POWER GAMBIT 5

To all of you, but especially Wolverine:
I name the ghosts but to exorcise them

*********

"One day there was a blond blue-eyed boy near the robot. The
owner said: `Lovely blonde blue eyed virgin boy. Pleasure him in
sex.' So the robot did.

The robot took the virgin in any possible way and the owner
approved. The robot staged sex shows with the virgin following
the voice-commands of the owner and the owner was pleased.

"The virgin's skin was silk, his body supple. After one or two
times the virgin showed pleasure at the robot's actions. The
owner was pleased at that.

"The owner talked to the virgin but the robot could not hear,
whatever he said to the virgin made the virgin supple and
reactive in the robot's hands.

"Then one day the owner gave the coupling voice-command to
the robot and the robot pushed its cock deep inside the virgin's
anus, an action the robot had performed several times before.

"That time the owner voice-commanded `Lock' and the robot
locked his cock deep inside the virgin.

"The owner inserted a knife-holding hand between the robot and
the virgin and cut away the virgin's sex. Then he pushed the
virgin's cut-away sex into the robot arse. The owner used a tool
to push the cut-away sex deep into the robot arse.

"The robot remained locked.

"Then the owner inserted the knife-holding hand again between
the robot and the virgin and cut the virgin's belly going up up up
to his sternum.

"The robot remained locked.

"Then the owner dropped the knife and ripped the virgin's heart
off with his hand and pushed it deep into the robot's arse.

"The heart was still pulsing.

"The robot remained locked.

"The owner voice-commanded `Kiss and stay locked.'

"And the robot did."

The last unbearable card, bringing death to the player.

Remy cannot go on, no matter how he tries to force himself.

In the silence, the Wolverine's breath is like tearing silk.

********

Hank sighs heavily.

"Look, Bobby.."

"Robert" the Iceman says.. well, icily
"make the effort."

`Shit!" he thinks `But this is easier that I imagined!'

"Robert." meekly enough, but a spasm of anger tightens the blue
frame

"Look this is difficult enough without you imitating Gambit."

"Ah, but it worked for Gambit, didn't it?" Bobby has found a new
liberating strength in relentlessness and is not going to give it up
for nothing.

Hank regroups and tries a new tack:

"The fact is that I am ready to admit I was out of line, but your
behaviour was not exemplary as well."

"What behaviour? I was scared shitless. Being scared shitless
is a `behaviour'', Blue? You pounded me into mindlessness. Is
mindlessness a behaviour?"

"No." Hank can't get out of this one, no matter how he twists and
turns, he cannot get out.

"It's like pulling teeth." He blurts, honestly for once.

The Iceman sighs in relief.

"Yes, love" he says very gently "But they are rotten teeth. They will
kill you."

*******

"Remy…" Logan is getting scared.

"There was no *I*, can't you see?" the Cajun wails, all his
defences have crumbled, there are no more walls to hide
behind. Remy is leaking tears but his voice is still obsessed by
the need to make the man he loves understand.

"It's called psychic death. The *I* dies. There's no self. Only an
empty body like a robot. I can't remember that poor boy… I don't
even know how old he was or remember his face! He had no
face, the only thing the robot knew was what the owner said! So I
say blonde blue eyed virgin because that's all I will ever know of
him! He must have screamed while he died like that, but there
are no screams in my memory, the owner never said `screams'!
I WAS NOT there!"

Remy has to stop, he's panting like a dog and his sight is gone,
he's covered in cold sweat and tears, he's trembling so hard the
chair shakes.
His torment is like a goad propelling the Wolverine to him.
Unthinkingly, urged by the other's pain he grips the thin
shoulders hard, a grip to obliterate thought.

There is a long pause, then Remy can go on. He's started this
lethal game of ripping off shields and now there's no recourse
but to go to the bitter end.

"I loved Essex, you see. Adored him, worshipped him. And that
was me, before the death of self. He was the only person who
had accepted me, praised me… I gave him my soul to keep and
he crushed it. He didn't want even the mindless love I was
offering to him, he wanted total control."
Why has breathing become so hard? Why can't the man
crushing his shoulders see it?

"Logan…" he goes on desperately "Total adoring obedience,
even in the face of terrible tortures, was not enough for him. He
wanted…"
A groping for understanding, even now, even years after,
"I don't know what he wanted or why, only what he did to me that
killed the self and robbed me of life.

"He put me in a coffin. No reason, no why, he just did. My wrists
were tied, my ankles were tied and why? It was a coffin, as long
and wide as me. There was a tube that went into my mouth.
From the tube I was fed and watered. He thoughtfully tilted it so
my feet were slightly higher than my head. And he left me in
there. For eternity. Forever. Until I was dead."

"He killed the me that was, Logan, the *me* that I was is dead
forever, Logan, and now I can't even remember the face of a boy
he killed under me!

"Why, Logan, why?"

But the hard man gripping his shoulders has no answer to that,
he can only strangle in the fury of a pain that he cannot fathom.

********

"Yes, right." Pulling teeth is a bland metaphor for what Hank is
going through.

"But you don't have to do it, love." A tinkling voice, a crystal voice,
an icicle voice

"You do not *have* to do this, you know. Only if you feel
something for me, and if what you feel for me is love. You can
send me to perdition, if the price is too high."

And from the depths of his half-animal soul the cry is like the
death of the dinosaurs:

"You can never want me, Bobby, no human can never want this
monster!"

******

"I wanted you to understand, but now I can't even tell what…
Look, I was dead. Dead, not alive, not there. I will never know
how much time passed, I don't know if it was years or months…
The robot was *not* alive until the owner saw it, commanded it. I,
no, no not I, there was no I, the robot let that horrible thing
happen with no feelings. The only thing the robot knew was his
owner voice. Nothing existed beyond that.

"Oh," Remy moans, now totally out of control "But there is worse,
you see, Logan, there is worse because the robot died in the
corpse-kiss of the blond blue eyed virgin.

"A new I was born there... the beginning of me, remembering the
dead I, but different. That was a child who worshipped, who
adored, yet felt loved."

The body is swaying now to a rhythm of utter despair

"The child-me that was born of the sacrifice of the blonde blue
eyed virgin perceived all Essex did as love. He felt loved and
appreciated and safe…

"Safe, Logan, I felt so safe in that short time, nothing could harm
me, nothing could hurt me, my god loved me.

"So I was careless of what I said: the loving child, feeling loved,
had no need of fear or caution. I spoke out of turn and when he
punished me, I was all sweet repentance…"

Remy has to stop once more, it seems to him his heart is
bleeding, his mind is bleeding, his whole being is bleeding and
fading away to nothing.

Where to find the strength now? He dredged it all, breathing has
become an exhausting task, it seems to him his very heart is
tired of beating, how to go on? How to find a voice to tell of his
last ordeal?

******

The Iceman is just Robert Drake now, pink and scrubbed and
warm, he runs to his amazing love and embraces him tightly,
letting him feel his nakedness, his warmth, his human fragility.

"You are so beautiful" he says gently "So huge and powerful and
beautiful. Who would want anything else, when you are near?
You were wonderful when I first saw you, but that was nothing,
nothing Hank, to what you are now. I wish you could see into my
head, I really do, because then you would *know* it's not just
words, it's the truth of my heart."

° Are you serious, Bobby? °

"Jean!" he yelps making Hank's eyes grow big
"Are you listening in?"

Her mental laughter is so amused that the young man has to
grin.

° Of course, child, you are screaming on all frequencies! Well?
Do you want Hank to *know* what you are thinking? °

"Can you do it?"

° Easy as pie, pet. ° and the last word clinches it. The Iceman is
now officially one of her loves, his grin widens and turns,
wickedly, on the poor Beast who's only heard half of this
conversation and is so torn between believing and not believing
his love's words, that he can't speak.

"Yes, please, Jean, yes, do it!"

And the Beast sees. He sees himself through the other's eyes,
majestic and beautiful as a god, not an animal but something
more than human, better than human. And he can finally weep in
joy, in pain for all the years wasted in self-loathing, in gratitude
for a love he hadn't seen or believed possible.

He hugs the slight young man engulfing him in his long blue
arms and weeps tenderly.

Bobby's voice is just as tender as he says
"Thank you, Jean, thank you."

° Glad to be of assistance, pet. Now remember, let him play, but
keep him in line. °

"I won't need to, lady Phoenix. Believe me, I won't ever need to…
OWWW! Stop it, love!" because Hank, hearing her, is nodding so
vigorously that his chin is thumping on Bobby's head.

° I believe you. I'm right, Hank, right? °

Laughing, crying and rubbing his boy's head the Beast gargles:
"Yes! You are always right, Jean."

"Now…" the Iceman disengages with some difficulty from his
lover's hairy arms. Then he winks at the air and goes to pick up
something.

"Now you can put it back." he says presenting the collar.

"I… I don't think I w… want to…" Hank falters, but his eyes betray
him.

"You may not want to," Bobby is very firm "but I do. It's what I want
more in life, now that you are your real self again. It won't make
you feel any better about how the others treat you, but it will make
*me* feel better."

Still breathing through his mouth – but now he's starting to get
excited as well – the Beast closes the collar around his boy's
neck, locking it with shaking fingers.

"Tell me again how you see me… darling." He whispers.

"As a huge, beautiful, powerful, wise, magnificent,
superhuman… teddybear!"

******

"Please stop now. I can't stand it."

Logan is so out of his depths that he feels he's drowning, his
voice is little more than a breath.

This is all the strength Gambit needs and more. He straightens
up and takes the Wolverine's now unresponsive hands in his.

"I had to stand it though. I had to fight not to make what you were
doing to me the love actions of Essex the god. Everything in me
wanted to make it so. Everything.

But what kind of love would that have been?

"Only I knew nothing in between, so I did the wrong thing. I made
you become a bully, and a cruel bully at that. You are not like that,
that was as foreign to you as breathing water. But you were
breathing water, my love, and I don't like gills, so I had to go
away.

"Now please bear with me, and listen because I can't stop now,
I'm not fighting for your love anymore, just to give you back the
humanity I made you lose.

"I'll not burden you with all he did to me when I was like a child
and loved him so thoughtlessly. I'll just tell you how and why it
ended.

"One day he was ranting, as he always did, about his greatness
and his destiny and his godlike powers.

"I drank it all in, believing in it, like an acolyte at the unfolding of
the Secrets, but one thing made me laugh, it was such a
let-down in the magnificence of his rant, so I said, laughing and
happy, playing with my cock as a child would play with a toy,

`Yes, but, master, don't use that stupid name! You are so much
more than human and have to call yourself Mis-ter Sinis-ter! It's
the most stupid name on the Earth!'"

Logan can't help a ghost of a chuckle
"It *is* the most stupid name of the Earth!" he says

"He punished me for that, Logan." Remy is whispering now "He
made me kill the Morlocks."

The ghost of a chuckle stops as if cut by a guillotine blade.

The silence is unrelenting.

******

"Why are you grinning so much, my lady?" Scott is grinning too,
happy without knowing why.

"An old knot has been undone, pet. A new… No, two souls are
reborn. I'm getting ideas…" her grin changes to something more
feral, hungry and lifegiving.

"Yes…?" Cyke feels he is asked to be Scott Summers, Jean
Grey's husband, and not her pet for once, and his accelerating
heartbeat makes him pant a little.

"Oh, yes. Definitely. I think the moment's come to use in much
more direct and simple ways that rather splendid cock of
yours,…" She pauses for effect. This is foreplay of the brain, the
subtlest and most arousing technique of love.

"Scott." She says and he's erect for her at once.

******

It's up to you, now Logan Wolverine, no other has been offered
such a gift for a wedding day.

Be careful how you spurn it, some wounds never heal.

Be careful how you accept it, you will be kept to your word.

He can't be anyone else, Logan, he can only be what his past
has made of him. Not a weak man, not a silly man, but fragile,
like diamonds. Hard, shining, precious and terribly fragile.

Now say something, Logan Wolverine. The time for running is
past.

******

"I don't know about the word love, Remy. I don't know if I can use
it with a man. I never thought it possible." Logan knows he has
no options, the truth may kill, but it's the only thing that will let him
be able to live with himself afterwards.

"I used men because I couldn't bear the thought of doing…
those things to a woman, but I loved the lady Mariko and I loved
Jean with all my heart. It's because it was so impossible with
Red and because I needed sex that I found out about the clubs
and I thought it was a good solution. Then you mixed it all up for
me and now I don't know anything anymore.

"I want you as I never wanted any of the others, but love… I just
don't know, Remy, I just don't know about that.

"The problem is I couldn't let you go, but I never thought past the
sex of it. I came here ready to wear your collar, ready to be your
dog, but all this talk of love makes me damn uncomfortable, it
doesn't feel right, it doesn't feel me, as I know of me.

"I'm sorry, Gumbo, it feels more like an obsession than love."

"No matter how you know it, no matter how you think you're ready
for it, you never are." Gambit's voice is low, but clear.

"It's not you, it's me. You can't be someone else and live. I
wanted something that was not for me. I don't even know if I
knew how to accept it, if it came to me. Love I mean. The clear
love between two people, no masters, no slaves, no doms, no
subs.

"I just thought it would be like being friends, only much more
than that. Shows you what I knew. Of course you can't love a
man, chere."

There's another thought filled silence.

"'Kay." Remy says in the end

"I'll be your slave. I lose, you win. The board is bare, you have
taken all my pieces and my king is down.

"I never told anyone what I've told you, I never even told myself,
because I've never dared think about it. This is the first time I put
words to my past and the words have made it come alive inside
me. I hid it somewhere inside me to go on, but now the door is
open and I have to go on another way.

"If there are no happy endings, I'll accept the only ending you can
offer. You can have me in every way you want, every crumb you
wish to throw me will be welcome. I will be good and obedient
and I will pleasure you and take pleasure in you if that's what you
need.

"You see, Logan, I can't be alone anymore, I will die of
desolation. And you are the person I love most in the world,
much more than I can love myself, so rest assured I will not
degrade you into a monster anymore.
You won't have to breathe water to have me."

The Wolverine ponders this and is, for a moment, tempted. No
aggro, no problems, no embarrassing incidents, no more
face-saving attitudes.

"Come on Remy, let's go home." He says.

"Could you hold me for a moment, Logan? Just this once, I'll
never bother you again." Remy asks in a small voice, timid and
liquid with tears.

The older man bends to hug the huddled body and feels the
shivers rattling the young man's body like a cat's purr.

"You didn't have to hurt yourself like this," he asks bewildered
"why?"

"I had to try." says the sad voice buried on his chest "I couldn't let
this pass me by without trying as hard as I could."

"Go for the strongest and throw all you have on the table…?"

"Yes, sometimes you win, sometimes you lose. Thank you,
Logan, now we may go."

*******

On the plane Logan is trying to sleep without much success.

`I hate flying' he thinks `I hate being caged in a tin box in the air…'
But that thought releases the images he has locked away, only
this time it's not only him in the tank being burned alive with
molten metal, it's also Remy in a narrow dark coffin being killed
to death by desolation.

"I have nightmares." He announces gruffly.

Gambit tilts his head "Yes, so do I."

"You don't know what it's like to be filled with molten metal." This
comes out as a challenge.

"No" is the wry reply "Must be the only thing that was not done to
me."

Then his companion's voice melts in tenderness

"But I do know what it means to be powerless, how scary and
hurtful it is."

"You know shit. I was made into a killing machine, I couldn't care
less how many died, only about the mission."

Now Remy cannot quite dampen the spark of hope in his breast
"Is this a game?" he says, warily "Because I'm not playing."

"No, and shut up, I have to think."

********

The plane is landing, Logan is silently thinking, Remy is silently
hoping.

"Your seatbelt's unfastened." the Wolverine rasps.

"Thank you."

"I'm not saying anything definite, mind you, because I haven't
made up my mind yet." Logan stops abruptly.

"But…?"

"But maybe we should try that friend-more-than-friend thing you
were blathering on about."

"I don't know what to do…" Gambit sounds so unsure that Logan
grabs him to stop him falling off his seat.

"Neither do I, Gumbo, but if we give it a whirl, maybe we can get
the hang of it."

Silence.

"Well?"

Silence.

"WELL?!!"

Something like the old sneering tone is back, belying the words:
"I'm scared shitless, Logan."

And, flooded by relief the Wolverine snorts and says
"So am I, Gumbo, so am I."

"Well," he adds after a while "don't tell anybody I can be scared,
understood?"

"Understood"

Question: how much love can saturate a word?

Answer: all the love in the world.

"Are you afraid you'll lose your growling rep?"

All the love in the world.

THE END