OLD FASCINATIONS, NEW SENSATIONS



Lying in bed, Rogue thinks that this, more or less, is the order of events:

1. She fucks Bobby only once, and badly, before they agree to be friends. She doesn’t envy Kitty.

2. Then she fucks Piotr, a little bit as revenge sex; he has an enormous cock but, unfortunately, doesn’t quite know what to do with it.

3. Then Jubilee—and that is the best sex, so far, goddamn!—playful and generous and untiring; and it is with her that she has her first orgasm with another person, and then her next three, too.

4. Jubilee promises toys, next time.

5. Then two new students, at the same time, what are their names; Joseph and Joel, something like that. And it’s fun, but she has the feeling they’d rather be with each other, and are using her to make that possible.

6. Then Jubilee, again, who follows through with her promise about toys.

7. Then another young student with a reptilian-form mutation and a tongue to match.

8. Then Bobby, again, who has just broken up with Kitty, almost immediately after they have gotten together—and it is much better than the first time, perhaps because while it might be pity sex on her side, it’s revenge sex on his side, and that makes for some interesting moments. At some points, he starts freezing strategic parts of her body, and she doesn’t pity Kitty quite so much anymore.

9. Then she fucks Piotr again, with the motivation of that mountain climber who, when asked why one would want to climb Everest, replied simply, “Because it’s there.” Only, “massive cock” instead of “Everest.”

10. She knows a little more what to do this time, and she demands to be on top, and it’s not only good, but great, especially with him moaning in Russian when he comes.

11. Then, for the first time, she meets the new target-practice instructor from New Orleans, just after one of his students has gone down on her in the Danger Room.

12. Was he watching? She still doesn’t know. Meeting her, he says only, “Gambit, at your service, chère.”

13. She says, with the confidence that only sexual power can give, “Rogue. What kinds of service?”

14. He says, smiling like a cat, “All kind of service, chère.”

15. In-fucking-deed. Jesus Christ, Mother Mary, Joseph, saints and angels, God and Lucifer.

16. The Danger Room is going to smell like sex for a year, after that.

17. Then, she fucks Jubilee again, who says she also fucked Gambit last week, and they both agree: holy motherfucking shit.

18. Jubilee says, “I came so hard I really thought I was gonna die. Like, I literally saw my life flashing before my eyes.”

19. She adds, “And I didn’t care.”

20. But then Jubilee gets a boyfriend, one of the other new students, so their little dalliance come to an end, regretfully on both sides, though they hadn’t ever really been that close to begin with. Only sex brought them together, and Rogue thinks this principle goes for most people in her life.

21. She is waiting for Gambit after his target-practice class, and after she finishes an awkward conversation with the student of his who had eaten her out, he exits the Danger Room, smirking at her.

22. “You’re popular, minette,” he says. He must have been listening.

23. “You, too,” she says. “Fuck me.”

24. And holy motherfucking shit: the sequel. The Danger Room really is going to smell like sex for a year.

25. Then Logan, Storm and Warren come back from San Francisco.

26. Warren makes no secret of his interest, eye-fucking her while he is being introduced to the students. He’s not really her type; a little too delicately-boned, a little too smugly “sensitive,” but hell.

27. She fucks him; and it isn’t really his tiny dick that’s the problem, but his—well, general badness. After all this time, she knows what good sex is, and this is not it. He moves limply, makes desperate little noises, and comes far too soon. And he doesn’t even touch her clit, let alone know where it is.

28. She goes to Gambit almost immediately afterwards, and he is already grinning his cat-grin at her. “Rich boy disappoint you?”

29. “Yup,” she grumbles. “Fuck me right.”

30. And holy motherfucking shit, part three—of infinity, she hopes.

31. Well, not infinity, she thinks quickly.

32. Since she took the cure, since she has started this whole adventure—and perhaps since the beginning, since Laughlin City—she has known that, given the possibility, casual sex would be her relationship status of choice.

33. Of course, since for the past few years she has had neither possibility nor choice, she has made some concessions to things called “romance,” things called “relationships.”

34. Though, if she’s honest with herself, she had never quite found her way into them. After all, she’d been the one anxious to fuck Bobby; Lord love him, he’d probably have held her hand and quietly fingered her with a glove for years. She wanted sensation, not intimacy.

35. Although, when he had seen him making an ice-skating rink for Kitty, she had realized what her life might be without either.

36. To be that jealous, when she didn’t want to be jealous at all; finding herself desperate to hold onto the little she had, when she didn’t want to want anything—she couldn’t let that go on. The cure was the answer; somehow, in some way. She hadn’t worked it all out in her head. She just knew—“I’m doing that.”

37. She’d told Logan that she wanted to get close to people, to touch people, but that hadn’t been the entire truth.

38. Then again, she doesn’t remember ever really telling him an entire truth. She hadn’t even told him her entire name.

39. But she’s not thinking about Logan.

40. In any case, now that she does have both possibility and choice, she wants to choose not to choose—to refuse to play the relationship game, the romance game, the intimacy game.

41. She knows, deeply: it’s not for her, never has been. She has enough people in her head; she doesn’t want any more.

42. In fact, she doesn’t want anything from anyone, except an amazing fuck, nimble fingers, and an eager tongue. Everything else can screw itself.

43. Gambit gives her all three, making her come like a fucking lunatic, so much so that one of the students anonymously posts a note on her door asking for a little consideration, when people are trying to sleep.

44. She makes a point of screaming much, much, much louder for much, much, much longer.

45. This amuses Gambit at first, but he tells her to stop after a while: “Gambit don’t like faking, minou.”

46. Then the news comes, after about a month. In very rare cases, and almost exclusively for those with immunocentric mutations, the cure’s duration has been shown to be—less than permanent.

47. And—fuck.

48. All she knows is—she has to leave. Where isn’t important. She has to leave, now.

49. She hasn’t even seen Logan yet, and she knows he will come to her with his face full of sympathy, kindness—and he is the person she wants to see the least. For too many reasons. For only one. She doesn’t know.

50. She is about to leave, backpack in hand, and Gambit intercepts her in the foyer, just as Logan did, before she left for the cure.

51. He asks, smiling, though she knows he already knows, “Where you goin’, minou?”

52. “Out,” she says.

53. He says, “Come with Gambit, it’ll be better than wherever you’re going, I promise.”

54. “Sorry,” she says, and she is. God, she’ll miss fucking him. Can she fuck him right now, right here? The thought tempts her, and she almost suggests it.

55. “Rogue,” he says, and she is startled for a moment at the serious tone of his voice.

56. “Stay,” he says. Then smiles, still like a cat. “Gambit ain’t done with you, yet.”

57. She looks at him, feels lust and regret tighten in her chest. She really is sorry when she says, “Sorry, swamp rat. That’s all you’re gonna get.”

58. She turns around and leaves him there; but unlike Logan, she doesn’t feel him walk away, into the shadows. He stays there, so she can feel him watching her when she closes the door behind her.


*


59. She hitches a ride to the train station, where she buys a ticket to Manhattan, which is where she had been planning to go, the first time she had run away from the mansion.

60. And sitting in the train, she thinks of it again; thinks of Logan, coming into the carriage to stop her. Already, then, she had already known, she had already had him inside—

61. No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no.

62. And the train to Manhattan is uneventful. She puts her hair up in a ponytail, combing the hair over to hide, for the most part, the white streak.

63. She spends the first half of the week fucking human men, typically in club bathrooms. Her skin isn’t coming back, yet.

64. The second half of the week, her skin is buzzing a little bit, but she can tell it isn’t back yet, so she fucks mutant men, typically in club bathrooms.

65. On the subway, she sees an advertisement warning against high-risk sexual practices, and she feels a little guilty; then, after imagining various scenarios, really guilty.

66. The second week in Manhattan—

67. —the second week in Manhattan.

68. The second week in Manhattan, she wanders into a mutant-human hostess bar, lured in by a handsome young Asian man in a suit who calls her beautiful so many times, she’s embarrassed that the line actually works.

69. Apparently the bar is for humans interested in hooking up with mutants. A kind of mutant fetishist bar, she thinks. They really have everything in the city.

70. They ask if she is human or mutant, and she lies and says, “Human.” Holding onto it for as long as she can.

71. And soon she is surrounded by more-or-less good-looking young men, who give low-powered demonstrations of their mutations, like party tricks.

72. Like Bobby with the ice rose; like Gambit, slowly warming a card on her clit—

73. But she is supposed to forget about that now. She is not going back. She drinks another vodka martini.

74. But in the back, she sees a group of Japanese men and American or European women—and at the center, one man in particular whom she recognizes, and time stops around her body.

75. Knowing she does not know him, knowing that she does.

76. He is quite a bit older than in her memories, silver-haired instead of black-haired, now. But he is still youthful in his face, and even though he is sitting down, she can discern his size from here; six feet six, two-hundred-and-fifty-pounds, still the same. He hasn’t let himself go.

77. He sees her looking at him, and thinks she is interested, so he murmurs something in the ear of one of the younger men in his circle.

78. A blonde woman is next to him, looking jealous.

79. The young man approaches her, and says, in polite but halting English, “My boss would like to meet you.”

80. Dread and curiosity fills her body—but curiosity wins. Shaking, she stands; tries to smile. She approaches the man, to where he is beckoning her to sit, next to him. The blonde woman has to move down.

81. “Pretty girl,” the man says. “What’s your name?”

82. “Marianne,” she says, and mentally kicks herself, because it’s too goddamn close to her real name.

83. “Marianne,” he repeats. “My name is Ryuuji.”

84. No, it’s not, she thinks to herself. It’s Harada Kenichiro.

85. And—fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck.

86. “You like my bar,” he asks.

87. “Is this your bar?” she asks, and she is genuinely surprised.

88. “Well, my friends and I own part of it,” he replies. She thinks, I’ll bet you do.

89. And what is she doing, what is she doing, what is she doing, what is she doing.

90. She hadn’t meant to sit down here, hadn’t meant to meet this man—

91. She hadn’t thought she would ever have to; she had always thought that he would remain an intimate stranger, a ghost in her head.

92. One of many—and fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck.

93. Now the past comes crashing back to her, but it isn’t her past, it isn’t her past—

94. But here he is, and she cannot help but want to know more, to want answers; to want to finally fill in the blanks to the memories in her head that do not belong to her but occupy her nevertheless.

95. He says, “Are you from New York?”

96. She says, No, she’s from—“Alabama,” she supplies, quickly. She had almost said Mississippi. She needs to get it together.

97. “Ah, that’s where your accent comes from,” he says. “It’s very sexy.”

98. She says, “I like your accent, too.”

99. “Yes, I’m from Japan,” he says. “Have you ever been there?”

100. Yes.

101. “No,” she says. “I’ve never even been outside of America before.”

102. Japan, Canada, Poland, Germany, England—

103. Fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck.

104. “It’s much smaller than America,” he says, smiling. His English is actually quite perfect; it’s only his accent that gives him away. “Very crowded. But also very beautiful, especially in the spring time.”

105. The blonde woman is glaring at her. A girlfriend? A wife?

106. “I’ve heard,” she hears herself saying. “The sakura blossoms in the spring time.”

107. Fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck.

108. He looks at her, pleased. “Yes, that’s right, sakura,” he says. “Many tourists come for that. Japan is well known for the cherry blossoms.

109. And thank god it’s well known for it; because that’s not how she knew it.

110. She looks at his hands, knowing: Logan has fought those hands.

111. She sees a scar, thinks it might have been Logan’s doing, then she tries to remember; and yes, it was.

112. “You like Japanese men, too?” he asks, leaning towards her. The blonde woman is really glaring now.

113. She thinks: she should suck his skin, and then she would know more.

114. And then she is horrified at her own thoughts, horrified that she would do that to an old man. Who knows who he is now, what his life is. She has to remind herself that it is not her revenge she is carrying out; it is not her fight.

115. How many times has she had to tell herself this: Not her memories. Not her past.

116. But the anger she feels is real, and it is as if she is sixteen again, and hasn’t she learned to cut that shit out already?

117. But she hadn’t ever run into one of Logan’s ghosts in a bar before. And this one is a hell of a first one.

118. Still. She is not going to touch him. She is not going to touch him.

119. She doesn’t even know if her mutation is activated, anyway. She isn’t even wearing gloves, just a very long-sleeved shirt, that hangs well over her fingertips.

120. But looking at him, she thinks she is changing her mind; unable to stop herself from repeating: what he did—what he did—what he did—

121. No.

122. He buys her another drink, and as she is drinking it, she realizes there is something in it, because she is starting to feel thick and syrupy inside her own body.

123. And Harada is leaning over her, about to kiss her, and she tries her best to push him away, trying to convey to him that she isn’t pushing him away as a girl who is fending off an attacker who apparently drugs his future conquests—

124. —though of course, she is doing that, too—

125. —but as a mutant with powers. With powers.

126. But it’s too late, and he kisses her on the mouth.

127. And the powers are definitely back, because he is in her, and with a blinding rush, she has more answers than she wanted, to more questions than she had thought to ask.

128. She has enough presence of mind to jolt and push him away, fast—and they hadn’t kissed for more than a few seconds, but she already can feel his mutation ghosting her skin, can already feel the tachyon field around her, and everything around her buzzing with the possibility of turning into a potential blade.

129. And Harada falls backwards in his seat, unconscious.

130. Everyone is shouting, in Japanese and English—both of which she understands, thanks to Logan—

131. —whom she touched much longer for a few seconds; both times—

132. Not fucking now, she tells herself.

133. And the blonde woman next to him leaps up, tells the other men—whom Rogue understands are about to shoot her—and says in Japanese that she will take care of it.

134. And the woman drags Rogue by the hair and shirt, towards the kitchen, where the woman seems to want the fight to take place. The woman is too strong, she can’t even move, let alone find a patch of skin.

135. Other patrons pretend not to notice. The workers in the kitchen, seeing the blonde woman, hurry out.

136. She thinks: I’m going to die.

137. The blonde woman punches her in the stomach, and Rogue flies onto a steel countertop, knocking over a mixing bowl that clatters to the ground, and the pain is unmaking her.

138. The woman is fucking strong.

139. And now she is shouting, in English, “Who are you? Who do you work for?”

140. And she punches Rogue in the stomach again; she seems to have figured out that she has to avoid her skin. Her blows have now moved them through the kitchen, out the back doors, into an abandoned alleyway that smells profoundly of garbage and mold.

141. Rogue thinks she is some cross between Harada’s consort and bodyguard; the only reason the woman hasn’t killed her yet is because she want answers.

142. She punches Rogue in the stomach one more time, harder—and Rogue thinks dully that soon the woman is probably going to give up on answers—and asks, “Who do you work for?”

143. “Weapon X,” Rogue chokes out, not knowing why, thinking it is probably a bad idea, but at least it will buy her time.

144. And the blonde woman’s eyes widen, then narrow. “Then you’re dead,” she says, and lunges forward to punch Rogue one more time, in the stomach—

145. But Rogue uses the dwindling powers she has just stolen from Harada to tear a hole in her shirt, though in her panic it is a little uncontrolled, so she knows she has showered cuts all over her stomach, as well—

146. —so that when the blonde woman punches her, the skin of her fist connects with the skin of Rogue’s stomach—

147. And the pull begins before the impact of the strike can be absorbed.

148. The woman falls, her hand stuck to Rogue’s stomach. She tries to tear her hand away, to punch again with her free hand, clawing—

149. But Rogue grabs the woman’s hand with her own, now, and screams as the pull roars against her, inside her.

150. When the woman falls to the ground, an eternity later but still too shortly after, Rogue cannot move, cannot breathe, cannot think.

151. But she hears footsteps coming towards the alley from inside the kitchen, and she knows, she has to run, run, run, fast, or she really will die, now—

152. So she runs—

153. But after a while, she realizes she is not quite on the ground anymore.

154. She runs through the Meatpacking District, trying to keep her feet from lifting into the air, feeling her entire body shifting itself, and the only thing that she knows belongs to her now are the tears on her face.


*


155. When she gets back to her hotel, she cannot generate the tachyon field anymore. Harada has already disappeared from her body.

156. But the woman feels different; different from Erik, different from Logan, the only people she had touched like that.

157. Rogue has retained all of their memories—or as much as she lets herself remember, since she had forced herself to start forgetting them more or less immediately after obtaining them.

158. More or less successfully. Less successfully, in some cases.

159. But the woman feels different; her memories are there, with Erik’s and Logan’s, and once again Rogue feels as though she has read twenty books at once, with all the jumbled thoughts and facts and reminiscences floating—

160. But the woman feels different; the power doesn’t feel like a heavy coat she is trying on momentarily; the way it felt with Harada, and even the way it felt with Erik, Logan, John—

161. (Although John had been special; she had already, secretly, been practicing how to control, if not her mutation entirely, then, at least, to some extent, the content of what she took. And on her first trial, she had succeeded; she hadn’t taken any of John’s memories, just his power. But she’d never gotten the chance to do it again; and this evening, she’d been too frantic to control it and try.)

162. But the woman feels different.

163. The woman feels different.

164. The power already feels like a part of her; deep as marrow in her bones. It feels as though she has always had it, and always will.

165. And she knows, without knowing how, that she is right.

166. She has killed a woman. She has taken all of her life.

167. And then she starts to vomit.


*


168. After a few minutes, she is able to make it to the bathroom, where she resumes vomiting in the toilet.

169. As the adrenaline wears off, she is starting to feel the thick effects of that drug again, as well as the bruises on her stomach, so she puts two fingers down her throat, makes herself vomit.

170. Thinking: This, in her blood now, is the woman’s life.

171. And then she doesn’t have to make herself vomit anymore. Tears mix with it.

172. She thinks she’s gotten rid of the drug, at least; but her stomach still pains her, though not as much as she knows it would have, if she hadn’t absorbed the woman.

173. And she vomits again.

174. It is like this, while she is on the floor of a shitty hotel bathroom, bitter saliva hanging from her mouth, tears and snot covering her lips and chin, that the bathroom door opens.

175. And she thinks—this is it, they followed me, after all.

176. Thinking again: I’m going to die.


*


177. But Gambit is standing there, in his light body armor and trench coat, carrying his staff, smiling.

178. As a greeting, he says only, “Told you Gambit ain’t done with you yet.”

179. And she isn’t sure if the sound she is making is laughter or sobbing.


*


180. “What a cheesy fuckin’ line,” she says, when she can finally speak again.

181. “I think you like it,” he says, and she is back to laugh-sobbing, or sob-laughing, for a long while.


*


182. “How,” she asks, when she has wiped her mouth with the towel he is stretching out towards her.

183. She is perched on the edge of the bathtub. Tears are still streaming from her eyes, but she doesn’t feel the emotion of crying anymore, grown numb to it; her body is doing all the work for her.

184. “Thieves and Assassins’ Guild,” he replies. “Gambit have some old friends who come to this bar. Even this swamp rat know what a yakuza is.”

185. She looks down.

186. “You know it’s owned by yakuza, yeah,” he says, and it isn’t really a question.

187. “Yeah,” she mutters, wiping her face with the towel again. The tears aren’t stopping. “So you were an assassin?”

188. “Thief,” he corrects her. “Thieves’ Guild. Until not too long ago, Thieves’ Guild and Assassins’ Guild was enemies. Now they have a union.”

189. “Now that you’re gone?” she quips, trying to smile.

190. “Yeah,” he says, also smiling; but his smile makes more tears come down from her face.

191. He adds, “But there still some people loyal to Gambit. Willing to fight a few little yakuza for him, anyway.”

192. And her eyes widen. Fuck. “What happened?”

193. “Nothin’ happen,” he says, still smiling. He shifts his weight, and she sees that there is blood on his staff.

194. “Much,” he adds, when he sees that she has seen it.

195. “Fuck,” she whispers, aloud this time.

196. “Nothin’ happened that don’t happen every weekend from New Orleans to Tokyo, believe it. Small-time thugs fighting each other, that’s nothing.”

197. Then his eyes narrow. “But what you were doing—with Harada Kenichiro and his girl of the week—now, that don’t happen every weekend.”

198. “Some girl of the week,” she muttered.

199. “She’s dead,” Gambit tells her.

200. “I know,” she snaps. “I killed her.”

201. “I know,” he says. “Good. She woulda killed you if you hadn’t.”

202. She lifts an eyebrow at him. “You sure you’re not part assassin?”

203. He laughs. “Maybe a little bit,” he says.

204. He picks up his staff, puts the bloody end of it in the sink, and starts rinsing it with water. “So, you want to tell this old thief why you were messing around with the old kumicho of Yashida-gumi?”

205. She stares at him. “How do you know all that?”

206. “You insult me, minou,” he says, wiping his now-clean staff with another towel. “I keep informed.”

207. “Yashida-gumi,” he pronounces. “Part of Yamaguchi-gumi; biggest and wealthiest yakuza clan in Japan.”

208. She lowers her eyes. “I don’t want to talk about it.”

209. “I saved your life,” Gambit says, pointing his staff at her, so it is only a few inches from her nose.

210. And she has said that before, to someone else—but unlike Logan, she isn’t going to say, No, you didn’t, when it might be true.

211. Instead, she takes hold of the staff, hard. “You wouldn’t like it if I broke this, would you?”

212. He grins and doesn’t move it. “I get others. I’m a thief, remember?”

213. She tightens her grip on the staff, but doesn’t break it. She lets go, and says, reluctantly, “He has something to do with someone I know.”

214. “Someone you’d kill for,” he elaborates.

215. “No,” she says, though it is true, and she has done such a good job of not thinking too much about Logan, she isn’t going to fail now.

216. He studies her. “Yes,” he states, with absolute certainty. “Someone you’d kill for.”

217. She glares at him. “I don’t like you so much when you’re not fucking me.”

218. “Or licking you,” he adds, pleased. “Or—”

219. “All right, all right,” she mutters.

220. He smiles, then pauses. “So this someone you’d kill for, he’s at the mansion,” he says, and it’s not a question, either.

221. She stands from the bathtub rim, tries to step out of the bathroom. He doesn’t let her, blocking the door frame with his body.

222. He stares down at her, and she can see his eyes from up close. She wonders why they don’t scare her, not even a little, the way they seem to scare everyone else.

223. Instead, they turn her on, always and badly, speaking to something small and heated and coiled within her, and she is annoyed at herself for getting wet just by being this close to him, just by seeing those eyes.

224. He seems to have noticed, because he is smiling now, and moving closer, saying, “Maybe you tell Gambit later, eh, minou?”

225. And he tries to kiss her, to touch her bare stomach, with its network of tiny cuts, still exposed by the tear in her shirt—

226. And she jumps back, shouting, “No, don’t!”

227. He looks at her, perplexed. “Why?”

228. “My mutation,” she explains. “It’s back.”

229. “So?” he asks.

230. “So,” she snarls. “So, if you touch me, I’ll fuckin’ kill you, just like that woman.”

231. “So Gambit be careful, yeah,” he says, stepping towards her again.

232. She throws the tear-and-snot-covered towel at his face. “You’re too fuckin’ horny for your own good.”

233. “I’m serious, minou,” he says, catching the towel. Then he laughs to himself. “Gambit’s always serious about sex.”

234. “No,” she says firmly. “Not anymore.”

235. He stares at her. “What, ‘no, not anymore?’”

236. “No,” she repeats, more slowly, as if he is an idiot, which he is. “Not anymore.”

237. He is still staring at her. “What—you done, you close up shop, like that?”

238. “Pretty much,” she says.

239. He starts to laugh. “You sure give up easy, minou.”

240. “Yup,” she says. “Now move, I want to lie down.”

241. He continues staring down at her, then lets her pass. She flops onto the bed, facedown.

242. “Gambit don’t give up that easy,” he calls after her. “But we not gonna have this conversation tonight. Let’s finish the other one first.”

243. “Fuck, motherfuck,” she says, raising her head. “Is this conversation the price of your magic cock? ‘Cause it is fuckin’ cher, chèr.”

244. “Pas mal,” he says, impressed. “You speak some French?”

245. “No,” she mutters. Only the little French that Erik knew.

246. And dammit—get back, back, back, back, back, memory.

247. “So, this someone you kill for, he’s at the mansion,” Gambit repeats.

248. “How’d you know it’s a he,” she mumbles into her pillow.

249. There is a silence, and she looks up to see him scrutinizing her.

250. “Because it is,” he says at last.

251. “That’s a good argument,” she says.

252. “Tell me I’m wrong,” Gambit says.

253. She says nothing. “Aha,” he says, and she wants to punch him; knowing that if she does, he’ll probably fly into the wall. The thought is enticing.

254. “So he’s at the mansion,” he repeats, for the hundredth time.

255. “Yes,” she says finally. “Jesus Mary fuck. He’s at the mansion.”

256. She can feel herself being scrutinized once again.

257. “It’s the Wolverine,” he says only.

258. Her head whips around. “How the hell do you know that?”

259. “I didn’t,” he says. “Do now.”

260. And she is going to punch him.

261. He sees the impulse, and is smart enough to back away from the bed, leaning against the small desk situated on the other side of the room.

262. “Because you didn’t fuck him,” he says. “Barely even talked to him. That’s how Gambit know.”

263. She stares at him.

264. “He special to you,” he says, with a look she cannot read.

265. “No,” she says. “He’s just Logan.”

266. He starts to smile. “So you gonna tell him what happened, then, tonight.”

267. Her face goes white. “No—and please, please, please don’t—Gambit—I’m begging you—don’t—”

268. “Ah,” Gambit says, and his smile makes her chest tighten again. “He’s special.”

269. And she closes her eyes, feeling the tears already coming.

270. “Fuckin’ swamp rat,” she says, wiping her face. “The only thing I like about you is your cock.”

271. He is still smiling. “And tongue,” he says.

272. Then, from the desk, he extends his staff towards her and pets her head with it, as she begins to cry again.


*


273. After she has finished crying, he asks, “How you gonna explain the powers?”

274. “I’m not going to,” she says plainly.

275. He snorts. “So you just gonna walk into that mansion with all these new powers, and say, ‘Bonjour, everyone, Papa Nöel came early this year’?”

276. “No,” she says testily. “I’m not gonna tell them anything. I’m not going back to the mansion at all.”

277. And now the staff smacks her on her shoulder, swiftly and sharply.

278. “No,” he says. “You can’t stay in the city, minou. My friends and I didn’t do nothin’ too bad to those guys back there, but if they see you, they’ll kill you, no doubt about it.”

279. “They’re all going back to Japan tomorrow,” she says. “They were only here for the weekend.”

280. He looks at her. “How you know that?”

281. She sighs. “He kissed me, so I absorbed him a little bit. He’s mostly gone now, though. The woman’s taking up almost everything.”

282. “Well,” he says, looking relieved and disappointed at the same time. He has lost some leverage.

283. Then he smiles. “If you don’t come back, Gambit gonna tell your man what happened.”

284. “He’s not my man, and I’ll fuckin’ kill you,” she hisses.

285. That worked, he seems to think to himself, because his smile is huge now.

286. And she really will punch him.

287. “You come back, or Gambit tell everyone,” he says innocently. “That’s the deal.”

288. “What is this, blackmail?” she cries.

289. “Yep,” he says.

290. She explodes. “What the hell is this? Who are you? What are you even doin’ here? I barely fuckin’ know you, and because your skeezy friends spot me in the city, you come to play knight-in-shining-armor?”

291. She laughs, hoping it sounds cruel. “What are you, in love with me?”

292. “Little bit,” he says simply, and she chokes.

293. “Come again?” she asks.

294. “And again and again, as Gambit recall,” he says, grinning.

295. She grabs his staff and is really about to break it now, but he moves quickly enough to pull it back from her, and stand it up at his side. “Uh, uh, uh, easy now, chère,” he says.

296. “You’re ‘a little bit’ in love with me?” she repeats in disbelief. “What the fuck is that?”

297. “That’s that,” he says. “A little bit in love with you. Not a lot. Just a little. For now.”

298. “You’re fucking everything that moves in the mansion,” she says.

299. “So’re you,” he points out.

300. “But I’m not even a little bit in love with you, or anybody else,” she says.

301. “Really,” he says, and it’s that goddamn pained smile again. “Gambit don’t usually kill for people he just find nice.”

302. “Well, that’s why you’re not an assassin,” she says.

303. “No,” he says, staring at her. “Lots of reasons, for that.”

304. She frowns. “Look, I appreciate your—help, and all. But I can’t come back to the mansion.”

305. “Because he’s there,” he finishes.

306. “No,” she cries out, exasperated. “Because my mutation came back.”

307. He scratches his head with the staff. “Last Gambit checked, it was a school for mutants.”

308. “I just don’t have a life there anymore,” she declares. She looks down at her hands, covered by her sleeves.

309. “Last month, I could do anything I wanted, I could live any way I wanted. Now I’m going to have to be stuck in a bubble again, all covered up, with nothing. Either I’ll have to live there, all alone; or worse, I’ll have to get close to someone, be someone’s sweet unfuckable girlfriend again—”

310. And the idea makes her skin crawl.

311. She continues, “I’d rather live alone, anywhere else. Where I can live the way I want, on my terms.”

312. He looks at her. “You can live any way you want,” he says slowly. “You got lots more than nothin’.”

313. “Spare me,” she says.

314. He gestures at her body. “Look at all them new powers you got. You could do some real good on the team with that power, now.”

315. “Oh, yeah,” she bites out. “And what am I supposed to tell them about how I got these powers, ‘Papa Nöel came early this year’?”

316. “Could do,” he says, amused. “Or do what you said; don’t tell ‘em nothin’. It’s your business, they can’t pry. And I won’t tell.”

317. He puts a hand on his heart. “Thief’s honor.”

318. She snorts. “So what, I just join the team, just like this?”

319. However, having said it aloud, the thought appeals to her more than she would expect. Being strong, finally; being in control of something; having a place of worth; doing something helpful for the people who had helped her, who had given her everything. She likes that.

320. And he sees that she is softening, because he stretches the staff out towards her again, and pokes her face with it lightly.

321. “That’s right,” he murmurs. “Just like this. This face should join the team.”

322. “You just wanna fuck me more,” she mutters.

323. “Yep,” he says again.

324. She looks down at her hands, covered by the long sleeves. At the tear in her shirt.

325. “I give you a week,” Gambit says. “If this old thief’s tongue isn’t licking you in a week, then I’m using it to tell everybody what happened. Comprends?”

326. She looks at him. “Gambit—” she says softly.

327. “Remy,” he says.

328. She blinks. His name; his real name. She thinks she might have seen it on a document somewhere, but he has never told it to her before.

329. And she wants to tell him her name—but then she thinks—there’s still only one person she has ever told it to, and—

330. He raises his hand. “No worries, chère,” he says. “Gambit don’t ask nothin’ from you, ‘cept that you think about coming back to the mansion .”

331. He starts to grin. “And about letting me fuck you a little more,” he adds.

332. She can feel herself nodding. “Okay,” she says quietly. “I’ll think about it.”

333. “Bon,” he says. “I’ll be going. You go sleep now, minou.”

334. “All right,” she says, lowering her head to look down at her hands.

335. Then he approaches the bed, stands in front of her.

336. “You didn’t do nothin’ wrong,” he says, clearly and deliberately, fixing her with his eyes. Making sure she hears and registers every word. “She woulda killed you. Comprends?”

337. She closes her eyes and feels the tears and the vomit again, but she swallows them both.

338. “Yeah,” she rasps out.

339. Gambit looks somewhat satisfied. “Good girl,” he says again, and leans forward to kiss her—but she leans back, eyes fearful.

340. He gazes down at her, smiles, then brings his staff up to kiss it—even sticking his tongue out to lick it. Then he touches the staff to her cheek, her mouth.

341. “Ew, it’s wet,” she says.

342. “That ain’t what you said last week,” he remarks. “Bonne nuit, minou.”

343. “Good night,” she says.

344. And when he is gone, she still feels the wet patch on her cheek, her mouth.


*


345. The next day she buys gloves, more long-sleeve shirts. Knowing she has already made her decision.

346. Still, she waits five more days; she doesn’t want the rat to think he’s that convincing.

347. It’s enough time for the cuts and bruising on her body to mostly fade, and she thinks she must have gotten some increased durability, along with the rest of the powers that she is now teaching herself about, parsing through the woman’s memories.

348. She doesn’t have to teach herself much; she has taken the woman’s sense memories, too. She kicks, and her leg goes higher than she had ever thought it capable.

349. Though she doesn’t have the muscle to accommodate it yet, so she is sore as hell afterwards.

350. She spends nearly all five days working out: she goes running in the park; buys protein powders that taste like vanilla chalk, and lifts weights in a nearby gym, trying to ignore the stares from permanent members, at this strange new guest member: at her gloves, long-sleeve shirt, and long sweatpants. She sweats like a pig, but she needs the muscles in her body to match the ones in her mind.

351. But on the sixth day, she takes the train back to the mansion, and for the first time, she nearly calls it home, to herself.

352. But when she walks through the front doors, she nearly turns around and walks back out. She can feel the changed atmosphere among the students, knowing that she is at once “one of them” again; and at the same time, a total exile. Mutants whose genitals she has licked now give her a wide, wide berth.

353. She is sick and nervous and miserable, and for a moment, and she feels sixteen again—

354. Until she thinks, Well, fuck ‘em—and she doesn’t feel sixteen anymore, at all.

355. She thinks Gambit will be the first one to find her, with a smug grin and a sexual invitation she isn’t entirely sure she is capable of turning down.

356. But it’s worse; Logan is the first one to find her, just before she re-enters her old room.

357. And she has spent so much time trying not to think of him, so much time studiously ignoring his presence in her mind, that it has actually worked—she is surprised to see him; so surprised that she is not ready, at all, to see him, and needs to get out of this situation as quickly as possible.

358. Sounding angrier than she has ever heard him speak to her, he says, “Where the hell have you been?”

359. She says, “Manhattan,” and shuts the door behind her. And she throws herself on the bed, facedown, thinking, That went well.

360. Once she is in her old bed, she realizes how tired she is, and falls asleep, still facedown, her growing muscles grateful.

361. A few hours later, a knock comes on her door, and of course it is the Cajun, smiling like the cat who ate the canary. “Funny seeing you here, minou,” he says.

362. “Fuck you,” she says.

363. “All right,” he says happily.

364. “No, no—what I said before still stands,” she insists.

365. “What, how you can’t live your life the way you want?” He rolls his eyes. “Believe me, Gambit ain’t the only one who still wants you. You should hear the boys talk.”

366. She shakes her head. “You’re lying.”

367. “You think you can fuck a metal cock, or a cock made of ice?” he asks her, grinning. “‘Cause Piotr and Bobby are wondering.”

368. And the idea does sound interesting—but that’s not the point, that’s not the point, that’s not the point. “That’s not the point,” she says.

369. “That is the point,” he replies. “You can live how you want. You wanna fuck all the time, you got options. You wanna join the team, let’s go talk to Storm.”

370. Thoughtfully, he adds, “I think you should teach. Flying and combat, somethin’ like that.”

371. “You’re getting too far ahead of yourself, swamp rat,” she says.

372. He shakes his head. “Nope,” he says. “This swamp rat just showing you that you got a life here. There’s good things here.”

373. He smiles distantly. “Sure as hell better here, than out there.”

374. She looks away. “I’ll talk to Storm,” she says finally.

375. “Good,” he says. “Now what about the fucking?”

376. She rolls her eyes. “Good night, Gambit,” she says, closing the door.

377. “Remy,” he calls as the door closes.


*


378. The next day, she goes to Storm’s office. Storm looks worried, but not angry or hurt. Rogue thinks with a wince that she probably expects this sort of thing from her. Storm, who hadn’t been happy about her taking the cure—Storm, who had already come to the train station the first time she ran away, looking for her.

379. She realizes, for the first time, with horror, that they must have looked for her this time, too.

380. Rogue says, “I’m so sorry,” and Storm’s face softens.

381. Gently, she says they were all worried about her; Logan especially.

382. Rogue tries not to think about that last part, and apologizes again.

383. “It’s all right, honey,” Storm says. “We’re happy you’re back.” She lowers her voice. “And despite what you might think—I’m very sorry. About the cure.”

384. She looks down at Rogue’s gloved hands. “So your powers are back, now?”

385. Rogue nods. Storm looks relieved.

386. Then Rogue swallows and says, “Actually I have—something to—tell you about that, too.”


*


387. And in the Danger Room, fighting Piotr and Warren, who volunteered for this demonstration of her new powers, she feels great, better than she has ever felt before; almost as good as fucking Gambit, she thinks—

388. —and she knows her resolve on that particular issue isn’t going to last long. She is already thinking of scarves, plastic, latex, the Danger Room, the supply closet, the garage, every car in the garage, the garden, the medbay, every position possible, and these new muscles will come in handy—

389. And just as she is hook-kicking Warren in the middle of one of her fantasies, she glimpses Logan staring at her from the viewing room, and the fantasy shifts without her permission.

390. After the demonstration is over, she goes up to the viewing room to meet Storm, tentatively waiting for the barrage of questions from Logan—but he isn’t there.

391. She isn’t sure if she is relieved, or even more worried. But she has impressed Storm, and that’s all that matters.

392. And when she goes back to her room, Gambit is already waiting outside her door, leaning against it.

393. “You do good?” he asks, standing up straight.

394. “All right, I think,” she says, unable to hide her smile.

395. He gazes at her. “You look good like that, minou.”

396. She looks down at herself; sweaty, disheveled, make-up likely smudged, her armpits rank as hell.

397. “You like that?” she teases. “I guess it’s true what they say about French people and stinky armpits.”

398. “Not French,” he says. “Cajun. Better. Don’t forget it.”

399. She laughs and pulls the key out of her sweatpants. “I’ll try not to.”

400. Behind her, he is already pressing her to the door.

401. “Stinky armpits, huh,” he murmurs. “Gambit like it.”

402. He sniffs, deeply. “Maybe we make an appointment for every time you finish at the Danger Room, eh.”

403. “Pervert,” she mumbles, but she already knows that all her resolve is gone. She wants to fuck him again, desperately—until it makes her more sore than five days of working out.

404. And he knows it, the rat.

405. He must have thought this through, because he has a little square silk kerchief of his own in his pocket, thin enough to be kissed through.

406. Thin enough to be eaten out through.

407. And holy motherfucking shit, it is as good as she remembers, and she doesn’t know how she could have deprived herself of this for nearly a week.

408. Then he asks if she wants to be naked, or if she wants him to be naked; and she is touched that at the generosity of that choice.

409. “You be naked,” she says, reaching for her nightstand drawer, full of condoms and four pairs of strategically altered pairs of tights she had made while dating Bobby, thinking they could use them, though they never did. “As punishment for makin’ me come back to the mansion.”

410. And because her cuts and bruises are just about to fade, but aren’t quite healed, she thinks.

411. “Gambit makes you come in other ways, then,” he says. Then he looks down at her, and she can feel herself warming again, at the sight of his eyes. “And it ain’t no punishment.”

412. And holy motherfucking shit, holy motherfucking shit, holy motherfucking shit.

413. Before he leaves, he says, slipping on his trench coat: “Gambit knew you’d come back.”

414. “I didn’t come back for you, swamp rat,” she says.

415. “I know,” he replies calmly.

416. And she blinks. “No—I didn’t come back for him, either.”

417. He smiles, but doesn’t seem to believe her.

418. “You make this old thief happy, coming back,” he says only. “Gambit missed your face.”

419. “Sweet-talker,” she says.

420. “Yep,” he says. “Later, minou.”

421. And she stretches, letting herself bask in the feeling a little bit.

422. Then she climbs out of bed, towards her bathroom. She is drenched in Danger Room sweat, plus Gambit-sex sweat; but she kind of loves it, is a little sad to feel it dissipate underneath the hot spray.

423. And in the bathroom, rubbing her hair with a towel, she thinks she can hear a frantic knocking at her door, and she thinks, Gambit? An emergency?

424. She hastily puts on a pair of gloves, a new pair of sweatpants and a mismatching long-sleeved shirt, throwing the towel on the bed.

425. When she opens the door, Logan is there, looking half-furious, half-terrified.

426. “Jesus, Logan, it’s just you,” she says, when she can finally breathe again. “I thought there was an emergency or something.”

427. He doesn’t say her, but seems to be smelling her, taking in her clothes, her wet hair.

428. Then, with a gruff voice, he tells her she is a certified bad-ass now; she agrees, delighted at the compliment—especially from him.

429. Then he asks how she got the powers.

430. And she grins with all the joy she can muster in her heart, and shakes her head. “Not telling,” she says. “Why not?” he asks.

431. “Because I don’t feel like it,” she replies, and knows that she is successfully keeping all the pain and unease from her voice.

432. Because it is true, anyway; she doesn’t feel like telling him. And she never will.

433. He is looking at her again, and she thinks she knows this look; but it can’t come from him, it can’t come from him.

434. He moves, as though he is about to leave, so she relaxes; but then he turns back and asks her about Gambit, as if he is pulling teeth. “You and the new guy—that’s still going well?”

435. And she bursts out laughing, more out of shock, rather than an actual comic reaction. “Going well?” she repeats. “We’re just fucking each other.”

436. Although that is going really well; going so well, she already wants to do it again, is thinking of going over to his room.

437. She adds, “So yeah, it’s going really well, actually.”

438. Then she shrugs and says, “As long as the sex is good, I’m not that picky.” She wiggles a gloved hand at him and smirks. “It’s hard for a girl to find a creatively inspired partner.”

439. He says, and she doesn’t know what he is saying, “So what, anyone’s okay?”

440. She looks at him for a moment, then says, honestly: “As long as it’s good, and it stays strictly casual, anyone’s okay.”

441. He asks, and she doesn’t know what he is asking, “Even me?”

442. But then she knows what he is asking.

443. And he is really asking this, she realizes. He is really asking this.

444. But—she can go as far as he can, she thinks. If not farther. She is not a sixteen-year-old girl anymore.

445. She raises an eyebrow at him. “If you’re any good,” she says, also honestly.

446. He looks at her. “You got a scarf?” he barks out, finally.

447. She walks over to her drawer, retrieves a clean scarf. She takes off her sweatpants, puts on a new pair of tights, then walks back to him, like that.

448. “You’re prepared,” he remarks quietly, taking the scarf, looking at the tights.

449. “Yeah, well, I like to—” But he is already kneeling, putting the scarf between her thighs and she has to grab his hair to steady herself.

450. And when they fuck, neither of them are naked, because after he makes her come once, she lunges at him, practically the minute he gets the condom on.

451. That she is fucking Logan; that this could be happening so nonchalantly, so easily, makes her actually feel that it is nonchalant, easy.

452. Like she told herself; she has always wanted a life in which she could choose not to choose; a life in which she could refuse to belong to anyone. Out of the relationship game, the romance game, the intimacy game. She has enough people in her head; she doesn’t want anymore.

453. Nothing but an amazing fuck, eager fingers, a nimble tongue.

454. But if Logan happens to have all those things; and, to top it off, asks nothing else from her—

455. Then she can do it with him, too.

456. Why not. Why not. She is not sixteen years old, anymore. Sixteen years old and in love with a man in her head.

457. She has already long left that girl behind. It’s that girl that she needed to be cured of, she thinks. And she has been; completely.

458. But then she thinks of Harada Kenichiro—and the things she had just learned, that she hasn’t even let herself think about yet, the answers she has, the things she knows without knowing anything—

459. But she won’t, won’t, won’t think of them—they are not her memories—it is not her fight—it is not her past—it is not her past—

460. And now Logan is growling, and she doesn’t think of Harada anymore.


*


461. Afterwards, she tries not to see how much he is trembling; that he looks like he has been hit by a bus. She wonders if she is really that good; but she thinks she is, actually.

462. She says, with all the calm in her body—but she realizes, it isn’t an act; she actually is calm—

463. “Okay, you pass.”

She thinks about Gambit’s words. You can live any way you want.

This wasn’t one of the ways I imagined, she thinks. But it’s still a way, she knows.

She is not a sixteen-year-old girl anymore. In love with a man in her head. Knowing everything without knowing anything. Working so hard, every day, to erase it all, forget it all.

Like she told Gambit: she isn’t even a little bit in love with anyone, anymore. The only real thing is her own want. And she thinks that this way to live, is a way she wants.