What the Future Holds
Part Eight
By CRIM§ON

Remy LeBeau awoke in comfort for the first time in months. He found himself in the Professor's room. Figuring that he was placed there because both the Med. Lab and his own room had been destroyed, he allowed his senses to take in his surroundings. As awareness was brought back to him, decided that he wasn't as comfortable as he originally thought.

From somewhere in the room he heard the voice of Cecilia Reyes "He's coming to." Trying to get up, he felt a hand on his chest. "Stay down, Remy. You've taken quite a hard beating, getting up could only aggravate it."

He nodded to her, feeling the pain throughout his body first hand. Don' gotta tell dis cajun twice. "How'r d'ot'ers?" He asked in a dry raspy voice.

"Here. Drink this. It'll make your throat feel better," she told him, handing him a glass of water.

"Merci."

"The others are just fine. A few scrapes and bruises. Bobby had a concussion, but he's doing fine now. You had obviously taken the brunt of the assault."

Again, Remy nodded, as his mind tried to get a hold on what was going on in the world around him. It was still working a little slower then he was used to. "Did you fin' anyone else?" He asked, in somewhat better english then before. Out of no where, another hand appeared on Remy's opposite shoulder. His head wipped in it's direction, making pain shoot up his neck. He followed the arm back to see the face of his leader. Professor? Where did he...? Reyes was talkin' to someone before, must'a been him. Wonder why my spatial 'wareness didn' pick him up.

"Gone," he replied sadly. "They're all gone." A calm anger was starting to grow in him, slowly replacing the sadness in his eyes. "Not even a trace of them," His gaze was almost a distant stare, and his grip on Remy's shoulder started to tighten as it did.

"Pro-proFESSer!" He squeaked out.

At that the professor forcibly came back from his revrie and loosened his grip, without apologizing. Remy let out a grunt of relief, and Xavier went on exactly where he had left off, as if nothing had interrupted him to begin with. "Their bodies were burnt beyond a trace. The entire room was turned to ash." Remy winced at this, but remained silent. "Cecilia, I would like to speak with Gambit alone. Would you mind leaving for a moment."

For an instant, it looked to Gambit as if she were going to say something, then she just got up and left. It struck Gambit as an odd thing, to see an X- Woman give up so easily, but he let it go as being one of those rookie quirks. Being left alone in the room with Xavier, Gambit was automatically intimidated by his power, which led him to question just that, "'Fesser? How did you get you're powers back? I t'ought dat dey were gone af'er..." He trailed off, not really sure if he wanted to bring up Onslaught. He kept telling himself that Onslaught wasn't the Professor, that they were two different people, but there was something there. When they were all in the mansion together, pinned down on the ground, there was just SOMETHING of the Professor in that. And that frightened him.

"A small child. A small child taught me that there was more to my powers, or rather the lack there of, then I had originally thought. It appears that my powers hadn't vanished, but that I had mentally turned them off, while trying to stop the onslaught(Soar: Do not capitalize this, it's small for a reason). That however is not important at this moment. You had a good look at those who attacked us, better then the others. More then that, you recognized one of them. Think back. Can you tell me who it was?"

Remy closed his eyes thinking. He didn't know what the Professor had in mind, but he was the Professor after all, and he had never steered him wrong before. The vision of what had happened was too blurry. He tried to remember where he had seen the agent before, but his mind was drawing a blank. He opened his eyes, his mouth following suit, and shook his head. "I'm sorry 'Fessor. I-I can' 'member. I t'ink I saw him b'fore, but I can' place him."

"When you're stronger, I'll preform a mind sweep. We WILL find him. Right now your mind is too unstable. It would collapse under such a sweep. I can't even probe you, it's so weak. When you're stronger. Right now rest, I'll go tell the others that you're alright." With that he got up and left, without waiting for Remy to respond.

Again Remy's mind was working a little slower then usual, so for a moment he didn't even pick up on what Xavier had just said to him. ...I'll preform a mind sweep... I'll preform a mind sweep...For some reason he couldn't let that go. There was something wrong with that... But what? He let his apprehensive side take over. The side that had always warned him to stay away from telepaths. He didn' ask. He didn' ask Remy. He told. Dat's not right. 'S not like de Professor. Why? With that suspicion, his shields started to strengthen reflexively. If there was something wrong with the Professor again, he wouldn't let him take him off guard, not this time. He managed to shrug off his bad feelings about the Professor before, but that just made it easier for Xavier to get inside his head; easier for him to attack. Gambit wasn't about to let that happen again, for as much the professor's protection as his own.

Xavier entered the rec room, thinking how appropriate the name seemed. His entire life, home, sanctuary away from the world that hates and fears them, privacy, and safety for mutants, everything had been taken away from him. The X- Men had been taken away from him, and his body yearned for revenge. A sudden voice broke him from his thoughts.

"Professor? Are you all right?"

"I'm Fine Bobby. I'm just... Tired. How do you feel?"

"Like I stuck my head out a school bus window, and found out why they always told us not to do that."

Xavier sighed. Bobby always did that, made jokes when he should have been crying. Sometimes he wondered how he did it. How he turned a blind eye to the rest of the world.

"How's the Swamp Rat?" Marrow asked, a slight concern shading her voice for the first time since she had been with them.

Xavier looked at her for a moment before he clued in. "Gambit will be fine. He is a strong person, and should be up and about in no time." Strong indeed. How he managed to blow me out of his mind when I tried to enter it still illudes me. I'll have to look into that later. Xavier looked up at the others and noticed that they were all looking at him with some show of concern.

Logan steeped forward. "I'm gonna go check on the Cajun," He announced, leaving the room.

Xavier nodded, "The rest of you get some rest. I'll be in my study if I'm needed." With that, he turned his chair around and went through the door.

Xavier entered his study to find it in just as bad condition as the rec room, and the rest of the mansion. Again he sighed. Why did they always have to hate them? Every time they turned around, someone else was literally or figuratively beating down the door to try, yet again, to destroy them all. This time they succeeded, but this time they weren't going to just sit back and take it. This time they would show the world exactly why the government SHOULD fear them. They would pay for the blood that was spilled. Suddenly, out of no where, Xavier felt one of his X- Men drop off from his constant probing. He had been keeping tabs on them all, but now one of them was missing. focusing, he found that it was Gambit who had disappeared. A sick fear overwhelmed him. If they lost Gambit, that would mean that they had lost the only chance they had of finding out exactly who had killed the X- Men. He broadened his scan to Wolverine, and found that his initial fears were unprecedented. Gambit, in fact, was doing quite well. He had restored his shields around his mind even tighter then they were before, and was fortifying them as he and Logan spoke.

Out of the corner of the room, came a cold voice out of the darkness, "Impressive, isn't he?"

Xavier's head jumped to where it had come from. He had been so intent on his scans that he failed to notice that Sinister had come back. This new realization, however, didn't put up as much of a call for action as it once did. "How?" He asked in pure amazement.

"With Cerebro down, teleporting in was--"

Xavier waved him off with a gesture of his hand, and a slightly irritated look on his face. "Child's play. I realized that as soon as you spoke. I meant Gambit. You have studied him. You know his powers and their potential better then anyone, perhaps even himself. How did he manage to put up shields powerful enough to keep me out?"

Sinister smiled. He so did love the chance to explain his experiments on mutant genesis, especially to one with enough scientific knowledge to understand it. "I have studied Gambit since he was a small child. I set his path in motion, so that it would lead him straight to me. He has always shown a great amount of potential in the field of ESP and PK. (ESP is Extra Sensory Perception. Being able to get information through means other than the five senses, also described as a sixth sense or third eye. And, PK is Psychokinesis. That is, the ability to affect objects or events, without physical aid, much like telekinesis. FYI CRIM§ON!) However, it changes so rapidly, that I have never been able to tap into it fully. His spatial awareness, advanced mental shields, and his, as young Ororo so bluntly put it, Charm powers, are examples of this. At one point his empathic abilities were abundant, but I lost contact with him for a short period of time, in which something occurred to weaken them. He has been somewhat, edgy, around telepaths as well as doctors, ever since. I came back for him recently, because I believe that I may have learned a new way to access these powers."

Xavier nodded his head in accordance with Sinister. "That makes sense. But I hadn't noticed it before."

Sinister's smile broadened proudly. "Of course you hadn't. No one besides myself has ever known his full potential. He keeps it that way. If he doesn't let anyone get close, there won't be any vonerable place for them to strike at. It's how he was taught to protect himself. Push people away, and they won't be able to get close enough to hurt you. He's slipped a few times, with his family and with Rogue and Storm, even with you. But I had that set right. You yourself did a good job of betraying his trust, and once again dealing him a bust hand, and I must thank you for that; I couldn't have planed that better if I tried."

Xavier sat thoughtfully silent a few minutes before he spoke, "Why are you here, Sinister?"

"Ah, yes. A change of subject shall suffice to keep me away from that sore spot in your past, though, I do not know that you have anything to be ashamed of." He waited a moment for Xavier to make a comment. When it was apparent that none was forth coming, he decided to answer Xavier's question, "You have something that I want."

Xavier stiffened, "You want me to hand Gambit over to you."

"Not without me giving you something in exchange of course." Sinister stepped into the light, allowing Xavier to see that the smile which had played on his face, and in his eyes, was no where to be seen. "I could easily kill you right now Charles. I have fortified myself against any telepathic attack, and you present no physical challenge what so ever, but that does not suit my purpose. The only thing you have to experience from keeping him here, is his inevitable refusal to allow you to enter his mind."

Xavier went pale at that. Sinister had this habit of hurting people the most by stating blunt facts. Perhaps that's what made him so Sinister to begin with. "What makes you so sure that he will refuse? He has lost many of those he loved here today as well. He may just--"

"Do not fool yourself, Charles. Remy LeBeau can feel a telepathic probe a mile off, and sets up his shields accordingly. He has already set up blockades that would destroy most telepaths minds the moment they went too deep. It traps them with in their coils and slowly, painfully, kills them; From the inside out. I've seen him do it. While he was unconscious none the less. If you try to go in there uninvited you Will Not find your way back out again."

"What makes you think that he's strong enough to take on the most powerful telepath on the planet."

"Xavier, if he had not let down his shields when you attacked him and the rest of the X- Men, you would be quite dead right now. Once he has you, there is no way out. The more YOU try, the less HE has to. Every bit of power you throw at him, comes back on you ten fold."

Xavier accepted that Gambit wouldn't be any help in finding them, but he still wanted to find those responsible for killing the X- Men and return the favor. "You said that you would be willing to give me something in exchange for Gambit."

Sinister's face remained unchanged, and Xavier wondered if this was where Gambit had gotten his poker face from. "Of Course. I have the names, ranks, and locations of all those responsible for the demise of the X- Men. Hand Gambit over to my care, and revenge shall be yours."

"What purpose does this serve to you?"

"I assume that you mean besides the reacquisition of my prodigy." Sinister baited sarcastically, hoping that that would be enough to make Xavier think that was all he wanted.

Xavier sat back in his chair and waited for him to continue.

"S.H.I.E.L.D. has stood in my way, on numerous occasions. Those responsible are highly regarded as the top agents the government has working for them. If you and the remaining X- Men were to destroy them, it would give me more freedom in my research. Not to mention, gaining me a very powerful ally in you."

Xavier ignored the complement and went on pondering his situation. "The others will not let him go with out a fight. If such a fight did ensue, and I didn't stand at their sides, they would have to ask questions."

"I would be enthralled to see you STAND at anyone's side Xavier."

"That was uncalled for Sinister."

"Perhaps."

"You are ignoring my question. How would I get him out without the other X- Men stopping me? And beyond that, I would need him against S.H.I.E.L.D. Our numbers have been notably depleted, an attack with him stands a much better chance of succeeding."

Sinister smiled knowingly. Xavier may have been a lot harder to manipulate then the Marauders, or even Gambit himself, but his ignorance of Gambit's past put Sinister at an extreme advantage. "You would have a better time trying to convince him of the mind probe. Remy LeBeau would not attack S.H.I.E.L.D. if it meant saving all of the thieves in New Orleans. He would definitely not attack them under the mere promise of revenge. He is not driven by it, and has no use for it. Why do you think he hasn't come after me, for all that I've taken from him?"

"I assumed he had." Xavier replied reflectively.

"You assumed incorrectly." Sinister responded dryly, then added with a distant gaze, "He can't."

"How do you mean?" asked Xavier, interest coloring his tone.

Sinister, however, had no intention in telling him that. Only Nick Furry himself, and a handful of S.H.I.E.L.D. operatives had ever known the truth behind that, and Sinister wasn't about to let Xavier into their little elite club. "Think about what I've told you Charles," He stated before vanishing.

As Wolverine walked into the room, Gambit's eyes opened, but he didn't look at him. Instead he continued to stare at a spot on the ceiling, as if it were the most interesting spot he'd ever seen.

Wolverine pulled up a chair and waited for him to gather himself. He was about ready to give up when he noticed that Gambit wasn't even blinking. He then started looking at the spot. It really wasn't very interesting so he decided to look at it from Gambit's point of view. He got up and jumped on the king sized bed beside Gambit, linking his ankles, and folding his arms behind his head.

Remy winced at the sudden pain. Logan hadn't hit him, but right then, the vibration was enough to cause him pain. He looked over at Wolverine with a curious gaze. Logan replied with one that begged the question 'What?' in a completely innocent way. An amused smile crept over Remy's features, and the two returned their inspection of the spot.

After a few moments of lying like this, Logan spoke up, "You know, it really isn't a very interesting spot."

Gambit chuckled and replied, "Non. I s'pose it isn'. But the potential..."

Logan smiled at his teammate, "I'd belt ya one right now, if I weren't afraid I'd break ya." Remy returned the smile. It was a smile however that was plagued by sad, angry, and suspicious thoughts. Sitting up, Logan placed his hand on his friend's shoulder. "Are you okay, bub?"

(Remy would have sat up with him, but that spot...) "I'm fine Logan." His features were incredibly sad, and Logan wished that he were up to cheering him up, but he knew that he was in just as foul of a mood. Remy closed his eyes. "Logan?"

Wolverine looked at him. He had said his name as if testing to see if he were still there. He sounded almost afraid of something. "Yeah Cajun?"

Remy opened his mouth as if about to say something, then he closed it again. He took a deep breath and opened his mouth again, but then closed it. Logan could smell a sick fear coming off him, and he didn't like it.

"What's wrong Remy?"

"De... De Professor..."

Logan stiffened, as Remy hit the exact reason Logan had come in to check on him. Something was terribly wrong with the Professor, and Logan was worried about Gambit. Chuck seemed to be far too thoughtful when he had said that Gambit was going to be okay. "What about him Cajun?"

"I..." He opened his eyes and looked at Logan. It would be useless to tell him all this if he weren't going to believe him, and Logan REALLY liked the professor. When he looked at him however he saw nothing but trust. "I'm not really sure. But--"

"But there's something wrong with him. I noticed something was up with him too."

"Den I'm not crazy."

"Well I wouldn't go that far..."

"Ha ha Logan. Very funny. But I be serious mon ami, Dat Homme's leakin' power, an' he's just about mad enough t' use it on anyone." He replied, as he tried to sit up and face him.

"What did he say t' ya after Reyes left?"

He finally managed to get up right and looked Wolverine straight in the eye. "He wan'ed t' know who it was. Exactly who it was. Logan do you get what I'm sayin'? He's gonna go af'er dem, and not'in' any of us say is gonna change his mind."

"Yeah. I getcha Cajun."

"He's not gonna listen to any one of us, but if we all work toget'er maybe we c'n convince 'im dat dis isn' de right t'ing t' do." He said, swinging his legs around the edge of the bed.

"Are we really sure that we want to stop him."

"You wanna Stand by and let MORE people lose deir lives? T'ink we seen enough o' dat already."

Logan folded his arms and looked at Remy with a questioning gaze of his face.

"Quoi?" Gambit asked, looking over his shoulder.

"How did you ever end up workin' fer Sinister?"

Gambit's eyes started to blaze, and he turned away from Wolverine. "Low blow Logan," He said quietly.

"It wasn't meant to be. Yer a good person Gumbo; What was he holdin' over yer head?"

Gambit kept getting quieter as he spoke, and if Logan wasn't Logan, his words would have been lost. "Nothin'... It-- it doesn't matter. I made de-- de wrong decision, an' de Morlocks paid wit' deir lives..."

"Remy?" Wolverine moved behind him and put a hand on his shoulder.

As soon as he did, Remy's head jumped up, and he looked Logan dead in the eyes. He smiled at him and said, "Why do I get de sudden urge to tell you dat I don' swing dat way?"

Logan let out a sudden laugh and pushed Remy away with the hand that rested on his shoulder.

Remy fell to his knees on the floor, and let out a curse.

"You okay Cajun?"

"Non, I'm not."

"Oh shit Remy, I'm sorry." Logan got down beside Remy on the floor. "What happened? Where--?"

"Homme? I t'ink you broke me!"

For the first time since he'd entered the room, Logan's smile reached his eyes, and he let out a joyous laughter, which was joined by Remy shortly after. "Come on Cajun," Logan laughed, helping Remy up, "Let's go talk to the others."

"Right. Dey're in de rec room."

"Okay, where's the Professor?" Logan asked as he got Gambit to his feet.

"He's... In his study..." Gambit replied stumbling.

"You don't sound too sure Remy."

"Non, I'm sure. It's just dat for a minute, I t'ought dat dere was someone else dere."

"Who?"

"Donno. No one prob'ly. Xavier's leakin' a lot o' energy. It was probl'y just an echo."

"Probably?"

"...Prob'ly..."

"Right."

TBC...

"The higher we soar, the smaller we appear to those who can not fly."