Partners in Crime (X-Men ROMY)

Chapter Eight

"No, but it worked, didn't it?"

Rogue huffed.

"How about we hit the shower, then I'll make it up to you."

"If you think I'm going to shower with the man who just tried to blow me up, you have another thing coming!"

"Aww, don't be mad, chère, you know I wouldn't hurt you."

Rogue did indeed know that, but she wasn't ready to forgive him yet.

"We are taking separate showers, then you can spent the rest of the evening making it up to me and if you don't, I'm sleeping in the spare room tonight."

"Chère! How can you be so cruel?"

"Because you tried to blow me up, that's how!"

She locked him out of the bathroom and proceeded to use all the hot water. When she came out an hour later, Remy looked disgruntled but Rogue ignored it, sailing past him and into their bedroom to get dressed.

When she was done, she came out into the living room and stood by the power inhibitor. While she really didn't want to lose Remy, she did want to get rid of her last weakness. This little contraption, no larger than a dinner plate, was the key to her freedom, the only problem was, which freedom? Did she want to be free of her captors but always alone, or did she want to be freed of her power and loved, yet always looking over her shoulder.

If only she could control her own powers, then she wouldn't need this infernal machine to be with Remy, but it didn't matter how well she could control other peoples powers, or how hard she tried to stop absorbing someone, she just couldn't get it.

 ***

"Hey, turn it up!" someone in the bar called, and the bartender duly turned the volume up on the television. Rogue and Remy couldn't help but turn to look. On the screen was a middle aged man with greying hair and a widening waist. The caption said he was Senator Lawrence.

"... believe that mutants are a potential threat to out society and until we know who they are and what they can do, the American people will forever be living in fear. That is why I am proposing the Mutant Registration Act."

"But didn't Hitler do something similar with German Jews? Isn't this bill worrying?" a voice off camera asked.

"Of course not." He chuckled a little, looking like everyone's favourite uncle. "We licence people to drive and to own guns because both have the potential to be dangerous. This is exactly the same thing and we no more want to take a mutants liberty away, than we want to revoke someone's driving license. If a mutant stays within the laws of society, they have nothing to fear from the registration act."

Discussions were breaking out around the bar now, so the bartender turned the volume down again.

"They hate us, don't they," Rogue said quietly. "We're always going to be running."

"Now, chère, we don't know what the future holds. Don't start worrying about something that may never happen."

"But even normal people hate us. I saw a poll on the news this morning, and 78% of people think that mutants are dangerous."

"78% of people are morons. People are afraid of what they don't understand, but that doesn't mean they won't change their minds."

Rogue just sulked into her beer.

"Hey," he said to get her attention. "Listen to the two men at the end of the bar," he told her, pointing to a couple of elderly gentlemen who were discussing mutants.

"What about the one who walkes through solid objects?" said the one dressed in blue. He looked to be about 60, with a fashion sense that was at least a decade out of style.

"Oh, scary! What's she going to do, walk over my grave?" said his friend, who had a kindly sort of face, a little like the senator on television, but this man's kindly features weren't practised like the senator's were.

"What about that shape changin' one?" the first friend argued.

"My wife does that every day. I wake up next to a dog but by the time I leave for work, she's a real glamour puss."

"Well the one who controls weather ain't good!"

"Sure as hell is! If I knew where to find her, I'd befriend her myself. I'm sick and tried of my barbecues being rained off and my tomatoes failing!"

"This ain't a joke, Bill!"

"Sure sounds like a joke to me, and a dumb joke at that."

"They can teleport!"

"So could Captain Kirk, and he wasn't a bad guy." The friendly looking one chuckled.

"What if they teleport into your house to steal stuff?"

"Any decent thief could get into my house, Don. Yours too, your window locks aren't worth shit." Remy had to smile at the truth of that statement. "Look, anything these mutants can do, we can do. Humans have either found another way to do, or a way around it. 'Sides, it's not like I've got anything worth stealing anyway."

"Frigin' mutie lover, that's what you are, Bill."

"Frigin' bigot, that's what you are, Don."

Rogue cheered up a little as she listened to Don and Bill's debate. Maybe not everyone was against them and maybe, just maybe, common sense would prevail.

Debating mutant rights wasn't exactly the evening Remy had planned when he said he'd make their fight up to her, but she did seem happier than went they'd left the apartment and by the time they got home that evening, Rogue had forgiven her Cajun.

After the drink in the bar, she had been fed at one of the best bistros in town, and she had drunk some of the finest wines while there. Remy was slowly teaching her to appreciate wines and which ones were worth ordering. After all, he reasoned, if she couldn't get drunk, she should at least be able to enjoy the finest tastes.

 ***

As they lay in bed that night, with the power inhibitor on beside them as it was every night, Rogue tried her best to access her power and levitate off the bed. It took three hours of trying, but finally she rose an inch or two and was even able to lower herself back down gently.

As well as their daily sparring sessions, each night she practised levitating once she thought Remy was asleep, not allowing herself to sleep until she had succeeded. She still worried about losing Remy once she could access her powers with the dampening field on, but she had decided to trust that he would always be there for her, and that she was in more danger of 'them' capturing her again than she was of losing Remy.