driftfleet | .02 [ Mama Said There'd Be Days Like This ]

Entry tags:

.02 [ Mama Said There'd Be Days Like This ]

Who: Rogue
Broadcast: nope
Action: Planet with optional Vanquish options
When: Planetside, from beginning to end.

A Is for Augmentation
[It’s the middle of the night, and all good children are supposed to be in bed… so then what is Rogue doing, walking around the boarding house with her gloves off and her eyes closed?

Maybe it’s the same thing that has her shrieking awake a few night’s later, one single, panicked cry that she quickly stifles as awareness returns? Unfortunately, this won’t be her last night with nightmares… and unfortunately, sometimes the sleepwalking and the nightmares may come at once…]

B is for Bounty
[...hunting, that is. Rogue wasn’t planning on making a habit of this, it wasn’t really her thing, but if she found a wanted poster for a guy who did something that pissed her off enough, she would go and make it her business to hunt that particular individual down.

Of course, she didn’t really have any idea what she was doing. It just seemed like a thing to try. How do you find a needle in a haystack, and one poorly washed thug really was almost interchangeable. Walking up to someone and asking, ‘Hey, have you seen this guy?’ was probably not the best way of going about it.

In fact, that’s possibly the kind of thing that could get a gal more attention than she was looking for...]

C is for Chisel (and hammer, and stone)
[Rogue wasn’t exactly sure what that quadraped was, but… she has decided to call it a ‘zeorse’ and she is happy to see it. Do not doubt that she will be making friends in the stables and riding off on adventures…

And one of those adventures takes place after a week or so on the planet, and the quiet confirmation that both Tony and Zessica had… gone, Rogue borrows a chisel and hammer from a local She rides out into the wild and finds a cluster of hard red rock, and in the lee of the wind carves three names there: Tony. Zessica. Anja.

She’ll be more withdrawn and quiet than normal when she returns those tools.]

D is for Drunk and Disorderly
[Sometime after this conversation, Rogue will be… upset.

She will be upset enough to go blindly into the night with a powerful need to punch things, though with Kurt there she didn’t feel it was… the best idea, perhaps, to go and start a bar fight even though it would be so. easy.

So she just goes to a bar. And she orders a drink. And if there is a fight she doesn’t have to start but gets to finish, so be it.

So. Be. It.]

E? E is for Everything Else.

[On the Vanquish? Shopping and hoping to make something out of this material? Staring dramatically into the sunset?]

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

[Rogue shook her head.]

If it's a light touch, all I'll get is what's on the surface. Unless I go diggin' later. An' I won't. I don't do that. Not unless I have to.

[If it was related to a mission or to someone's life or... just so she could finally have some quiet.]

But if it's a light touch, there's not usually as much there ta even... dig into.

[She hasn't explained this much about her powers in a long time. She hoped it made sense.]

[ He nods, and more insistently, holds out his left hand for her. ]

Just to see if it's safe for you.

[ He's thinking of a good memory: one of warmth and family and strength in Hell. The Commandos, around a campfire, complaining about Frenchie's cooking. That won't hurt to give away. ]

[Safe for her.

Didn't he get it? It was about what was safe for him.

But no. He wouldn't see that at all. Jim was a guardian. And somehow, he saw that this hurt her too... he wanted to make something safe for her.

Rogue shook her head, ever so slightly. What would it be like to be this intrinsically good? She wished she knew.

If she was that good, maybe she wouldn't know what it was like to offer to make something safe for someone and be rejected. If she was that good, maybe she would have rejected his offer.

She didn't.] Okay.

[Slowly, Rogue removed one glove and took a half step forward. Meeting his gaze, she very simply put one bare index finger onto his metal one.

Her shoulders sagged in relief when nothing happened. Her finger stayed just so.]

[ He gets it. He doesn't care. Nothing can hurt worse than what already exists. Because she's good, and she's brave, and one of the strongest people he knows, she meets him halfway. ]

[ Jim's silent for a few seconds, and then gently, he curls his metal hand over her bare one, waiting for her to realise that her touch warms it up. ]

[Rogue was very, very still as she allowed Jim to... hold her hand. Her bare hand.

Who would have thought, on a night like this, that anyone would want to touch her? She didn't deserve this. But. There were gifts that were too precious to refuse, both for her sake (and oh, how she'd needed this. she almost felt she had a heart again.) and for the sake of the giver.

Rogue let out a long, shaky breath. She didn't pull away, looking at their hands and the wonder that came with simple touch, simple trust. As if trust and touch were ever simple.]

...your hand's cold. [A glance up at him, her eyes wide and open, vulnerable. She's let him in this far, she wasn't going to hold back further - the kind of intimacy that only comes with a close question, asked and answered, as she had.]

Do ya feel it? [Her touch. The cold. Anything?]

[ Sometimes they are. She should know: she's the one who reached out to him, but Jim doesn't mind reminding her when it's important. He wants to do more than this. If it wouldn't hurt her or compromised other people's secrets he'd have reached in and hugged her without fear or regard for his being. ]

[ They have this. It has to be enough. Rogue doesn't need him to be her shield. ]

I feel pressure. [ so he doesn't crush something by accident ] Nothing else.

[ The heat of a body, the soft texture of human skin, that's long gone. ]

[Rogue nods, her gaze going to his hand again. It was... oddly strange, to be around someone who she could touch, even in this way. Being untouchable didn't make her invulnerable, but it made her darn close. There was a creeping awareness of the fact that he could, in fact, crush her hand in his.

She slid it forward, grasped hold. Rogue glanced up at him, that vulnerability joined with resolve.] Sit with me? It's been... a real bad night.

[Please.]

[ He squeezes her hand lightly. The metal is now warm. ]

Always. You don't have to talk to me.

[ Just don't shut him out. ]

...thanks.

[The gift of sitting in silence was... one Rogue craved. She hadn't been able to do that with anyone, really, not in the same way since Logan had left. She had a feeling that she'd be able to do it with Jim, and wasn't that something.

She had a further feeling that Logan would have liked Jim. That makes her smile a little, wry and soft and she shakes her head.]

...but. Kinda feel like I've gotta. Don't want you havin' ta get anymore surprises like this from me. [That wouldn't be fair.

And then... then once he knew it all, maybe she could tell him what had driven her out. Once he'd decided... if she could even say it like she wanted to say it.]

[ The War made him appreciate silence, and dark corners. Maybe it's dramatic to say, but all men have demons and he would rather be on good terms, lest they rule him. There's already one version of him that's empty, and he fears the Winter Soldier finding out that it's not him. That man isn't nothing: he's echoes and memories and a will to live that Jim doesn't have. ]

I figured it was somethin' to do with your skin. I didn't [ he pauses, considering. They're still holding hands, and he squeezes hers again lightly. ] Lifeforce, huh? Ten bucks says you found out the hard way.

[ He hurts for her, he realises. All he wants to do is take this monster by the throat and get it to leave her in peace for the rest of her life — Lord knows she's earned it. But the world doesn't work like that, and sometimes all you can do is be with someone when they're going through hell. ]

[She would give a laugh, except... she couldn't about her powers. Instead, she ducked her head.] Yeah... kinda. I mean. It's complicated.

[The most raw experience in her life was still not free from Mystique's influence.

She swallows and tugs his hand slightly. Let's go sit down, she can't do this while standing in the street.]

[ He looks down at their twined fingers, and then nods, letting her lead the way. ]

[Rogue led them away from the road, to sit on a large stone a few feet away.

It was strange to be keeping contact with Jim for this long, but... there was no way she could let go after what he'd shared with her.

She kept a decent space between them, but she wasn't nearly as guarded as before. It would be silly to be. This was safe.

...oh hell, how to even start?]

With the truth.

[ Because, sometimes, it's that simple. ]

[...with the truth, huh?

In the short time of the walk to the stone, Rogue felt the returning weight of Kurt's anger and her actions begin to press on her. The truth? Jim wanted to know about her powers, and she still wanted to scream just a little and all in between there was the fear of rejection just... choking her.

She glanced down at their joined hands for a moment, and made a choice to be brave.]

...I was adopted when I was four. I was in the system 'fore that. Just another abandoned kid. [Although not every abandoned kid was found in a garbage bin. She was giving him the truth, but she couldn't say that one. It was in the file Mystique had shown her - who knew if it was even true? Part of her didn't doubt it.] The woman who took me in, she was real good ta me. We traveled a bit 'round the South for her work, 'til I was twelve an' she set me up with her partner. She'd still stay for long stretches, but... thought it was best I'd stay too, best I had a base.

...probably 'cause it was when I was around twelve they told me I had a skin condition. [Rogue swallows, and the empty hollowness of her tone is filled with banked anger.] It was a lie. 'cause the woman who took me in, see, her partner was a precog. An' they knew - they knew all about my powers. An' they wanted me ta be under their control when they sprung.

[She pauses for a moment, tries to wrestle her emotions into some semblance of control.]

[ Hardly a choice when it's all of her: it's in every last drop of her blood and written right into her damn DNA. But there's a value still in the choice, and so Jim squares his shoulders and sets his jaw, and squashes the desire to tell her she doesn't need to — he doesn't need to know this to care for her, or love her. ]

And were they?

It didn't happen like they planned. [A quiet, hard whisper.] You were right about that.

[The hard way.

What's the harm in one dance?]

But they found a way. For a time. Mystique found a way.

[There is a strange flavor in the way she names this woman, her mother. It is not quite loathing and it is not quite pain and it is not quite brokenness or anguish or love or hate - it is thick. And for all of its sticky weight, the word leaves Rogue's mouth like she is forcing it out, trips out quickly with almost a cut-off hiss.

Mystique.

"Tell me about the last time you saw Mystique."

She shudders.]

[ Not all love is simple or kind. Perhaps he's being impulsive, or overprotective, but he decides — immediately — he doesn't like this Mystique person at all. Never mind that she kept Rogue safe for all those years, that she had a hand in making something this compassionate and driven, even if it was an opposing force. Jim's had enough. ]

What happened to her?

[A broken laugh. More a sob than a laugh. Skipping to the end of the story. She'd wanted to tell him, but she'd wanted him to know, first...

She can't say it.

She can't say it.

She can't not say it. Her voice carries the strain of her emotions, the tension almost ready to s n a p.]

I pushed her off a cliff.

[And with that, she moves to withdraw her hand from his.]

[ Good, he thinks, viciously, but she withdraws and his hand determinedly chases hers, curling around it. ]

It gets cold.

[ He's referring to his hand. He could be talking about the stomach it takes for that kind of decision. Lord knows he was made for war and living there. ]

[Rogue caught her breath and turned her head slowly to stare at him, eyes a little too wide.

...would he never respond in a way that made sense? She'd almost think he didn't hear her - he was sitting here, holding hands not only with a walking biohazard, but a murderer -- a matricide. But she knew he heard her, because Rogue was certain that if she'd withdrawn her hand for any other reason, he would have let her go.

She doesn't fight him, though her shoulders round in an attempt to make herself smaller.

She swallows, feeling she should say something and not sure what. There is such an acceptance in his comment that... there is no room for silence, no need to rush and fill it with explanations that she really -- wants to give him. She wants him to know.

He doesn't seem to need to know to have made up his mind.

How is that possible? How is he possible?

Instead...]

I... didn't have the right ta do it. [Soul-gripping, wrenching, and the words pour out.] I didn't have the right ta make that call. It was wrong. An' I could have helped her, could have actually used my powers ta help someone -- an' I didn't. I just -- shoved her right off. An' I hurt Kurt, Gawd, I hurt him so bad...

[She shrinks then, even more successfully, curls up in on herself as if she could make herself disappear.

I killed my mother and I'm not even sorry she's dead. Still. What kind of monsters does that make me?

The kind, perhaps, whose mother had died the moment you found out your whole life was predicated on a lie? No, that sounded like an excuse. There were no excuses for what she'd done.]

[ Firmly, ] I'm glad she can't hurt you anymore.

[ Maybe that betrays his cold heart, but he never pretended that it didn't exist or didn't influence him. There is pain in her life and it's made her strong, but at the same time there's necessary pain and there's cruelty. Sometimes one looks like the other. This isn't. ]

[ And if she can't carry this with her then he will simply do it for her. ]

Did Kurt know her the way you did?

[...that was true, at least. That was something real. Mystique couldn't hurt Rogue anymore... not in the ways that she had.

Rogue was glad about that too.

Mystique had needed to be stopped. Rogue wished she could say she'd done it for that reason. She couldn't even say, for sure, the reasons why she'd done it.]

Kurt... it's not that simple. [She drew a ragged breath.] He's her... biological son. An' my teammate. We found out 'bout the connection at different times, but when we did... he kinda appointed himself my brother.

[And it had been something solid in a world where she had lost... everything.

Maybe Jim knew a thing or two about that.]

[ One or two. He tries not to think of himself as a person who needs an anchor, but the truth is they help. Sam makes things easier; Nat lances the wounds and stitches him up. ]

[ She's got to work it out, then, untangle this little web. Don't know if I'd do right even if I had the chance... ]

But if you haven't... not yet?

[She wasn't sure exactly what he was asking, and it was kind of nice to have a point of confusion that wasn't about this, but could instead be asked and easily clarified.

She even glances up at him.]

If I haven't what?

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