes forced him to wake. He moaned as he stretched; the pleasing motion turned into twinges of pain that ran through his stiff limbs.
In a fleeting moment of confusion, he didn't know where he was. He then realized, somewhat disappointed, that he was lying in his old bed, in his old bedroom, with the amenities of the LeBeau's at his disposal.
Kicking the covers off, he sat up and leaned against the headboard. He touched his hair with his right hand and threw it back, letting out a sigh of dismay. He wondered, with a wrinkle of seriousness between his eyebrows, when his bed had stopped being a refugee and became so alien.
Since his going back home ("the prodigal son returns", he could still hear his father's words resonating inside his head), he felt out of sorts, out of place. What made him think anything would change with his return? Just the naivety of a young man willing to try to do everything differently next time. What a surprise, he thought sarcastically, everything was exactly the same.
He was trying to escape his old routine, but seemed to have fallen into the same pattern again. He felt as if he was roaming around, absorbed between obligations to his Guild, switching between nights of promiscuity and others of pure monotony – the fact he was alone in his bed wearing pajamas meant the previous night fell into the second category – as any hope of moving on or change got lost in repetition.
He let out a loud sigh, not really wanting to get out of bed, not knowing how to break away from that damn sick cycle. His dark eyes turned to the tux hanging in his closet. There was yet another day of futile formalities ahead of him. Refusing to resign himself to his state of affairs, he pushed himself to find the strength to leave it all behind again. He unsuccessfully asked himself what it was that tied him down to that place. There were people he cared for, he also loved the city where he grew up, however, he didn't love his family business. He clearly enjoyed the excitement of his "bailiwick", nonetheless, lately it didn't seem to be enough.
Even though he wasn't exactly proud of the things he had to do for the brief months he allied with Magneto, it had been an exponentially more interesting time than now. His main motivation to affiliate himself with a caricature of a megalomaniac bad guy had never been compatibility of opinions. He thought the whole mutant superiority thing was bullshit – which at the time had been a mere detail to overcome in hopes of a satisfactory experience.
The young X-Men came close to being a real challenge. The same could not be said about Apocalypse. The giant bastard nearly killed them all off. Although he wasn't proud of being absent from the mutant's defeat – due to reasons that were out of his control –, he had kept informed about each move, always rooting, from a distance, for the X-Men and their allies to come out victorious.
In hindsight, fighting side by side with the X-Men had been more exciting than he would have admitted to himself back then. Had his path crossed with Xavier before Magneto, he might have been tempted to join the X-Men instead of the Acolytes. Opportunities would come and go, he knew it well. It wasn't worth crying over. Clearly after the kidnapping (he detested using that word despite it being fitting in that case) of one of their members, he had burned up any chances with the baldy.
Back to the present, his stomach growled, which turned into enough of a motivation to finally get out of bed. He tasted his own bad breath for sleeping too much and hurried to the bathroom. He stared at the reflection of his eyes in the mirror, his mouth full of toothpaste, trying to make sense of the feeling that there seemed to be something wrong. Perhaps it was the nightmare he was sure he had during that night. He couldn't visualize it, but he could still feel the chills as he recalled how he felt.
He was running off wearing only his pajama pants. The cold felt like tiny needles painfully piercing his whole body. He could see his own white breath. His bare feet sunk into snow.Everywhere he looked there seemed to be tall ice walls, as though he was trapped inside a box, being examined and experienced on. He was aware it was a bad dream, but couldn't escape its rules. He knew he needed to keep running, away from the pale face, the smile full of cannibal teeth, the sinister eyes. He ran, and ran, and ran. The distance between him and the wall never fell away. As it is in dreams, he knew he could keep running for miles and never get close to the end. He fell to his knees, then on his fours. He was panting but he couldn't scream. Rising to his feet, he found himself in a forest. Cursing, he went on running. He could feel something was approaching. Now he was wearing his full outfit. His boots sometimes splashed muddy water from shallow puddles. The rhythmical hoot of an owl filled the air, sounding like an evil omen. The pathway grew narrower and darker. He felt like thorns kept poking him until a particularly pointy branch ripped his eyebrow open and the blood poured, blurring the vision of his left eye. He felt the iron taste of his own blood on his lips. Cards slide out of his pocked andflew away. A king of diamonds floated in front of his eyes. The diamond shaped stone shining bright red.
He spat out the toothpaste and washed his face, satisfactorily spilling cold water. His stubble rubbed against the soft towel, but he didn't bother to shave.
That nightmare wasn't a one-off case. Of late his nights seemed to be haunted by agonizing dreams.
At last, he accepted he needed to take action, he had to escape the walls of that house that were closing in on him. He listened to his conscience and realized he could no longer sit idly by while he had the knowledge that macabre plans had been set in motion. Doing nothing would be the same as helping fulfill those plans on a huge scale.
He moved with a jolt and fetched the thick black covered folder, which had laid untouched inside the drawer of his nightstand for the past two weeks. He grabbed a backpack and filled it with assorted pieces of clothing, not giving it a lot of thought, just enough for a few days. He would tell his dad that he had urgent matters to attend to. The feud between the Guilds hadn't changed, however, physical confrontations had been sparse for the last months. As long as there wasn't a fight in which he had to use his powers, his father wouldn't miss him. He put on a pair of jeans, a tee, sneakers, tossed his backpack on his shoulders and hopped onto his motorcycle.
Gambit knew where to go.
She enjoyed solitude. That was what she would always say when someone bothered her with inopportune attempts at pushing her to be more of a people person. However, she was antisocial, end of story. It wasn't just the nature of her powers that forced her into loneliness; she appreciated the time she spent alone. It made it easier to put herself in perspective. Easier to focus and see the bigger picture.
Quietness, however, was something hard to find in a mansion with dozens of residents. Still, occasionally it was possible. Just like that afternoon, when she was in bed, curled up with a book in her hands. Her senior year had come to an end, and, for now, she didn't want to worry about the future. All she wanted was to be left alone. She got what she wanted for about an hour until the bubble she had created for herself was abruptly burst when Shadow Cat came running through the wall, giving Rogue a scare. She couldn't understand how she hadn't gotten used to her roommate's dramatic entries.
"You won't guess who's here" the girl with the ponytail said, nearly out of breath. She sat down on her bed and stared at the other girl, not even blinking.
"Can't wait to find out" Rogue grumbled, indolent, her voice a drawl, her eyes glued to her book, which she was now pretending to read since her concentration had evaporated.
Ignoring the obvious signs that her roommate wanted to be alone, Kitty babbled on. She was feeling vibrant and fidgety about the news she brought. "Didn't think I'd see him again. Who knew, after months a former Acolyte would show up here."
Rogue regretted it right away but couldn't stop herself from turning a surprised face to Kitty. She tried to hide it, but flushed slightly when a certain name popped in her head. Quickly, she brushed the stupid thought aside, unconsciously tucking a streak of white hair behind her ear. Pulling herself together, a tedious expression returned to her face.
"You think I should go say hi?" Kitty asked. Rogue shrugged, making an extra effort to show she didn't care. "He's kinda a shy, right?"
Rogue held back a sarcastic chuckle. Shy would be the last word she would use to describe him. "Ah didn't think he'd come back" she mumbled.
"Me neither. I thought he'd stay in Russia with his family."
"Come again?" Rogue asked as she turned to face the other girl, with a confusing look, failing to disguise her disappointment.
"Piotr is talking to the Professor right now" Kitty said, not quite getting Rogue's confusion.
The day of her abduction and consequent involvement in the fuel between the Guilds in New Orleans was only a distant memory to everyone, including Rogue. Therefore, even she was surprised by the fact that he came to mind so swiftly when she heard the word Acolyte.
"Ah do think you should go say hi" Rogue said in an attempt to make Kitty go away. It worked.
For some more minutes she still tried in vain to go back to reading. She read and reread the same line over and over again until she gave in.
Rogue laid her book down on her lap, feeling her eyes burn with tears. "You fucking idiot" she whispered to herself, sniffing. She grabbed the pair of gloves from the nightstand, which she had taken off so she could turn the pages on her book. She put them on ragingly as though the protection she found in them could muffle unwanted thoughts. At last, she got to her feet and walked up to the dresser across the room. She closed her fingers tightly around the handle and hesitated before she flung it open. On the bottom, under layers of socks and gloves, there was a rectangular piece of paper with its face down, whose existence had fallen into oblivion at that point. Rogue pulled her glove off her right hand and grabbed the object, shoving her fingernails under it to flip it over.
Queen of Hearts.
The playing card was slightly creased from the times Rogue had held it on the subsequent days to her returning to the Institute, and after Apocalypse's defeating, restlessly asking herself what it really meant.
She was suddenly transported back to the fatidic day.
"My lucky lady. She's gotten me out of a whole load of jams."
"Then Ah need a deck of those."
"It is nice having someone to watch over you, Rogue."
She took off her other glove and held the card between her thumbs and index fingers. She was going to tear it in half. Moments later and she admitted to herself that she couldn't do it. She had tried it before unsuccessfully. She could not understand why she held onto that shitty piece of paper. She just couldn't get rid of it. There was a sentimental value she could not fully figure out.
"You just did the wrong thing for the right reasons" she told him then.
"So what now?" his tone of voice telling her that maybe he hadn't lied about wanting to help her.
"I'm going back with the X-Men" she said, impulsively, turning her back to him. "I don't care what you do."
"Sure you don't" he shot back, reaching out for her hand, impelling her to turn around and face him.
"Well, I better go" she rushed to say before she started to doubt herself.
"You'll be fine, chérie, you got people watching over you."
And she watched him go. All there was left was a card he placed in her hand.
Furious at her own mind for having taken her back to that moment in time, Rogue shoved the card back into the bottom of the drawer, hiding it under sock balls. She slammed the drawer shut, which made the objects on the dresser shake.
Her rage grew bigger as she forced herself to recall all the shit and lectures she had to take from Logan on their way back to the mansion. That was how it had to be, she thought to herself. She had to remember everthing that happened afterwards so she wouldn't be fooled by her own memories. To remind herself that it had not ended on a tender moment.
Ignoring all the inquisitive and confused looks, she curled up on a seat on the back of the Blackbird, soaking wet and shivering with cold. Her brother comforted her with a blanket, but the weird looks she was getting from the others didn't come unnoticed. Logan's were of pure reprehension.
As soon as the Blackbird took off Logan sat down next to her. "Start talking. What the hell happened down there?"
"Ah been used again. What's new about that?" she retorted bitterly as she tried to warm herself up with the thin blanket. The promise of explaining everything going down the drain.
Logan growled. "I want all the details, Stripes."
"Can't we do this some other time?" she burst in anger.
"Nice try" he retorted between his teeth.
Rogue snorted angrily. "He said… he did it because he wanted to help me" the honesty in her own words made her eyes burn with tears.
"And you believed the Cajun's good intentions?" Logan questioned in a tone that made it sound like he was accusing her of being naïve.
She ignored his question. "Ah touched him by accident and found out that his father was in trouble" she then turned her face to Wolverine. "Let's be honest, Logan. It wasn't like Ah was gonna help him out of kindness if he'd asked. Not to mention that he must be too proud to ask for help" she realized she wasn't that different. Rogue couldn't say for sure she would be incapable of doing something like that if she were in Gambit's shoes. Kidnapping her was reproachable, but Gambit did what he had to do. He likely believed there was no other way out.
"And you helped him anyway" it was a statement not a question.
Rogue nodded. "Ah couldn't just leave him there. It'd be against the X-Men's beliefs."
"Even though he had used you? Tricked you into doing his dirty work?"
"Cut it out, Logan! Ah know, okay? You... you'd never understand."
"I'm trying to" Logan said back, not changing his angry tone. "I know there's more to your actions than principles."
"There isn't" she retorted under her breath. Logan knew that was a lie; in a way, so did she.
Back to the present, Rogue returned to her bed and curled up in a ball, pulling the covers over her cold body. She hadn't thought of him in months, and intended to keep it that way.
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