Two Pair
Interlude: Phone Calls
by L.M Griffin
Logan wasn't sure what was more disturbing: the fact he was pulled
out of a sound sleep, or that he had been in such a deep dream that
it took a ringing phone to wake him up. He growled low in his throat,
shoving aside the covers to grab the phone off the cradle. Running his
fingers through his already pointed hair, he snapped into the phone,
"Yeah?"
The accented voice on the other end was quietly wry. "Gee, Logan...ya
almost sound like ya ain't glad ta hear from an ole friend."
Logan's bushy eyebrows raised to the ceiling. "LeBeau?"
A bitter chuckle filled the phone. "Congrats, Wolverine. Got it right
on de first guess. Gambit should give ya a box o' cigars."
"Where are ya, kid?" Logan asked warily, even though the question
more on his mind was, 'How in the hell did you get out of Anarctica?'
No-one had seen or heard from the thief since Rogue had...left him stranded
at Magneto's base. Not that Logan could blame the kid. If the team had
left him in the middle of nowhere with no food or water, and no concievable
way of getting back to civilization, he'd be a little 'miffed' too.
Might not want to get all 'chummy-chummy' again with the old gang.
He was Wolverine, however. He would have found his way back. Apparently,
so had Gambit. A fact which heightened the Canadian's opinion of Gambit
considerably.
Logan noted the coldness flickering through the younger man's voice
as LeBeau said, "T'aint none of yer bus'ness, Logan. Jest called ta
ask ya to do somethin' for me..."
Logan felt his bushy eyebrows raise again. "Oh, and what's that?"
"I'm gonna give ya a phone number. Want ya ta pass it on to Jubilee.
Don't let anyone else have it, or Gambit be plenty sore with one Canucklehead,"
came the terse reply. Yet even with the shortness of it, Logan noted
a deeper edge of emotion.
Logan's smile became almost feral as he answered. "Me 'n the kid
been talkin' more lately, 'cept she ain't sayin' much. She don't open
up to me if she thinks it's gonna worry me." He smirked. "Can't say
I blame the pun'kin. When I worry, I tend to rip into furniture. She
brought your name up a few times, said she missed ya. I figured out,
what between what 'Ro was tellin' me, 'n the fact the kid's been worried
about ya, that you two have gotten closer over the past year 'n a half.
Kinda wonderin' how close m'self, actually."
The temperature in LeBeau's voice dropped again, as Logan was rather
happy to note. "We made a pact. Her for me, me for her. We watch each
others backs. Nothin' else." There was another pause. "What did every'ne
tell her 'bout me?"
Logan took a moment to process the information before he carefully
chose what he was going to say. LeBeau didn't know what had happened
to Jubilee. For that matter, no-one did. When Logan had found her in
the desert, she had looked beaten six ways 'till Sunday, but she had
insisted that it had all came from escaping Bastion's citadel. He didn't
believe that for a red-hot minute,
but when he had pushed her for more information when they had all gotten
back to civilization...she just clammed up. Insisted she was fine.
After all she had been through, no one wanted to tell her that Remy
was gone, what his 'crime towards all mutants' was. Logan himself had
done it for a different reason. If the kid talked to Remy, she'd open
up to him again. Logan didn't know what Jubilee would think of Remy's
past, but he knew the girl trusted the thief. That, in itself, was good
enough for Logan.
"We told her you had family business to take care of. That you'd
get in touch when you could." Logan fibbed. Truth of the matter, no-one
had told Jubilee anything, which, he had argued
about with Chuck, wasn't going to cut it. The kid kept on asking, and
everyone just kept on...changing the subject. Jubilee wasn't going to
wait much longer until she took the initiative and went to find Remy
on her own.
The answer he gave, however, seemed to satisfy LeBeau. "Bien. Take
this number down...'n remember, Jubilee. No one else." the
thief said quickly.
Logan cleared his throat. "Not Rogue."
LeBeau's voice sounded choked. "Non."
"Not Storm."
"Non."
"Just Jubilee."
"Oui."
"Huh."
"I told ya, Logan...dere is nothin'. She is just a ch'ld."
"..she's not gonna be a 'ch'ld' forever..."
"Quoi? Speak up dere, Logan. I can't hear you."
"Nothin' important. What was the number?"
LeBeau gave the number, then promptly hung up.
Logan left the number folded beside the phone as he flopped back
down on his bed. He folded his arms above his head, and proceeded to
meditate the rest of the night. The next morning he walked into the
kitchen, scratching his head. Ororo and Rogue were already awake, and
he noted that, yet again, both women looked like they hadn't slept well.
They greeted him quietly, as he grunted in response to them. He was
never pleasant until the caffeine kicked in all the way. He walked over
to the coffee pot, pouring himself a large cup.
"Yah were gettin' a call purty late last night, Logan..." Rogue murmered
behind him, lifting a forkful of eggs towards her mouth. She frowned
at it, but ate it anyways. Sleep deprivation was one thing. Food was
something else.
Logan turned, lifting one eyebrow, as Ororo added, "Was it something
important, Logan?"
Logan looked at the two women before him, his blue eyes reading them.
What was going to be best for everyone involved here? That he break
his promise to LeBeau, and tell the two women the young man had considered his closest companions that Gambit was alive
and well, but just didn't want to see them?
Tell them that Remy only trusted one person in the entire world completely,
and she was a fifteen year old girl?
"Just an old friend, gals...catchin' up on old times. He fergot about
the time difference." Logan shrugged. The two women nodded their heads,
then moved their conversation on to more trivial topics. Logan drank
his coffee, saying nothing. For better or for worse, Gambit was going
to have to come back on his own. How he dealt with all his 'family'
then...well...
Only time would tell. Right now, time seemed to be the only thing
alloted to them.
******
The cellphone rang in the fancy penthouse suite in Chicago. Once.
Twice. Remy LeBeau opened his left eye, the red glowing with irritation.
Maybe if he just ignored it....
The phone kept ringing. With annoying persistance. He sighed, and
groped over to the nightstand, picking up the phone and speaking groggily
into it, "Halo? LeBeau here. Dis bettah be good, or som'one's dead."
There was a rustling, and something close to quiet sniffling. A young
female voice whispered, "Remy? I'm sorry...I'm just so scared...and
I needed to talk to someone...and Wolverine just gets all snarly when
I bring up stuff like this..."
Remy sat upright in bed, now fully awake. It was Jubilee, and she
needed him. "What is it, p'tite? Gambit's here." he soothed, checking
the clock. 2:00 A.M. He could probably make it to Masschusetts in a
few hours, if he broke every concievable speeding law that had ever
existed.
There was a quiet sigh, and Jubilee sniffled again. "You're gonna
think it's stupid."
Hm. Maybe he wouldn't have to drive to
Masschusetts. Well, all the better. "I'm not gonna know till ya tell
me, Jubilee..." he said calmly, running his fingers through his tangled
auburn hair.
"I had a nightmare...a nightmare that Bastion had me again..." Jubilee
said into the phone, as if she were saying she had wet her bed, or something
equally humiliating. Sitting in the closet in the downstairs front hall
of the Academy, she felt terribly young and afraid. She couldn't talk
to anyone here...and Wolverine was already upset about what little she
had told him about the entire experience with Bastion. She didn't want
to disturb him any further...so...she called in the other front runner.
Anyone else would have been annoyed and told her to go back to sleep,
it was just a dream. Remy, on the other hand, felt his mind sharpen.
Jubilee didn't just call up someone about nightmares. She was obviously
upset, and afraid. Besides, he had only heard brief snatches of what
happened to the girl through old 'friends'. He hadn't known she was
actually captured by Bastion. He leaned back on his pillow, keeping
his tone neutral. "Do ya want to talk 'bout it?"
Jubilee closed her eyes, gripping the phone tightly in her small
hand. She took a deep breath, and started speaking, her voice getting
higher and higher as she went on. "Yeah, I do. It started out in the
chair that Bastion strapped me to..."
...She was back in Bastion's stronghold, and he was ramming mental
attack after attack to her head, trying to force her to give him the
information he wanted on the X-Men . She screamed, the pain ripping
her brain apart. She tried to keep silent, tried to tell him nothing
about the X-Men, but the pain was too much. In her dreams, she told
Bastion everything she knew...
...Suddenly, she was free of Bastion's citadel, and running through
the woods outside the Mansion. What she was running from, she could
only imagine, but she knew if she got to the Mansion she would be safe.
Wolverine would be there, and he always protected her. Or Gambit. Gambit
would keep her safe, it was part of their deal. The creature following
her couldn't stop two of the most dangerous X-Men ever known. As she
ran, she noticed a fog moving through the trees. As she neared the Mansion,
the fog grew thicker. So thick she started choking on it...
...It wasn't until she cleared the trees when she realized the fog
was actually smoke. Her eyes widened in horror as she saw the Mansion
ablaze, Sentinals crawling all over the grounds, or what was left of
them. She could see something lying on the ground, and she cautiously
moved forward to see better. The stench of something dead filled her
nose, and as she stepped over the object, she understood where the smell
had come from. All around lay the X-Men, lying in various broken poses.
Dead, to the last one. She moved through their bodies, face frozen in
shock and horror...
The only thought that would come to her was, 'It's all my fault.
All my fault.'
...She knelt between the two broken bodies of her Logan and Remy,
tears flowing down her cheeks freely. She sobbed, resting her head againist
the blood soaked grass. "I'm so sorry...I didn't mean to...I'm sorry.."
Then she heard Bastion's voice above her, "I'm afraid my dear, that
sorry just won't cut it this time, now will it?" She raised her head
in horror, as he brought down a huge hunting knife towards her chest...
******
"...and then I woke up. Screaming." Jubilee finished. She could feel
sweat on her brow, as she rested her head againist her knees. She felt
slightly nauseous.
Remy, on the other hand, felt fully sick to his stomach. If he hadn't
been completely sure that Bastion had gotten his, he would have gone
out and hunted the twisted madman down himself. Rage was literally filling
his veins. Jubilee had been tortured and beaten, and her very sense
of self was shaken to the core. No wonder her voice sounded so bruised,
so lost. He was on the killing edge just imagining what she had to have
gone through.
He took a deep, calming breath. Jubilee didn't need his anger, she
needed his support. "P'tite...it wasn't your fault Bastion captured
you...'n if you had given him anythin', it would've been under extreme
duress."
"Yeah, but I would have betrayed the team...it could've ended up
with all o' you dead..." Jubilee said quietly, moving her dark hair
away from her red-rimmed blue eyes.
Remy sighed softly. "Som'times, p'tite...things happen dat be outta
our control. Som'times...ya don't mean to end up hurtin' da ones you
love, or even innocent strangers. But somethin', or som'one, took yer
fate outta yer hands, 'n ya end up doing things dat end up...leadin'
to people gettin' hurt..." There was a long pause from Remy, as he closed
his eyes, trying to fight back the pain that was welling up in his own
chest. Memories of dark tunnels, of screams of terror, of death...
"Yeah...I guess so. I guess that means that...it wouldn't have been
my fault. 'Cuz was just a...a stupid mistake." Jubilee felt slightly
better, as she added, "People can't hate you for a mistake. They might
not forgive you right away, but everyone makes stupid mistakes, so sooner
or later they should. Right Remy?"
She frowned into the phone, because the silence was lengthening.
Something prickled at the back of her neck, as she spoke into the phone,
a bit louder, "Yo Gumbo? Still breathin'?"
"Hm? Oh yes, Jubilee, jest takin' ta heart what you said. You speakin'
a few truths dat I be thinkin'...be thinkin' some people would benefit
from." Remy felt a bitter smile touch his lips.
The prickling was creeping all down Jubilee's spine. Something was
wrong. Very wrong. She wasn't sure what it was, but everyone had been
avoiding her questions about Remy lately, and now here he was on the
phone. Sounding...soul weary. She felt the muscles in her cheeks tighten.
"Remy, you okay?" her voice had dropped low again.
Remy felt something crack inside of his chest, and he closed his
eyes tightly. "Who me? Nevah been better, p'tite. Why ya ask?"
"No reason...you just seem tired, is all." Jubilee frowned, tugging
on a lock of dark hair for a moment. Oh-kay, this was bad. She knew Remy was lying to her.
"Well p'tite...ya called Gambit at 2:00 A.M. He's not 'xacly in his
best form, non?" Remy forced cheer into his voice.
"Oh...all right. Then I guess I should let you go then, so you can
get some sleep." Jubilee said slowly. And with complete disbelief.
Remy winced slightly. She knew something was wrong, that he was hiding
something from her. He nearly told her everything then, about his own
crimes, and the trial with Eric the Red. Being left by the woman he
thought he loved in the middle of the frozen wastelands of Anaractica
to die. He couldn't though. He couldn't bear it if Jubilee turned away
from him too, for what he had done. After everything else he had lost...she
was the only good thing he had left.
"Yah, gotta catch a flight ta Korea tomorrow." he said slowly. "Gambit
got somethin' ta do overseas, but he'll call ya when he can get a chance.
Good eno'gh?"
"Gonna have to be, fer now," Jubilee paused for a moment, as she
leaned back againist the wall. "Hey, Remy?"
"Yah Jubilee?" Remy covered his eyes with his hand. He had a feeling
he wouldn't be sleeping anymore tonight. The nightmares would be just
too vivid.
"I miss ya...take care of yerself. Don't get into any jams where
I can't get to ya to pull yer troublesome hide out of." Jubilee's voice
was soft, that note of complete caring there. She did care about Remy.
Heck, she loved him as much as she could. At least as much as she loved
Logan. Now there was a shocker.
Remy wiped at his face, not surprised to find a small tear trickling
down his cheek. His voice was a bit rough around the edges when he replied,
"I miss you too, p'tite...don't worry about dis ole thief. He's gotta
come back in one piece. He made a promise to a spec'al lady he would
be dere for her, no matter what."
"Darned skippy....one more thing, Gumbo..," Jubilee's lips quirked.
"Don't call me p'tite."
Remy laughed softly into the phone before adding with a smirk, "But
of course...p'tite." He clicked off the cellphone, still smiling. Surprisingly
enough, he managed to drop off to sleep with little trouble, comforting
images of laughing blue eyes in a china doll face following him into
the dream world.
Jubilee put the phone back on the cradle, her blue eyes narrowed
with thought. Something was up. Something with Remy. Something...horrible.
'Cuz he wasn't back at the Mansion (it was 1 A.M on the East Coast...),
no one wanted to talk about him ("Where's Remy, 'Ro?" "...how are classes
going, Jubilee?"), and most importantly...Remy hadn't mentioned Rogue.
Once. With all the trouble lately with the 'kiss' and Joseph, Remy couldn't
have one conversation without worrying about her. Jubilee, frankly,
had gotten just a little tired of it. It was like listening to Paige wail on and
on about Jono. Yet, he hadn't brought her up. At all.
Jubilee added up what she knew. Remy wasn't at the Mansion, and the
other X-Men didn't seem to want to talk about him. Meaning it was big,
as in team encompassing. On Remy's part it somehow involved Rogue. In
a bad, bad way. No wonder Wolvie had given her the phone number under
the strict instructions that she not give it out to anyone. Hm. All
right. It was about time she got some real answers on what was going
on down there in Salem. She yawned for a moment, crawling out of the
closet and putting the phone back where it belonged. She plotted as
she made her way back to her room. Oh, she'd get to the bottom of this.
And with the recent news from Logan, she knew just who to crack for
information...
*******
Ring. Ring. Click. "Xavier's School for Gifted Youngters. Salem Center."
Kitty Pryde said, brushing brown curls from her face. She was slightly
out of breath, having forgotten just how big the Mansion was in her absence. She had literally had to run from
one end of the house to the other, just to find a phone.
"Pryde! Just the person I wanted
to talk to," Jubilee purred softly. She leaned her feet againist the
headboard of her bed, preparing herself. Katherine Pryde was an 'old
school' X-Man. As long as she had been with the X-Men, she had heard
just how 'smart' and how 'wonderful' Kitty Pryde was. Jubilee took it
all with a grain of salt and a roll of the eyes. Pryde might have been
all that and a bag of chips, but the fact that her own team Excalibur
had broken up, and that she couldn't handle her relationship with Pete
Wisdom, led Jubilee to stamp one mental word on Kitty's forehead. Wuss.
Kitty raised an eyebrow. Jubilee. Wanted to talk. To her. She felt
the word 'Meep' rise in her throat, but she pushed it back down. Whatever
Jubilee wanted, it couldn't be that bad. "Hey Jubilee...what can I do
for you? " she said, keeping a wary note to her tone.
Jubilee smirked. Oh this was going to be TOO much fun. She let her
voice slip into a little girl tone, the 'sympathy squeezer' tone. "I
was just wonderin'...if you could pass a message along to Remy for me?
I mean...I'd talk to Logan about it...but he's been so busy makin' sure you're okay..."
Kitty winced slightly. She realized that Logan divided his time between
his two 'surrogate' daughters, and right now she was taking up the lion's
share of that attention. It was a fact that she wasn't really proud
of. Guilt laced through her voice as she said, "Well...I'd tell Remy
but..."
"Please, Pryde? It's really important. I know he must be busy lately, 'cuz no-one can ever find him...but he's the only
one I can really talk to about the whole thing with Bastion." Jubilee
squeezed her fingernails into the palm of her hand. It hurt to use the
memories of what Bastion did to her like this, but hey, that s.o.b tried
to use torture to get information about the X-Men out of her. Might
as well return the favor. Sorta.
"The whole thing with Bastion? What whole thing with Bastion?" Kitty
frowned. Logan had brought it up once, while they were talking, just
how worried he was about Jubilee after that whole experience. He seemed
surly that the young girl wouldn't talk to him about it, but Kitty knew
Logan well enough to know why Jubilee probably didn't want to tell him.
The Mansion's interior structure probably couldn't handle what her imagination
was suddenly concoting. The guilt deepened.
"I...I really don't feel like talkin' about it much, Pryde...let's
just say...he tried to break me, and it didn't work." Jubilee let that
note of hestitation hang in the air, before she took a deep breath,
"I just want to talk to Remy. Remy...can help me..."
Kitty dropped her head. She couldn't do this to Jubilee. She deserved
to know what happened to Gambit. "Listen...Jubilee....Remy's not here
right now. In fact he...well..." she paused for a moment. Then gathering
up her courage, she told the entire tale as she had heard it from the
others. The Trial. The memories Rogue had gotten from Gambit, of his
own part in the Morlock Massacre. The collapse of the base. Rogue saving
Gambit from being executed, only to throw him down into the snow, and
flying off alone. The X-Men going back, but finding no trace of him.
So they had finally left, certain that the Cajun had met his death there
in the middle of a snowfield.
There was a long silence on the other end of the phone, as Jubilee
wiped tears from her eyes. Remy had...had...but...there was something
missing there. Something important. "Did he know? Did Remy know that
Sinister was going to..to kill off the Morlocks?" she whispered. Remy
couldn't have known. No. She would never believe that of him.
Kitty took a deep breath, then said, "Ororo said that he didn't know
what was going to really happen. So did Rogue. Sinister...Sinister lied
to him, fooled him into believing that he didn't mean the Morlocks any
harm." That was what Rogue had said.
Yet she knew that all of the X-Men acted now as if Gambit had gone down
there and slaughtered the Morlocks all on his own.
A burning anger started in Jubilee's stomach, and moved through her
entire body. He hadn't known. He hadn't known that the Morlocks were
going be murdered by the Marauders. He had made a stupid mistake in
judgement, and they had left him to DIE. No, not them. Rogue. Rogue had left him, because she couldn't deal with his
guilt. Talk about the pot calling the freakin' kettle black! Jubilee
was gripping her hand so tightly that her nails were piercing the skin.
A thin trickle of blood slipped between her fingers and dripped onto
her leg.
Her face was a tight mask of anger, but she just managed to unclench
her grip. She let out a shaky breath as she heard Kitty, as if somewhere
out in the distance, calling to her, asking if she was okay. 'Of course
I'm NOT okay...' she growled softly to herself, but shook her head.
Kitty was many things, including a rival, but at least she hadn't had
anything to do with Remy being where he was now. She couldn't take her
head off for this. Jubilee took another breath, then answered, "I'm
fine, Pryde. Now, I'm gonna ask you a favor. As a fellow X-Man, and
as a daughter to Logan."
Kitty blinked with surprise, but something in the back of her mind
told her it was the least she could do. "Sure, Jubilee...."
"I want you to call me and tell me the second Gambit gets back to
the Mansion," came the flat response.
"Jubilee...I don't think he's going to..." Kitty started to say,
before Jubilee cut her off.
"He'll come back. And don't ask me how I know, I just do." Jubilee
said, trying not to snap.
Kitty nodded her head slowly, almost in silent agreement. Just listening
to the way Jubilee put it, she started believing it herself. "All right...you
got it. The second he gets back, I'll call you," she stated firmly.
Jubilee licked her lips, nodding her head in satisfaction. She knew
she didn't need to invoke a promise from the older woman. Kitty had
been raised by Logan. Upholding honor was just part of the credo he
had taught them both.
"Thanks Pryde. I owe you. Talk to you soon." Jubilee clicked off
the phone before turning on her stomach. She rested her chin on her
folded arms. She knew the other woman would probably be wondering why
Jubilee wanted to know the moment Gambit came back. It was simple, really.
When he came back, he was going to need a friend. He was going to
need someone he trusted around. Well, it looked like she was the only
one left who fit the bill.
"Just hold out Remy...and come back in one piece. I'm here for you...,"
she whispered softly.
"I'm not gonna leave you alone."
******
FINIS, Interlude
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