Betrayal - REVIEW THIS STORY

Written by Valerie Jones
Last updated: 01/02/2007 02:01:11 AM

Chapter 32

Charles gritted his teeth against the normal disorientation of entering another mind. It reminded him of the one time in his youth that he had been talked into riding one of those spinning rides at the amusement park that stuck you to the sides of the room and then dropped the floor away. Not only had it made him nauseous, but for several hours afterwards he had felt like the world were slightly canted, and no effort of will on his part would straighten it. The feeling persisted as Charles pressed slowly into Remy's mind. He was trying to make their entrance as unintrusive as possible, despite the discomfort.

As if emerging from a dense fog, the version of New Orleans they had walked before coalesced around them, but it did not become real. This was not where Charles wanted to go. This was Remy's conscious construct-- how he defined his mind to himself. It was a reflection of the conscious mind, with all of its opinions, emotions and self-deceits. Since that was what they had been searching for before, that was where they had gone. But now, Charles wanted to access the subconscious mind-- the part that recorded everything without predjudice. That was why the subconscious often drew conclusions that the conscious mind could not. It was the only one with access to all of the available information. Remy's memories would be stored there, complete and in chronological order.

The city began to fade around them as Charles pushed deeper. He had not gone very far when the resistance began. Because Remy was conscious, he was aware of what Charles and Jean were experiencing. In some respects, he would be experiencing it with them. In turn, they also could feel his reactions. They could feel his emotions, and would see the effects of whatever he was thinking on the substance of his mind. They were too deep to read thoughts easily, though. Right now, Remy was sending them fear and pain.

Charles was surprised that his probe actually *hurt*. Most people were frightened at the sensation of another mind delving into their own, but Remy had been so badly traumatized by the death he had experienced mind to mind, that he now interpreted an intimate mind touch as pain. Despite his desire to allow the probe, Remy was resisting them out of pure panic. The harder Charles pushed, the stronger the waves of fear/pain/darkness/loss from Remy that pummeled him and Jean.

"Charles, we can't do this," Jean protested. Her green eyes were unearthly bright against the stormy darkness around them. "It's too painful for him."

"If Remy had not *asked* me to do this, I would agree," Charles answered. "But he did, and I think this pain may be more easily conquered than the fears that plague him now."

"Then first we're going to have to calm him down." Jean winced as another wave of blackness rolled over them. It felt as if they were being pounded by a black surf, tossed and spun by the force of it, but they had no references to tell if they were really moving or not. Everything around them was roiling black and gray.

A small light began to shine in front of Jean. It was the color of firelight, but steady. As the light reached him, Charles felt her projection of warmth and security, a motherly protectiveness with just a hint of sexuality. It was a conglomeration of all of the things a woman could be. Charles approved. Something would have to strike a chord with Remy.

"He's resisting." Emma Frost watched the young man across Xavier's desk. She was the contact link between Jean and the professor and the outside world.

Elizabeth glanced at her. "That is not surprising." She went back to her scan. So far, nothing seemed to be disturbing the astral plane. Betsy was not quite willing to admit that she was nervous. She, of all of them, had met Gambit's uncontrolled powers. She wasn't entirely certain she would be able to protect the X-men. But, she reminded herself, that was why Emma was there. Between them, they should be a match for any single telepath.

Gambit's eyes were closed, his high brows deeply furrowed. Elizabeth could see the knotted muscles of his jaw in clear relief. Hopefully, he wouldn't end up breaking his teeth, she thought absently. In his lap, the long fingered hands were balled into fists that quivered occasionally. Rogue had moved over next to him, her earlier anger apparently forgotten. She was in full uniform, as they all were, and she rested one gloved hand on his knee.

Emma turned to look at Jean, and Betsy could feel her surprise through their light link, though Emma gave her no details. Emma grinned, her gaze flicking between Jean and Scott. For his part, Scott only watched his wife with poorly concealed concern, and ignored the rather feline expression directed at him. At the same time, Gambit's tension began to ease, though his brows remained furrowed.

"They're in," Emma said. She was still grinning. Betsy didn't think the smile had anything to do with Jean and the Professor's success.

"You find this amusing?" she asked the White Queen. Rogue turned to stare at Emma, her expression darkening just slightly into what the X-men had learned to identify as her "dangerous" look.

Emma's confidence did not waver. "Oh no," she answered. "I am simply being forced to re-evaluate my opinion of Mrs. Summers."

Despite the stares, she did not expand on her cryptic statement.

The light grew brighter, extending beyond them and reaching out to the mind that surrounded them. Jean's eyes were closed in concentration, her brow furrowed as she forced the light outward. The tumult began to ease, and Charles found his way getting easier.

Each push inward still required tremendous effort, but they were no longer pounded by the dizzying black waves. Jean drifted beside him, eyes closed. Charles kept hold of her and pulled her along after him. She had no attention to spare for where they were going.

After what seemed like a very long time, they broke through. The swirling grays and blacks gave way to a ribbon of mixed colors, surrounded by emptiness. Charles breathed a sigh of relief and Jean opened her eyes. This was a normal memory string.

Jean smiled tiredly at him. "I don't think I want to know how close we just came to getting blasted."

Charles studied her with concern. He was beginning to feel some small amount of fatigue himself, and she seemed to be worse off. If their level of energy expenditure continued this way, they were going to find themselves in trouble long before they finished what they had come to do. If they were lucky, of course, the worst was past. And they did have Betsy and Emma to draw on, if it became necessary.

Together they moved toward the far end of the pulsing string. Like always, it seemed to be a living thing when viewed from outside, a record of the the living force that surrounded them that somehow seemed to take on life of its own. Charles was always astounded by how beautiful the mind could be, how vibrant. It was one of the things that encouraged him whenever he felt like giving up on a person. Even Sabretooth's mind had had aspects of beauty to it.

They followed the memory string to its far end, which represented Remy's earliest memory.

"It's cut off very sharply," Jean observed. Normally, this end of the string was a bit fuzzy and frayed due to the indistinct half-memories of very early experiences that most people retained.

Charles shrugged. "That is unusual, but not particularly alarming. Every mind works differently. Perhaps we should see where his memory begins. That may explain why the cutoff is so distinct."

Jean took a deep breath. "I hope we're doing the right thing, Charles."

Charles took her hand and squeezed it. "So do I."

Together they touched the end of the painted ribbon. The colors seemed to explode around them, swirling violently at first and then slowly settling into their places as a scene took shape around the two visitors. This was what Charles had dubbed "real memory". He and Jean had no real presence here. They were like ghosts, and would have no ability to influence what they saw.

A dark alleyway formed around them. The buildings were tall and lightless, and rough cobblestones stretched away under their feet. They had been there before, or someplace very much like it. The cold rain sheeted down out of a night-gray sky, though this time they couldn't feel it.

"New Orleans." It wasn't a question. Jean turned a full circle, studying their surroundings.

"Indeed." Charles, too, looked around. "He did grow up here." As he spoke, a familiar figure came into view. They had met this child before, as well.

The boy wandered down the alley toward them, back hunched against the rain. His red hair was plastered to his head, and he had his arms wrapped around himself as meager protection from the cold. They could hear the rapid breathing, broken by occassional sniffles, as if he had been crying for a long time and had finally run out of tears. Charles would still put his age at four or five. He wore a blue blanket sleeper-- the kind with the white feet-- that seemed to be a constant among small children.

Jean moved closer to Charles, as if for comfort. Her sigh was heartfelt and sad, but her comment was acute. "He seems healthy enough."

Charles considered the child that had passed and was now retreating from their view. "Yes. Whatever happened to separate him from his family, it must have only just occurred. That would explain the abrupt beginning of his memories. I suspect everything before this point in time was simply wiped out by the trauma."

"I guess we'll never know where he came from, then, or who his parents were. That's too bad. Rogue said that it really bothered him, even if he'd never admit it."

Charles nodded noncommitally. There was nothing they could do.

"We should get to work," he said.

Jean nodded, and they began to move along the memory string. Events flowed by, almost like a movie, but with more depth. Time seemed highly flexible, so that the events they witnessed occurred in order and with palpable spacing, but yet that much time did not seem to pass for them personally.

As they watched, the lost child wandered, running away from everyone he encountered-- both those who would hurt him, and even those who would help. He sank close to starvation before he learned where he could scrounge in relative safety. Careful observation taught him the rules of the street. He stayed away from the sharks-- the gangs and the pimps-- and stuck to the shadows, surviving in invisibility.

He rarely spoke, but when he did it was, at first, in english-- *good* english, Charles noticed, and later in the gutter French of the street. He learned how to beg, and who would take pity on a street rat. And he learned how to steal from the revelers and tourists that thronged the city streets. It was more difficult than it sounded. The Thieves' Guild didn't like anyone crowding in on their territory, so he had to learn to pick only small targets, those beneath the Guild's notice.

At first Charles was surprised to see the boy taking in several other children, watching over them to make sure they got enough to eat and that they stayed out of the way of the truly dangerous. Then he realized that he shouldn't be surprised at all. One thing that had always been a constant with Remy was family. Every time he had lost his, he had found a way to build a new one.

Years passed, and they watched the boy growing up into a strange mixture of human being and wild animal. The street children all had a feralness to them. They fought savagely to survive, willing to shed blood in an instant if they felt threatened, and yet they somehow remained children. They stood at the store windows and stared in wide-eyed wonder at the model trains that wove in and out at the base of the christmas trees, and ran laughing through the streets the one time Remy found a half-full plastic jar of bubble soap with the wand still inside.

He and Jean went on, past the day when the head of the Thieve's Guild caught Remy trying to pick his pocket and had taken him home. Eventually, at least. In telling that story to them, Remy had neglected to mention that it took Jean-Luc LeBeau nearly three weeks to coax the very wary, wild creature into his home, and even longer than that to tame him. It was incredibly cliche, but Charles and Jean had leaned against each other and laughed to see four grown men and women unable to contain one eleven-year-old who had absolutely no intention of letting anyone take comb or scissors to his hair.

Charles had long suspected the truth, that the thieves of New Orleans carried an amazing amount of the mutant factor in their genes. Remy grew up in a world of mutants, where almost everyone had powers of some sort. So he was only a little surprised when his own powers surfaced. Charles had to give the thieves credit for that. Remy's transition into his powers was one of the most painless he had ever seen. The guild family was tight, and Remy was encouraged and reassured, taught and corrected in the use of his powers from the very beginning.

And yet, his life was filled with a strange dichotomy. To Remy it didn't seem strange, because he had lived that way all of his life. But Charles was appalled by the duality. On one hand, the thieves were intensely loyal to each other. Children were doted on by all of the adults, regardless of who they really belonged to. They were protected and cared for, just as the adults were willing to put their lives on the line to defend anyone who was a member of the guild. But they also trained their children to be killers in the fued with the assassin's guild. At times, any chance meeting between members of the two guilds would end in death for someone. Remy had learned to always be alert on some level, because death could be preparing to spring out of the darkness at him at any time.

They followed Remy through the flush of first love with Belladona. Their affair had sparked the idea of peace between the two clans. Charles tried to accelerate their pace. This was history they knew, and nothing seemed to point to anything outside of the two guilds.

They watched Sabretooth murder the girl, Genevieve, in France, and were appalled, but unsurprised. It took Remy and his brother two months to track Sabretooth back to his employer and then steal the Cheating Star from him. The experience changed the teenage Remy from a boy playing games into a professional thief. A month later, he was married, but the promise of love and peace made on that day were shattered by Belledona's brother, Julienne. Remy was forced to kill him in a duel, though Charles hoped that he might spare Julienne's life if he had the day to live over again, and was then banished from New Orleans for it.

Charles and Jean remained silent as they followed Remy through the next years, as he wandered across the planet and back-- honing his abilities, and building a reputation as a talented thief. But other than the contracts he took, his life seemed to be nothing more than a continual search for the next party. Charles understood the emptiness that drove him, and the desperation to fill it with anything that came along. They watched sadly as he was driven further and further down into the dark ways--

"Charles, wait." Jean's voice interrupted his thoughts. They paused, and Charles turned to face her.

"What is it?"

"Something's missing." She waved her hand, encompassing all of Remy's life with the gesture. "We've been looking for things that are tied to the deaths of the X-men-- but what about the things that *aren't* here?"

"Such as?" But he realized the answer as soon as he spoke. "Ah. Telepathy." He felt foolish for not having seen it himself.

Jean nodded. "We know that he's an alpha class telepath, but he hasn't shown more than an ounce of telepathic power. Just that low level hypnotic charm, which is as much a matter of personality as anything else."

"Perhaps it's emergence was delayed until later. Magneto did not come into his powers until he was in his twenties."

"That was because of the disease he suffered as a teenager. Remy didn't have anything like that happen to him, and his other powers showed exactly when they were supposed to. But no telepathy."

Charles pondered the questions. He had already developed a few of his own, during his few discussions with Gambit and his observations during their last excursion into his mind, and was now almost amused by how stubbornly unanswerable they seemed to be.

"What's so funny?" Jean was watching him curiously.

Charles sighed. "I shouldn't be laughing. It's just frustration. Here I've been, thinking all along that a chance to mindscan Gambit would resolve all of the questions I have-- and all I'm discovering is more questions. The man is a complete enigma."

Jeans expression told him that she shared some of his feelings. "So which questions are we talking about?"

"Do you want the whole list?"

"Howabout just the highlights."

Charles crossed his arms and stared downward while he organized his thoughts. "All right. One-- our newest one. As you said, we know Gambit is a telepath, but he doesn't ever seem to have developed the power. Perhaps it will emerge later-- we still have a few years to cover. But perhaps not.

"Two-- we know that Remy killed someone through a telepathic link, but he claims he doesn't remember doing so. This, also, is something we haven't seen. But, it may be yet to come.

"Three-- and on a slightly different topic. Gambit seems to have three distinctly different alpha class powers. One is the norm, like Scott's optic blasts or Bobby's ice powers. Even Storm only has *one* power, despite how flexible the application of that one power. I have only one power. You have two powers-- telepathy and telekinesis-- which are closely linked. Very rarely, we find mutants with two dissimilar powers. But three is almost unheard of. My son Legion is the only one I can think of who had more."

Charles paused at the memory. His son's death was still painful, despite the fact that it had been Legion's own doing. Legion had had a veritable legion of powers, with a different personality to go with each one. And when his mind had become somewhat whole, he had even had the ability to move through time.

Charles pushed the thoughts away and went on. "Four-- Gambit's agility is beyond human, but doesn't appear to be a mutant power. He showed the same abilities throughout his childhood, though they have increased with age and practice."

Jean's eyebrows arched slowly as she catalogued each of his points.

"I do have to agree it's odd," she finally said. "Still, there has to be an explanation, somewhere. Either we've missed it, or it has not happened to Remy yet. Maybe we should just go on and see if we understand once we've caught up to the present."

Charles nodded, aceeding her point. Together they began to move forward once again. Familiar names and faces swept by-- Candra, the Silver Samurai, Storm's friend Yukio, Sabretooth, as well as a large number of people they did not recognize. And each encounter seemed to leave the young Cajun colder, more isolated, and more willing to dish out the same kinds of abuse.

"Not a very nice person, I'm afraid," Charles commented at one point. And, sadly, it was true. They watched in chill horror as he escaped an Interpol prison to go hunting for the agent who had put him there, intending to kill her. The woman's name was Tanya, and she had fooled him completely. He had fallen for her, believing that she loved him in return, but she had only been searching for evidence to use to convict him. She had done her job with rutheless efficiency and flawless acting. They could feel echoes of the pain of that betrayal from the mind around them, mixed with anger for having been taken in, and even a sense that he deserved what he'd gotten. Charles remembered Genevieve and wondered if that wasn't true.

As they progressed forward from that point, the pain that eminated from Remy increased, mixing with black fear. Charles began to dread seeing the young woman's fate. And when that fate came, it was not what Charles expected.

"Emma?"

The White Queen didn't respond to the question, but Betsy felt their mind link tighten. Together they began to erect shields to protect the others in the room from the spiraling waves of hate and fear that were emanating from Gambit. At first, the emotions had been unfocused, but they were beginning to harden into sharp barbs that could indeed injure the unprotected minds around them. Betsy could tell that they were directed randomly, which she found oddly reassuring, but they were also increasing in intensity.

"What's going on?" Scott asked.

Emma seemed to have realized the seriousness of her involvement. She was not smiling when she answered, "I believe the term is `hold on to your hat', Scott."

"An' what is *that* supposed ta mean?" Rogue leaned forward in her chair.

"Only that Remy is beginning to throw out dangerous psychic energy," Betsy answered calmly. The last thing they needed was Rogue in a tizzy. "And we don't have any way to know how intense it will get."

Remy was waiting for Tanya in her apartment, sitting on the couch with a glass of champagne in hand. The bottle was in ice on the side table, with an empty glass next to it. The scene was identical to the one he had come home to that last night, except that he did not have a swat team hidden away, ready to jump out and ambush her. He had only his powers and his anger, but that was more than enough.

He had taken her to an old warehouse, one of those cement and metal buildings that seemed cold even in the middle of summer. And it was cold there, and damp, and gray and oppressive, seeming to steal the air away before you had the chance to breathe it. Just like the interrogation cell buried beneath the "Justice Building" as the members of Interpol who worked there had jokingly named it.

He stripped her and tied her into the hard metal chair. She had simply stared back. She was familiar with intimidation tactics. And she had been on the other side before, spitting insults-- both professionally and personally deragatory-- at his bare skin. And they had struck like tiny whips. So he returned the favor. Interpol had grilled him for a confession of espionage against several European countries at the behest of certain Asian parties-- namely clan Yashida. But he grilled her for a confession of her betrayal. Hunting him was one thing-- that was her job as an agent. But she had made him believe, for the first time since leaving New Orleans, that he might be able to regain his shattered dreams of a family, children, and a safe place, full of love, in which he could hide from the ugliness the world seemed determined to throw at him.

The pain of having those hopes revived and then slaughtered became rage as he stared at the woman who had done it, and who did not even regret her actions. He had meant only to scare her, to give her a taste of the pain he felt as she and the other agents had turned slightly illegal methods on him to gain a confession. But somewhere in there, he lost all rationality, and when he finally regained it, the damage was done.

Tanya lay on her side, the heavy chair knocked over. She was sobbing in fear, begging him over and over again not to kill her. The proud demeanor was broken, as was her will, leaving nothing but a frightened child behind. Long, bloody lines crisscrossed her face and torso-- shallow knife wounds that would leave dark scars. One eye was ruined, though that was hard to tell through the bruises.

It was a horrible thing to see anyone broken down so completely. It was a desecration of the human spirit. But to be the one who had done it. . . . . Remy had turned and run. Away from her, away from himself, until he collapsed in the darkened street, retching and crying.

Charles discovered that he could summon only pity, not compassion. He was utterly horrified by the darkness that lurked in the young man's heart.

Beside Charles, Jean gasped. "Sinister." She pointed at the darkness where the pale skinned man emerged and stood watching Remy. Almost paternally, he helped Remy to his feet and led him away.

Scott was on his feet, hands gripping the back of his chair until the knuckles turned white. "What's going on?!" he demanded angrily.

Elizabeth did not have much attention to spare for him. The psychic assault was becoming intense, though it was still undirected. Still, she looked questioningly at Scott.

"Jean is practically screaming at me through our rapport, but I can't tell what she's saying!" Scott's hands went to the sides of his head and then back to the chair, leaving his hair in disarray. "Is she all right?" His expression was intensely distraught as he stared at Emma.

Some of the White Queen's placid facade had worn away. She was beginning to show some signs of strain. "As far as I can tell, she is unharmed," she answered Scott. "But both she and Charles are extremely disturbed emotionally and it's affecting their astral selves. I expect they are simply reacting to him," she pointed to Remy. "*He* is about to come unglued."

Rogue started and began to look frantically between Remy and Emma. "Why? What's wrong?"

Emma shrugged and did not answer. Storm placed a restraining hand on Rogue's shoulder.

"Emma is doing what the Professor asked of her. She cannot help us or Remy if she is dealing with you." There was no compromise in the blue eyes that skewered Rogue. Then Storm took a steaming mug of tea from the tray she had just brought in and pressed it into Rogue's unprotesting hands. "Drink this. There is nothing we can do but wait." As she turned away, Betsy caught a glimpse of shadow in Storm's eyes. She would not show her concern in order to be an example of strength to the others, but she, too, was desperately worried.

Strangely, Sinister was patient and almost kind in dealing with his emotionally wounded charge. But Charles could see the true intent behind the kindness. Sinister had found a weapon, one that was vulnerable enough to be molded into whatever Sinister wanted.

And over time, Remy became exactly that. He used his abilities to charm, cajole and extort people to serve Sinister's interests, even helping to kidnap those Sinister chose as test subjects for his genetic research. That research was carried out in the basement of an abandoned theatre in Seattle.

For a time, Remy simply did not care about the consequences of what he did. Sinister had convinced him that he was the only friend Remy had, and the young man proved once again to be stubbornly loyal to those he saw as family. But eventually he could no longer deny the truth of the horrible things Sinister did to his "patients". They began to argue over Sinister's actions until the day that Remy's scarred, tattered conscience could no longer ignore the plight of Sinister's victims. His own victims, since he was as much a part of their being there as Sinister. He had come to see Tanya's face every time he looked at one of them.

He had tried to free them-- those that were still able to care about such a thing, at least, but Sinister arrived to stop him. And Sinister was far too powerful for Remy to beat in a one-on-one fight. Sinister had left him, bloody, bruised, and in tremendous pain from the shards of broken ribs that lacerated his insides, caged in the lab. He had been able to do nothing but watch as Sinister continued his "research". Eventually, Sininster treated the wounds, but did not release his captive. Charles guessed that he did not intend to until he was certain that Remy's rebellious spirit was completely dead.

But even he, perhaps, underestimated Gambit's ability to mislead people by creating a facade so complete that most would never think to look for a different person behind it. Sinister released a subdued, apologetic young man, who went back to doing what he was told, just as before. But Sinister's research included the use of a number of different chemicals, some of them in quantity. In the course of cleaning the lab, those containers housing the more volatile materials were slowly rearranged. Convinced that leaving these people in Sinister's clutches was the worst thing he could do, Remy picked his time. Sinister was deeply involved in a dissection, and Remy was supposed to be sedating another patient for the same treatment. Instead, he went to the stairs and used his charged cards to ignite the chemicals he had set up. He knew what he was doing-- the result was a set of multiple explosions of napalm-like liquid that clung and burned nearly everything, bringing swift death to all those in the basement lab. Sinister's roar of fury was drowned in cleansing fire. Then Remy had left, before the fumes overcame him, hoping desperately that Sinister was dead and that his memories could be destroyed as easily as the lab.

Charles found that he was shaking. He looked at Jean and saw tears glimmer in her eyes.

"This is what nearly drove Rogue insane, isn't it?"

Charles nodded. "I think so." It was hard to speak around the lump in his throat. He wasn't certain how he felt. He was angry and frightened, horrified and sympathetic, all at the same time. He knew his own emotions were resonating with Remy's as the Cajun relived his actions. The hurt ran very deep, and it was a wound that had never healed.

"We've found a threat to the X-men, at least," he added a few moments later.

Neither of them felt like talking, so they simply continued on. Remy went back to his theif's ways, but stayed away from people. Time covered the wounds somewhat, and the cocky Cajun charmer they were used to began to emerge again.

And then a telepath sent by Interpol tried to probe his mind. Charles and Jean had to shield themselves from the intense flash of pain. They could see a jagged tear in the memory strand corresponding to that moment in time. The strand was fuzzy on the far side where it picked up, becoming clearer as Remy regained his memories in a british mental asylum. The events were just as Remy had described them to Charles, and gave him no clue as to when the damage to Gambit's telepathic powers might have occurred.

Jean chewed her lip as she considered. "This just doesn't make sense. Suddenly his mind is damaged? When could that have happened?"

"I don't know. It is almost as if he didn't *have* any telepathic power until someone tried to probe him. I suppose it is possible that it was the feedback from this telepath's death that caused the damage." Charles knew his words lacked conviction.

"No, it was a classic trauma-induced reaction from the moment their minds met. We're here, we can see that clearly." Jean was frustrated.

Charles sighed. "We only have a couple of years to go. Let's finish this."

Jean nodded. She was as uncomfortable as he was. Gambit had turned out to be both more and less than they had expected. Charles was acutely aware of his diappointment. Not just in Remy himself, but also in the world that had treated him so harshly. Charles could not help but blame Remy for the damage he had caused, and yet, he had paid dearly, hadn't he? In the coin of the soul, at least.

Betsy sighed and rubbed her temples. "Hopefully, that was the worst." The pain was easing. From the expressions around her, she could tell that the others could sense the change, even if they couldn't put a name to what was different.

Only Rogue was not stirring as if being released from some unknown miasma. She was leaning towards Remy, staring intently at the still figure. Then she reached toward his face, and to Betsy's surprise, brushed the tears from his cheeks. Remy did not respond to the touch.

Some months later, Sinister found his recalcitrant protege. The sudden surge of panic fear from discovering that Sinister was still alive was like a physical blow. Charles and Jean exchanged worried glances. How much more trouble had Sinister caused for the young mutant? Charles wasn't certain he could stand to be a witness to much more.

Sinister tried to recruit Remy for a mutant team he was putting together. Several of the members were there with him, and Charles recognized them with a sense of dread.

"The Marauders. . . . " He didn't finish the thought aloud.

Remy refused, but Sinister continued to press him, appearing several times in the next weeks to remind him of what he supposedly "owed" Sinister for the destruction of his lab and research. In the end, Remy gave in-- not by joining the Marauders, but by offering Sinster another name, a mutant who would fit perfectly into Sinister's plan. Victor Creed. Sabretooth. Remy thought that would make him even with Sinister, and perhaps buy him a little distance from the man.

Charles and Jean looked at each other. Finally, Jean put their thoughts into words. "The Mutant Massacre."

Charles sighed. "He didn't know what Sinister had planned." It was a weak defense, and Charles knew it. Jean just shook her head.

They continued forward in time, watching as a child-Storm plummeted into a swimming pool, almost at Remy's feet. He had dragged her out of the water and helped her to escape the Shadow King, willingly risking his life to protect an innocent. It was an act of pennance, Charles realized, as well as one born out of a real desire to see a child safe. And that pennance continued with the X-men. Charles finally had an answer to one question-- he knew why Gambit stayed with the X-men and fought for a cause he didn't really believe in. He had found a way to improve the world a little bit, or at least die trying, and he hoped that that would somehow make up for the things he'd done in the past.

A smile crossed Jean's face as they watched Remy encounter Rogue for the first time. It was on Muir island, after the Shadow King had been destroyed and his influence erased from their minds. It was that kind of hammer-blow-between-the-eyes kind of feeling that Jean remembered when she had first met Scott. And Rogue's seeming untouchability made her that much more attractive.

Ororo's unconditional friendship had given Remy a chance to believe in people once more, but it was Rogue's tentative love that gave him a reason to want to believe in himself. As Rogue had fought to overcome her fears, to reach out to him, to believe that the impossible could become possible with them, he had started to find the strength to believe, too.

And then, that day in Israel, he had risked everything for one instant of time in which their dreams could become reality. It had seemed like the only way to let their lives end. But they had lived through, instead. The sensation of losing his mind to Rogue's powers left Charles and Jean feeling like they were plunging off of a cliff, but they held on and the sensations disappeared once he woke, three weeks later. But Rogue was gone. She knew the truth, and his dreams were shattered once more.

The last few months flew by without surprises. Charles and Jean came to the end of the memory strand. Jean hugged her arms around herself.

"I don't know whether to hate him or cry for him," she admitted.

"Neither do I," Charles agreed. "But he *is* trying to do what is right. We have to remember that."

"I know. I-- it's hard. How do we forgive?"

"However we can, Jean." Charles sighed. "I would have struggled, I think, to forgive Sabretooth for his past if he had ever had a true change of heart. And yet, I must believe that I would have found a way. Otherwise, my dream all these years would have turned out to be a lie-- an empty promise. I *have* to forgive Remy, or I will have failed him. And failed all of my X-men."

Jean stared at him for several moments, and then nodded. A flicker of a smile appeared on her lips and she leaned over to kiss him on the cheek. "Thank you."

Charles returned her smile, his heart lightening. Then he cleared his throat, suddenly abashed at the intimate moment. "We still haven't answered the question that brought us in here."

Jean's gaze grew expectant.

"What relation does Remy have to the deaths of the X-men?"

She shrugged. "Apparently nothing. Unless Sinister expects to use him against us, and I doubt he would be successful now."

"Except for the fact that there are a number of things that apparently don't exist in Gambit's memories, I would agree with you. Whatever happened to damage his telepathic abilities had to have happened sometime, but I didn't see any evidence that his memories have been tampered with and we didn't find any gaps, save the one. And that one is already explained."

"Do you think the memories we're looking for might have been removed?" Jean's expression was intense.

"I would almost say that is the only answer left. What is the saying? `When you have eliminated the impossible, whatever remains, however improbable, must be the truth.'"

"So what can we do?"

Charles took a deep breath. He wasn't too sure of this one, himself. "I think there's one place left to look. The tree."

Jean's eyes widened with recognition. "It might work."

"Maybe. But it's the only link we have to the damage. Do you feel up to this?" He tried to evaluate her condition. They were both worn out, emotionally, but he didn't think either of their mental fatigue levels was dangerous yet. And he was afraid that if they left Remy's mind now, he would never allow them to re-enter it.

Jean nodded. "I'm ready if you are, Charles."