Anna Raven (runsaway) wrote in tomorrowtoday, @ 2013-07-23 10:32:00 |
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Entry tags: | gambit, rogue |
Log: Rogue and Remy ~truthiness
Characters: Anna Raven, Remy LeBeau
NPCs: Dr. --
Timeline: Monday, July 22, 2013 - 11pm [backdated]
Location: 2nd Sub-Level, Med Lab, HSSot
Description: Its always life and death with these two, isn’t it? When he’s up, she’s down, he’s left, she’s right (hehe, Rogue’s right~); will they, won’t they? Like ships passing in the night... Here we go again! Tell-The-Truth day is over and yet listen to all the honesty coming out of Rogue’s yap.
Rating: TBD
Apparently something had happened upstairs over the weekend... With all of the crises going on at any given moment it was really hard to keep track. It didn't matter though. Nothing mattered, in fact. Nothing outside of this room anyways.
Three days had passed and there was still no sign of improvement. Rogue hadn't left Remy's side the entire time, save for maybe to wash her face and change her shirt. Otherwise she refused to leave in case his condition changed, not even to eat. The trio of doctors were able to stabilize him and saw him through the worst of it, now it was just up to him. If his condition didn't improve soon, she knew there wasn't anything to be done. She had some experience in this area, after all. She had seen this happen before up close and personal. It didn't make it any easier, of course, if anything it made it that much more difficult. Rogue was just biding her time before she had to make her final goodbye.
Her heart twisted inside of her chest to see him like this. So still. So quiet. It was maddening. She wished he would snap out of it, scold her for not doing a better job, or give her grief about something or other, show some sign that he was alive in there—anything!
It was late in the evening and she had pulled her chair close to his elevated hospital bedside, just sitting with him, making prayers to God. Carefully, gently, Rogue reached out and held Remy’s hand, locking his fingers with her own. It felt nice just to feel him there although now it was bittersweet.
"Sugar... This was not how this was meant to go down." She spoke softly, voice nothing more than a whisper. "Ah know you can't hear me, but there are things Ah gotta tell you anyways. Things Ah just gotta say because Ah might not have the chance again. Or the courage.
"Ah'm sorry Ah've been so awful to you. Ah would take it all back if Ah could. Ah think a lot about the night that Haroun died. An’ how sometimes Ah wish it had been me instead.. An’ how if not for me the two of you woulda been happy. Ah wanted to tell you this the other day, but didn't because Ah was afraid of what you might say. Ah was afraid you might agree. An’ Ah was afraid you wouldn’t hear what Ah was tryin’ to tell you.
“Its not easy for me to open up to people. Ah get scared that if Ah do, everyone is just going to leave me anyways. And it hurts too much to always be the one bein' left, so Ah push people away.
"But somethin' about you that Ah just couldn't stop. Ah didn't know how you did it either, 'cause every time Ah put up a wall you just found a way to slip past my defenses. God damn, that was obnoxious." Rogue let out an exasperated laugh, her eyes welling up with tears.
"You can be real annoyin' sometimes, you know that? Stubborn, too. Ah guess that's why we clash so much, maybe you an' me are just too alike. Ah dunno, maybe. Ah wish we had more time to find out. Ah wish Ah hadn't made such a...such mess of everything. Because Ah think Ah always knew the way Ah felt, Ah was just too self-involved to admit it sooner.
"From the first time Ah laid eyes on you, Ah think Ah knew. Heh. Ah thought, 'Honey, this snake charmer is as close ta Prince Charming as you're ever gonna get.'" Rogue sucked up a breath and held it a beat before pushing it out again.
"So Ah guess what Ah'm tryin' to say, Remy, is that Ah love y—"
---
The vitals monitor beside Remy’s bed that kept track of all the important functions, everything needed to ensure there was balance in his body, beeped as there was a spike in the readings. Remy was back, and his eyes were opened, the red on black onyx color combination flaring with light as his mutant energy had engaged briefly, setting off the sensors to the cables that were attached to points on his body. The static of kinetic energy burned out the sensors before Remy could put a stop to it, but he paused his powers, instinctively holding back, before the high tech medical equipment was seriously damaged.
He was stable, thanks to the expert care of the doctors on staff. There wasn’t much to do about the sensors, but such was the risk you ran when treating mutants in serious medical conditions. Remy’s arm was broken and had been reset, his head injury wrapped with gauze, torso wrapped tightly as well to support and set broken ribs. He was scraped and bruised, but after three days in a coma, those were starting to have signs of healing.
Focusing on Rogue at his bedside, Remy’s dark eyes showed profound confusion for a moment and he lifted a hand that was attached to an IV line and brushed his fingertips - hands bare of his gloves - over his own lips. “Haroun... Rogue?” His voice was rough from disuse and his breath, when he drew in a deeper one, was thready and uneven as he settled back into consciousness and out of the place he had been before. That place with Haroun.
“Hey, chere.”
---
The erratic beeping coming from the monitor had Rogue swinging her attention in that direction. She had been there long enough to know what it should be doing, not that she understood what any of it meant, she just knew where it had been during its resting state. This beeping, while a change in status, didn't indicate whether it was good or bad and Rogue was about ready to leave the room to go get someone, fearful that Remy was taking a turn when he spoke the first words she had heard him say since Friday.
Rogue brought her gaze back around to Remy. Her eyes filled with all the telltale signs of someone who had been crying for a long period of time, red rimmed and puffy. Her heart gave a leap. But the exuberance was quickly squelched when she saw confusion flash across his face. Disorientation was only to be expected, she supposed, but it still filled her with dread. His fall could have resulted in any number of head injuries, the potential for significant trauma immense. Did Remy even have his memories from the last few weeks? And if not, how could she begin to tell him that Haroun wasn't there? Or why he wasn't there?
The impending doom that weighed on her chest lifted when he seemed to focus after that, although she was going to need to tell him about what had happened. She knew he was going to have questions about why he was in traction.
"Hey, sugar," she replied in kind. Rogue wiped her eyes with the back of her hand and sniffled. "You should see the other guy," she told him softly, mirth in her tone though her voice was raw with emotion. She'd let him acclimate to being conscious first before asking if he needed anything, but for now she kept it simple just glad he was no longer in a coma.
In the meantime, Rogue had drawn up the hood of her wrap and billowed it around her like a proper pariah, settling into the shadow it cast over her face like a second skin. She was glad he hadn’t actually heard her confession. She didn’t want to lay that at his feet so soon after Haroun’s passing, if ever. It was fucking shameful.
---
A sound that could pass for a laugh stopped in his chest and Remy shut his eyes, pausing to absorb the moment. He was back and holy hell, it didn’t feel nice. “I look dat bad? Cause... Remy feels great. Je suis parfait.” His voice was strained and he didn’t know where or how to start assessing the damage to his own body. He yearned for that darkness for a moment. The place where there was no sensation. Coming back to the land of the living, having given his word or not, was a lot to take in. But Rogue. Rogue was here. And she had been crying. He could disparage living later. She needed to know he was fine. He was fine, right?
Remy opened his eyes and focused on her again, seeing that she’d drawn the hood up to shadow herself, to hide, and it brought a saddened expression to his bruised face. If she wanted to hide, he wouldn’t drag her out. Maybe he didn’t have the strength and maybe she needed it. “Where we at?” Starting with the basics seemed like something they both could handle at the moment.
---
His words, however rough, drew a smile to her lips but with her face concealed, Remy would never know it. She just... didn't want him looking at her right now. She didn't want him knowing that she had been crying harder than she should or that she had hit her own head while trying to prevent him from going splat. And on the cusp of her tearful confession, Rogue was looking to keep herself at arm's length. It was just... part of the life she had to lead, having to do the tough things time and time again—making the best out of just one more bad situation.
"We're at the School o' Tomorrow," she told him. "Do you remember what happened?" She'd get to his litany of injuries in just a moment, she just needed to know where to start.
---
Stark’s school. That made sense. “Believe I do,” he furrowed his brows and lifted a hand slowly, looking at the IV running from it with some consternation. “We was up dere. On de roof. You took a phone call.” He recited it from memory like it had happened all of ten minutes ago, an hour tops. “Told Remy to stay put.”
Letting the hand drop back down, Remy looked at her hooded visage. “Guess I didn’t listen too well, non?” A small smile ticked against his cheek and he swallowed. “Got anyting to drink in dis joint, belle?”
---
Okay, good. So Rogue didn't have to explain to him how he got injured, that was a relief.
"Yeah, but, here...," she said and rummaged in her seat for the water bottle that was there. Rogue hadn't really left that spot since three days ago. She had accumulated a few things. Water, magazines, Remy's playing cards. Though the hood remained firmly in place, Rogue stood to deliver the water bottle, uncapping it before she did, ready to help out in any way that she could, even if that just meant handing the bottle over to him.
---
Instead of taking the bottle from her when she held it out, Remy’s hand closed on Rogue’s wrist. He knew his grip was probably weak compared to her strength on a normal day, and even worse now, but that wasn’t the point. He pulled her closer, tried to, rather, fairly certain he’d lose his grip before she even had to give resistance. He was further frustrated that his other arm appeared to be trapped. No matter. Make the best of any given situation. It was how he’d been raised.
So before she could pull away or his grip could fall, Remy peered into the hood, “You saved my life, Rogue. Didn’t you.” He said it like a statement. No one else could have carried him back here in time after the fall. But there was an accusatory undertone to the words.
---
Even though his grip was weak, there was no one that could stop Rogue in her tracks like Remy could. Once she figured out what he was trying to do, she went along with it and moved closer. She could no more fight him on this than she could anything else. From behind the hood she met his eye, but then all too soon, drew back once more.
"Ah didn't do anything anyone else wouldn’t have done," she said in response to his words, but also his tone. Rogue frowned from behind her hood. Just what was he getting at?
---
“Non?” Remy challenged her logic. His grip fell back down, too tiring to keep up, but his eyes sharpened, moving to the chair she had been occupying, then back to the darkened profile, “Anyone else been sittin here?” He was still accusing. He’d spotted the magazines, the water, even his cards. “How long?”
It was taking a lot of energy to remain this focused and vigilant, but Rogue hadn’t left him any options when she’d pulled her hood up. He had to use his other skills to find out what he could. Plus side being it was taking his mind off the uncomfortable throbbing pain he was in and the fact he was sure it was being treated already by pain medicine, controlled in small doses through the IV while he’d been unconscious.
---
Rogue skimmed her cheeks with her fingertips and brushed away the tears that were forming in her eyes. It had been an emotional last few days and she was trying to stave them off because they were just too big and too real for her to deal with at that moment.
"Three days," she said quietly, but didn't answer his other question. He had had visitors, but she had been the only one standing sentry over his hospital bed. "You should drink something," she said in lieu of actually responding.
"Here... Just..." Let me. She didn't hand him the bottle this time, but instead brought the mouth of the bottle up to his lips to drink.
"We have to stop meeting like this," she said quietly. The lower half of her face was exposed by the light as she drew near again. Rogue gave him a small smile, although she couldn’t keep from wondering if this is what it felt like to have seen her moribund and dehydrated—heartbroken and desperate—but probably not.
---
Three days? Remy had been expecting a lot less, and it stopped his next question long enough for her to bring the water closer. He let her, but did so with a frown and only drank a swallow before reaching again, this time to nudge the bottle away and not to capture her. “Tanks, chere.”
Letting out a sigh and settling, hand across his chest, Remy realized what she meant by her words and smirked at them, “Guess we even. Seen each other at our worst.” He hadn’t been holding it over her head before, but for some reason, deciding they were even like that was sad. “But Remy didn’t sit for no three days at your death bed, petite.”
Remy hadn’t missed the tears she’d wiped away under the hood. Pointing them out would just make her lock up even more. She was already buried beneath her layers, her hood, hiding from him while still being at his side. It was confounding.
---
When he nudged her away, she recapped the bottle and backed off with a nod. She didn't have anywhere else to go but back into her chair and eased herself back onto it drawing her legs up with her, knees to her chest. "Guess we are," she said, equally as sad at that, but at least keeping it out of her voice if she couldn't keep it off of her face.
At his considerations, Rogue just shrugged. "So?" Then after a beat added, "It ain't really your style. 'Sides you were just doin' what Ah asked ya to do..." Sitting with her would have gone above and beyond the call of duty, when really up until that point she wouldn't have given him the time of day. And by now Rogue was used to being alone.
Rogue swallowed and then changed the subject on him, "You're goin' to be okay though... You didn't hurt your back or nothin'..." Rogue expelled a ragged breath and then sniffled again. "Dr. MacTaggert said you got luck on your side."
---
“Ain’t my style?” Gambit smirked at that. That wasn’t why he’d stayed back and given her space when they returned. It had a lot more to do with her than with him. And then it had to do with Haroun. He let out a breath and shut his eyes, the smirk staying in place. “A’ight, chere. Style. But Remy seems to remember you telling him to stay away, once upon a time, too. See how good I listened to dat order.”
The shift of subject caused his eyebrow to lift, but Remy didn’t open his eyes for a moment. There was a lot one could glean from another person when relying on senses other than sight. That, and it was easier to keep his eyes closed. Remy didn’t remember living being so tiring before. He wanted to get something more out of Rogue, something elusive that he kept just missing, and the frustration at his current limitations made the next remark an impatient one with sarcasm. “Luck,” he huffed, scowling up at the ceiling, “She ain't never dealt me a fair hand. Luck was on my side, I’d be in Barbados somewhere sipping a cold drink on de beach. Not...”
Fuck. Remy frowned in a wince at his own phrasing. He dragged a hand over his mouth as though he could wipe them away, erase them and try again. “Didn’t mean it like dat, petite.”
---
"That too. Ah said those things." Rogue considered her next words carefully, debating whether or not she should even say them. Ultimately she settled on continuing the conversation since, for whatever reason, it was easier to talk to him this way—half-hidden and captive, respectively. Rogue saw no point in postponing it any longer. Especially not since he was the one who opened the door to begin with. "Ah didn't know how you wanted me to react though, it felt like the world was closin' in on me." Rogue reached into her hood and tucked back a piece of hair. "Ah mean, no excuses for being a dick but..." Rogue expelled a puff of air. "Nah, just no excuses." She shook her head and glanced away. She'd take her lumps for that one.
When he fell quiet, Rogue swung her gaze back around to monitor the situation and keep tabs on his health with a vigilant eye. But he was just being quiet, resting, she realized. She then came to settle her chin on her knees while she waited patiently, just letting him take whatever time he needed. Or if that was all he was going to say she'd stay a few more minutes and then go find the doctor to let her know he woke up but was sleeping. She'd wait though, because if they saw that he was awake they might start poking at him, and she could at least spare him that annoyance.
What he said next had her furrowing her brows, listening to him made Rogue feel sad, but not for the reasons he might think.. "Mean it like what? Not lyin' here in a hospital bed talkin' to me?" Rogue resettled the hood so that it was still on but for the first time he could see her face since it had gone up. There was a light smirk tracing her lips, she was hardly insulted by his frankness. "If Ah were you Ah'd be sayin' the exact same thing. My bad luck must be rubbin' off or somethin'."
---
Remy gave a low laugh at that. Sure, ever since coming to New York he’d run into one problem after another. But that was the story of his life since being abandoned or kidnapped - he never got the straight story - from the hospital as an infant and entering a life of crime. Maybe that was why he and Rogue gelled together. All those hard knocks. If she only knew.
Well, at least she wasn’t offended that he’d rather be on a beach then laid up in a bed. Her company notwithstanding. “On de bayou, we call it bad joojoo. Could be we cursed. You believe in destiny, chere? De kind dat says we gotta end up one way and ain’t nothin’ ken stop it?” He searched her revealed face, glad she had come out of her shell some, and he was thoughtful, an edge to his voice. “Or you tink we ken change our fate and get a second hand under de table?”
It helped keep him alert, being able to look into her eyes again. And his mixed feelings about the prophecy regarding his involvement with the Guilds turned over in his mind to mix with everything else that was pooling together. The roof, the purpose of going up, the fall and what came after - seeing Haroun and knowing the experience was real, carrying messages meant for the living - Rogue at his bedside for three days and her shrouded but consistent presence. Somehow it was all turning back to the age old question of the purpose of life and Gambit almost shrugged it off. But he wanted to know her answer.
---
"Ah don't know about all that." Rogue seemed skeptical and the obvious answer was no, but she did consider it for a moment. "Ah mean, take me for example... you might want to say that considerin' all the bad shit that's happened in my life, but it feels cheap. Like, where an' when do you start takin' responsibility for your actions and the part that you play in this whole drama? Ah let things just happen to me for too long because Ah felt like Ah deserved ‘em—" That's what happened in Mississippi. "—But Ah could have done some things differently. Lots of things. Ah could have not given up...
"Mystique used to say we were masters of our own destiny. Ah think that's what Ah believe. Ah dunno. Who knows? Stuff just happens and you've got to deal.
"Now if you wanna talk about second chances, Ah'm livin' proof that they exist."
---
Remy smirked and reached out his arm towards her, his bare hand with its old scars steady despite the exhaustion creeping over him. “Remy LeBeau.” He introduced himself, voice soft and fading of energy, but he stubbornly persisted, “Some people call me Gambit.” On the theme of second chances, Remy thought now was a good time for them as any.
---
Rogue watched him curiously, not sure what he was getting at at first. Maybe he had hit his head harder than she thought. But then she understood his meaning and gave a snort, coupled with a roll of her eyes. Still, she couldn't keep the smile off of her lips. "Okay," she said tipping her head back to look at him and eye the hand, before reaching out and taking it in her own. "Anna Marie Raven. Its nice to meet you." When Rogue's eyes filled with tears this time, it wasn't because she was sad.
"You should sleep," she said after that. "An' Ah should go..." Rogue swiped her own hand over her face. She probably looked rough. And she had to work tomorrow. That was not going to be fun. At all. But better knowing that Remy wasn't going to die. Rogue stood and came to stand by his bedside. "You're goin' to be okay, okay?" Then, in a move that could only be described as atypical, she dropped a kiss to the top of his head, gently, soft and barely there, onto his jet black hair, then backed up again, her hood returning to around her form. "Sleep..." She raised her finger to him.
"Oh, but one more thing..." Rogue neared again, dipping her hand into her pocket to retrieve one of her burner phones that she was so fond of. Rogue took Remy by the hand and turned it over, pressing the phone into his palm. "Use it." There was only one phone number programmed into it—hers. And then, she was gone, slipped away into the shadows.
---
Remy’s eyes slid closed again when she planted the kiss on his head. There was a strange comfort about the gesture that he appreciated a lot. He hadn't had a lot of ‘motherly’ figures in his life and he couldn't bring himself to think of Rogue like that, either, but something about what she did just sat right with him. It set him at ease and he quirked a small smile. “If you say it’s so, belle, Remy trusts you.”
He felt the phone, watched her, gave a nod. But that was all the energy he had left and he was asleep, seeing her slip into the shadows and leave before his eyelids closed again.