D'Ancanto

Chapter 5

 

 

Marie awoke, bolting upright in a scream. A second scream, sharper and shorter, joined hers, pulling her out of disorientation. Charlotte sat back down on her chair, a hand to her chest.

"What the hell, woman?!"

Panting, Marie looked around. Bedrails, linoleum floor and in-wall medical equipment-- she was in a hospital. She tried to locate a hurt-- had she gotten shot?-- but only felt an overall ache. Maybe she'd been in an accident. The patient across the room caught her eye and information came back. Remy Lebeau AKA Gambit, member of the Guild and on a first-name basis with the head of the organization, named-- She winced and rubbed the sudden piercing ache at her temple.

"You always get knocked out when you used your powers?" asked Charlotte.

"N-no," Marie replied. "This was especially intense."

Dr. MacTaggert pushed open the side curtains, coughing delicately into her shoulder. "I'm sorry I'm late; the Legacy Clinic was even busier than normal today. Good evening, Detective. Not been the best few days, has it?"

"Not even close."

Charlotte stretched and rose from her chair. "Your screaming works better than an alarm clock. My mom's gonna be pissed I dumped Timmy on her so long."

"God, Char, get the hell home! How's your boy supposed to cure cancer if you're here watching my fool head?"

Laughing, Charlotte bent down to give her a hug then paused. Marie hated the uncertainty and fear in her eyes so she socked Charlotte playfully instead to break the awkwardness.

"See you tomorrow," said Charlotte.

"I better."

Dr. MacTaggert offered an escort to the lobby which Charlotte declined. When the clinic doors slid closed, the doctor paid Marie her full attention. "Bobby and Ororo briefed me on your powers. I also rushed your bloodwork from the other week. My fear was that you had contracted ALD and this fainting spell was a manifestation of the disease."

Marie's throat closed up. "So?"

"I don't see the usually markers for ALD."

And she could breathe again.

"--but there are some irregularities that I hope you can help clear up. I said the usual markers for the Legacy Virus weren't present in the sample but there were some, shall I say, unusual components that I haven't seen elsewhere. It may mean nothing; mutants don't always react to infective microorganisms in a predictable manner. Specifically, you have extremely high levels of unconjugated Novomane, far higher than what I would predict considering your first and only recorded dose was ten years ago."

Not knowing how to react, Marie just nodded. MacTaggert returned her stare. Marie bit her lip, released it and bit it again. She twiddled her fingers then pressed out a wrinkle in her blanket. She couldn't meet the doctor's eye.

"Marie, I'd like to remind you that as a physician, everything you tell me will be under the strictest of confidences except in extreme cases where you may hurt yourself or others. I know you don't usually faint when using your powers nor are you helpless to disengage from the person you choose to absorb. If you've somehow contracted a new strain of ALD, I need to be able to backtrack everything that may have affected your health. Please, Marie. I need your help."

Marie confessed.


The significance of Logan's absence in the clinic should have rung klaxons in her head earlier but Marie cut herself some detective slack considering the past twenty-four hours. She rolled her shirtsleeves over her gloves and slipped on her favourite sneakers to look for him. Dr. MacTaggert had given her to okay to get out of bed although she had to stay another night for observation. Upstairs had Bobby, Storm and a bunch of memories she'd rather not revisit (including the company dinner the other month), but Logan was there, too, and dammit she missed the hairy old man.

Xavier's Institute's success meant extensions to the family homestead but Ororo's discriminating eye ensured the additions blended well with the original building. The clinic was the most obvious change. It stood where the pool house once was with easily five times the space. The medical and genetics laboratory occupied the third floor. In-patient and examination rooms took up the first two floors. Marie passed by a large, orange Quarantine sign over one of the rooms. She peered in. Six beds crammed into a space made for four. Machines traced their vitals, lines poked out of their bodies into bags of medicine, food and hydration solutions. Half needed oxygen masks. All of them moaned in pain. She walked away quickly.

A glass and stone walkway connected the two buildings on the first floor and that was the route Marie took to search for Logan. After being incorrectly directed to the wrong room several times, she finally made her way to the sub-basement where the tinny guitar hook of a classic rock song thrummed down the hall. She found Logan in the Council Room, arms crossed, staring up at digital maps. Multicoloured dots clumped over the largest map, one of the USA.

"I guess you've been busy coordinating things," she said. "You're looking pretty damn comfy in those leader pants. Who'd've thought, huh?"

Logan turned his head. The blankness of his expression sent her heart thudding.

"You're angry with me," Marie guessed. "Is it because I don't visit any more? You know I hate butting heads with Storm. And besides, what's stopping you from visiting me? I'm the one with the nine-to-five now."

"Where did you get the admantium bullets?"

She blinked. "Whuh--what?"

"The bullets, Marie. The one thing that could kill me. The ones you used to take down Pyro. I found it in a wall after his attack. Are they standard MacTac gear now?"

"No! No-one on the force knows I have them."

"So you've bought adamantium bullets specifically for... for what, Marie?"

"It's complicated."

"Then use small words," he bit out.

"Mr. Summers had them," she said, the words coming out in a rush. "He had... I think he had them from that time in Alkali Lake. He never... He didn't do anything with them; he just had it in a box in his toolbox for the Blackbird and I helped him a lot with it and with the garage and when I found it, it was like he'd forgotten then were there. He told me to give it to you." She took a breath. Logan still refused to face her. "I was going to. I was... you remember what he was like. I thought he kept them 'cause he wanted to kill himself or maybe you, and you were pretty out of it, too, so I didn't think it was the right time to give it. Then the whole Alcatraz thing happened and I got the Cure then I moved out and the bullets went with me. Logan, I'd never use them against you! You believe me, don't you?"

"So that day with Pyro, you just happened to have them in the trunk?"

A light magenta charge skated over the leather of her chair. Marie reeled it in best she could. "No."

She didn't say any more, forcing Logan to turn around to make eye contact. "Then tell me what the hell is going on, Marie. You never visit and when you do, you knock down everything Xavier's is about. Now you're sick and Moira says you don't even want me to know why."

"It's--"

"Complicated?" He shook his head.

"Look, I'm not the only one who's let things slide. You hear what Storm says about me, about my decisions and you never say a thing! You didn't go to my graduation from the police academy and the last time you drove down to Brooklyn, it was to pick up a new student that, by the way, I called in to the school. So don't even try to make me feel like the goddamn bad kid when you haven't been that great of a dad either!"

Magenta spikes of energy jumped all over the table, leaping from pens to cups and along the table's edges. One of the pens exploded but the charge barely scorched the surface. At the far end, a set of paperclips rattled and shot out against the wall. Marie's eyes went hot. Fisting her hands, she willed the charges away. It was a matter of mentally ironing out the molecular bonds in the charged object. That was Gambit's voice talking in her head.

Logan took a few steps back. He dropped into a chair, or fell into it, stricken. Marie didn't feel any better.

"After--" He coughed the roughness out of his voice and started again. "After Alkali, I had to pick up Summers' slack. It was... she would've wanted me to, y'know? Jean. And you, too. Every time we talked on the phone while I was out looking for that damned base, you'd go on and on about how great the school was and how much fun you were having. Half the conversation was about Summers' shop class. I was half-expecting to see you come out in a cardigan and sensible heels."

Marie snorted.

"You're so damned independent, kid. You got the Cure, to hell with what everyone said, then struck it out by yourself. I've never been more proud of everything you've accomplished on your own. But I guess I'm not like that anymore. I had over fifteen years of being on my own. Call me nuts but having all these crazy idiots tripping me up is pretty damn fun."

"Wolverine, domesticated," she teased.

He shook his head. "No, just finally home. All thanks to you, Marie. My whole life changed for the better the minute you snuck into my trailer."

Oh God. Marie sniffled once and tried not to do it again because she was twenty-eight years old, dammitall. "They make me feel better."

Logan blinked.

"I don't know why. I think it's because you're made of adamantium and also they belonged to Mr. Summers and I think... I really think he was going to use them, Logan. I stopped him so I kept it and... I have eight. I had eight. Before Pyro's attack, I only ever used one of them. In the field range. No one else knows what they are, I swear."

He blinked again. Held his arms out. Marie rushed into his embrace, clutching at his ubiquitous flannel shirt that smelled of cigars and finally felt at comfortable in her old home. She missed this, missed the hairy old man looking after her even when she didn't need it any more. She missed looking for him.

"So, you're still Rogue?"

"That depends," she drawled, "Do I owe you money?"

Logan stilled.

"What?"

"Say that again."

"I owe you money?"

He grabbed her shoulders. "Not like that. Not that way. Your accent... it sounded like someone I knew once."

"Pre- or post-amnesia?"

"I'm not sure."

The tail end of her memory-- Remy's memory-- flashed to the front of her mind. "Well, you better get sure because I just absorbed someone old enough to have known you that long. He calls himself Gambit and crazy as it sounds, he's part of a huge gang called--"

"The Guild," Logan finished.

Marie threw her hands up. "I should just come straight to you for all things covert."

"What are you doing messing with the Guild?"

"I'm a cop. The Guild is like the mean old witch in the gingerbread house. Which is to say fake as a three dollar bill until recently. What do you know about it?"

Logan honest to goodness scuffed the floor with his boot. "I did a job for them, a long time ago. It was pretty soon after I lost my memory. Gambit was the only person who knew me and could be trusted." He checked himself. "He was the best of the worst at least."

"What kind of jobs?" Marie asked.

"Transporting packages. They didn't trust me to do any of the big things."

She crossed her arms, leaning away. "And what, exactly, are the big things?"

"What have you heard about the big things?" Logan said cautiously.

Marie started tapping her foot. Charged dust motes popped around the floor.

"Fine, fine, you cleared for a walk outside?" She wasn't, but Marie followed him to the east acreage anyway where the trees and underbrush made for challenging horse trails. Once inside the denser part of the bush, he spoke once more. "You gotta tell me how much you know. Even as a transporter, I have oaths to follow and it ain't worth risking the Institute's safety for me to spill."

Scrunching up her forehead, she slowly put the jumble of absorbed memories into a somewhat coherent narrative. "Gambit's important. He... doesn't have one role but the big shots, Belle and Salvatorre, talk to him a lot. He doesn't have a home. No, that's not right, he doesn't stay at the Guild's home base. He's not... he's exiled?" She rubbed her forehead. "It's still pretty foggy. He remembers you. He says... keep your eyes on the clouds when you fly."

Logan looked nonplussed. "That's probably Guild code but I never used it. Twenty-five years ago when I worked for them, they weren't incorporated into one Guild. There were four separate groups: Thieves, Assassins, Hookers and Dealers. Each guild had a couple states under them. Some even fought for territory."

"So what made them one big happy family?"

"Beats me. Why don't you ask Gambit?"

Marie rolled her eyes. "He's got a slight case of comatose right now and frankly, I'd like to keep it that way. The man would flirt with a hole in the wall."

"Did he try anything?"

"Nothing I couldn't handle so you can just go on and stop bristling."

"You said they want to hire you for a hit?" Logan rubbed his whiskers. "That doesn't make sense. The Assassin's Guild is the best. They're fucking scary. When they do a hit, no one hears it. Most people don't even know it's a hit unless publicity is part of the plan. They take pride in doing a job two hundred times better than the average person. Why would they hire out?"

"I'm a good shot," said Marie.

"I'm sure you are but you're still not an Assassin. They train the minute they can hold something in their hand. They all do: Assassins, Thieves, Dealers, even some of the Hookers."

"That's disgusting."

"They're not nice people." Logan searched his pockets for a cigar, cut it, lit it and took a deep puff to cleanse his mouth. "Gambit's a Thief. He specialises in breaking and entering."

"He sure as hell does," Marie said under her breath.

"He always did seem to have the boss' ear but I don't know those names. Then again, I wasn't in on everything that went on in the Guild. Not that I asked. I needed the money and Gambit was the only person who knew me who didn't seem to want to put a bullet through my head."

"So, he's a good guy."

"Not hardly. But he's ain't a complete scumbag."

"I guess that's not the worst recommendation for all the people floating around in my head," said Marie.

"Yeah, well--" Logan's phone beeped. He flipped it out of his case and cursed as he read the message. "I've got to go."

"Second job calls?"

He nodded. "Ziff party gone bad in Miami."

"How bad?"

"Playing with the fault lines bad." He pointed at her. "You don't go anywhere."

"Doc would fry my ass."

"Yeah, she can do that with her coffee." He ruffled her hair before running off. Marie decided not to take offence. Sure her thirtieth birthday was in viewing distance but the old man had at least a century on her. To his eyes, she would always just be a kid. His kid. And right now, she didn't mind that at all.


Although she felt well enough, Dr. MacTaggert didn't want Marie discharged until Gambit woke up as well. She still had his powers as well as his memories. Strange thing about those memories, too-- although they were jumbled, the scenes themselves had never been so vivid. She smelled the scents coming out of the diner outside his Manhattan apartment, distinct from the ones at the bakery in his childhood neighbourhood. She flushed remembering the first time he failed at a pinch and the repetitive, heated prick of a tattoo gun. The warmth of urine down her pants when Stryker's men strapped him on a dissecting table. Her knee throbbed from a landing gone wrong.

"How long does this usually last?" asked MacTaggert.

"We figured it at a two-to-one ratio, double whatever time I held on," Marie said. "It was a little crazier than that when my powers first catalysed though."

"Hmm."

"I hate it when doctors go 'hmm.'"

MacTaggert let out a tight smile. "That's what we do when we're not sure what the heck is going on."

"Probably why I hate it."

"If you're that curious, I can pull out my medicalese." She clicked around the main screen of her desktop array. Five different documents popped up on the three monitors. "That in the middle is a comparison of your blood against baseline human, a nullified mutant and a mutant with energy-based abilities. Your powers shouldn't affect blood serum composition but I wanted to be sure. If you look at yours against the nullified mutant, you'll see these." Little yellow dots appeared on Marie's results and the other nullified mutant; hers had far fewer yellow bits. "Those are serum proteins that have incorporated the Novomane therapy. Because it changes your DNA, some components of the added gene show up in certain proteins."

"So whatever it is that Lykos did stopped the gene therapy from working," said Marie.

"That appears to be the case although I couldn't tell you why. The first batch of Novomane was retracted because it was too potent. It couldn't be titrated for mutants who need certain powers to live. And, of course, there were the mutations that don't respond to the treatment."

"Why is that?"

"The honest and unsatisfying answer is I don't know," said MacTaggert. "We don't know exactly how Novomane works to begin with so we don't know how to tweak it when it doesn't. Essentially, what Worthington Avent-Smythe did is a highly controlled version of throwing things at the wall to see what would stick. The Institute and our affiliates have to reverse engineer everything from that. But back to your blood work, take a look at this here." A few more little things lit up on the screen, blue squiggles and green spots. "The green blebs are the unconjugated components of Novomane."

"And the blue squiggles?"

"You said you didn't want me to say 'hmmm.'"

Marie pinched the bridge of her nose.

"I wish comparative studies were as quick as on TV but unfortunately, we've got only got two lab techs. I have to twist arms to get our samples processed in other facilities."

"Now you're talking my language," said Marie. "Most days it feels like MacTac processing is on some forensics B-list."

"But at least there's a list now. I remember when--"

A gentle, insistent pinging sounded through the clinic. Dr. MacTaggert snapped into attention. With one click, she turned all the monitors off and was down the hall in the fastest walk Marie had even seen.

"What's wrong?" she asked.

"Mission emergency," the doctor answered. She pressed her headset on. "Wolverine, status."

"I got a two mutants ODing on ziff. I've got one... shit, I've one guy whose skin is ripping off him. Frost's keeping the other one knocked out but I don't know how long she can keep it up long distance."

"Acknowledged. Put them in the second medical wing ASAP." To Marie, she said, "We'll continue our conversation--"

"I can help," Marie interrupted.

"I'll be having a hard enough time looking after three patients!"

"Look, ziff drives people's powers out of control. I absorb powers."

MacTaggert studied the set of her jaw then waved her along. The fastest elevators to the sub-basements were at the main building. They only broke into a sprint once the doors opened to the steel walls of X-Men headquarters. The doctor wore sneakers to work; considering her practice's demographic, that was probably wise.

They reached the hangar just as the Blackbird's ramp hit the floor. The landing was a little rough. Rogue wondered who piloted the jet and if they babied it as much as Mr. Summers did. The hangar rumbled again and she realised it wasn't the landing that made the floor shake.

"Are we having an earthquake?" she asked MacTaggert.

Logan ran down the ramp with a young man's body slung over his shoulder. "If we don't stabilise this guy, we'll be seeing a new fault in the East Coast. Emma's losing control of him."

Behind him, four X-Men helped another man-- a teenager really-- down the ramp. Greyish skin trailed behind him, leaving pale pink trails of lymph and blood. Prioritise. Marie reached out for the earthquake-generator first. He'd do the most damage.

"What are you--" Logan began.

But she'd already made contact. "Ésta es la pura, güey. Carajo, tomé un poco anoche y, a todo dar, putas estrellas, carbon. Como si te metieran una sobrecarga."

"Suenas como un pinche cabrón/pendejo colocado de éxtasis. Dame eso."

"En serio, carbon, es pinche dulce."[1]

The earth reached up inside her through the soles of her feet and up her spine. Rock and soil felt as different as her left and right hand.

So much for the land of opportunity. At least he was far away from his father and uncles here. Sure line-cooking didn't pay much but this was only the first step in--

She spoke to the planet. The earth shook in reply.

"Rogue! Get it under control!"

He slid his hand down his partner's chest, his fingers skimming his beltline, his thumb playing with the rough hairs leading down where he wanted to go. Lips nibbled at his jaw. "¿Quieres que regresemos a mi casa?"

He smiled.

Marie fell to her knees. The floor rippled. Spreading her fingers wide, she took a deep breath and imagined smoothness, sliding her hands out as though straightening a bedsheet. The rumbling stopped. The earth murmured its discontent and she shushed it. Smoothed it out. Calm, calm, calm.

Logan slid his arms around her shoulders and knees. "I got you, kid."

"The... other mutant."

"He's out and on a stretcher. You did good."

"No, no, the other one. His skin." Marie lolled her head back until she spotted the other stretcher. The boy couldn't even lie still in it, not with his skin pouring out and tearing his body with its weight.

"You contained the worst of it, you shouldn't--"

"He's going into shock," said Dr. MacTaggert.

Marie pushed out of Logan's arms and made for the stretcher.

"She's one of your fucking patients, too!" she heard Logan yell.

"So we break the connection before it gets too--"

Bobby helped her stay upright beside the second stretcher. Marie touched the boy's leather grey skin. Her own skin prickled, the pink leaching to grey before her eyes even as the boy's receded. Her arms flopped down from the heavier weight. Flaps of skin slapped the floor. The contact shook the hangar again while screws from the surrounding grate flooring began to glow magenta.

"Llevo uno de los grandes y algo de cambio. ¿Tú?"

"Más o menos lo mismo. Yo ya estoy pasado, güey."

"¿Estás de chingada? ¡Vamos a probar la mercancía!"

"No carajo, que sabes que esa mierda me deja chingado. Trabajo mañana."

"No hasta las siete. No me seas sangrón, güey, vámonos de reventón, carajo."[2]

"Control it, Rogue," Logan ordered. "Control it now."

Sweat slicked down her back. "Not as. Easy. As that."

"You can do this, kid. I know you can."

Grunting, she imagined stuffing all the voices behind a door, like the exercises Dr. Grey did with her long ago, all the while keeping her body still in case she set off another explosion or earthquake. Still, the ground shivered under her feet and heat formed wherever her expanding skin touched.

"Knock me out," she told Logan.

"What?"

"Do it!"

He pressed his fists against the sides of her neck. Spots washed out her vision and she passed out again.


"When you're on stage today I'm going to be looking up at you and be thinking one thing."
"What's that?"
"Please God don't let him trip."

"Senior proponents of the Citizen Protect Program arrived at the Second National Mutant Affairs Summit amidst cheers and protests. The leader of the program, Senator Simon Trask, had no statement for us preceding the event, saying only that the outcome of this summit would--"

"We've known each other for so long. Your heart's been aching but you're too shy to say it--"

Marie turned to one side and puked. Dr. MacTaggert immediately shone a light in her eyes. "Your reactions are normal this time. Good."

"Is barfing a normal reaction? 'Cause I'm about to do that again."

"Last time your eyes were open, you spoke French by way of stoner. I'll take the barfing." She pulled a kidney basin out of nowhere and stuck it under Marie's chin.

"Did it work?"

"It most certainly did. We've isolated those two patients in the Danger Room as we do with most ziff overdoses but I'm certain it'll only be for observation. They're woozy but their powers are under control." MacTaggert sighed as she brushed her bangs away from her glasses. "That was one of the bravest, most stupid things I've ever seen."

"Can't have one without the other," said Marie.

"An all too unfortunate truth. God only knows what you did to your own condition, exerting yourself like that."

Marie observed her arms. "Did you poke me again?"

"Three more vials for your troubles. I'll be using your CBC arrays as my wallpaper for years I'm wagering."

"Whatever rocks your boat, Doc. Should I even ask about when I can go back to work?"

"Do you want to go to work with uncontrollable absorbed powers?"

"Duly noted." Marie fell back onto her pillow. "Gambit hasn't woken up yet? I couldn't've touched him for more than five minutes."

"As you said, your usual ratio of absorption is two-to-one but I suspect your increasing Novomane dosage has affected your abilities. I should have guessed with your shifting powers."

"I'm not a shape-shifter."

"Oh but you are," said MacTaggert. "Not our usual definition but you do change your body on contact with mutant humans. Look how your skin changed after absorbing Angelo. And the range at which you shift... even Mystique only physically resembles other mutants. She cannot actually fly like Mayor Worthington, for example, because her bone composition does not change. Nor is she bulletproof should she choose to mimic Pete or create ice like Bobby. You, however, can. And I have no idea how that's possible."

Marie shirked from the doctor's interested gaze. "A unique and beautiful snowflake. That's me. Are you saying I can't go back to work until everyone wakes up? What if they're all out for weeks like the first person I absorbed? I don't think I can take that many days leave and I've got bills to pay."

Dr. MacTaggert gave her a visual once over. "Another twenty-four hours of observation then Logan has to clear you for active duty. If you can get past his tests, you should be okay in a mixed crowd."

"Great. It'll be just like flunking my first driving test all over again. Maybe I should just ask Jones to bring me-- Hang on. Gimme the remote."

Bemused, MacTaggert did so. Marie flipped to the news channel. A newscaster's voice narrated the footage taken from earlier that morning. "Government officials and grassroots leaders alike will discuss the goals set in the first National Mutant Affairs Summit back in 2010. Early reports suggests that adjustments will be made to the rulings created during that summit. However, the country is split quite evenly on whether these changes are positive or negative."

"What are you--"

Marie waved her hand, shushing the doctor.

"One of the most controversial attendees is Senator Simon Trask, head of the Citizen Protect Program which seeks to limit the positions occupied by mutants with dangerous powers. We take to the streets for--"

"He hired me to assassinate Trask," said Marie, pointing to the unconscious Gambit across the room. "Now that I've refused and he's out of commission, there must still be someone in the Guild acting as back-up. Someone needs to warn the senator and everyone at the summit."

"As much as I hate his politics, an assassination would make him a martyr not to mention reflect poorly on the mutant community," said Dr. MacTaggert. "I'll alert Logan."

"While you do that, can I borrow a laptop from one of the classrooms? I'm getting bored."

"You're going to work." MacTaggert sighed, turning her gaze heavenwards for divine intervention. "No wonder you and Ororo don't get along. Both bull-headed and determined to have things your own way. I suppose everything I said about resting has gone in one ear and out the other."

"I have to alert MacTac, too. Technically, it's a mutant-related crime."

"I'll have one of the students bring a laptop down. Anything else, Detective?"

"You wouldn't happen to know where my cellphone is, would you?"

"I do but I'll not give it to you unless you promise to limit your work to two-hour periods between three-hour rests. You've had unexplained bout of unconsciousness followed by a very much explained one. I should be taking an EEG of your brainwaves just to make sure everything's in working order."

Marie crossed her fingers. "Yes, ma'am."

"Liar. But I'll have the last laugh when you pass out in your soup. It's one of my favourite soups and I will eat it off your tray." Dr. MacTaggert keyed a cupboard open and rummaged through the shelves, emerging with a "ha!" and Marie's phone in her hand. She gave it with the reminder, "Two hours."

"Two hours," Marie parroted, trying to look innocent.

But MacTaggert didn't bite. She walked away, muttering, "Always get those patients. What I wouldn't give for a nice, obedient hypochondriac."

Marie turned her phone on. Glowing icons informed her of five voice messages, twenty-seven emails, and eight new APBs. Six of the emails she could answer without her files; the rest she marked with an "Away From the Office" message. She tackled the voicemails next: one from the Captain asking after her health, one from the Captain's assistant reminding her of the procedures for injury on the job, a woman enthusiastically proclaiming she might already be a winner if she just gave them her credit card number, and the final two from Charlotte.

"Hey, D'Ancanto, you better be resting. If I get an email or a call from you in the next twenty-four hours, I'll make your rookie week seem like an all-expense-paid trip to Cancun. Don't worry about the Ziff Car Case. We've been punted down the priority list because of a triple homicide over in the Upper East Side but I'll keep at their backs. Get better."

A nurse-- Annie, according to her name tag-- put a chunky laptop on the bedside table, presumably fetched by a student. Marie waved her thanks and continued to listen to her messages.

"Hey, it's Jones again. The guys we picked up from District X want to talk but they're waiting for you. I'll try to convince them otherwise, maybe bring Everett or Zeigler in. Don't rush out of the hospital though; just wanted to let you know. Bye."

"Excuse me," Marie addressed the nurse. "Do you know if the Institute still has encrypted logs on its wi-fi?"

"Yes, they do," said Annie "You can always ask Kitty if she can set something up for you."

"Thanks, I will."

But Kitty might not get to it until later that day; Marie wanted her files right now. This was the part of the job they never put in the brochures, the powerless monotony of waiting. Guess MacTaggert was going to get her two-hours-only rest period after all. She puttered around on the internet and caught up on the latest bulletins on the NYPD website. After having her soup-- which was delicious for hospital food-- she napped only to wake up to the three shouting psyches in her head. All her favourite shows were on the recorder at home along with her movies, so she couldn't use them to drown their noise.

"Do you need a painkiller?" MacTaggert asked, seeing her rub her forehead.

"You wouldn't happen to have a tepe on-call, would you? The Professor or Dr. Grey used to help me with things like this but it's been years since I did any shielding exercises and I can't even remember my neutral space never mind create it on the astral plane."

"Oh! You mean for the people you absorbed." She tapped a pen against her teeth. "I'll have to call Emma Frost STAT."

"I appreciate it." Marie rubbed her temples again. "Oh man."

MacTaggert disappeared around the curtain, hopefully to make that call. The psyches increased in volume.

"Don't you dare disrespect me in my own home again!"

"Don't worry! I won't ever come back home!"

Street lamps blurred past him, throwing reflections off the chrome of his bike. He remembered when he didn't wear a helmet on one of these things. Then again, he remembered how badass the speakers on his helmet were. He cranked the volume higher.

"I have two shrimp appies! Tossed greens, hold the onions! Berry salad! Two beef: medium, medium rare!"

"Yes, chef!"

"Swing me next, Angelo, swing me next!"

"You want an around-the-world, little sister?"

"Yay!"

Marie curled her knees up to her chin. She had to find her neutral space. Her neutral space. The mirror-calm of a sea. A lush islet, willows at its peak, anemones in the water. Herself, on a tire-swing hanging off one of those willows with just the tips of her toes getting wet. Ripples on the water catching sparkles off the sunlight.

"Go. Now. Don't bother packing."

"That eager to get rid of me, Belle? Ink's barely dried on the papers."

"Fool! They'll kill you!"

He watched the Federales and the DEA beat his cousins and uncles half to death, feeling only a distant sort of satisfaction. He didn't turn them in out of revenge or a sense of duty to the law. He just wanted to leave. And now he could.

"I have two scallop ceviche, one pumpkin amuse-bouche! Three house salad sides! One scampi, one peppersteak well done, one tropical rice bowl!"

New York City's orchestra of car horns, construction and humanity followed him as he wove between Manhattan's lunchtime gridlock. He stopped at a light. A woman in a fine suit, her hair tipping out of its knot, lifted her head up from sipping at her coffee cup. He grinned at her; she returned it with a wink. Days like this, he almost didn't miss New Orleans.

Gritting her teeth, Marie tried to overlay her neutral space over the memories. The waters of her sea crept spilled into the streets of Manhattan. It hissed on the stove elements of the tight Miami restaurant, extinguishing the flames. It licked at the edges of an inner city playground.

"I want two seaside salads, one tossed salad--"

"Twenty a hit, fifty for a strip. Guaranteed experience-- you're base, right?-- yeah, this'll change your world."

Her tire swing flailed as the waves splashed against her knees. At the edges of her neutral space, the waves crashed against skyscrapers, sun-baked streets and restaurant tables.

He attached a scrambler on opposite sides of the statue's base, deflecting the infrared lasers sweeping the room.

"You sure I'm ready to meet Gris-Gris?"

Marie snapped her head up, eyes wide. "Gris-Gris. Griegry. Oh shit. My phone, where's my phone?" She pushed the hospital tray out of the way, searching in the blanket folds. When she found it, she speed-dialled Charlotte.

"Aren't you sick?"

"Griegry's real!" she blurted out.

"Breathe, D'Ancanto, and keep your voice somewhere below squealing."

"The guy Lykos was blabbing about, Griegry, who supposedly stocks ziff for the whole state. He's for real."

Charlotte flipped thorough papers. "Uh-huh. You're working while you're sick in a hospital."

"No. Yes. Sort of. Look, I told you when I absorb people, I get some of their memories, too. Well, one of the guys--"

"Wait, you absorbed more people? When? Why?"

"It's kind of a long story that-- actually, it's a relevant story. They were a couple kids from Miami ODing on ziff so I skimmed the worst of it off--"

"Aren't you in the hospital because your powers are on the blink?" Charlotte demanded. "Am I going to have to go up there and mother your ass?"

"Jones! Focus!" Marie yelled.

"I'm focussing! I'm focussing on my partner who's barely recovered from working a week straight, got stalked by a gangster, passed out flat after going into a seizure in the middle of the street and is probably still PTSD from using her weapon--"

Marie's head throbbed. "And I do appreciate it but this is a major lead in the case. Look into this and I swear I'll be a good patient."

"Yeah, and I got a bridge in Brooklyn to sell you." Charlotte sighed. "Okay, so, tell me about Griegry."

"First of all, it's spelled G-R-I-S, dash, G-R-I-S. Gris-gris. It's French or something."

"Yeah-huh. French. You absorbed a French guy. I'm running the name through III right now."

"It might be an alias. Kind of like Gambit."

"Or the X-Men?"

She smiled wryly. "Yeah, like that."

There was a silence. Then, "I got nothing."

"Crap."

"No kidding. We're going to have to slog through NCIC. Hey, if the kids are from Miami and they know about a New York supplier--"

"It could be a multi-state organization like MS-13."

"That could explain the Maryland plates on the ziff car," said Charlotte. "They're moving things up and down the coast either making the drug or delivering raw material. Still no hits on Gris-Gris."

"Which means he's good or he's new."

"Or both."

"I hope it's not both," said Marie.

"I'll start making calls. Again. You better get better so you can help me."

"Ma'am, yes ma'am." As Marie hung up, she heard Charlotte snort disbelief. The name, the drug components, at least two known dealers and, paperwork willing, an investigation into Worthington Avent-Smythe's east coast facilities. Seemed like her whole world centred on Novomane.

The landscape of her neutral space roared into a cataclysm with fifty-foot tidal waves smashing the islet, the skyscrapers, the restaurant, the seaside and every other memory-plane in her mind or the others'. The phone dropped out of her hand as she curled on her side. The noises were too loud, a mash of English, Spanish, French, yelled, whispered, scolded, pleaded, while cars, motorcycles, boats zoomed past and lights from the billboards, strobe lights, the sun blinded her to the source of the exhaust, bathroom stalls, salt sea--

MacTaggert and Annie ran towards the sound of Marie screaming.


Translations: (thanks to olansamuelle)

1: "It's the pure stuff, my friend. I fucking took some last night and was, fucking, tweaking stars, man. It's like being supercharged."
"You sound like a fucking e-tard. Gimme that."
"I mean it, man, it's fucking sweet."

2: "I got a G and some change. You?"
"About the same. I'm done, man."
"You kidding me? Let's sample the goods!"
"Hell, you know that stuff messes me up. I got work tomorrow."
"Not until seven. Fuck, man, let's party."

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