Disclaimer: Fentry and all related characters are mine. All recognizable characters (Gambit, Angel, X-Men, etc...) belong to Marvel comics and are being used without permission or profit.

The Boundary
Part I
by Spade

"So, is there any particular mutant that you're looking for, Hank?" Forge asked. He was sprawled amidst several peculiar tools, the top half of his body hidden under the computer panel he was working on.

Hank rewired a few plugs and cords and made a noncommittal noise. Forge had posed the question casually but Hank was certain Forge knew who he was looking for. Forge had gotten enough hear-say to know about Gambit and the Marauders, but hadn't said anything by way of how he felt yet.

"I figured I'd bring in the Loch Ness Monster," Hank said lightly, "and then I'll find Big Foot. Maybe even Elvis. I hear he was seen at Harry's Hideaway last week."

"Hank-"

"You know very well who I'm searching for."

Forge pulled himself out from the computer panel and off the floor. "That should do it. This new Cerebro won't be nearly as accurate as the last without its Shi'ar components, but it'll do for now. I brought over the files and signatures from X-Factor to download here."

"You have my gratitude, old friend," Hank replied.

He had been pleased to find the message Forge had left on the answering machine saying that some of X-Factor would be arriving soon to help with repairs. There was still a good deal of structural damage left over from Onslaught. And then there was the lack of any furnishings or equipment since Bastion and Operation: Zero Tolerance had come knocking. Hank pondered over Bastion's originality for a moment. Most villains simply trashed the building, knocking down walls or blowing them up or burning them down. Important equipment was left beneath the wreckage to be dug out and repaired for further use. Bastion had forgone the building entirely and taken all the equipment inside.

More, he's taken priceless possessions. It wasn't enough to debilitate our technology, he had to violate our home by removing everything that reminded us that we were a family. That we were human. Photographs, books, personal belongings; only a few items had remained, forgotten in the back of one of the closets in the boathouse. It wasn't much. Just a suitcase, some clothes, and bed sheets. Everything else had been stripped away. Even Rogue's stuffed animals. I'm sure those must have intimidated Bastion to no end.

Forge was studying Hank's face intently and then went back to replacing the files. "I don't know why you're spending this much trouble over a lost cause."

Hank paused, taken aback by the tone in his voice. It was tight with repressed anger and for a moment Hank didn't understand why. He forgot the wires he was twisting and focuses all his attention on Forge. "Do you really believe Gambit is a lost cause?"

Forge shrugged but kept his gaze on the steady scroll of  readouts on the small computer screen. "I trust Ororo's judgment, Beast. But even she can be wrong."

Hank nodded with a mental "Oh..". Forge's reaction was more based on Ororo's emotional state that anything Remy had done. She had been distant when Forge had shown up, something Hank had attributed to Forge's current associations with Mystique. Though, part of it was due to her worry for the Cajun.

I don't suppose there was an easier way for Remy to play this out, Hank thought. The more he went over the events of late, the more he believed the assessment fit. Gambit tells us when he arrives, we turn him away right off. We accept him, learn the truth two years later, and we throw him out for treachery. Hank had no illusions that he knew how Remy thought or felt, but he was certain that Gambit had never been out to hurt the X-Men or the Morlocks. It bothered him that the X-Men might be so judgmental to one that they had claimed as their own.

The computer beeped and the lights dimmed momentarily. Forge glanced up at the ceiling. Without the usual heavy duty circuit protectors and systems, they stood a good chance of blowing out the fuse box if they tried doing too many things at once. The screen flickered and Forge began typing in all the files and the bio-signature they had one Gambit, then settled in as Cerebro began a slow search.

*****

Rogue froze in the kitchen doorway. Storm glanced up, then returned her gaze sharply to the cup she was rinsing out, eyes narrowing fractionally. Rogue considered bypassing lunch all together but she had already skipped breakfast in order to avoid Ororo. Storm's expression, while displeased, wasn't confrontational and Rogue was in no mood to start anything so the chance of a fight was minimal.

She walked over to the fridge and grabbed some sandwich fixings, bringing them to the table. Lorna Dane, a member of X-Factor, was seated across from her. The green haired woman glanced up from the blue prints spread across the sparse table, her gaze darting between Ororo and Rogue.

"What's all that?" Rogue asked to break the quiet.

"The blue prints for the mansion. I'm checking where all the steel support beams are going." She picked up a mug next to her and swallowed the last of its contents in one long gulp. Storm came back from the sink and sat down across from them.

"We will need your assistance in removing the more dilapidated portions of the mansion," Storm said to Rogue. She nodded, thankful that Ororo was willing to be kind in the face of what Rogue had done. It had been turbulent to say the last when Storm discovered that Rogue had left Remy in Antarctica to die. It had rained steadily for a week when Ororo and Rogue combined had been unable to find him. Unknown to Rogue, Logan had also been checking around his old connections, which had also come up empty handed.

Rogue went back to her sandwich stuffs, scraping what little was left of the mayonnaise with a knife. Lorna watched with mild amusement.

"So when was the last time anyone bothered to shop around here?" she asked.

"Ah think Cecilia and Sam went a week ago," Rogue answered.

Lorna gave a heavy sigh and levered herself from the table, pushing some green locks of hair behind her ear. "Well. when you finish eating, grab your coat. We're taking a field trip to food lion."

"What about th'rebuildin'?" Rogue asked.

"Well, there isn't really anything we can do until those two hermits emerge from the basement, is there? X-Factor's here to help you guys get back on your feet. In a house with this many people, you can't do that with an empty refrigerator."

*****

There was laughter. Not a pleasant sort of laughter. Even though he couldn't see Harpoon through the dark, he knew it was him. No one else laughed like that. It was a thick, mad cackling from someone who took pleasure in ripping the wings off an angel.

The darkness that surrounded him was suddenly obscured by shredded feathers and blood.

Warren woke with a start. Pale sunlight crept between the curtains, cutting a thin beam of light across the plush carpet and down the center of the bed. He stretched his hand to the other side of the mattress where Betsy Braddock had been lying.

"Betts?" he called out softly, not wanting to wake her should she still be asleep. His questing hand found he should and she murmured drowsily.

Warren climbed out of the bed as quietly as he could and went in search of his clothes, trying to remember what it was that had woken him so sharply. Going to the kitchen, he made a pot of coffee and walked to the table to wait for it to finish. He reached his arms above his head, stretching his back muscles and ruffled his wings to get the feathers to settle properly. He'd had another dream, he realized, something to do with his wings. Concentrating on a whorl in the wood, he started to wade through the layers of his subconscious.

Harpoon, he thought. His shoulder blades itched as he remembered. Harpoon had been one of the Marauders who had damaged his original wings beyond repair. Harpoon, he rolled the name around in his head and then grimaced. Not Gambit.

If it hadn't been for Gambit, the Marauders would never have existed. The Morlock Massacre would never have happened and he'd still have his first wings. A small corner of his mind asked if he really believed that. If Sinister had wanted the Morlocks dead he would have found a way to do it, with or without Gambit's consent to help.

"He should have told us," Warren whispered sharply, "instead of lying and pretending he was one of us."

One of the X-Men... Apocalypse flashed briefly through his mind though he tried hard not to see him.

He sat there until Betsy came out of the bedroom, draped in one of his nightshirts. She passed him, running her hand over his arm as she went. Pouring two cups of coffee she brought one to him and sat down across from him. Her stance was relaxed but she was leaning slightly forward, legs crossed, her gaze deep.

"Something you want to talk about, luv?" she asked.

"I was just thinking," he replied.

"Whatever it is, it's bothering you," Betsy said.

Warren wondered whether his nightmare and troubled thought had a hand in waking her. Though she usually shielded her mind from others' thoughts, he didn't think that shield was quite so strong while she slept. She probably picked up his mood with her telepathy.

She arced an eyebrow after a moment's scrutiny, then said, "You're going to have to look at the past sooner or later, Warren. We both know ignoring it makes things worse."

"What's that supposed to mean?"

She rubbed her temples, knowing what she would say next was going to hurt him. "You can't blame Gambit for your involvement with Apocalypse. It doesn't work that way."

"Doesn't-- Betsy that's absurd!" It's too early in the morning for this he thought. He got up from the table and started pacing.

"No it isn't. His role in the Massacre cost you your wings. Isn't that why you went to Apocalypse? So you could fly again?"

"That was a long time ago, Betsy. I'm not the same as then."

"I know," She assured him. "I wasn't going to bring this up now, not so early in the morning, but your thoughts were so clearly steering in that direction. I thought now would be a better time."

"Well you thought wrong! Why do you want to talk about something that's dead and buried?"

"I want to talk about is, Warren," Betsy told him. "And the X-Men, where we're going, and what we're ignoring."

*****

Some hundred miles south of Warren's apartment, Remy LeBeau sat perched on a stool in his kitchen, staring in dismay at the playing card pinched in his hand. He tried to will it to life, waiting for the crimson glow accompanied his kinetic charge. He barely moved save to brush his bangs out of the sweat that was forming on his forehead, and for several long minutes, nothing happened.

There was a brief spark around the laminated edge, a stinging, burning sensation that shot down into his wrist, and then it was gone.

Remy swore and dropped the card in disgust, rubbing his thumb into his palm to massage the ache in it. It felt like there was a steam roller in his head pounding his brain flat and all he'd accomplished was singing the paper.

Though his power hadn't defined him like they had Warren or Rogue, they had always been a part of him. He had used them to save his life and his friends more times than he could count. They had saved his life when Rogue abandoned him in Antarctica and there was the problem. In an instinctual effort to survive, Remy had charged the molecules around his own body. It had provided him with a small bubble of air, not much to ward off Antarctica's icy temperatures or the battle with pneumonia that followed, but it prevented lasting damage to his cells. He had suffered only minimal frostbite and while his lungs still ached when he breathed, he was recovering.

But his powers had somehow burned themselves out. Something was blocking the flow of the kinetic charge. Remy rubbed his stubbled jaw and took stock of the situation. Y'still got de mental power if not de charge. His psionic abilities were something of an enigma. He didn't call it telepathy or empathy because it didn't seem to fit solely into one category or the other. It was more like a combination of both. Still got de thievin' skills. He had taken a job recovering a stolen museum artifact a few days ago just to make sure. While he wasn't back to his optimal levels of prowess, he was still the best thief there was and it had gone off without a hitch. He just needed a little more time. He flexed his fingers. Maybe dis ain't permanent. Maybe it is. Give it time.

What else had the X-Men cost him? He spared the sofa a withering stare and thought of the woman he had found sitting there two days earlier. There was no trace left of her, psionically or physically, and for the life of him he couldn't figure out how she'd gotten in his apartment in the first place. Could I be losin' my mind as well? He dismissed the idea after a moment. If he was sane enough to ask the question he hadn't gone over the edge just yet.

*****

Ororo and Rogue walked down the store aisle, Rogue leaning her elbows on the cart and Ororo looking over the list in her hand. Most of the items on the list were written in a neat, flowing hand, Lorna's writing. The one exception was the word 'BEER' which had been added at the bottom in Logan's loose, agitated script. Storm glanced up at Rogue, almost smiling at the younger woman's preoccupied half-smile. Rogue was thinking about Remy again. She had been examining her memories of him. Mostly to try and figure out where she's screwed. Occasionally she would slip into one of the happier times they'd shared.

Ororo's expression turned thoughtful. "If you care so deeply," Rogue head snapped up and her eyes cleared, "then why did you forsake him so?"

It was a quiet question and Ororo tried not to make it sound threatening, knowing that the less accusing it sounded, the more willing Rogue would be to answer. As it was, Rogue's green eyes hardened and she looked away. This sort of discussion almost always led to either or both losing their temper, but they were in a public place and neither wanted to make a scene.

Mystique had been appalled to hear what had happened, not because of what Remy had done, but what everyone else wasn't doing. She had declared that all this tip-toeing around anything that had to do with Gambit made her sick and marched straight to Rogue's room. At the time, Ororo had been apprehensive about what Mystique would do, having never been sure of the woman's intentions. But she was now grateful for the intervention. Mystique had proceeded to force Rogue to admit to what happened and how she felt about it.

"Ah'm angry, 'Ro," Rogue said. "He never trusted us enough to tell us what he'd done."

"Does that mean he deserved to die?"

Rogue's eyes glared sharply at Storm before focusing straight ahead. "No, it doesn't. Ah wasn't thinkin' clearly." Storm opened her mouth, but she cut her off. "Ah know that don't excuse nothin' an' I don't need you t'tell me that."

"You still have not answered my question," Ororo said after a moment. "You still care. Why would you be so cruel when he needed you  most?" Her voice reverberated with her own guilty feelings. Since learning where Remy had been left, she had been torn between her duties to remain and lead the X-Men and her duties to Remy as best friends. If Remy was indeed dead, then the blame fell on both their shoulders.

Distress started creeping into Rogue's eyes. "Ah did love him before. Ah love him now. But at that trial, when Ah'd seen what he'd done...," she shook her head at a loss for words. "In that moment, Ah hated him. An' it was like he was in my head, an' Ah knew it wasn't him. It didn't feel like him, but it sounded like him."

"Are you suggesting that Erik the Red made you leave him there?" Ororo asked. That would have been the easiest way out.

"No. But Ah knew how much Remy hated himself for what he'd done, an Ah was so angry that Ah believed what that voice said." She stared at Ororo earnestly. "God help me, Storm, Ah wanted t'believe it. Ah may have killed him. Worse, Ah may have broken him."

Ororo clasped a hand over Rogue's and squeezed gently. "I will not believe that Remy is beyond saving." She wouldn't think that Remy was dead until there was a body and in her heart she knew there would be none. But she also had the feeling that he ever returned home, he would never be the same.

End Part I

Spade
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