Title: Free Falling
By: TriplePirouette
Category: Angsty, foofy
Time line: during X2, follows the AU time line of "I've Got You"
Rating: PG
Disclaimer: They're not mine- I'm a poor and having fun... take pity...
Distribution: my site, WRFA, anywhere else please ask first :)
Summary: Sequel to "I've Got You." Follows that AU time line during X2 to find out what happened at camp after Rogue's near-death experience.
Author's notes: Yes, it's a sequel to "I've Got You." I had this in mind almost as soon as I finished that. Is it as good? ... eh. You can decide that. This is less adrenaline, less urgency, but more introspection and foof. Yes, I hear the Tom Petty song in my head when I look at the title, too... but they are mutually exclusive. No relation. shrug Things happen like that sometimes. I think this is the end of the line for this particular AU-verse for me. It was a great place to play in, though.
Feedback PLEASE at: I love anything constructive! Blatant flames, however, will be disregarded and used to roast s'mores...
Rogue calmly walked from the plane under her own power, her knees only wobbling a little bit as she headed for the edge of the clearing. She put her back to a tree and curled up in the dying light of dusk, her eyes focused on Logan's campfire silhouette as he talked to Magneto with the rest of the X-Men.
"Rogue?" Bobby was still a few feet away, and his voice was quiet, but shaky. She looked up at him, hard pressed to tear her eyes away from Logan, her bottom lip between her teeth. She didn't speak, and he took that as permission to keep talking. "I, uh, inflated a tent for you."
"Thanks." Her voice was small, but still grateful. She turned her eyes right back to Logan, and Bobby could see that her mind was in turmoil.
"I'm glad..." Bobby stumbled and stuttered, trying to decide what he was glad for, "I'm glad you're not dead." He winced as soon as it came out of his mouth. The truth, but not tactful at all. He should know what to say to his girlfriend after she almost flew out of a plane, shouldn't he? Shouldn't he be the one to make her feel better?
"So am I." She was still emotionless.
"Can I..."
"No. No. I need to be alone for a while on solid ground." Her eyes flicked to Bobby and back to Logan, and he tried not to be hurt by her obvious dismissal. He wasn't the one to just save her life, after all. Logan had.
"Ok, then..." Bobby walked back among the tents as the adults dispersed. Logan and Jean headed back into the Blackbird, and Bobby followed, desperate to feel anything but the pervasive powerlessness he felt now. "Can I help?"
Jean smiled best she could in the situation, desperation to help wafted off of Bobby, and that was something she could fix, could control. "Actually, yes. Scott's been having you shadow him on repairs, hasn't he?"
"Mr. Summers asked me along a few times, showed me some parts. Made me squeeze into the access panels once." Bobby shrugged, his heart beating faster at the opportunity to really do something to help since this whole fiasco started.
"Good, Iceman. You'll fit better than I do." Logan slapped him lightly on the back and turned to walk away and take charge of what needed to be done in camp, but Bobby grabbed for his hand.
"Hey, Logan..." Logan spun, not liking to be touched, and utterly curious about the boy's behavior. "I just... Thank you isn't enough from any of us. You saved her life."
Logan regarded the confused, yet grateful young man in front of him. If they had nothing else in common, they both cared for Rogue. Logan didn't like any kind of outpouring of emotion, and had no response other than the truth before he walked away: "It's what I do."
Storm silently sat on the ground next to Rogue. She still hadn't moved from her spot against the tree, and night had descended nearly an hour ago. The young girl's eyes followed Logan around the campsite.
"How are you doing?" Storm asked quietly, her eyes following Rogue's gaze and landing on Logan as he tended the fire.
"I'm not dead, so it's pretty good." The hint of humor in her voice made Storm hopeful.
"Being alive is usually a plus. I'll teach you how to use the seatbelts, if you want. It never occurred to me that you didn't know. They're specially constructed harnesses."
Rogue's eyes flickered up to the sky and stayed there, avoiding thoughts of this afternoon. She'd observed everyone, watched quietly as she sorted things out in her head. She watched as they each found some way to take control of what was going on around them in this situation that was so utterly out of their control. Rogue didn't like being out of control. "What's it like to fly?"
"The plane?"
"No. To fly. I've seen you in the sky. Not often, but I know you fly. And hover. So.. What's it like, surrounded by nothing but air?"
"Rogue, I don't know if..."
"Please?" Rogue's face snapped to Ororo, her eyes wide and brimming with unshed tears. "I want to hear what it's like. I don't want to be afraid of it. I don't want to have to worry about closing my eyes and not being able to sleep because it will be an endless dream of falling."
Silence fell, and Rogue turned her eyes back to camp. Fear and Seatbelts. It was all she could think about. They were the two thoughts she pulled from Logan in the second that they'd touched. He'd been thinking about how they were always getting into trouble with seatbelts, and was overwhelmed with fear at the thought of her hurdling out of the plane. She was hoping she could think about something else, hoping she could find some control in knowing that she wouldn't have been afraid by asking what it was like to fall though space and nothingness and yet have some control over it.
"It's not falling." 'Ro smiled. "It's flying. And it's...amazing." Rogue smiled back and even jumped a bit when Ro grabbed her hand, holding it in both of hers.
Logan could smell her standing behind him, even over the scent of the fire. "What do you want?"
She stood over him from behind, her blue, scaled arms running over his shoulders and down his chest as she leaned her lips to his ear. "You know what I want."
Disgusted, he pushed her hands off of him. "Yeah? Well it ain't what I want."
She leaned down again, her lips at his ear and blue arm visible as it pointed over his shoulder to the clearing where Rogue and 'Ro sat. Her scales seemed to flip away, revealing smooth brown skin. "No... not her... maybe... her?" And the brown again flipped to imitate white cloth covered fingers, her voice shifting in his ear. "You like 'em young, Wolverine? I could be young for ya."
Logan stood and pushed the metamorph away from him, spitting on the ground at her feet as she shifted back to blue. "You're nothing to me except a place to sink my claws."
She licked her lips, and it made him physically sick. "No one's ever left a scar like you..." she purred as she ran her fingers over the three parallel scars over her belly button. Anger and lust had always run a close parallel for him: a good fight followed by a good one night stand did wonders for him once upon a time, but these days it didn't feel right anymore. Her behavior, however, went beyond anything he could comprehend. The line was drawn, and she was clearly on the other side.
Tonight, however, he couldn't run her through to teach her a lesson. She'd probably like it, anyway. "We're playing nice now, remember?" Logan shook his head and walked away, ducking into his tent and zipping the zipper.
"I will take you flying sometime." They'd spent forever talking about the sensation of flying. The shy was an inky black now, the twinkling of stars the only light besides the dying fire. Ororo stood, and held out her hand to help Rogue up as well.
"Thanks. I... it helped. Thanks."
"Will you be heading to bed? We have a long day ahead of us."
"In a bit." Rogue sighed and walked into camp with 'Ro. Her eyes fell over the tents until she found the right one. "I need to talk to him."
There was no question in Storm's mind as to whom she was referring. "Good idea. Just don't startle him awake." Ororo's joke fell flat, and she cleared her throat. "Jean and I are sharing a tent if you need us."
The women parted ways, and Rogue walked slowly over to Logan's tent as she heard Storm get into hers and zip the front flap closed. "Logan?" Rogue whispered. She heard him rustle around, sniff, then open the flap for her.
"Everything ok, Darlin'?" She shrugged and crouched to enter the tent. It was large enough for two, but no one wanted to tangle with Logan's claws in the middle of the night. "I, um, I need to talk to you."
"Ok." He sat up a bit more, sitting Indian style and facing her. She noticed his belt was gone and the top button of his jeans was undone as he ran a hand over his face, but that he still had his boots on: comfortable, yet ready for trouble at a moment's notice.
"We touched, when you were... anyway... we touched." She mirrored his position and tried to look him in the eye, but couldn't. Not quite.
"Sorry. I know you don't like people in your head."
"I don't mind you, you know that."
Logan looked profoundly sad. "Well, anyone up there isn't that great for you. Even me."
"No... You... you help. I... I was thinking about what happened a lot. Asked 'Ro about what flying is like... what free fall is like." She looked up and finally locked gazes with him strongly. "That's what it felt like, you know. Free fall."
"When you were..." There were no words, it was still so fresh. He made a vague hand gesture, and she shook her head.
"No. When you were holding me and I realized that you'd touched me. Our minds together felt like free fall."
"I don't understand." He was slowly shifting closer to her.
"It was all going wrong and we couldn't stop it. From the moment the mansion was attacked, we could each only do so much." Rogue shifted forward a bit and their knees were touching. "And it had been building. All of the fear and worry and confusion... and then..." she laughed, remembering one of only two clear thought's she'd gotten from him, "and then we were plagued by seatbelt safety... or lack there of... and it all came to a head at that one moment. I was afraid and you were afraid and I was terrified and then you touched me, and you'd saved me and you were holding me and I was safe, but my mind still felt like free fall. Like everything else could just go away because in those few seconds, all that mattered was you holding on to me."
"That was all that mattered." Logan grabbed her hand in his own, and couldn't even think as he watched tears silently roll down her face. She was babbling, and probably wouldn't have made any sense to anyone else, but he understood perfectly because it had been exactly what he felt, too.
"It was. If everything else went wrong, we both only needed that one thing to go right. And it did. And I couldn't believe it did. And when you were finally holding me, it just, all fell out of my mind. Like this dizzying, spinning sensation. Nothing was wrong anymore because you'd saved me." She looked down and smiled nervously. "You must think I'm crazy."
"No. You're right. It felt like free fall." Logan traced the curve of her cheek over a stray lock of hair, and he could feel the palpable shift in their relationship, in the air, in the moment...
"Logan..."
"No." He grabbed both of her hands, and using her gloved hand, nudged her face to meet his piercing gaze. "Now just... it ain't the time. Bobby's still... and the Professor... and the kids that they got in the lab..." He grunted and scrubbed a hand at his face. "I can't say we've got time, 'cause shit like seatbelts and Mystique and mutant hunters are always going to be in our way, but neither of us are really thinking right either. And your still..."
"Too young?" She looked at him openly, cautiously, even hopefully.
"Maybe. I ain't really decided that. All I know is that it doesn't feel right yet."
"You always trust your instincts."
"They haven't led me wrong yet."
"They told you to keep me with you in Laughlin City..."
"Like I said, they haven't led me wrong, yet."
She sniffed a bit, her nose running from the silent tears, but smiled, too. She didn't want to let herself believe what she wanted to believe. But tonight he'd saved her life, and he was still her closest friend in the world.
"Logan?"
"Yeah?"
"Can.. Can you hold me while I sleep? While we sleep?" She tried to hide her face as she asked. "It's not... I just..."
"Afraid of Magneto? Cause I'm not much help there." He raised an eyebrow at her, and she had no choice but to laugh.
"No."
He turned serious in a heartbeat. "You're not afraid of the claws? The Nightmares?"
"No." She looked up, eyes burning with intensity. "But I am afraid that this is the dream. That I'll close my eyes and I'll really be dreaming this, that I'll be falling out of that plane, the ground rushing up to me and the 'bird getting farther and farther away..." Panic slowly crept into her voice. "I don't want to dream that, Logan. I don't want another nightmare to add to my collection. I don't want to dream about being chased out of the mansion, either. I just..."
Once again, Logan used her covered hand in lieu of his bare one, pushing her finger against her lips and shushing her. "Come here, Darlin'. I won't let you fall." She smiled and shifted over as he lifted the edge of the sleeping bag. He slid in before she did, then he covered them both. Before he could ask her how she wanted to do this, she attached herself to him: her head cradled under his, her arms around him, and her lower body wedged right up against his. It was as close as she could get to their position in the plane while they were lying down. His lips grazed the top of her head in a ghost of a kiss. "Go to sleep, Marie." He felt her smile against him at the use of her real name. "I've got you."
"You do."
"I do. I ain't letting go."
"No more free fall?" Her voice was fading, her breaths coming slower and slower.
He held her close, knowing that he couldn't begin to predict what the morning would bring, never mind their future, but that in this moment, he could give her the comfort she needed. "No, Maire. No more free fall."