Chapter 4
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Rogue began training with Magneto's team. She wasn't sure what exactly his plan was, only that they were on a tight schedule. Rogue also wasn't certain what exactly her part would be. She was given firearms training, and she learned to control her own ability more. She could take a little at a time, this might be useful if one of her comrades was incapacitated during the coming battle. One day, as part of a trust building exercise, Rogue absorbed a little of Pyro's fire ability. It was just a little, Pyro was a little hazy but otherwise okay. During this training Rogue became familiar with the other members of the team, Avalanche, Toad, Blob, and a former hustler named Gambit. Gambit seemed to like Rogue, by his own admission he had a weakness for beautiful women. He was devilishly handsome, only one year older than Rogue, andmaybe Rogue even had a crush on him. But she couldn't even hold his hand without possibly killing him, not exactly a good match for romance. Rogue also came to befriend a shapeshifter named Mystique. She could pass for human, look like "normal" people, but felt that she shouldn't have to hide her natural blue skin. Mystique became like a mother figure to Rogue. Her biological mother had rejected her, but Mystique accepted Rogue for who she was, warts and all. These people might be considered criminals and terrorists to the law, but to Rogue they were her new family.
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In addition to physical training Magneto also taught his Brotherhood that humans and mutants could not peacefully coexist for long.
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Magneto: These anti-mutant arguments, I have heard them before. Back then it just wrapped around anti-semitism. The nazis had no idea that I was a mutant when they rounded me up, to them me and my family were just three more jews to be thrown into the Lodz Ghetto. The head of the ghetto, Chaim Rumkowski, he thought he could save us by making us indespensible to the German war effort. My father believed this too, he even joined the Jewish Police. They thought that cooperating with the nazis would make us more accepted, that it would save us. There was one incident, a fire in the ghetto. For a brief moment jewish and nazi firefighters were working together to fight a common threat. Did it save us, no. Rumkowski sacrificed more and more of us to save the whole ghetto. And in the end, when they liquidated the ghetto, Rumkowski and his family were among the last sent to the death camps. Xavier says not all humans are bad, and he is right. Never let it be said that all Germans were nazis. Hanz Litten, Joseph Hartinger, Edgar Jung, Sophia Scholl, colonel Staufenberg. They were all German people who resisted the nazis, and all were killed for their efforts. Because the great majority of the people were either hardcore anti-semites, or because they were willing to go along with it. I do not know if senator Robery Kelly is a hardcore anti-mutant or merely an opportunist. He makes his anti-mutant speeches, and the democratically elected federal legislature cheered him on. Those other senators were all elected by the people of their respective states. I have no reason to believe that a single one of those elections was rigged. Too many of these politicians are willing to go along with anti-mutant histeria to stay in power and keep their jobs. Certain drastic steps need to be taken.
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Rogue had wanted to believe in Xavier's dream of peace and love. But Magneto had made some pretty convincing points, and he had lived through more of this stuff than Xavier had. Maybe he had a point. Maybe certain steps needed to be taken. One day Rogue was talking to Avalanche, and the subject turned to love.
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Avalanche: Gambit really likes you.
Rogue: He'll get over it, find some other young girl.
Avalanche: Guess it's not true love then. If it were, he wouldn't be with other girls.
Rogue: Is it true you nearly destroyed your highschool because a girl rejected you?
Avalanche: No, that wasn't why. I was a delinquint, no argument there. She found me, dangerous, and exciting. Her parents were having trouble dealing with the fact that she was a mutant so, we had a lot in common. We made a plan to steal the answer keys to the midterm exams and sell them to others. We got caught by this jerk of a teacher. He would have had every right to give us detention, instead he made it clear he would forget it, if she were to have sex with him. When he didn't take no for an answer, that's when I lost my temper. I probably would have killed him, but she convinced me not to do it. It was clear we weren't welcome there anymore, neither of us had much of a home to go back to, so we ran away together. I made a living for both of us working construction. More specifically I destroyed buildings for money, safely and legally. For three amazing months we were happy together, but then word got around how the boss was using a mutant to destroy buildings. They kept saying it wasn't fair that I did the work of twelve men. Do you think I got payed as much as twelve men? These guys attacked us, once again I lost my temper, and this time people died. I don't mind that I killed a lynch mob, but she died too. I don't even remember hurting her, but they said that DNA confirmed it was her body. They tried to arrest me, but I escaped, and that's when I hooked up with Magneto.
Rogue: I'm sorry about your girlfriend. What was her name?
Avalanche: Her name was Kitty.
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This name, Kitty, that was the name of her friend from Xavier's school. Avalanche seemed to think she was dead, and Kitty mentioned having been in a teenage romance that "ended badly." Rogue couldn't help but make the connection, but Avalanche here did have a temper, and if Kitty left him, maybe it wasn't her place to tell him that she was alive.
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One night Rogue went out with other members of this "Brotherhood of mutants." She rarely went outside anymore, too much risk of being identified. But Magneto said that they were fast approaching their mission, the team deserved the chance to let off some steam. Rogue still wasn't sure what the plan was, but she had heard Magneto and Mystique talk about the upcoming summit at the United Nations. Heads of state from almost 200 nations would be attending. Rogue feared the plan involved attacking this summit. Magneto had always been honest that the plan might involve killing people, but now it was becoming more real. And attacking the leaders of that many countries, that could actually unite the whole world against mutants, the final war that some felt was inevitable. Rogue tried to forget her troubles for one night, to just be an ordinary teenage girl hanging out with her friends on a Friday night. But they didn't get a completely free night. Some of this group were known around here to be mutants, and other patrons of this pizza place made rude remarks about this. One young man made bad comments, but he seemed to find Rogue attractive. He tried to talk to her, even when she made it clear she was not interested in him. This creep said Rogue was too pretty to be hanging out with these "Inhumans." Somehow it never occured to him that Rogue might be a mutant herself. She went outside to get away from him and have a ciggarette. But this creep followed her, and tried to grab her arm. To his shock he suddenly got weaker, and lost conscioussness. Rogue was a little freaked out, she went back inside to get Avalanche and show him what happened.
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Rogue: The creep just grabbed me, I didn't mean to.
Avalanche: I believe you. But if we call the cops, you'd be identified as a mutant, and maybe they look closer at your history. The sad fact is any 12 year old with a cellphone could learn what you are.
Rogue: We can't kill him, we'd be caught.
Avalanche: Agreed. But we can put him in a scenario of mutual assured destruction.
Rogue: What do you mean?
Avalanche: I'll call Magneto.
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Magneto and Mystique cane to help. They were surprisingly understanding, Mystique may have had similar experiences with guys like this creep. The four of them drove the unconsciouss creep to an old office building in the city. It was the middle of the night, noone else was around here.
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Rogue: What are we doing here?
Magneto: Helping this sinner learn the error of his ways. We are going to show him what it's like to be a mutant.
Rogue: How?
Magneto: We have a machine here, it is powered by magnetism, by me. It turns humans into mutants. If he goes to the police and reports what we did to him, he'll have to come out as a mutant himself. From what you've told me that won't be something he would want to do.
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Magneto hooked himself up to the machine, it went on, and there was a flash of light that covered almost the entire building. Rogue saw first hand Magneto use this machine to turn the creep into a mutant, and then let him go. But Magneto was clearly weakened by the machine.
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Rogue: Are you okay?
Magneto: I will be, but I need some rest.
Rogue: We're pretty close to the United Nations, is that your plan, to turn all of the world's leaders into mutants?
Magneto: Every leader who attends this summit, yes. They will go home to their countries and pass laws to protect our people. They will have to, their own survival will depend on it. And the fact that some of their families will be attending this summit, thus the families of these leaders will depend on them passing these laws.
Rogue: But just because they're mutants now, there people aren't. What if they get voted out of office?
Magneto: Fortunately many of them are dictators, not democratically elected.
Rogue: They could still be overthrown.
Magneto: True, there will still be conflict and turmoil. The survival of our people will not be assured in one stroke, but this is an important step.
Rogue: It weakens you when it's just within this building. This far from the summit, would you even survive?
Magneto: No, it will destroy me. But as I told you once, it is not just about me and my survival, it is about the survival of our species.
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Rogue thought about what Magneto was prepared to do. He was willing to give his life for his people, but maybe he was needed to lead his people during the turmoil that would follow. She also wondered if these leaders really would pass pro-mutant laws after becoming mutants themselves, or would they just hide their mutant side from the public. If they did, would they be overthrown? In any event there would be turmoil, and Magneto would be needed. Rogue on the other hand, she was condemned to never be able to be intimate with anyone. And if she were found, she would be executed for murdering her father. Rogue didn't feel she had much of a life, and she wasn't looking forward to the great conflict that would follow the attack on the United Nations. She made a decision, about a week before the upcoming summit.
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Rogue: I want to take your place.
Magneto: What do you mean?
Rogue: Put me in the machine, give me your magnetic powers, and I can activate it.
Magneto: You are aware it will kill you right?
Rogue: Yeah, but I don't have much of a life anyway. If I were arrested I'd just be executed anyway and of no use to our side. At least this was I can die to save our people.
Magneto: I cannot ask one of my soldiers to die if I am not willing to make the same sacrifice.
Rogue: Our people need you to lead them after.
Magneto: You are absolutely certain you wish to do this?
Rogue: I am.
Magneto: Than I thank you for your sacrifice. You will die a hero for the cause.