DARK SIDE OF THE MOON
thatcraftykid
track four // “GREAT GIG IN THE SKY”
ENOUGH ROPE TO HANG HERSELF
“Believe in what? You made – ” Suddenly, she has to laugh.
It’s too ironic and too hopeless not to. “You made us into a d-disease!”
– Rogue –
Even seated, feet solidly on the floor, this moment feels to Rogue a lot like standing on thin air. Just as if she were defying gravity, the nervous energy collecting under her ribcage pumps currents of warmth beneath her skin, straight to her head. She’s slightly dizzy and too pleased to do more than dart glances at Logan.
It’s absurd, the idea of him and her. A solid unit. Logan and Rogue. Never-say-goodbye, them-against-the-world, together-forever friends-maybe-more. Years spread out in front of them, decades. He promised her something too good to be true, and he’s in her head enough that she believed him. Yeah, kind of absurd. Definitely risky. But no more so than standing on thin air, and Rogue’s done that too many times to be scared of the feeling anymore.
She glances past Logan to the mother and son whose casual touching had bothered her earlier. The boy, face still red from the temper tantrum he’d thrown, vrooms his matchbox car happily on his mom’s leg. All it had taken was a hug from behind and everything in his world was okay. Rogue wonders what would induce Logan to put his arm around her again.
With a piercing squeal, the train jerks to a halt. Logan’s arm comes across her chest to keep her from flying forward. She grasps his leather coat, heart in her throat where Carol’s dog tags hum against her skin. A briefcase hits the wall. Like aluminum, the train crumples and pulls apart.
All of it metal. Magneto.
Light flickers as she stands slowly, turning to kneel on the seat she’d been sitting on. A lingering tear rolls down her check, because he’s here for Logan and it’s nobody’s fault but her own.
The expression on Logan’s face is one of startled readiness. Sparks cascade down the ripped-apart hole at the end of their car. Cape billowing, an older man in a red helmet floats in. He’s a sci-fi supervillain and he should be laughable. Anxiously gripping the top of her seat, Rogue looks up at Logan. He looks back, equally unsure of what, exactly, this mutant who wants a war is capable of.
Logan takes a hold of her shoulder, impelling her to sit back against the seat next to where he stands. Turning her head, Rogue makes brief eye-contact with the little boy’s horrified mother. There are an awful lot of people on this train and, from what the Professor told her, Magneto isn’t the type to lose any sleep over collateral damage.
A similar thought is probably going through Logan’s head. His claws shoot out right in front of her face.
“You must be Wolverine.” Magneto shares the Professor’s vaguely English accent, only it’s the opposite of calming.
Rogue’s adrenaline builds as she calculates just how much strength it will take to rip one of these chairs from the bolts and clobber him with it. She half-stands when Logan starts to move forward, but one raised hand, encased in a black leather glove, stops him dead.
“That remarkable metal doesn’t run through your entire body, does it?”
Logan’s arms go crucifix.
She reaches for the chair, but the armrest jerks up to slam into her stomach. The force of the hit tips her back into her seat and the other armrest crosses over her chest to pin her there. With all of Carol’s strength, she can’t pry them apart.
Magneto doesn’t even spare her a glance as he renders her helpless. His attention is focused on sadism. Logan’s claws spread apart slowly, each millimeter punctuated by his suppressed grunts. Pain rolls his eyes back into his head. Magneto lifts him into the air.
“Stop!” Her command comes out more hysterical than threatening. “Stop it!” She’d say more, but the armrests don’t allow her to gulp enough air to spew out the insults and profanities that would give her the illusion of bravado.
Through clenched teeth, Logan jerkily grits out, “What the hell do you want with me?”
“You?” Magneto chuckles. “My dear boy, whoever said I wanted you?”
Rogue stops fighting her restraints. Her. Not Logan. Magneto wants her. Relief and terror battle it out. With what must be a tremendous effort, Logan turns to look at her. She can feel his panic in her own mind. Rogue’s eyes are on Magneto, who, aside from the getup, is the picture of amused elegance.
“Southaven,” she says, getting him to turn his attention from Logan for the first time. Rogue sets her trembling jaw. Magneto kidnapped Senator Kelly and now he wants her. Southaven is the only link between them. It makes as much sense as any of this does.
“Yes, I know what they did to you there,” Magneto answers gravely. His eyes sweep over the silent, shocked people huddled in their seats. “Mankind can be so cruel.”
“Leave them out of this,” Rogue says quickly. She grimaces an apology at Logan. He’s choking on the need to sink his claws into Magneto’s throat; she can feel the echo of his fury. But there’s only one way out of this, and a fight isn’t it. “And let him go.”
It’s a bargain and all three of them know it. Logan, still floored, renews his pantomime struggle. Magneto acquiesces with a slight nod, pointing his index finger. Logan flies black, outstretched arms breaking the frame as his body shoots through the narrow doorway to hit against the wall. He falls to the ground, unconscious.
Rogue whips her head around to glare at Magneto.
“That was necessary,” he explains evenly.
Like hell.
“My methods are not Charles Xavier’s. But that is exactly why I, and I alone, can give you the justice you seek, for yourself and for all of our kind. You have seen what they will do to us, and you are right not trust them for it.”
The armrests twist into their former position, seemingly freeing her to make the choice that’s not a choice, just as the recruitment speech isn’t a recruitment speech. There’s something else behind it. He wants her for a specific purpose, and she’s not going to like it.
“How do you know so much about me?”
Maybe she can stall for time. Logan said he wasn’t the only one looking for her.
“I am in possession of certain files that were never meant for public consumption.”
Her poker face falters, and the curve of his mouth tells Rogue he knows full well that he has her. Because he has the Southaven evidence.
It’s all we need! Once people know the truth, they won’t stand for it. Not for one minute.
Rogue bites down on her bottom lip in an effort to push back Carol’s blind enthusiasm. In its wake, the fact remains the same – Magneto, the enemy, is Rogue’s unlikely redeemer.
He holds out his hand, palm up.
Adrenaline still pumping, she lifts herself off the seat. Her feet dangle over the ground as she glides down the aisle. His smile widens when she puts her hand in his.
“Welcome to the Brotherhood.”
The heavy knot in her stomach threatens to drop her to the floor. Only Carol’s conviction keeps her hovering. Rogue goes with Magneto but she looks back at Logan, willing him to stay down and get up all at the same time.
A man with yellowish green-tinged skin leaps off the top of the nearest train car, leaving behind a large sack. Magneto pats her hand as they float across the tracks and into the station. When they touch down he continues to hold it, like she’s a little girl out on a stroll with her granddad.
“Watch your step, my dear,” he cautions.
Rubble and glass are strewn everywhere. Cyclops, eyelids exposed, is slumped over a broken row of seats. A needle sticks out of his neck. The same kind of syringe hangs from Magneto’s belt, clearly meant for Rogue. The thought that she couldn’t fly fast enough away from him to do any good, even if she wanted to, is less than heartening.
Fangs – Sabretooth, the Professor said – comes out from behind the ticket counter, an unconscious Storm gathered in his arms like a prize. Rogue’s hackles raise. There’s something wrong and oddly suggestive about the pose. The Logan in her head wants to attack him outright.
“Leave her,” Magneto orders.
With a low rumble, Sabretooth drops Storm heavily on her side and steps over her body to fall in line. Jaundice-Man – has to be Toad – keeps too close behind Rogue, grinning a gummy smile. She straightens her posture. Better to be walking out of here on her own two feet than in a bag slung over his shoulder.
Except she doesn’t expect to exit out the front doors right into a full police brigade. A dozen black and whites are parked on the lawn and the officers ducked behind them have their guns trained straight ahead.
The police chief has a bullhorn over his mouth. “All right, hold it. Hold it right there. Stay where you are. Put your hands over your heads. Now.”
With infinite patience, Magneto lets go of her hand to comply. The two cars directly in front of him rise into the air. He gives the cops under them enough time to run for cover before letting his arms drop and the cars smash impressively on top of two others.
The police officers surge forward. It’s to their credit but to no avail when Magneto turns their weapons against them.
“You homo sapiens and your guns,” he says disdainfully.
Like cool wind, a whisper echoes in her mind. Rogue.
Suddenly, Sabretooth reaches out and takes Magneto by the neck. “That’s enough, Erik.”
Beside her, Toad turns. “Let them go.”
Now, Rogue. Go now.
The Professor’s insisting presence blows through her mind, stirring her up again.
Anna Marie, that’s too dangerous!
The files! We have to know –
“Why not come out where I can see you, Charles?”
It isn’t worth your life. We will find another way.
It was worth my life!
He’s right, he’s right. Oh, chickadee, listen to him.
Rogue shakes her head to dislodge the voices. What other way? Magneto has no reason to kill her. She’ll trick him and get away with the evidence. She has to. She already turned her back on what’s happening at Southaven once. Logan wouldn’t have done it the first time.
You don’t really believe it will be that easy.
“Can’t you read my mind?” Magneto asks, tapping his helmet.
The Professor must be having two separate conversations while controlling two people at once. No small feat.
“What now? Save the girl? You’ll have to kill me, Charles. And what will that accomplish? Let them pass that law and they’ll have you in chains with a number burned into your forehead.” His gray eyes roll to his peripheral, capturing hers. “But first they’ll have you again, locked back in a padded cell. Out of your mind with pain.”
It’s not the pain, Rogue thinks, it’s what they do to you when you’re not aware. It’s waking up to someone else in your body and a nurse making conversation about the weather. Chunks of you are missing and it feels like you’ve grown another head, but that’s not supposed to matter because you’ve got clean sheets and green Jell-O.
It won’t be that way.
It already is that way, that’s the point! Carol’s plea for understanding reverberates like pealing bells.
“Then kill me and find out,” Magneto challenges, voice booming again. “Hm? Then release me,” he hisses.
Toad’s hand gently but firmly wraps around Rogue’s upper arm, tugging her forward. Her mind’s so cluttered with Southaven and Carol and her momma and Logan and Professor Xavier that she takes a step.
“Fine,” Magneto snaps.
Under his power, the gun facing the kneeling police chief cocks. Fires. Rogue jumps out of her skin, coming back to herself and the present. The bullet presses into the petrified man’s forehead.
“Care to press your luck, Charles?” Magneto cocks the rest of the guns. “I don’t think I can stop them all.”
The police chief groans as the bullet sinks in harder.
Sabretooth lets go of Magneto’s neck. Toad loosens his grip on Rogue’s arm.
“Still unwilling to make sacrifices. That’s what makes you weak.”
Not weak. Principled. This isn’t the way. Let me help you.
Rogue swallows. Maybe she should…But a helicopter is there, blocking her escape long enough for Magneto to take her hand again.
“Goodbye, Charles,” he says in a clipped voice.
Rogue, I am asking you to trust me.
She tries to match Magneto’s long strides, recklessly letting Carol bring suppressed memories to the surface of her mind so that Professor Xavier will see why she’s doing this and hopefully hate her a little less for it. I won’t let them make me hurt anyone, she assures him, even though she has no idea what she’s getting herself into.
From the pilot’s seat, Mystique bares her teeth in a smile. Magneto helps Rogue strap herself in.
As they lift off the green, Rogue looks out the window. The sight of the guns dropping somewhat reassures her. No one got hurt. There was an easy way or a hard way, willing or unwilling, black or white. She chose gray. When Logan wakes up, he won’t necessarily understand her choice, but he will forgive her for it. Then he’ll come after her. After all, he promised.
She glances over at Magneto, then at the back of Mystique’s and Toad’s heads. Sabretooth takes up the seat facing her. His black eyes are more vacant than even an animal’s ought to be. He’s beyond feral, he’s simple. Controllable. The way the people at Southaven think all mutants should be. Rogue shudders and presses her eyes closed.
The padded cell Magneto threatened her with wasn’t hyperbole. Shame creeps up Rogue’s neck. For countless days after she’d taken Carol’s life, neither one of them had been enough of a person to assume control. When not sedated, she’d thrown her unfamiliar body against walls, ceilings, doors. She was moved from her isolated single on the second floor to the basement and left in a room with soft walls and only a tiny glass window on the door. She punched through it, slicing open her the soft underside of her upper arm nearly to the bone. For her shocked parents on the other side, it must’ve been like looking in on a horror film.
No matter what the doctors said, there was reason behind her behavior, method. Carol’s lifelong fear of the dark was exacerbated in death, bordering on phobic. If they pushed hard enough, they could break through to the light. If they kept absorbing more lives, they could fill the void in Rogue’s head.
She stares up through the black webs floating in front of her vision. A leather glove brushes across her damp forehead, making her flinch.
“Oh, dear. You are in a state.”
Mental fatigue clouds her brain. This is no time for coma-narcolepsy, she needs to be on her guard. Rogue tries to say something sarcastic, but it comes out a half-hearted growl. Come on. She’s stronger than this.
With gratefully borrowed confidence, she thinks, Me. Awake. Aware. Me.
Steadily, her vision starts to clear. At the sight of Sabretooth’s big paws awkwardly pushing a breeze in her direction she almost laughs out loud. Instead, she lets her eyes roll back and her face rest against the window. When in doubt, play possum. That’s what Logan would do.
It’s a few minutes before Magneto finally speaks, his tone tinged with exasperation. “You can stop that.”
Sabretooth makes a grunting noise and the air settles.
Magneto harrumphs lowly. “I should have left you with our friend the Senator, all the good you did me.” Fabric ruffles, like he’s massaging his neck.
“He was distracted, the big puss.” Toad’s chuckles get louder at Sabretooth’s answering rumble. “Aw.”
“Sabretooth,” Magneto admonishes archly. “Use your words.”
Toad nearly giggles with glee, a disturbing sound that Magneto cuts off quickly.
“I shouldn’t think you’d find the destruction of a brother’s once skillful mind quite so amusing, Toad.”
“At least he had something to lose,” Mystique puts in. Her voice ripples with contempt.
Magneto lets out a small snort, but continues in his teacherly voice. “Look at your brother, Toad. And your sister.”
Good lord. That’s one holiday card Rogue never wants to pose for.
“Humans, with their exploitations and their experiments, have driven them to madness.”
The edge of madness, thanks very much. Her balance hasn’t failed her yet.
“They are the reason we do what we must.”
Silence follows that rather ominous pronouncement. How annoyingly circumspect of Magneto not to exposit his entire master plan, thinking her beyond hearing.
Rogue cracks open an eyelid. No city lights break up the clear night sky below, only the faint reflection of the last quarter moon. They’re over the ocean headed…She racks her brain for an internal compass and an idea of distance covered at approximate speeds. Math is Carol’s forte. Logan can track anything. Between the two of them, by the time Rogue feels the helicopter descend, she estimates they’ve gone thirty to forty miles southeast. Not that that information does her a fat load of good since she can’t say with any certainty how much of the trip is over water. Even Carol the Marvel needs rest.
Helicopter landed, Sabretooth reaches for her. Rogue pretends to rouse and gasps a little for show.
“Now, now,” Magneto chides, wrapping an arm around her shoulders to assist her out of her seat. “You’re perfectly safe with us.”
She lets him help her walk, though she flops her head around for the satisfaction of making him lean away. Rogue doesn’t press her luck, as much as she wants to know how and why Magneto’s playing her. Sabretooth is the maul first, ask questions never type.
Rogue tries to seem oblivious while she looks around for any distinguishing landmarks. Zilch. Rock as far as the eye can see and multiple openings like the one even Toad has to crouch to get through. The ceiling a few feet in is ten times as high, with domed light fixtures where normal caves would have stalactites hanging down.
Curiosity gets the better of her, and she continues forward on her own to peek around the corner. Gleaming sheets of metal section off a couple of rooms, possible exits. Another curve at the end of the tunnel makes Rogue wonder how metallic the rock must be for Magneto to have manipulated it the way he clearly has.
Mystique steps into her line of vision, startling Rogue.
“This way,” she prompts, swishing her unclad hips in the direction of the other tunnel entrance. She trails her fingers lightly over Magneto’s shoulder when she passes, putting a hint of a smirk on his face.
And Logan thinks their age difference is pervy.
The floor slopes slightly under Rogue’s shoes the further they move inside. Even lit up and architecturally designed, there’s something inherently dark about going into a cave. The cold and damp doesn’t help. To keep Carol’s unease at bay, Rogue considers the possibility that Magneto is planning to have her work her cares away down at Fraggle Rock. It’s not actually that hard to imagine him overseeing an assembly line of mutants slaving to complete his master machinery of total revolution. Or something.
With such grandiose ideas of what a good lair should include, it’s a little anticlimactic when Rogue finds herself taking a seat in an uncomfortable chair, while Magneto goes around to sit on the other side of his desk. Mystique sets a laptop in front of her. “Mutant 579” is emblazoned across the screen.
“These files belong to you now,” Magneto says, steepling his gloved fingers together in front of him. “What would you like to do with them?”
Rogue’s hands remain her lap. “I want what you tried to trick me with. I-I want a trial. Unless…I mean, the evidence…”
“There’s no shortage,” Mystique replies, sounding almost bored. Her fingers deftly scroll over to a zip file, pulling up photographs.
She clicks on a few idly. Rogue on her back, making unconscious skin-to-skin contact with a medical cadaver. She’d woken up during that particular test and thought she’d killed somebody. Dr. Rao holding up a large, dried-out husk of skin to the camera, while Dr. Banks lifts the rest of Rogue’s stomach to reveal the layer of stone underneath. In the background, the small, blurry outline of Paige Guthrie lies prone. A wave of homesickness washes over Rogue. She misses brothers and sisters she never had. Gloved nurses kneeling on linoleum. Rita looks around helplessly. Vicky, who has Rogue half-dragged out from under the bed, is caught in an expression of revulsion. The color photo clearly captures the milky red eyes, white-yellow fuzz, and drooping whiskers that were the result of long-term contact with short-lived lab rats.
The force of her desire to slam the laptop shut and never, ever have to relive Southaven again is fairly overwhelming. Eyes stinging, she crosses her arms over her chest and concentrates on watching her breath hover in the air.
She doesn’t see Mystique click on the sound file, so when Dr. Demille’s voice, her slow drawl pitched to be coaxing, comes out of the speakers Rogue doesn’t hold back a noise of derision and distress.
“Tell me about Jeffery Garrett.”
A long pause follows.
“He didn’t regain consciousness for days after you left. We were very concerned.”
Rogue hears something unintelligible.
“Pardon?”
She listens to herself respond through clenched teeth, “He doesn’t want his power anyway. I just borrowed it.”
“I understand your desire to be able to – How did you do it? Blink your eyes and find yourself outside of your bottle, so to speak,” she says drolly. Dr. Demille thought it was delightfully amusing to compare mutant powers to TV Land shows. “To be quite serious, we were worried. Mr. Macomb in security woke up in just a day, but not Mr. Garrett. Mutants are better able to withstand your mutation. Isn’t that what we discovered when you touched Lora Gibbons?”
“They made me touch her,” is her response. Rogue wishes she’d been fiercer. To her own ears, she sounds like a whining teenager.
“I thought we had concluded that the force or impelling agent you feel when you’re on the brink of taking from another is the result of your own condition, exacerbated by repressed memories of the trauma you suffered,” Dr. Demille says.
“You concluded that. I never wanted to touch that crazy woman. She sees radiation and UV light and thinks it’s angels and demons.” A chair scrapes against the floor. “Can I go now? Clearly the sedative’s wearing off, and I’m sure it’s about time for an even bigger dose.”
Papers rustle. “Well, whatever you’re scheduled for I’ll suggest they double it. And keep the door to your room locked at all times.”
“They already moved me to my own ward,” she complains, though Rogue well remembers how defeated she was. “What if I have to use the bathroom?”
“Changes have to be made. Did you think no one would notice your late night visits to Carol Danvers’ room? The security cameras in every corner actually do record.”
A long minute. “You don’t have to stop me. Please? She’s lonely.”
“You’re lonely, Marie.”
“I told you not to call me that.”
“Mm. The infamous mutant dissociative name phenomenon. I will not address you as ‘The Rogue,’ Marie, however much you protest. It’s demeaning for both of us.”
The clip stops. Rogue wipes her face on the back of her gloves.
“I would have killed the bitch,” Mystique states levelly.
“I didn’t want to know her any better.” Rogue sniffs to clear her sinuses. “What about Carol? Is her file there, too?”
“Yes,” Magneto confirms. “However, I rather thought you would appreciate a firsthand account. A Senator Robert Kelly is currently enjoying my hospitality. Along with my special attention.”
Now that Carol is so much on the forefront of her mind, Rogue can hardly believe she’d barely recognized Kelly on the news just two days ago. This is the man who based his entire political career on the marginalization of mutants. This is the man who’d blatantly used Carol’s story to soften his image after a sex scandal ended in divorce, and then abandoned the issue when a cure didn’t come quick enough.
Oh, yes. A firsthand account is just what Carol wants.
Magneto stands, motioning for her to do the same. “My dear, I would like very much to introduce you to the brave new future you will help us usher in.”
Okay, that’s not something she or Carol likes the sound of.
With one hand resting between her shoulder blades, Magneto leads her through more tunnels.
She tries to pay attention so she knows the way back, but Carol’s memories of Senator Kelly spark into her thoughts at random. Kelly walking into her room at Southaven behind flower arrangements and in front of a camera crew. Kelly introducing himself after she won the Medal of Freedom. Kelly shaking hands with her father. Kelly at a press conference praising her heroism prior to her mutation. Always grinning at her, always putting his arm around her. “Captain Danvers, you are more than admirable,” he would say. “The future of America looks bright because of your selflessness.” Shortly after his last visit, Carol’s memories become hazy, incoherent. Dark.
Rogue almost stumbles, and she realizes with a start that she’s crossing a bridge that Magneto is creating out of scraps of metal even as they walk. The spectacle allows her to refocus. What kind of place is this, anyway? Now the lair looks more like a dam than a cave.
Once across, Magneto waves his hand to bend back the prison bars keeping Kelly locked inside.
“How are we feeling, Senator? Advanced, I hope.”
Confused, Rogue steps into the cell behind Magneto. Only a pair of abandoned leather shoes indicate that Kelly had once been imprisoned here.
Over the sound of waves crashing against rock, Rogue hears a pained, gasping moan.
Jerking his arm back, Magneto rips the barred window out of its mount. Assuming a casual stance, he leans over the side.
The raspy voice of Senator Kelly reaches Rogue’s ears. “What the hell have you done to me?”
Magneto chuckles. “Senator, this is pointless,” he observes, a smile in his voice.
Rogue edges forward, trying to get a look at Kelly over Magneto’s shoulder. She can sort of see him grasping onto the side of the cliff wall, but she can’t work out how he could’ve gotten there.
Continuing, Magneto taunts, “Where would you go? Who would take you in now that you’re one of us?”
Rogue’s eyebrows shoot up. Kelly’s way too old to manifest, according to every PSA she’s ever seen. So then how…
Magneto straightens, turning toward her. “The Senator’s fate is now our fate, just as the fate of every human will soon become our fate. This is the future. However.” Magneto steps aside to give her clear access to the gaping hole in the rock face. “For past transgressions, his life is in your hands.”
Hesitantly, Rogue takes Magneto’s former position. Kelly’s sweat-slicken face is tilted toward her, blind terror in his eyes. Hundreds of feet below him, waves beat against the shore. She reaches down to grasp his wrist carefully. Her glove does a little to absorb the wetness of his skin but he still almost slips, his wrist stretching bonelessly. Before he plummets, she reaches out with her other hand and drags him through the window by his collar.
He lands on the floor with a sickening squish. The effort to get to his knees proves insurmountable, and he flops down at her feet. She waits for Carol’s righteous anger to sweep away the pity Rogue feels for him.
Motioning cordially, like he’s hosting a campaign fundraiser, Magneto says, “Senator Kelly, I would like you to meet Rogue. Rogue is a former beneficiary of the excellent patient care you yourself pushed to the top of the agenda at Southaven Mutant Treatment Clinic. Rogue, meet the Senator. I’m not mistaken in believing you have a mutual friend.” Smile gone mocking, he clarifies, “Captain Carol Danvers.”
Kelly turns his cheek to the side to look up at her through his arms. His eyes, drawn at first in wary confusion, search her face. When recognition hits, his stare falls accusingly on her gloves. “You’re the mutant who killed her.”
Rogue flinches, but her body leans forward. “How dare you, of all people? You’re ignorant,” she replies, her accent lilting high.
Carol lets go hastily. Forgive me.
“Come now, there’s no cause to be melodramatic,” Magneto intervenes. “No one is ignorant in this room, unless deliberately so. Senator, you have seen the security tape just as well as I. We can agree on ‘euthanasia’ rather than murder, can we not?”
A generous relabeling. Carol’s hand may have reached out to touch, but it was Rogue’s monster who tasted her weak will to live and drank her in completely.
Rogue falls hard on her knees, bringing her palms down smack on the floor. “What did you do to her?”
Kelly acts like he didn’t hear. His focus is on the hairline cracks in the rock forming around her spread fingers. She presses down harder, her hands sinking like they would in wet cement.
He raises his rubbery face. “I-I didn’t do anything.”
Rogue feels her left elbow being lifted. She jerks her attention to Magneto, who stands above her. “You won’t get the vindication you seek that way, my dear child.” He pinches the seam over her middle finger, drawing her glove off. The skin of her hand is tingling. Reaching out. Magneto maneuvers her arm closer to Kelly, then steps away.
So obvious, he’s manipulating her. He wants her to touch Kelly; maybe that was the plan from the start. Maybe he needs to know something – But why not just get a telepath, then, or any other of the innumerable mutations that would meet the same end? And why tell her he has Carol’s file? She knows she can get the hard facts another way.
Only, she wants more than facts.
“No – no!” Kelly recoils from Rogue’s bare hand.
It’s been a long time since she was an object of abject horror. She doesn’t like it, Carol doesn’t like it. Logan hates it.
Rogue twists around, lunging for Magneto, hoping to knock him down. The chain of Carol’s dog tag stops her short. The garrote wrenches her back onto Kelly’s body, which absorbs her impact like a waterbed. Rocked by buoyancy and impelled by Magneto, the side of her face makes awkward but solid contact with the wet, salty skin on the back of Kelly’s neck.
She pushes against his body, the pull of her mutation, and waves of nausea. Breaking away, she skitters onto her hands and knees. Her forehead bounces and ripples with the contact against the ground. Fluids leak out through her pores to puddle around her body.
Oh, God. Oh, God. No, please –
Magneto’s hand hovers near her shoulder. “Don’t fight it.”
The light. She can feel the way it seeped into Robert’s bones. The whisper, Magneto’s damning whisper – “Welcome to the future, brother.” He’s been poisoned. He needs a hospital – They’ll know. They’ll all know what I am. Oh, God. Mark. Mark, who stood by him through the divorce, only because he believes in the cause and the threat – He won’t understand. His own son will disown him. Mark. The only person in the world who loves him. I’m infected. Oh, God.
With all of Robert’s terror, fear, and prejudice surging through her, she glares at Magneto. He stands, shaking his head in disappointment. “I had hoped you would be a believer.”
Clear vomit trickles out of Rogue’s mouth. Fury turns to incredulity. “Believe in what? You made – ” Suddenly, she has to laugh. It’s too ironic and too hopeless not to. “You made us into a d-disease!” Like AIDS. John would get such a kick out of this. “You made them right!”
“You lack perspective.”
That’s funny, too, because she has nothing but perspective – multiple, conflicting, arguing perspectives. Some in the dark, some in the spotlight. But, oddly enough, the sum of all they have to live for doesn’t add up to a whole hell of a lot. Especially not for Robert, who’s drawn himself into the fetal position. She’s mildly shocked that he’s still conscious.
Rogue sits back, her legs twisted abnormally under her. She’s almost sobbing now, because she made the wrong choice. If she dies here, no one will find her. The Professor will wish she trusted him. Logan will blame himself.
But maybe she won’t die. Magneto is still trying to evangelize her: “Look into the distinguished Senator’s thoughts, Rogue, and tell me he would not have exterminated us.”
The fine print of Project Wideawake. It may come to that. It’s a war. Does Magneto want to subvert it? Or does he just want to win?
Rogue find she doesn’t care one way or the other. Disgusted by his hypocrisy and his gentility, she draws her lip into a snarl worthy of Logan. “Go fuck the horse you rode in on.”
The syringe hanging on Magneto’s belt lifts and sinks into her neck. Grasping it between her fingers, Rogue tips forward.
“Young people,” she hears, before seeing dark.
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