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xp_logsRemy wakes up in bed with his wife. Who doesn't know who he is. Or remember that she's married. Or any of those, you know, minor details... (NC-17: SEXUAL CONTENT)
Despite the fact that it had been late when Remy had come to bed, his eyes flickered open an hour before the alarm. His manipulated system only allowed him a few hours of sleep most nights, but he enjoyed lying in bed and letting his mind turn over whatever new information the day had turned up, allowing Ororo to keep a somewhat normal sleeping schedule with her husband.
It was something that still amazed them. Remy had been a solitary creature most of his life, but since Ororo, he found himself missing her presence beside him when work took them off in separate directions. It wasn't even just the physical enjoyment of her smooth warmth next to him. It was a connection that reassured him that for that night, he wasn't alone in the world. It was a welcome balm to the other horrors that lived inside his head.
His arm was already resting across her side, and he let his fingers slide lightly over the smooth skin of her abdomen, feeling the toned muscle under the soft, dark skin. He'd come in after she'd already been asleep, her schedule as demanding as his in most ways, and she didn't have the advantage of a government augmented metabolism. So, unlike most nights, they passed on their usual lovemaking. Now, pressed against her, his body responded to the lack, excited as always by the touch of her skin.
Ororo stirred sleepily under his touch, coming half-awake at the movement of his fingers. She couldn't remember the turn of events the night before that had led her to be in a stranger's bed but now that she was here she certainly wasn't going to run away - even if she would be chastised for her absence. Well, so much the better; the thought of the rules she was breaking made her all the more determined to stay and she writhed a bit, turning over until she could meet her bedmate's lips with a kiss.
Morning, chere." Remy said quietly, grinning as she turned over under his hands. Obviously she didn't mind getting woken up at all. He stroked her side, sliding up to cup one breast as his lips moved to her throat.
Chere? Oh Goddess, not a Frenchman.... She pulled back slightly to look at the man currently fondling her, eyes widening in surprise as she took in how old he was. Good-looking, yes, but definitely old.
Remy noticed the pause, and let his own fingers still. Ororo wasn't one for nightmares often, so he doubted that was the case. His red on black eyes caught her blue ones, seeing the slight dilution of the pupils from surprise.
"Somet'ing de matter?" He said, a little puzzled. Maybe something had happened last night that she was just remembering?
"No," she said boldly, shaking her head as she took in his strange eyes, the way they seemed to regard her with such familiarity. Should she remember him? She couldn't for the life of her think of why he might know her, besides the obvious fact that they had spent the night together. Which reminded her... "Do you have a condom?" she asked, glad to have remembered before things went any further.
"Oui." It was another odd note. The genetic manipulation that the government had inflicted on LeBeau meant that if he and Ororo ever wanted children, they'd need some serious help from Muir Island to do it. Which was likely a good thing, considering what Gambit's habits had been. Usually, they only used protection when one of them had been off in a less sanitary part of the world for a while and their blood work hadn't come back. Enough that they kept a supply, but it wasn't their normal habit. Something had her distracted, although Remy tried to push the momentary flash of concern aside. When he needed to know she'd tell him. He trusted her.
Remy fished a condom packet out of the bedside table and rolled back over, stealing a kiss as he did so. Ororo responded in kind, eagerly reaching to help him with the prophylactic, already sliding a leg over his, the atmosphere in the room becoming heavy, charged with static. The feel of the city close around her still made her skin itch, but at least for a little bit she could forget that and concentrate purely on the sensations coursing through her body.
The feel of her always enflamed him, even after being together for years and then married. He heard it was supposed to get boring or stale, but between his agility and her mischievous streak, Remy was left feeling more like they'd only barely scratched the surface. His hands slid down along the curve of her spine, running flat across her rotating hips.
Then, without ceremony, she shifted and mounted him, throwing back the covers as she began to move above him. She knew what a glorious picture she made, her dark skin and pale hair contrasting beautifully in the early morning light. She was powerful, she a goddess, she thought, throwing her head back, she was-- why couldn't she feel her hair tickling her back? Her hands flew from his chest to her head, feeling her shortened locks and giving a loud gasp of shock. "What have you done?" She demanded of her partner, glaring down at him accusingly.
Remy was snapped out of the centring pleasure by the accusing tone, and looked up at her, confused. "I don't think I did anything different." He said carefully, watching her clutch her head. What the hell was going on?
Without any regard for the activities they had been engaged in Ororo removed herself, running to the nearest mirror - a small circle hanging on the wall near the window - and gasping once more. There was no mistake about it, her hair was much shorter, now in a choppy cut not even grazing her bare shoulders.
"Basha!" she declared, whirling to face him as the air around her crackled dangerously. "Is this a kind of joke? What did you do to me?"
"'Ro, you not making any sense." Remy said, the hair on the back of his neck rising with the angry static growing around them in the bedroom. "Is it you hair? Its de same as it was when you went to bed."
She didn't respond, instead turning back to the mirror and examining herself in closer detail in a state of near panic. It wasn't just her hair that was different - her face had changed as well, now less rounded and lightly lined around the eyes. "I am old!" she exclaimed.
This must be his fault - he was some sort of youth-sucking mutant, preying on her beauty. "Give it back!" Ororo demanded then, hitting him with a heavy gust of wind that flattened the blankets of the bed.
The wind buffeted Remy, sending him crashing into the wall. His spatial sense was underlining the signals that hadn't fit with him earlier. This wasn't Ororo. At least, it wasn't his Ororo. It was close, but her movements were different; a touch hesitant in parts where normally she was smooth and controlled. As if she were unsure of herself, her confidence shaken. It wasn't a shapeshifter - there were too many little elements that matched Ororo movements that would be impossible for anyone who wasn't gifted with his bizarre mental radar to pick up.
"You need to calm down, Stormy. Somet'ing's happened to you."
The use of her code name stopped her momentarily; how did he know that? Narrowing her eyes suspiciously she lowered her hands somewhat, though the atmosphere within the room did not calm. "Who are you? What happened to me? Do you know the Professor?" she fired at him then.
"You don't know who I am." It was more of a statement than a question, although the momentary flicker of pain in his eyes didn't reach his voice. Maybe it was some kind of memory suppression, but why target just Ororo? Bringing up the Professor wasn't a bad idea. If this was an attack that had somehow slipped past Frost, Charles might be the only one who could fix it. "My name is Remy and, oui, I know Charles Xavier. And de rest of his students and X-Men at Westchester. What's de last thing dat you remember, ch- Ororo."
Doug wakes up almost naked. In bed with a woman. Who he knows, but doesn't know him...
~BEEP BEEP BEEP BEEP~ an alarm clock blared loudly as Doug Ramsey struggled toward wakefulness. He rolled over, and reached towards the source of the noise in an attempt to smack it into quiet so he could get some more sleep. Except when he reached, his arm fell over someone sleeping next to him.
This was confusing to Doug for a number of reasons. First, he was pretty sure he was in a queen or king sized bed, and his bed at Xavier's was a twin. Second, he couldn't think of anyone who would be in bed next to him. Even Artie and Leech weren't really the sort to come snuggling up to Jamie or Doug in the middle of the night. Besides, the person next to him felt too big to be his younger suitemates.
And then Doug's arm brushed up against something soft that his still catching up brain was pretty sure was a breast, and his eyes shot open. He didn't recognize any of the room around him, though he quickly guessed from the furnishings that it was someone's apartment, which he had absolutely no idea how he'd gotten to from the mansion. Then he looked over at his mystery bedmate, who was on her back with one hand over her eyes. His brain whirred, and he blinked. That looked like...Jubilee. If Jubilee were a twentysomething hottie. He tried to remember if Jubilee had ever mentioned any relatives that looked a lot like her.
And then the beginnings of adrenaline got to his brain, and he woke up all the way to realize that whoever the woman was, she was wearing a very formfitting camisole with spaghetti straps, and he could see an awful lot of her arms and shoulders, and the outline of the breasts his arm had bumped up against. That caused a stirring in...suddenly Doug realized he wasn't wearing his usual T-shirt and sleep shorts. He pulled the covers up and looked underneath them to find that he was only wearing a pair of boxer briefs. Emphasis on the 'brief'. ~And when did I get a sixpack?~ he thought, extremely confused.
And then the woman who may or may not have been Jubilee muttered as she started to wake due to the still-beeping alarm clock. Doug was sure that there was something that one should say in a strange situation like this, but all he managed was "Um."
There was a noise coming from somewhere, a really annoying, really insistent noise and Jubilee stirred from what had been a truly epic dream starring a complete hottie to flail sideways at her alarm clock, opening her eyes as it crashed to the ground only to turn her head again when greeted by the sound of another person, and not just any person but the hottie who'd been in her dream.
"Hey gorgeous," she said, figuring if her dream was going to decide to do weird things like this, then she could totally play along.
The sleep-roughened purr in (was it Jubilee? He still had no idea) the woman's voice caused Doug's erection to go from 'half' to 'full' in the space of several seconds. It strained against the cotton of his underwear, and he was even more aware of how little clothing they both were wearing, if that was at all possible.
Doug's head jerked up from his desk, sweat running down his temple and breath coming in gasps. Gazing around the room, it seemed like everyone was concentrating especially hard on their papers, studiously ignoring him. ~Oh, god, what did I...~ the thought trailed off as he realized his hand was still pressed firmly to his arousal, which was still extremely hard. Blushing furiously, he quickly gathered his papers and fled, oblivious to the confused gazes that followed him.
His sleep-fogged arousal shifted suddenly to shame, and Doug was abruptly up and out of the bed, hands clasped in front of him and stammering nervously.
"This...um," Jubilee began, wondering why her dream lover had suddenly turned all shy and weird when he was obviously very happy to see her. "Isn't a dream?"
Doug's voice had more than a small note of panic in it as he replied.
"I don't think so. If this was a dream, I'd be, um..." Having a lot of sex. With what appeared to be a very willing and stunning college-age woman. "I mean, it being a dream would explain these ridiculous abs," he said a bit more thoughtfully, poking at his stomach with a finger before returning to frantically attempting to hide his very erect...erection. "Because I swear, I didn't have these when I went to bed last night. Also where in the world are we?" ~And who are you?~ was the unasked followup that he couldn't quite bring himself to ask.
"This isn't your place?" Jubilee asked, finally dragging herself from the bed and walking toward him. "Cause, it's certainly not mine and if it's not yours, this could be kinda weird. Also...do you remember anything from last night? Cause, well, you're kinda nakedish, but you don't exactly appear to be terribly comfortable with the whole thing."
"No, it's not my place!" Okay, that had maybe come out a bit strident. Doug took a few short panicky breaths. "I figured it was your place. I mean, I live at..." Doug paused and frowned. If he didn't entirely recognize his own body, maybe the other person was... "Jubilee?"
"Yeah?" she replied, wondering what the questioning note in his voice was all about, obviously they'd exchanged names last night, albeit she didn't actually remember what his was, or why she'd been outside the mansion, or in the same place as an obviously college age guy. "And, um, don't take this the wrong way but, I totally don't know what your name is, funny huh?"
Huh. It was Jubilee. But she didn't know him? Curiouser and curiouser, as the line from Alice in Wonderland went. And Doug was definitely feeling like he had gone down the rabbit hole, and emerged in a world where nothing at all made sense. "I'm Doug? We're both students at Xavier's?" His nervousness and confusion led to every sentence sounding more like a question than a statement. "But when I went to bed last night, we weren't..." Twenty-somethings. A ridiculously fit Adonis and Aphrodite. Sleeping together. All of the above.
"Weren't?" Jubilee repeated helpfully, hoping he would finish that sentence with something that actually made sense. The fact that he thought they were both students, and not just herself didn't make any sense at all. Unless he was an alumnus or something. Had there been some kind of party last night?
She supposed if there had been, someone might have spiked the punch, she'd have guessed John frankly, and she was totally going to kill him the next time she saw him, because much as she was enjoying the view right now, she would have preferred losing her virginity to be something she remembered the next morning.
Doug just pointed mutely at the closet door, which held a mirror on the inside of it and was slightly ajar. She wasn't going to believe it until she saw it, he was pretty sure of that. And he certainly wasn't going to put his hands on...all that skin...to direct her. Even if he wanted to. Because future Jubilee, or whoever, was only wearing a pair of high-cut panties below the waist, and her legs were...amazing.
Jubilee's eyes followed 'Doug's' pointing finger and shrugged, heading toward the mirror. She froze the moment she came into actual seeing distance and blinked several times at what appeared to be herself, even going so far as to wave and then step in and out of the mirror frame to make sure she wasn't still dreaming in some weird ass dream that seriously needed to get over the whole surreal elements, like, totally now.
"So, um...I appear to be a lot older then when I last looked," she said somewhat lamely, glancing back over at Doug, and then seeing as how she wasn't likely to get another chance, totally checked him out from head to toe while she was at it. "I take it, um, you're not as old as you look either?"
The overt look caused Doug's face to flush bright red, which then spread...well, quite far down his chest, which Jubilee could see because it was all still on display. Pants. There really needed to be pants. Except for the part where he really wanted to size up Jubilee in the same way, even if he didn't want to admit it. "Sixteen," he said, his voice cracking a little bit.
"Dude, you totally don't look sixteen, we should seriously take advantage of this fact to go like, buy alcohol or something. No way we're gettin' carded lookin' like this," Jubilee noted, looking around the apartment for something that resembled pants that would fit her and not seeing anything. "So, like, I'm totally lacking clothing here, which sort of points to this not being my place, ya know? You see anything that might fit?"
Doug's brain finally got back on the tracks long enough for him to notice a pair of jeans that looked like his hanging over the back of a chair. He grabbed them and gratefully held them in front of himself. He was going to put them on, but then he realized without his hands covering, his erection would temporarily be in plain view. Fortunately, fate intervened, and he spotted a fairly tidy pile of clothes near the dresser that looked relatively feminine. "Those look like yours?" he offered hesitantly. When she turned around to put things on, then he could put his jeans on while she wasn't looking.
Jubilee pulled what looked like a 'man in black' pair of suit pants on and a button down white shirt, wondering when the hell she'd turned into a stiff. Either that, or she'd been going to an interview...people in their twenties did that, right?
"So, we were in bed together, does that like, mean we're an item or something, or were we totally one night standing, do you think?" she said over her shoulder as she dressed.
Well, Doug had intended to pull his jeans on, but then Jubilee had bent over to pick up her clothes. And the camisole had ridden up slightly, so he could see all of her panties and all the way down her well-muscled legs, and he took the chance to look without getting caught (hopefully, at least). Finally he turned his back to her to pull on the jeans, since he'd gotten distracted. When he turned back, the sight of her in an untucked buttondown that looked like it could have come from his closet didn't do anything to relieve the situation in his pants. "I don't even..." He wasn't the type for one night stands. Of course, he also thought he was a virgin. And who knew what had happened in the years between sixteen and...whenever?
"So, what do you think? Married, dating, FWB?" Jubilee continued on, tucking her shirt in as she looked around for shoes, she found a pair of red trainers not far from her clothes and slipped them on her feet. "Having a torrid affair?"
The idea of any of the above caused Doug to breathe a little bit quicker in panic, but he did his best to force himself to calm down at least a bit and think about the situation rationally while he searched for a shirt to put on, still painfully aware of its lack. "Well, neither of us is wearing a ring? So married is out, I think..."
"Well, we could be one of those new age couple types that never wear their rings, but I figure not," Jubilee replied with a grin, teasing a little. It was hard not to when he seemed so panicked by what seemed to her to be a weird, but not particularly distressing turn of events. She figured they'd just need to wait till someone or something, whatever it had been got bored and then they'd be back to normal. "But I figure, torrid affair or dating is probably most likely. Think you're the type of guy who'd have a torrid affair?"
"No, but then, I didn't think I was the type of guy to have..." Sex at all. When he'd gone to bed the night before, he'd been busy pining over Marie, and Paige, and a few other girls. And then he'd woken up with a full grown woman. Jamie would never...he abruptly began searching his pockets. Maybe Jamie would be able to help. "Where's my phone?" he asked, half to himself.
"Duuuude, I totes did not think of my phone," Jubilee said, forehead slapping herself as she began searching through her own pockets. "Huh, not here, Ororo is gonna murder me if I forgot it again."
Having found nothing in his pockets, Doug began searching the rest of the room. On the bedside table, next to a wallet and a set of keys that he was presuming were his, there was a small item, about the size of his flattened hand, with nothing but a screen filling the majority of one side. His brain didn't immediately guess 'phone', because where was the keypad? Then he remembered hearing something about touchscreen technology for Nintendo's new handheld, and experimentally tapped the screen with his finger. A password prompt and small onscreen keyboard appeared, and he whistled low. Clearly his future self or whatever kept up to date with the newest technology.
But this, naturally, raised a different question. How was he supposed to guess his own password?
"Dude, what is that?" Jubilee asked, walking over to take a look at the device Doug was holding. "Okay, whoever you are, you must be totally loaded. Wonder if that means I'm rich too? I could play the rich celebutante, like for serious."
"I -think- it's my phone," Doug told her, then shrugged. "Maybe technology has gotten really amazing in...however many years." Occam's Razor - the simplest possible explanation was likely to be true. Somehow, he was guessing they were in the future. Well, the future relative to them at sixteen. Or something.
And he was still stuck trying to figure out his password. If it was his phone, he was guessing his password might be a bit less...robust than it would on something more important, like a computer. So, at a loss for anything else, he went with brute force.
[HackTheGibson] - incorrect password, access denied. [MartinBishop] - incorrect password, access denied. [Swordfish] - incorrect password, access denied.
On his fourth attempt, he entered what he probably should have tried first. "TheCypher". The password prompt disappeared, revealing a multitude of buttons. Finding the one labeled 'address book', he tapped it, then scrolled down the resultant list to 'Jamie'.
Three attempts later, he had gotten the same near simultaneous pair of clicks that indicated someone picking up and then hanging up the phone. Once could be chalked up to mistake, maybe even twice. But three times was a pretty clear message that the person on the other end didn't want to talk, and wasn't interested in simply ignoring the phone ring to let it go to voicemail. Doug stared at his phone blankly, wondering why Jamie would do that to him, and having absolutely no idea.
Suddenly the 'future' didn't seem so welcoming.
"No luck?" Jubilee asked, noticing the look of doubt and feeling just a little less happy about this whole thing.
It was okay as long as everything was upbeat, when things started getting serious it meant she had to really think about what was happening and that was not something she really wanted to do right now.
Doug shook his head. "I have no idea what to do now." The weight of whatever crazy thing had happened to them finally had gotten to him. "You?"
"Um, do you have Ororo's number in there at all?" Jubilee asked, moving closer as she peered at the device.
"I think..." Doug went scrolling through his phone's address book, when suddenly it began vibrating in his hand. ~INCOMING CALL: REMY~
Remy goes looking for the other members of X-Force. First stop is Cammie, who has woken up in a strange apartment, and has decided that she's going to rip off whoever lives there...
The night before had been cold, even for Texas and Cammie had hunkered down in a warehouse that hadn't been used in years under a combination of stolen blankets, newspapers and her leather jacket, stolen just the other day right under the nose of some inattentive store clerk.
When she opened her eyes she freaked out. The corner of the warehouse was as close to a safe space as she got and she woke up somewhere else. That itself shouldn't have been possible; she was an insanely light sleeper. You had to be if you didn't want to get killed in your sleep or drug off somewhere. Which had apparently happened here.
She rolled out of the bed, clothed only in her underwear and her arm bindings. That disturbed her even more. Whoever had moved her had apparently taken the time to strip her down.
Cammie scrambled to her to her feet, looking around. The room wasn't in any place she knew. So it wasn't like one of her few friends had found her and taken her in. First thing she did was tear apart the dresser trying to find something to wear. The strange thing was everything looked like it it would fit. The extra layer of creepy that added was responsible for the total destruction of the dresser.
From the pile of clothes on the floor she picked a plain shirt and jeans and a worn jacket from a pin on the wall when a tack board over a desk caught her eyes. The well used picture that had been in her bag of her and his class ring, hanging there like someone had decided to put her life on display.
Though Cammie was tempted to rip the picture off, she took it down with shaking hands, careful not to damage it more than it already had been. And it looked like it had been through more than the last year and change and put it carefully in the pocket of the jacket. The necklace though she pulled off of it's place with a lot less ceremony and put it on, tucking it under her shirt. The other pictures on the board were like a window in to someone else's life.
Right now though, Cammie did not want to play this game. Those pictures and whoever was in them all were torn off and scattered to the floor before she pulled the tack board off of the wall and threw the stupid thing across the room. Whoever had drug her here was going to get a one hell of a parting gift from her. She was intent on trashing the place before she left.
From the noise, Remy was aware that Cammie was effected too. Today just could not get any worse, he considered, as he made his way to the door and opened it. The noise seemed to be contained to the bedroom of her apartment, and LeBeau stopped to slip on a pair of gloves. Her poison based powers were just a touch too dangerous not to take some precautions against. A thought chilled him. What if tomorrw they were six instead of sixteen? A temper tantrum could level the whole building in a short time from some of them.
He opened the door.
Cammie heard the door open and got ready, pulling the bandages off her left hand. Whoever it was, they had this coming, jacking her off the street for god knows what and going through her things and taking her leather jacket and replacing it with a crappy new one. Not to mention her little bit of cash and the stuff she planned on selling today.
"Get the fuck out of here, you sick fuck!"
"Almost sounds like your normal good morning, Cammie." Remy said, standing in the doorway. They had replaced the old windows with good security glass, which took time to get through. So the only quick way out was through him.
When she got a glance of him, Cammie didn't recognize him at all. Which made him knowing her name that much more creepy. And strange. She had a lot of fake IDs but not one that actually had her name one it. She didn't like fighting in enclosed spaces if she could avoid it, but if he was the only way out, well then he was going down.
"Get the fuck out," the 'or else' was implied in her tone.
"Non. Let me guess. You aren't where you went to sleep last night, you woke on in dis strange room where all de clothes fit you, your personal things are, and if you've taken de time to look in a mirror, you noticed dat things not quite de same. Dat 'bout sum up you morning?"
"So you are the sick fucker who brought me here!" was her response to that, along with making a fist out of her left hand and trying to figure out just how hard to hit him. She was still figuring that out.
"Non but I know who did. De question is do you want to know or would you rather hit me and away?"
"Well then what the fuck IS going on here!" Cammie returned.
"You not 16. Dis is your apartment." Remy said simply.
That didn't make any sense at all, demonstrated by Cammie tilting her head a bit as she tried to process that. "Prove it," was all she said, if only because she wanted to know why the hell she was here and what the fuck was going on.
"Take a look in de mirror. You look underfed and sixteen still?" It wasn't that Cammie had aged a lot, but years of proper food and training had changed her body from her emancipated appearance from when she'd first come to the mansion. "Bathroom is dat way."
He had cut off her question about where the bathroom was, because it wasn't like she knew where the fuck anything was here. Only that it was like someone made a horrible parody of what life could be for her to skip around in like some sort of bug in a cage. Well, some people did keep pet scorpions, she supposed.
Cammie gave the guy a suspicious glance as she went in the direction indicated and stared in mirror. The first thing that caught her attention was the 'Love Like Winter' written at the bottom in lipstick and song lyrics in sharpie around the edges. It was something she did, but she didn't remember doing it. Fuck, she didn't even know a couple of the songs that were up there. And it was missing a couple she put everywhere.
And then she finally caught a glance at her self. Her hair was still long, but not ragged like she actually had time to care for it. She was had a couple piercings missing and a couple added and her face looked... different. More filled out, a lot like she did. Which was funny as she couldn't recall the last time she had really eaten something more than what she could pull out of a dumpster. There were also hints of scars she could not remember getting.
She had a sinking feeling that whoever was out there might be right before she gave in to her next impulse and punched the mirror hard enough for it to shatter and to cut her 'bad' hand up while releasing a torrent of profanity directed at the situation and at herself, because now she was bleeding. And that tended to kill people. Everything she did tended to leave a body or ten behind.
"Wrap youself up. Dere's bandages under de sink." Remy said, not moving from his perch.
Cammie hit the mirror, or what was left of it, once more for good measure. The smell of her blood would have turned her stomach if anything could be said to do that anymore. If only because it generally meant something really bad had just happened. She did find the bandages and started wrapping her injured hand.
"Not worried about the fucking toxic sludge all over here now?" she snapped, "Because you really should be."
"I know about it." Remy said, still in his trenchcoat leaning against the wall. "And you. So, what's de deal? You going to believe me from now on?"
Cammie caught a glance of her own reflection in the pieces of the shattered mirror, "I don't know what to believe," she said, "but something really fucked up is going on here and I'm going to murder whoever decided this was fucking funny. So, if you know who, sure, why the fuck not with the whole 'trust' thing." For now, anyway.
"Calm down." Remy said, and the gaze he affixed her with was not unlike she'd seen on the road. It was the dangerous one; the person that had the capacity to bury you out beside the highway regardless of how hard or mean you thought you were. They never said much, and when they reacted, it was deadly. "You follow me, you do what I say, and dis all becomes a bad dream. You run, or put other people in danger, and Remy stick you somewhere dat makes you past look like a high school trip. We clear?"
Cammie blanched and nodded. She could tell the really dangerous people from the blowhards. And it was avoiding the former that kept her alive. Sure, she hadn't met anyone she couldn't kill with a touch, but in this case she didn't think she'd even get as far as the required skin to skin contact.
"Crystal," she answered. She'd shut up, do what he said and then when this was over or she had the chance she'd get the fuck out of here and away from people.
"Good. Get youself properly dressed and meet me in de lobby in ten minutes. Ooh, and you might want to stop breaking things. You may not remember, but you worked hard to earn dis place."
Remy finally finds someone who doesn't think they're sixteen. Of course, it's the newest member of X-Force, who's only nineteen...
It was early in the morning, Nico's less favorite time of the day. It would be accurate to say her brain didn't start working until midday, at best, so her being up and about when the weather was still cold really didn't go well with her. Work was work though, and she was good at her work, as inconsequential as it seemed to be. She barely noticed there was no security on the front desk, and that the place was perhaps a bit emptier than usual, but that didn't trouble her; apparently there had been some big shot making noise the last day, so maybe people were all over the place.
Exiting the Brownstone, the girl couldn't help but yawn. It was going to be one of those days...
Before she could make it more than a few steps, Remy came out of the doors behind her, trenchcoat flapping in the snowy street.
"Nico! Wait!" he said, his stride eating up the distance. "Where you going?"
Nico stopped on her tracks, turning around with a half sleepy face. "Well, I was going to get me some coffee, and buy some for whoever feels like crap as well. You want some?" And then she yawned again, hand covering her mouth.
"Then to de office?"
Nico gave him a careful look. "...yeah, that's how it usually goes right? Are you okay? You don't look okay."
She wasn't effected. So why not her and him, but Ororo and Cammie? "I'm not. Dere's been some kind of attack. Some of de others think dat dey sixteen again, wit' no memories of the years after." Remy said, turning her back towards the brownstone. "We need to check on everyone to see who's infected, and stop dem from trying to run away or contact dere parents or something."
"Wh-what? For reals?"
Suddenly she was very awake, yes. Nico tried to process the information without discarding it as some ill conceived joke, but still, that sounded crazy as hell. "Wait, Amanda too? Oh crap. I'm right after you."
"Not sure. You check on 'manda and Marie-Ange. Remy go see if Sarah's affected." And if so, hopefully not get a bone in the throat.
So it was seeing how Amanda was in her teens -which in a way was one of those meetings she never thought of having the chance of experiencing-" and also checking on some precognitive...redheaded person. Who probably had a gun or something. "Oh man... it is really going to be one of those days. I'm on it."
"You'd better be, because if dis has hit more people, we going to be in big trouble, fast."
Remy checks in on Sarah, who is also affected, and she's really really not happy with Remy. So nothing new there.
The hot water had been gone an hour ago. The shower had been well stocked for a hotel, and Sarah had enjoyed taking the extra time to wash the grime from beneath her fingernails as the blessedly hot water ran over her like torrents of rain.
She hadn't found any clothes that looked like her own on the floor by the bed, but somehow there had been a closet full of clothes her size with minimal bone damage. She picked a pair of sweatpants that hung low on her hips, a soft cotton tank-top, and made a mental note to raid the closet before she left for the tunnels. Just another guest leaving with a handful of belongings. It didn't matter they weren't hers.
There was a knock at the door, and Sarah glanced at the clock. Could be early checkout, but whoever's room this was had left all their stuff. Housekeeping maybe. Sarah took a deep breath, and opened the door. Stay calm. Act like you belong here. This is your room.
"Sarah? You awake?" Remy called through the door. Maybe she hadn't been infected, although so far, only Nico and himself had proven immune to the mental de-aging, and Remy still had no clue why or how it was happening.
The man outside wasn't dressed like hotel staff. He was older than she was, and not bad looking. Was this who she'd slept with last night? She'd assumed it was a woman because of the clothes and the shower, but she couldn't think of any other reason this guy would be here and talking like he knew her if it wasn't his room. She smiled, leaning in the doorway. "I'm sorry, do I know you?" Play dumb. Let him confirm.
"Merde." Remy muttered as she asked him the question. It had got her too, which meant another explanation to keep her here. "Good morning, Sarah. My name's Remy and I need to talk to you for a minute."
Ah. So she hadn't fucked him. She didn't know him at all from the way he introduced himself. "Nice try asshole. I don't need saved-- or whatever else you're trying to push my direction." She stepped back, moving to close the door in his face for emphasis.
"From de Morlock tunnels? Non, does you found you own way out of. Same as Callisto and Artie." Remy paused, catching her with his red on black gaze. "Still don't have a minute to talk?"
Sarah stared at him for a split second, than pulled a bone from her shoulder, ripping fabric and flesh. She swung at him. "They're fucking dead, asshole. Don't you dare try to use them to get to me."
Remy caught her wrist neatly, twisting her arm around into a painful wrist lock. Sarah was fast, strong and dangerous as hell, but Remy had been one of the people who helped make her that way. Sixteen year old Sarah had none of her adult's deadly abilities.
"Now, we can go round and round, but Remy don' have time for dat." He all but frogmarched her over to her desk where her phone sat. Without relinquishing his hold, he touched the screen to power it up. "If I can prove dat dey alive, you stop trying to kill me. We have a deal?"
"Who said I was trying to kill you? I just want you to go the hell away." Sarah glared at him. "And besides, I saw the bodies. You want to tell me some upworlder fucking knows more about my family than I do?"
"Dats where it gets complicated." Remy said, releasing his grip. As she back away, he toggled on the phone's picture viewer. Sarah wasn't much of a casual picture taker, which was the only reason he'd noticed her taking some photos last time they were at the mansion. An image of a scowling Artie was first, and he offered the phone to her. "Take a look at the pictures."
Sarah looked at the phone, and audibly gasped. Her thumb brushed the touch-screen accidentally and her cry of protest turned into an undignified squeak as another picture appeared: Callisto. Not looking at the screen, but unmistakably her. Sarah suddenly felt very small. "Where did you get this? What do you want?"
"It might be hard to believe, but you been de victim of an attack dat makes you think you still sixteen. Just take a look around, Sarah. Dis is you apartment." He said, pointing to her desk with her personal items.
"That's ridiculous," Sarah scoffed, "I couldn't afford a fucking apartment even if I wanted to." She glanced around at the room though, curious now. The room was peppered with stuff that she would have liked if she didn't live in a tunnel with corpses.
"You can. For a long time now." Remy said. "Go look in de mirror, Sarah. You face, you bones - dey are not what dey looked like yesterday for you."
"I didn't have a mirror yesterday, asshole." Well, maybe she had, but it didn't matter. She was beginning to really dislike this guy, who seemed to know a lot more than she was comfortable with and claimed to know everything else too. Well fuck that. "So what then? What the everliving fuck do you propose we do? Track them down and ask fucking nicely for them to fix things?"
Despite the fact that it had been late when Remy had come to bed, his eyes flickered open an hour before the alarm. His manipulated system only allowed him a few hours of sleep most nights, but he enjoyed lying in bed and letting his mind turn over whatever new information the day had turned up, allowing Ororo to keep a somewhat normal sleeping schedule with her husband.
It was something that still amazed them. Remy had been a solitary creature most of his life, but since Ororo, he found himself missing her presence beside him when work took them off in separate directions. It wasn't even just the physical enjoyment of her smooth warmth next to him. It was a connection that reassured him that for that night, he wasn't alone in the world. It was a welcome balm to the other horrors that lived inside his head.
His arm was already resting across her side, and he let his fingers slide lightly over the smooth skin of her abdomen, feeling the toned muscle under the soft, dark skin. He'd come in after she'd already been asleep, her schedule as demanding as his in most ways, and she didn't have the advantage of a government augmented metabolism. So, unlike most nights, they passed on their usual lovemaking. Now, pressed against her, his body responded to the lack, excited as always by the touch of her skin.
Ororo stirred sleepily under his touch, coming half-awake at the movement of his fingers. She couldn't remember the turn of events the night before that had led her to be in a stranger's bed but now that she was here she certainly wasn't going to run away - even if she would be chastised for her absence. Well, so much the better; the thought of the rules she was breaking made her all the more determined to stay and she writhed a bit, turning over until she could meet her bedmate's lips with a kiss.
Morning, chere." Remy said quietly, grinning as she turned over under his hands. Obviously she didn't mind getting woken up at all. He stroked her side, sliding up to cup one breast as his lips moved to her throat.
Chere? Oh Goddess, not a Frenchman.... She pulled back slightly to look at the man currently fondling her, eyes widening in surprise as she took in how old he was. Good-looking, yes, but definitely old.
Remy noticed the pause, and let his own fingers still. Ororo wasn't one for nightmares often, so he doubted that was the case. His red on black eyes caught her blue ones, seeing the slight dilution of the pupils from surprise.
"Somet'ing de matter?" He said, a little puzzled. Maybe something had happened last night that she was just remembering?
"No," she said boldly, shaking her head as she took in his strange eyes, the way they seemed to regard her with such familiarity. Should she remember him? She couldn't for the life of her think of why he might know her, besides the obvious fact that they had spent the night together. Which reminded her... "Do you have a condom?" she asked, glad to have remembered before things went any further.
"Oui." It was another odd note. The genetic manipulation that the government had inflicted on LeBeau meant that if he and Ororo ever wanted children, they'd need some serious help from Muir Island to do it. Which was likely a good thing, considering what Gambit's habits had been. Usually, they only used protection when one of them had been off in a less sanitary part of the world for a while and their blood work hadn't come back. Enough that they kept a supply, but it wasn't their normal habit. Something had her distracted, although Remy tried to push the momentary flash of concern aside. When he needed to know she'd tell him. He trusted her.
Remy fished a condom packet out of the bedside table and rolled back over, stealing a kiss as he did so. Ororo responded in kind, eagerly reaching to help him with the prophylactic, already sliding a leg over his, the atmosphere in the room becoming heavy, charged with static. The feel of the city close around her still made her skin itch, but at least for a little bit she could forget that and concentrate purely on the sensations coursing through her body.
The feel of her always enflamed him, even after being together for years and then married. He heard it was supposed to get boring or stale, but between his agility and her mischievous streak, Remy was left feeling more like they'd only barely scratched the surface. His hands slid down along the curve of her spine, running flat across her rotating hips.
Then, without ceremony, she shifted and mounted him, throwing back the covers as she began to move above him. She knew what a glorious picture she made, her dark skin and pale hair contrasting beautifully in the early morning light. She was powerful, she a goddess, she thought, throwing her head back, she was-- why couldn't she feel her hair tickling her back? Her hands flew from his chest to her head, feeling her shortened locks and giving a loud gasp of shock. "What have you done?" She demanded of her partner, glaring down at him accusingly.
Remy was snapped out of the centring pleasure by the accusing tone, and looked up at her, confused. "I don't think I did anything different." He said carefully, watching her clutch her head. What the hell was going on?
Without any regard for the activities they had been engaged in Ororo removed herself, running to the nearest mirror - a small circle hanging on the wall near the window - and gasping once more. There was no mistake about it, her hair was much shorter, now in a choppy cut not even grazing her bare shoulders.
"Basha!" she declared, whirling to face him as the air around her crackled dangerously. "Is this a kind of joke? What did you do to me?"
"'Ro, you not making any sense." Remy said, the hair on the back of his neck rising with the angry static growing around them in the bedroom. "Is it you hair? Its de same as it was when you went to bed."
She didn't respond, instead turning back to the mirror and examining herself in closer detail in a state of near panic. It wasn't just her hair that was different - her face had changed as well, now less rounded and lightly lined around the eyes. "I am old!" she exclaimed.
This must be his fault - he was some sort of youth-sucking mutant, preying on her beauty. "Give it back!" Ororo demanded then, hitting him with a heavy gust of wind that flattened the blankets of the bed.
The wind buffeted Remy, sending him crashing into the wall. His spatial sense was underlining the signals that hadn't fit with him earlier. This wasn't Ororo. At least, it wasn't his Ororo. It was close, but her movements were different; a touch hesitant in parts where normally she was smooth and controlled. As if she were unsure of herself, her confidence shaken. It wasn't a shapeshifter - there were too many little elements that matched Ororo movements that would be impossible for anyone who wasn't gifted with his bizarre mental radar to pick up.
"You need to calm down, Stormy. Somet'ing's happened to you."
The use of her code name stopped her momentarily; how did he know that? Narrowing her eyes suspiciously she lowered her hands somewhat, though the atmosphere within the room did not calm. "Who are you? What happened to me? Do you know the Professor?" she fired at him then.
"You don't know who I am." It was more of a statement than a question, although the momentary flicker of pain in his eyes didn't reach his voice. Maybe it was some kind of memory suppression, but why target just Ororo? Bringing up the Professor wasn't a bad idea. If this was an attack that had somehow slipped past Frost, Charles might be the only one who could fix it. "My name is Remy and, oui, I know Charles Xavier. And de rest of his students and X-Men at Westchester. What's de last thing dat you remember, ch- Ororo."
Doug wakes up almost naked. In bed with a woman. Who he knows, but doesn't know him...
~BEEP BEEP BEEP BEEP~ an alarm clock blared loudly as Doug Ramsey struggled toward wakefulness. He rolled over, and reached towards the source of the noise in an attempt to smack it into quiet so he could get some more sleep. Except when he reached, his arm fell over someone sleeping next to him.
This was confusing to Doug for a number of reasons. First, he was pretty sure he was in a queen or king sized bed, and his bed at Xavier's was a twin. Second, he couldn't think of anyone who would be in bed next to him. Even Artie and Leech weren't really the sort to come snuggling up to Jamie or Doug in the middle of the night. Besides, the person next to him felt too big to be his younger suitemates.
And then Doug's arm brushed up against something soft that his still catching up brain was pretty sure was a breast, and his eyes shot open. He didn't recognize any of the room around him, though he quickly guessed from the furnishings that it was someone's apartment, which he had absolutely no idea how he'd gotten to from the mansion. Then he looked over at his mystery bedmate, who was on her back with one hand over her eyes. His brain whirred, and he blinked. That looked like...Jubilee. If Jubilee were a twentysomething hottie. He tried to remember if Jubilee had ever mentioned any relatives that looked a lot like her.
And then the beginnings of adrenaline got to his brain, and he woke up all the way to realize that whoever the woman was, she was wearing a very formfitting camisole with spaghetti straps, and he could see an awful lot of her arms and shoulders, and the outline of the breasts his arm had bumped up against. That caused a stirring in...suddenly Doug realized he wasn't wearing his usual T-shirt and sleep shorts. He pulled the covers up and looked underneath them to find that he was only wearing a pair of boxer briefs. Emphasis on the 'brief'. ~And when did I get a sixpack?~ he thought, extremely confused.
And then the woman who may or may not have been Jubilee muttered as she started to wake due to the still-beeping alarm clock. Doug was sure that there was something that one should say in a strange situation like this, but all he managed was "Um."
There was a noise coming from somewhere, a really annoying, really insistent noise and Jubilee stirred from what had been a truly epic dream starring a complete hottie to flail sideways at her alarm clock, opening her eyes as it crashed to the ground only to turn her head again when greeted by the sound of another person, and not just any person but the hottie who'd been in her dream.
"Hey gorgeous," she said, figuring if her dream was going to decide to do weird things like this, then she could totally play along.
The sleep-roughened purr in (was it Jubilee? He still had no idea) the woman's voice caused Doug's erection to go from 'half' to 'full' in the space of several seconds. It strained against the cotton of his underwear, and he was even more aware of how little clothing they both were wearing, if that was at all possible.
Doug's head jerked up from his desk, sweat running down his temple and breath coming in gasps. Gazing around the room, it seemed like everyone was concentrating especially hard on their papers, studiously ignoring him. ~Oh, god, what did I...~ the thought trailed off as he realized his hand was still pressed firmly to his arousal, which was still extremely hard. Blushing furiously, he quickly gathered his papers and fled, oblivious to the confused gazes that followed him.
His sleep-fogged arousal shifted suddenly to shame, and Doug was abruptly up and out of the bed, hands clasped in front of him and stammering nervously.
"This...um," Jubilee began, wondering why her dream lover had suddenly turned all shy and weird when he was obviously very happy to see her. "Isn't a dream?"
Doug's voice had more than a small note of panic in it as he replied.
"I don't think so. If this was a dream, I'd be, um..." Having a lot of sex. With what appeared to be a very willing and stunning college-age woman. "I mean, it being a dream would explain these ridiculous abs," he said a bit more thoughtfully, poking at his stomach with a finger before returning to frantically attempting to hide his very erect...erection. "Because I swear, I didn't have these when I went to bed last night. Also where in the world are we?" ~And who are you?~ was the unasked followup that he couldn't quite bring himself to ask.
"This isn't your place?" Jubilee asked, finally dragging herself from the bed and walking toward him. "Cause, it's certainly not mine and if it's not yours, this could be kinda weird. Also...do you remember anything from last night? Cause, well, you're kinda nakedish, but you don't exactly appear to be terribly comfortable with the whole thing."
"No, it's not my place!" Okay, that had maybe come out a bit strident. Doug took a few short panicky breaths. "I figured it was your place. I mean, I live at..." Doug paused and frowned. If he didn't entirely recognize his own body, maybe the other person was... "Jubilee?"
"Yeah?" she replied, wondering what the questioning note in his voice was all about, obviously they'd exchanged names last night, albeit she didn't actually remember what his was, or why she'd been outside the mansion, or in the same place as an obviously college age guy. "And, um, don't take this the wrong way but, I totally don't know what your name is, funny huh?"
Huh. It was Jubilee. But she didn't know him? Curiouser and curiouser, as the line from Alice in Wonderland went. And Doug was definitely feeling like he had gone down the rabbit hole, and emerged in a world where nothing at all made sense. "I'm Doug? We're both students at Xavier's?" His nervousness and confusion led to every sentence sounding more like a question than a statement. "But when I went to bed last night, we weren't..." Twenty-somethings. A ridiculously fit Adonis and Aphrodite. Sleeping together. All of the above.
"Weren't?" Jubilee repeated helpfully, hoping he would finish that sentence with something that actually made sense. The fact that he thought they were both students, and not just herself didn't make any sense at all. Unless he was an alumnus or something. Had there been some kind of party last night?
She supposed if there had been, someone might have spiked the punch, she'd have guessed John frankly, and she was totally going to kill him the next time she saw him, because much as she was enjoying the view right now, she would have preferred losing her virginity to be something she remembered the next morning.
Doug just pointed mutely at the closet door, which held a mirror on the inside of it and was slightly ajar. She wasn't going to believe it until she saw it, he was pretty sure of that. And he certainly wasn't going to put his hands on...all that skin...to direct her. Even if he wanted to. Because future Jubilee, or whoever, was only wearing a pair of high-cut panties below the waist, and her legs were...amazing.
Jubilee's eyes followed 'Doug's' pointing finger and shrugged, heading toward the mirror. She froze the moment she came into actual seeing distance and blinked several times at what appeared to be herself, even going so far as to wave and then step in and out of the mirror frame to make sure she wasn't still dreaming in some weird ass dream that seriously needed to get over the whole surreal elements, like, totally now.
"So, um...I appear to be a lot older then when I last looked," she said somewhat lamely, glancing back over at Doug, and then seeing as how she wasn't likely to get another chance, totally checked him out from head to toe while she was at it. "I take it, um, you're not as old as you look either?"
The overt look caused Doug's face to flush bright red, which then spread...well, quite far down his chest, which Jubilee could see because it was all still on display. Pants. There really needed to be pants. Except for the part where he really wanted to size up Jubilee in the same way, even if he didn't want to admit it. "Sixteen," he said, his voice cracking a little bit.
"Dude, you totally don't look sixteen, we should seriously take advantage of this fact to go like, buy alcohol or something. No way we're gettin' carded lookin' like this," Jubilee noted, looking around the apartment for something that resembled pants that would fit her and not seeing anything. "So, like, I'm totally lacking clothing here, which sort of points to this not being my place, ya know? You see anything that might fit?"
Doug's brain finally got back on the tracks long enough for him to notice a pair of jeans that looked like his hanging over the back of a chair. He grabbed them and gratefully held them in front of himself. He was going to put them on, but then he realized without his hands covering, his erection would temporarily be in plain view. Fortunately, fate intervened, and he spotted a fairly tidy pile of clothes near the dresser that looked relatively feminine. "Those look like yours?" he offered hesitantly. When she turned around to put things on, then he could put his jeans on while she wasn't looking.
Jubilee pulled what looked like a 'man in black' pair of suit pants on and a button down white shirt, wondering when the hell she'd turned into a stiff. Either that, or she'd been going to an interview...people in their twenties did that, right?
"So, we were in bed together, does that like, mean we're an item or something, or were we totally one night standing, do you think?" she said over her shoulder as she dressed.
Well, Doug had intended to pull his jeans on, but then Jubilee had bent over to pick up her clothes. And the camisole had ridden up slightly, so he could see all of her panties and all the way down her well-muscled legs, and he took the chance to look without getting caught (hopefully, at least). Finally he turned his back to her to pull on the jeans, since he'd gotten distracted. When he turned back, the sight of her in an untucked buttondown that looked like it could have come from his closet didn't do anything to relieve the situation in his pants. "I don't even..." He wasn't the type for one night stands. Of course, he also thought he was a virgin. And who knew what had happened in the years between sixteen and...whenever?
"So, what do you think? Married, dating, FWB?" Jubilee continued on, tucking her shirt in as she looked around for shoes, she found a pair of red trainers not far from her clothes and slipped them on her feet. "Having a torrid affair?"
The idea of any of the above caused Doug to breathe a little bit quicker in panic, but he did his best to force himself to calm down at least a bit and think about the situation rationally while he searched for a shirt to put on, still painfully aware of its lack. "Well, neither of us is wearing a ring? So married is out, I think..."
"Well, we could be one of those new age couple types that never wear their rings, but I figure not," Jubilee replied with a grin, teasing a little. It was hard not to when he seemed so panicked by what seemed to her to be a weird, but not particularly distressing turn of events. She figured they'd just need to wait till someone or something, whatever it had been got bored and then they'd be back to normal. "But I figure, torrid affair or dating is probably most likely. Think you're the type of guy who'd have a torrid affair?"
"No, but then, I didn't think I was the type of guy to have..." Sex at all. When he'd gone to bed the night before, he'd been busy pining over Marie, and Paige, and a few other girls. And then he'd woken up with a full grown woman. Jamie would never...he abruptly began searching his pockets. Maybe Jamie would be able to help. "Where's my phone?" he asked, half to himself.
"Duuuude, I totes did not think of my phone," Jubilee said, forehead slapping herself as she began searching through her own pockets. "Huh, not here, Ororo is gonna murder me if I forgot it again."
Having found nothing in his pockets, Doug began searching the rest of the room. On the bedside table, next to a wallet and a set of keys that he was presuming were his, there was a small item, about the size of his flattened hand, with nothing but a screen filling the majority of one side. His brain didn't immediately guess 'phone', because where was the keypad? Then he remembered hearing something about touchscreen technology for Nintendo's new handheld, and experimentally tapped the screen with his finger. A password prompt and small onscreen keyboard appeared, and he whistled low. Clearly his future self or whatever kept up to date with the newest technology.
But this, naturally, raised a different question. How was he supposed to guess his own password?
"Dude, what is that?" Jubilee asked, walking over to take a look at the device Doug was holding. "Okay, whoever you are, you must be totally loaded. Wonder if that means I'm rich too? I could play the rich celebutante, like for serious."
"I -think- it's my phone," Doug told her, then shrugged. "Maybe technology has gotten really amazing in...however many years." Occam's Razor - the simplest possible explanation was likely to be true. Somehow, he was guessing they were in the future. Well, the future relative to them at sixteen. Or something.
And he was still stuck trying to figure out his password. If it was his phone, he was guessing his password might be a bit less...robust than it would on something more important, like a computer. So, at a loss for anything else, he went with brute force.
[HackTheGibson] - incorrect password, access denied. [MartinBishop] - incorrect password, access denied. [Swordfish] - incorrect password, access denied.
On his fourth attempt, he entered what he probably should have tried first. "TheCypher". The password prompt disappeared, revealing a multitude of buttons. Finding the one labeled 'address book', he tapped it, then scrolled down the resultant list to 'Jamie'.
Three attempts later, he had gotten the same near simultaneous pair of clicks that indicated someone picking up and then hanging up the phone. Once could be chalked up to mistake, maybe even twice. But three times was a pretty clear message that the person on the other end didn't want to talk, and wasn't interested in simply ignoring the phone ring to let it go to voicemail. Doug stared at his phone blankly, wondering why Jamie would do that to him, and having absolutely no idea.
Suddenly the 'future' didn't seem so welcoming.
"No luck?" Jubilee asked, noticing the look of doubt and feeling just a little less happy about this whole thing.
It was okay as long as everything was upbeat, when things started getting serious it meant she had to really think about what was happening and that was not something she really wanted to do right now.
Doug shook his head. "I have no idea what to do now." The weight of whatever crazy thing had happened to them finally had gotten to him. "You?"
"Um, do you have Ororo's number in there at all?" Jubilee asked, moving closer as she peered at the device.
"I think..." Doug went scrolling through his phone's address book, when suddenly it began vibrating in his hand. ~INCOMING CALL: REMY~
Remy goes looking for the other members of X-Force. First stop is Cammie, who has woken up in a strange apartment, and has decided that she's going to rip off whoever lives there...
The night before had been cold, even for Texas and Cammie had hunkered down in a warehouse that hadn't been used in years under a combination of stolen blankets, newspapers and her leather jacket, stolen just the other day right under the nose of some inattentive store clerk.
When she opened her eyes she freaked out. The corner of the warehouse was as close to a safe space as she got and she woke up somewhere else. That itself shouldn't have been possible; she was an insanely light sleeper. You had to be if you didn't want to get killed in your sleep or drug off somewhere. Which had apparently happened here.
She rolled out of the bed, clothed only in her underwear and her arm bindings. That disturbed her even more. Whoever had moved her had apparently taken the time to strip her down.
Cammie scrambled to her to her feet, looking around. The room wasn't in any place she knew. So it wasn't like one of her few friends had found her and taken her in. First thing she did was tear apart the dresser trying to find something to wear. The strange thing was everything looked like it it would fit. The extra layer of creepy that added was responsible for the total destruction of the dresser.
From the pile of clothes on the floor she picked a plain shirt and jeans and a worn jacket from a pin on the wall when a tack board over a desk caught her eyes. The well used picture that had been in her bag of her and his class ring, hanging there like someone had decided to put her life on display.
Though Cammie was tempted to rip the picture off, she took it down with shaking hands, careful not to damage it more than it already had been. And it looked like it had been through more than the last year and change and put it carefully in the pocket of the jacket. The necklace though she pulled off of it's place with a lot less ceremony and put it on, tucking it under her shirt. The other pictures on the board were like a window in to someone else's life.
Right now though, Cammie did not want to play this game. Those pictures and whoever was in them all were torn off and scattered to the floor before she pulled the tack board off of the wall and threw the stupid thing across the room. Whoever had drug her here was going to get a one hell of a parting gift from her. She was intent on trashing the place before she left.
From the noise, Remy was aware that Cammie was effected too. Today just could not get any worse, he considered, as he made his way to the door and opened it. The noise seemed to be contained to the bedroom of her apartment, and LeBeau stopped to slip on a pair of gloves. Her poison based powers were just a touch too dangerous not to take some precautions against. A thought chilled him. What if tomorrw they were six instead of sixteen? A temper tantrum could level the whole building in a short time from some of them.
He opened the door.
Cammie heard the door open and got ready, pulling the bandages off her left hand. Whoever it was, they had this coming, jacking her off the street for god knows what and going through her things and taking her leather jacket and replacing it with a crappy new one. Not to mention her little bit of cash and the stuff she planned on selling today.
"Get the fuck out of here, you sick fuck!"
"Almost sounds like your normal good morning, Cammie." Remy said, standing in the doorway. They had replaced the old windows with good security glass, which took time to get through. So the only quick way out was through him.
When she got a glance of him, Cammie didn't recognize him at all. Which made him knowing her name that much more creepy. And strange. She had a lot of fake IDs but not one that actually had her name one it. She didn't like fighting in enclosed spaces if she could avoid it, but if he was the only way out, well then he was going down.
"Get the fuck out," the 'or else' was implied in her tone.
"Non. Let me guess. You aren't where you went to sleep last night, you woke on in dis strange room where all de clothes fit you, your personal things are, and if you've taken de time to look in a mirror, you noticed dat things not quite de same. Dat 'bout sum up you morning?"
"So you are the sick fucker who brought me here!" was her response to that, along with making a fist out of her left hand and trying to figure out just how hard to hit him. She was still figuring that out.
"Non but I know who did. De question is do you want to know or would you rather hit me and away?"
"Well then what the fuck IS going on here!" Cammie returned.
"You not 16. Dis is your apartment." Remy said simply.
That didn't make any sense at all, demonstrated by Cammie tilting her head a bit as she tried to process that. "Prove it," was all she said, if only because she wanted to know why the hell she was here and what the fuck was going on.
"Take a look in de mirror. You look underfed and sixteen still?" It wasn't that Cammie had aged a lot, but years of proper food and training had changed her body from her emancipated appearance from when she'd first come to the mansion. "Bathroom is dat way."
He had cut off her question about where the bathroom was, because it wasn't like she knew where the fuck anything was here. Only that it was like someone made a horrible parody of what life could be for her to skip around in like some sort of bug in a cage. Well, some people did keep pet scorpions, she supposed.
Cammie gave the guy a suspicious glance as she went in the direction indicated and stared in mirror. The first thing that caught her attention was the 'Love Like Winter' written at the bottom in lipstick and song lyrics in sharpie around the edges. It was something she did, but she didn't remember doing it. Fuck, she didn't even know a couple of the songs that were up there. And it was missing a couple she put everywhere.
And then she finally caught a glance at her self. Her hair was still long, but not ragged like she actually had time to care for it. She was had a couple piercings missing and a couple added and her face looked... different. More filled out, a lot like she did. Which was funny as she couldn't recall the last time she had really eaten something more than what she could pull out of a dumpster. There were also hints of scars she could not remember getting.
She had a sinking feeling that whoever was out there might be right before she gave in to her next impulse and punched the mirror hard enough for it to shatter and to cut her 'bad' hand up while releasing a torrent of profanity directed at the situation and at herself, because now she was bleeding. And that tended to kill people. Everything she did tended to leave a body or ten behind.
"Wrap youself up. Dere's bandages under de sink." Remy said, not moving from his perch.
Cammie hit the mirror, or what was left of it, once more for good measure. The smell of her blood would have turned her stomach if anything could be said to do that anymore. If only because it generally meant something really bad had just happened. She did find the bandages and started wrapping her injured hand.
"Not worried about the fucking toxic sludge all over here now?" she snapped, "Because you really should be."
"I know about it." Remy said, still in his trenchcoat leaning against the wall. "And you. So, what's de deal? You going to believe me from now on?"
Cammie caught a glance of her own reflection in the pieces of the shattered mirror, "I don't know what to believe," she said, "but something really fucked up is going on here and I'm going to murder whoever decided this was fucking funny. So, if you know who, sure, why the fuck not with the whole 'trust' thing." For now, anyway.
"Calm down." Remy said, and the gaze he affixed her with was not unlike she'd seen on the road. It was the dangerous one; the person that had the capacity to bury you out beside the highway regardless of how hard or mean you thought you were. They never said much, and when they reacted, it was deadly. "You follow me, you do what I say, and dis all becomes a bad dream. You run, or put other people in danger, and Remy stick you somewhere dat makes you past look like a high school trip. We clear?"
Cammie blanched and nodded. She could tell the really dangerous people from the blowhards. And it was avoiding the former that kept her alive. Sure, she hadn't met anyone she couldn't kill with a touch, but in this case she didn't think she'd even get as far as the required skin to skin contact.
"Crystal," she answered. She'd shut up, do what he said and then when this was over or she had the chance she'd get the fuck out of here and away from people.
"Good. Get youself properly dressed and meet me in de lobby in ten minutes. Ooh, and you might want to stop breaking things. You may not remember, but you worked hard to earn dis place."
Remy finally finds someone who doesn't think they're sixteen. Of course, it's the newest member of X-Force, who's only nineteen...
It was early in the morning, Nico's less favorite time of the day. It would be accurate to say her brain didn't start working until midday, at best, so her being up and about when the weather was still cold really didn't go well with her. Work was work though, and she was good at her work, as inconsequential as it seemed to be. She barely noticed there was no security on the front desk, and that the place was perhaps a bit emptier than usual, but that didn't trouble her; apparently there had been some big shot making noise the last day, so maybe people were all over the place.
Exiting the Brownstone, the girl couldn't help but yawn. It was going to be one of those days...
Before she could make it more than a few steps, Remy came out of the doors behind her, trenchcoat flapping in the snowy street.
"Nico! Wait!" he said, his stride eating up the distance. "Where you going?"
Nico stopped on her tracks, turning around with a half sleepy face. "Well, I was going to get me some coffee, and buy some for whoever feels like crap as well. You want some?" And then she yawned again, hand covering her mouth.
"Then to de office?"
Nico gave him a careful look. "...yeah, that's how it usually goes right? Are you okay? You don't look okay."
She wasn't effected. So why not her and him, but Ororo and Cammie? "I'm not. Dere's been some kind of attack. Some of de others think dat dey sixteen again, wit' no memories of the years after." Remy said, turning her back towards the brownstone. "We need to check on everyone to see who's infected, and stop dem from trying to run away or contact dere parents or something."
"Wh-what? For reals?"
Suddenly she was very awake, yes. Nico tried to process the information without discarding it as some ill conceived joke, but still, that sounded crazy as hell. "Wait, Amanda too? Oh crap. I'm right after you."
"Not sure. You check on 'manda and Marie-Ange. Remy go see if Sarah's affected." And if so, hopefully not get a bone in the throat.
So it was seeing how Amanda was in her teens -which in a way was one of those meetings she never thought of having the chance of experiencing-" and also checking on some precognitive...redheaded person. Who probably had a gun or something. "Oh man... it is really going to be one of those days. I'm on it."
"You'd better be, because if dis has hit more people, we going to be in big trouble, fast."
Remy checks in on Sarah, who is also affected, and she's really really not happy with Remy. So nothing new there.
The hot water had been gone an hour ago. The shower had been well stocked for a hotel, and Sarah had enjoyed taking the extra time to wash the grime from beneath her fingernails as the blessedly hot water ran over her like torrents of rain.
She hadn't found any clothes that looked like her own on the floor by the bed, but somehow there had been a closet full of clothes her size with minimal bone damage. She picked a pair of sweatpants that hung low on her hips, a soft cotton tank-top, and made a mental note to raid the closet before she left for the tunnels. Just another guest leaving with a handful of belongings. It didn't matter they weren't hers.
There was a knock at the door, and Sarah glanced at the clock. Could be early checkout, but whoever's room this was had left all their stuff. Housekeeping maybe. Sarah took a deep breath, and opened the door. Stay calm. Act like you belong here. This is your room.
"Sarah? You awake?" Remy called through the door. Maybe she hadn't been infected, although so far, only Nico and himself had proven immune to the mental de-aging, and Remy still had no clue why or how it was happening.
The man outside wasn't dressed like hotel staff. He was older than she was, and not bad looking. Was this who she'd slept with last night? She'd assumed it was a woman because of the clothes and the shower, but she couldn't think of any other reason this guy would be here and talking like he knew her if it wasn't his room. She smiled, leaning in the doorway. "I'm sorry, do I know you?" Play dumb. Let him confirm.
"Merde." Remy muttered as she asked him the question. It had got her too, which meant another explanation to keep her here. "Good morning, Sarah. My name's Remy and I need to talk to you for a minute."
Ah. So she hadn't fucked him. She didn't know him at all from the way he introduced himself. "Nice try asshole. I don't need saved-- or whatever else you're trying to push my direction." She stepped back, moving to close the door in his face for emphasis.
"From de Morlock tunnels? Non, does you found you own way out of. Same as Callisto and Artie." Remy paused, catching her with his red on black gaze. "Still don't have a minute to talk?"
Sarah stared at him for a split second, than pulled a bone from her shoulder, ripping fabric and flesh. She swung at him. "They're fucking dead, asshole. Don't you dare try to use them to get to me."
Remy caught her wrist neatly, twisting her arm around into a painful wrist lock. Sarah was fast, strong and dangerous as hell, but Remy had been one of the people who helped make her that way. Sixteen year old Sarah had none of her adult's deadly abilities.
"Now, we can go round and round, but Remy don' have time for dat." He all but frogmarched her over to her desk where her phone sat. Without relinquishing his hold, he touched the screen to power it up. "If I can prove dat dey alive, you stop trying to kill me. We have a deal?"
"Who said I was trying to kill you? I just want you to go the hell away." Sarah glared at him. "And besides, I saw the bodies. You want to tell me some upworlder fucking knows more about my family than I do?"
"Dats where it gets complicated." Remy said, releasing his grip. As she back away, he toggled on the phone's picture viewer. Sarah wasn't much of a casual picture taker, which was the only reason he'd noticed her taking some photos last time they were at the mansion. An image of a scowling Artie was first, and he offered the phone to her. "Take a look at the pictures."
Sarah looked at the phone, and audibly gasped. Her thumb brushed the touch-screen accidentally and her cry of protest turned into an undignified squeak as another picture appeared: Callisto. Not looking at the screen, but unmistakably her. Sarah suddenly felt very small. "Where did you get this? What do you want?"
"It might be hard to believe, but you been de victim of an attack dat makes you think you still sixteen. Just take a look around, Sarah. Dis is you apartment." He said, pointing to her desk with her personal items.
"That's ridiculous," Sarah scoffed, "I couldn't afford a fucking apartment even if I wanted to." She glanced around at the room though, curious now. The room was peppered with stuff that she would have liked if she didn't live in a tunnel with corpses.
"You can. For a long time now." Remy said. "Go look in de mirror, Sarah. You face, you bones - dey are not what dey looked like yesterday for you."
"I didn't have a mirror yesterday, asshole." Well, maybe she had, but it didn't matter. She was beginning to really dislike this guy, who seemed to know a lot more than she was comfortable with and claimed to know everything else too. Well fuck that. "So what then? What the everliving fuck do you propose we do? Track them down and ask fucking nicely for them to fix things?"
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