Gift Of Flesh - Def Leppard

I am all destiny, a trade
A grain of sand
I am the lesson to be learned
I take the throat of innocence
And leave decay
I stain the way for all to see

No fear, no voice, no reason
In God no guiding light
When all the guilt that's in your head
Turns its back and plays for dead
You scorch the earth and torch the sky
Conscience low with head held high

Indulge and multiply
And sacrifice
As lack of breath chokes underground
Divulge degenerate
The darker side
From windows watch the screaming sky

[Repeat Chorus]

When all the guilt that's in your head
Turns its back and plays for dead
You scorch the earth and torch the sky
Conscience low with head held high

From all the truth comes all the shame
The curse of flesh just takes its aim
On hallowed ground and tortured sky
Walk in fear with spirits high

"I have to find out what really happened."

Kitty nervously wet her lips and pushed a strand of brown hair behind her ear.  "Rogue... I know you're still... in mourning, but, well, it's been two months now and-"

Rogue's eyes, clear and cool, snapped to hers and Rogue pushed herself to her feet.  "I know you all think I'm crazy.  I did too.  Until the day after the funeral when I had a session with the Professor.  He told me that he couldn't pick up anything from me of that night, except the moment I 'woke up' and realized I was with..." she paused, and it was an obvious struggle to keep her breathing even.  Then, "There is only one logical conclusion, Kit.  I wasn't in control of my body."

"Well maybe one of your personalities surfaced and..."

"No.  I would've known, and it's been long enough that most of them have faded anyway.  It had to have been someone with strong psi powers, now I just have to narrow the field a little."

Rogue's hand, gripping the backrest of the oak chair she'd been sitting on, tightened to the point that Kitty could see a thin trail of blood trickle down the wood from the force of her hold.  That was scary enough, but what frightened Kitty, really terrified her, was the look in her friends' eyes.  Grief, misery, anger she could understand.  But the calmness, that incredible composition that she'd once thought was a veneer to hide her pain, now seemed to be true, reaching bone-deep and coating her with a thin layer of ice.  She was actually relieved - and how alarming was that? - when Rogue hurt herself, showed enough passion about something to lose that bloodcurdling cool and show that she still felt.  *Something*.

"You could have been sleepwalking, or-" she rubbed her forehead briefly with the palm of her hand and blinked back tears.  Rogue didn't need another person feeling sorry for her.  She needed someone to be strong; someone to tell her the truth.

That she couldn't put the blame on anyone else.  It was hers alone to shoulder.

She hadn't meant to do it, it had in all likelihood been an accident, and everyone, *everyone* at the mansion was there for her, still loved her... but trusted?  How could they truly trust someone who killed with a touch, and quite possibly wasn't in control of herself when she did it?

"No, you know what Kitty?  I don't have time for this.  I can't sit around in the room that used to be yours and mine and chat about how deluded I am.  Because I know what I know.  And someone out there killed L-the man that I love, and I'm going to find that person."

"And then what Rogue?  How do you expect to be strong enough to find a person who you think is an incredibly powerful psi, and defeat them, when you can't even say *his* name."

Rogue brushed past her, and Kitty saw, with a troubled sigh, that the frost was back.

"Rogue.  I-I'm sorry.  I didn't mean to upset you.  I understand what you must be going through and-"

"You understand?" Rogue interrupted sharply.  "You cannot possibly *comprehend* what I'm going through.  Yeah, you sympathize, you pity me and you wish it hadn't happened.  But you have never loved anyone enough to ever possibly understand.  So don't you dare tell me you understand, because you can't even conceive of the *notion* of the strength of the love we shared, and you *never* will."

Kitty pressed her lips together and watched as her friend strode from the room.  She didn't blame Rogue for her words - they were in all probability the truth after all, and they'd probably been motivated by grief - but they still hurt, and knowing - assuming, she corrected, remembering Rogue's words - that whatever she felt was nothing in comparison to the anguish the other girl was experiencing, made her feel petty for even acknowledging the sting.

Well Kit-Kat, she thought tiredly, couldn't have blown that more if you'd tried.

Unnoticed, Jean stood outside in the hall, thoughtfully staring down the corridor at Rogue's retreating back.  She clicked her nails together and made a decision.  It was time to tie up a few loose ends.

When Rogue came to, she was sitting in a chair in one of the below level interrogation rooms.  She shook her head to clear the fog and was startled to find it ached.  She closed her eyes again and concentrated on breathing, in and out, inhale, exhale.  Then, expecting the worst, she raised her head and looked up... straight at - Jean?
"Jean?  What's going on?  Last thing I remember I was in the garden, looking for 'Ro, then suddenly I'm here.  What happened?"

Jean sat opposite her, leaning back against the chair, legs crossed, one swinging daintily to a rhythm only she could hear.  She took a puff of her thin cigarette and exhaled the smoke, lazily.

Jean smoking?  She never had before, always said it was bad for your health and stained your teeth and fingers.  I must've been really out of it these past few months, Rogue thought, not to have noticed she'd started smoking.

Jean ignored the question and said, with a little smile, "That's not important right now.  Let's chat a while."

Rogue tried to raise her arms and found they were bound behind her.  Battling down the rage that swelled inside her at being at someone else's mercy, she merely arched an eyebrow.  "Doesn't appear I have a choice in the matter, now does it?"

Jean smiled again.  That slow, cryptic smile that set Rogue's blood boiling.  What, now they had to tie her up just to talk to her?  Went to show that no matter what anyone said, once trust was broken it couldn't be rebuilt.  Then, something clicked in her head, and she thought, finally considered that the woman sitting in front of her, puffing nonchalantly on a skinny white cigarette, was responsible for killing Lo- her one and only love.  It took all of her control, everything the Professor had taught her, everything she'd learned over the past few months, not to reveal her knowledge, the hatred that blazed up inside her and licked at her eyes, causing them to burn with what she refused to think were tears.  She breathed in, then out again.  It makes sense, she thought, but first listen to what she has to say.  Listen, focus on getting through this, then... then you can kill her.

Jean drew lightly on her cigarette and said, "So Rogue, when you and Logan met, you were, what, sixteen?'

"Seventeen," she replied, coolly. "At least get your facts straight."

"One year isn't a very large difference."

"In New York it's the difference between being legal, and statutory rape.  And speaking of rape, how old was Scott when you first fucked him?  Or wasn't that voluntarily his decision either?"

By not so much as a flicker of an eyelash did Jean show she understood.  But Rogue knew, somehow *knew*, with instincts that may have been hers or *his* or Erik's or anyone else who was inside her, that the message had been received.  And by the cold glint of her opponent's - that's who she is now, she told herself fiercely, the enemy - eyes, that retribution was soon to follow.

Jean flicked ash onto the cement floor.  "Let's not get off topic, *Marie*.  You met Logan when you were a child, his nickname for you was Kid, am I right?"

At Rogue's terse nod, she continued, slyly, "So... if Logan had lived and the two of you had somehow managed to have children... Well, what if one was a girl and one day he noticed her looking very similar to her mother?  Given his track record with you, he might well have taken a less than fatherly interest in her.  Or perhaps a *very* fatherly interest, depending upon whose father you use as a role model.  So, in my estimation, I saved you and any offspring you might have had, had you not gotten a little too close to the truth, from a pedophile."

At that, any fragment of control Rogue might've had was lost.  She lunged for her, held back by the bonds and her own limitations, forced to watch Jean's amused smile as the ropes grated against the wrists bared by her long-sleeve shirt.  She gritted her teeth but couldn't restrain the harsh racking sobs from escaping.  Still, she shed no tears, felt them rip at her eyes but knew they wouldn't overflow.  Instead, they caught, dryly, at the back of her throat and she had to swallow several times before she could breathe.  The voice came to her from nowhere, providing the calm she desperately needed.  Don't react on your emotions, Rogue, use your cool, think.

While it felt as though someone had buried a hand in her chest and was slowly, methodically, ripping out large chunks of her heart while she gasped for air, she put on the act of her life and pretended to cry, tearless as always, shielding her mind, as the Professor had so diligently taught her.  Little had he known she'd be using those lessons against his star, and first, pupil.

Somehow, using strength she hadn't known she'd possessed, she loosened the ropes shackling her.  Still, she didn't move, waited, waited for the moment when it would happen...

Jean stood and walked over to her, a half-smile carved into her lovely features, and she leaned over, close to Rogue's ear and said, "I wouldn't have had to kill him, if you had just let him go.  He and I could have done whatever we wanted, without Scott ever having to know.  But you," she sneered, "he was always too 'in love' with you to even consider it.  So you see, *dear*, in every way that counts, it really is your fault he's dead."

And that was the last thing she said.  Rogue felt something snap inside her, and she reached up and grasped Jean's face with her bare hands.

The pull started and the other woman stared at her, shocked, unable to so much as move.

Rogue said, with difficulty due to the new personality streaming into her, "I did nothing!  You-you stole my future!  My life... with the man I love, will *always* love.  Nothing can change that.  Not words, not actions.  Nothing.  Everything you've ever said, everything you've ever *been*, is a lie.  One I won't allow you to continue to live anymore.  In fact, I can't in good conscience, let you leave this room alive."

She released Jean and watched her crumple to the floor, sifting through the new information for what she wanted most to know.  She psychically called out to the Professor, allowed him to read both their minds so he would at last know the truth, knew he and the others would be arriving in a matter of minutes.  It was all the time she needed.  To make Jean pay.

She raised a hand and sent the metal table flying through the air.  She let the table hover above the other woman, then slowly *forced* one of the large, hard legs through Jean's stomach, watched as her eyes rolled back in her head at the pain that must have been excruciating.  "That's nothing compared to what you've done to me, to *us*, but it'll do."

She twisted the table and then commanded it to pull out; it did, not with the wet suction of metal from flesh, but with long pulpy sound that reminded Rogue of what earthworms sounded like when they were squashed under a child's bare toes.  She smiled grimly when she saw intestine wrapped around the metal and said, "And you thought Erik was long gone."

Rogue pushed herself into Jean's mind, watched in amusement, the little worms slithering over each other without a clue as what to do, and then, as she heard the sound of footsteps outside, she lifted a mental foot, and crushed them all.

Later on, in the room that had once been theirs, Kitty sat with her, while the mansion was silent in shock and sorrow at what Jean had done, had become.  And a few, so very few, mourned her death.

The Professor had retreated to his private quarters, his apologies to Rogue profuse, his grief so strong that she, untrained in her new powers, had to ask him to block his emotions from her.

Ororo's face revealed nothing, not even her thoughts gave her away, but the pouring rain outside was enough of a profession of mourning.

Scott was practically comatose, they'd had to sedate him heavily to keep him from going after Rogue, and the sight of him kneeling by his wife's side, trying to push her intestines back into her savaged stomach... she didn't think she'd ever forget the anguished look on his face.  Still, she regretted none of it.  If she'd had the time, she would've liked to have beat the shit out of the now-dead doctor before killing her.  But there'd been no time.  Had the others entered the room seconds earlier, they would have stopped her from doing what she needed, *needed*, to do.

Rogue told her - the friend she loved and appreciated so much, the friend who sat by her side and had accepted everything she'd dished out - what had happened, and she knew, would've known even without telepathy, that Kitty was of mixed emotions about the whole thing.  She loved her, hadn't loved Jean, and Jean had deserved everything she'd got, but the fact that Rogue had killed her, cold-bloodedly, well that was something to think about, and Rogue understood.

Kitty said, softly, not wanting to hurt Rogue, "It was... him, wasn't it?  The one who helped you in the end?"

"Yeah.  I thought he was gone, but he was just... hibernating, I guess, laying low to stop from hurting me any more, waiting until I needed him.  Then he reared up, strong as ever, rallied the troops, so to speak.  He reached and pulled Erik out, helped me to save myself, to... avenge his death."

Kitty hugged her friend and then pulled back when she felt something wet against her cheek.  Her own eyes misted up when she saw the tears trickling down Rogue's cheeks, and she sniffled, "L-He... You vindicated yourself, and... you *did* avenge him, Rogue.  You did."

Rogue smiled and said thickly, simply, "His name... is Logan."
 

END