And I will be the one to hold you down,
kiss you so hard.
I'll take your breath away.
And after I wipe away the tears
just close your eyes dear...

Sarah McLauchlin - Possession

Ororo Munroe, the Mutant X-Man named Storm, sat in her seat in the Blackbird, watching the ocean pass by below. The other members of the X-Men team were quiet as well, all wondering how everything could have fallen apart so fast.

They'd gone to Israel, to stop an insane mutant from going back in time and changing the past. Storm and three other X-Men followed him, leaving the rest of the team in the present; to worry and wait for the world to fall apart around them.

The mutant was stopped, however, and the four returned triumphantly to the present. But while they'd been gone, the others had thought they'd been in the last moments of their lives, and one of them...

Storm closed her eyes. It didn't feel so much that they'd saved the world, when part of it was gone.

Quietly, she stood and moved towards the back of the jet. Only one of her teammates looked up as she passed to smile reassuringly. Bishop may not have shared her pain, but he understood it. She nodded in response and continued on.

Most of the X-Men were seated near the front of the plane, but Storm could see one young woman who wasn't.

Rogue sat curled up in her seat, her arms around her knees and her face hidden under her long hair, so distinctive with its long white stripe. Ororo could hear a low sobbing, but she didn't try to comfort her. Part of her wanted to hold the younger woman and tell her everything would be all right, but a larger part kept saying that this was all Rogue's fault, no matter how unfair that might be. Besides, she didn't have the strength to look her in the eye just yet.

Not when those eyes were red on black instead of green.

Storm stepped through to the back of the jet, where an alien medical life support bed was bolted to the floor, surrounded by Hank McCoy, Professor Charles Xavier and Jean Summers. They all looked up as she approached.

"How is he?" she whispered.

Hank sighed, rubbing his blue-furred arm. "Not well, Ororo. He's shown no signs of regaining consciousness and his vital signs are disturbingly irregular." The normally cheerful doctor was uncharacteristically somber.

"I have scanned his mind thoroughly," the man in the wheelchair said. "But even with Jean's help, I couldn't find anything. It's worse than how Carol Danvers was after she was drained. With her, there were traces of her memory and personality left, things I could work with to restore her. Here, there's nothing."

Storm closed her eyes in a moment of pain, then forced herself to look down at the bed.

Remy LeBeau was deathly pale, his face almost unrecognizable under the tubes in his nose, the wires crowning his head and the oxygen mask over his mouth. She could hear him breathing, watch his chest rise and fall, but the monitors beside him showed no upper brain functions and his hand didn't close around hers when she reached down to hold it. It wasn't her friend lying in front of her. It was just something that looked like him.

"Will he recover?" she asked. No one answered her. "Henry?" The doctor turned away. "Charles?' Xavier bowed his head.

Jean touched her arm. "I'm sorry, Ororo, but we just don't know. Things could change, but Rogue held him so long, she took so much out of him..." Her voice trailed off.

Ororo remembered. They'd just flashed back to the present, glad to be safe, to be alive, when someone started screaming for help. She couldn't even remember who anymore, not after the horror she'd seen.

In the moment she'd been convinced she was going to die, Rogue kissed Gambit and her mutant abilities absorbed his powers, psyche and memories, knocking him instantly unconscious. But then the moment of danger passed and she continued to kiss him, even though he was just a dead weight in her arms, because with his psyche came his love and desire for her. She'd lost control and with her phenomenal strength holding onto him, it'd taken such a very long time to get them apart.

"Is there anything I can do for him?" she asked.

"No. All we can do now is hope the effects aren't permanent."

"I would like to sit with him, if I may."

The three looked at each other for a moment, then nodded and made room for her in a corner where she could see her friend's face. And wish he could see her.

She'd fallen two stories, she remembered, and ended up landing in an extremely cold swimming pool. Regressed to childhood by an enemy, with much of her memory gone, Storm'd barely been able to swim to the ladder. Then, too tired to climb out, she'd floated there as footsteps approached out of the darkness and a young man knelt before her. He was dressed in black with a brown trenchcoat and a friendly grin that reached straight to his red eyes.

"Little late for a swim, eh, chere?" he asked with a laugh.

Storm shook herself out of her reverie at the sound of shouting outside.

"Ah- ah just can't take it anymore!" She heard Rogue yell. "Ah gotta get out!"

Storm patted Remy's arm gently and walked into the hall outside his sickroom. She'd been sitting with him for so long that her legs felt stiff as she moved.

Henry and Charles were in the hallway, along with Bobby Drake, trying to comfort the distraught Rogue. She looked so strange, with her tear-streaked, blotchy face and her unnatural eyes.

"Child," Storm called. "You cannot leave now. Remy needs you."

Rogue looked at her for a moment, then her face twisted. "Need me? Ah'm de last t'ing he needs!" She pulled at her hair, her voice a mixture of her own southern drawl and Remy's Cajun french. "All de time, ah'm bein' smothered by his mem'ries. Ah see de t'ings he's been through, de t'ings he's done... Ah can't get it out o' mah head! Someone, get it out!"

Crying, she flew away down the hall, and Storm felt curiously hesitant to follow, unwilling to forgive, however much she loved her. "Wait," she called, but the word wasn't very loud and she hated herself for it.

Bobby Drake pushed past her. "I'll stay with her," he promised. "We'll go on a road trip or something, then we'll come back." His form shimmered into the ice that was his mutant power and he ran after her.

"Oh, dear," Hank murmured. "I feel that our ranks have become quite depleted due to these events. I believe I would like to be alone for awhile." He walked away.

Charles Xavier looked up at Storm. With his telepathic powers, he probably already knew what she was thinking, but he asked the question anyway.

"Ororo? Are you all right?"

She stood still, strong and emotionless, for the weather she commanded would always mimic her emotions. So there was not even a quiver in her voice when she spoke.

"I do not know," she admitted. "I find that I want to punish someone for Gambit's condition, though of course that would be foolish. As foolish as it is to hold Rogue responsible. She is no more to be blamed than Remy is. Yet I want to, and I resent myself for it."

Xavier nodded. "I understand your feelings. You've lost a very close friend."

She looked at him calmly. "Remy is not dead, Professor. I refuse to accept that possibility."

He opened his mouth to protest, then closed it and said nothing as she went back into the darkened room to sit with her silent friend.

With a rush, the ball flew towards the plate. The bat moved to connect with it and Hank whooped as he ran, on his hands, towards first base. Bishop chased after the ball and threw it back with enough force to almost knock Psylocke off her feet when she caught it, but Beast was declared safe. Before he could open his mouth with flowery soliloquies, Cannonball stepped up to bat.

Ororo stood at the window and watched them play. The game looked like fun, but she couldn't feel any real urge to join and in fact resented somewhat the enjoyment they were having. Stormclouds began to form outside and she consciously forced them down. Her friends had done nothing to deserve her anger.

"No, Storm, they haven't." She turned to see Xavier enter the room in his hoverchair, his eyes sad. "Forgive me for eavesdropping, but your thoughts were so plain." He reached out to hold her hand. "I want to help you, Storm. All of the X-Men do."

She reached for the bowl of salad she'd made for herself. "Help me what? Get on with my life?"

"Yes. Cliched as it sounds, life does go on."

A slight smile touched her lips, though it came nowhere near her eyes. "That does sound cliched."

He moved the hoverchair over to the open door so he could see the game. "I understand how difficult the last three months have been for you. X-Men have died before, but they've always been quick deaths. This is the first time any of us have... lingered. Remy's coma is irreversible, Ororo. We all know that. You need to accept it and get on with your life."

She shook her head, tears in her eyes, and rain began to fall outside. The players ran cursing for the porch.

"I cannot just 'get on with my life,' Professor." She hugged herself and stared at the rain. "Perhaps it is because I have lost so many friends abruptly, but I cannot leave him. So long as Remy... lives, I will not leave him."

She heard him sigh, the sad sigh of a man who'd seen too much loss himself. "Ororo," he told her softly. "Remy is dead." Her throat tightened. Lightning flickered in the sky. "His body may be alive, but whatever it was in him that made him special is gone. I've already said my good-byes to him. So has everyone else here."

His chair hummed as he moved back up beside her. "Now I'm afraid I'm going to lose you too, because you can't let go."

Storm picked listlessly at her salad, then dropped the bowl back onto the counter.

"I cannot hear the Goddess anymore," she admitted. He looked puzzled. "The life in all things, that I have followed ever since I discovered my powers." She turned to face him. "Now I cannot hear her. I have not since Israel, since Remy..." The deep breath of air she took tasted stale. "I feel empty inside."

She chewed her lip quietly. "It just does not make sense. Remy and Rogue were filled with such love for one another. Her kissing him was an expression of that love. How could it all go wrong so quickly?"

"I do not know. I wish I did. All I can say, Storm, is that's life."

She smiled. "I am afraid, Professor, that I do not find that to be very comforting." She picked up her salad and stepped past him to return to the infirmary.

"Come out, Storm," Jean leaned against the doorway and looked at her friend. "It'll be good for you. It's been a long time since we've all been to Harry's for dinner together."

Ororo hesitated, glancing down at Remy. In six months, there'd been no change, other than in him growing thinner and weaker, his skin paler. His heartbeat was becoming more and more irregular each day and Hank had finally conceded the fact that he wouldn't live much longer.

Storm stroked the bit of his cheek she could reach under the tubes. It felt clammy.

"Ororo?" Jean put a hand on her shoulder. "Please come. Remy would be the first one to tell you to have some fun."

She nodded slowly in agreement. Before Israel, nothing could stop Gambit. He'd been the most energetic and irrepressible of all the X-Men. He'd been so much Ororo's opposite, yet he understood her in a way many of the other X-Men didn't.

"Very well. I will come for one evening. I have been neglecting many of my friends lately."

Jean smiled and hugged her when she stood. "It's good to have you come out again. We've all missed you so much."

Storm held her just as warmly, but she couldn't shake the feeling that her leaving now was a mistake.

There were nine of them at Harry's, all squeezed into a corner booth next to the window. There were a lot of other people there as well, but they kept mainly to the other end of the restaurant, leaving a wide open area around the mutants.

Ororo drank her wine and looked around at her companions. Cyclops, Phoenix, Bishop, Archangel, Psylocke, Cannonball, Beast and Wolverine. They all say together, laughing over their meals as they recounted old stories and enjoyed one another's company. It felt good to get out, her grief put behind her for the moment.

"Do you remember the time," Psylocke said to Storm with a twinkle in her eye. "When we went with Dazzler and Rogue to that mall in California?" Storm blushed and Psylocke smiled at her audience. "We went into this club that was featuring male dancers and Dazzler paid one of them to take Ororo up on stage with him. You should have seen her dance."

The listeners laughed uproariously while Storm blushed even redder and sipped her drink to cover her smile.

"It would have been far more embarrassing to just stand there," she admitted to even more laughter.

"That must have been quite the sight, darlin'," Wolverine chuckled over his beer.

Psylocke laughed. "We didn't get to see much, of course. We ended up having to fight a mutant-gobbling machine."

Though it hadn't been funny at the time, they all enjoyed the humour in it now. Even Storm. The darkness which had clouded her heart was lifting in the good company she kept, though it refused to depart completely. The feeling left her faintly guilty, so she said little as the other X-Men retold story after story throughout the dinner.

After one particularly embarrassing account of the time the X-Men were all regressed to babies, Beast wiped his laughter-induced tears away and spoke up.

"And who do we believe will be our adversary for this evening?" he asked. "The deadly Mister Sinister? Perhaps Apocalypse." He watched the waiter lay down a white piece of paper. "It appears it will be the bill." The X-Men roared again and only settled down when Cyclops stood and raised his glass.

"I want to make a toast," he said, his voice not going any farther than their table. "I want to toast the X-Men. For our ability to never go more than a week without a major disaster happening." Sniggers sounded. "For attracting trouble like a magnet," He lifted his glass higher. "And for always triumphing against them. For when miracles don't happen to the X-Men, we make our own instead."

"Hear, hear." They all drank deep.

Storm stayed where she was, thinking, as the others dressed to head for home. Jean knelt beside her.

"What's wrong, Ororo? Didn't you have fun?"

Ororo blinked at her. "What? Oh, yes, I did. I was just thinking about something Cyclops said." She stood. "We had better hurry or we will be left behind."

Jean linked arms with her as they went to join the others.

Storm stood at the foot of Gambit's bed, staring down at him. He'd grown visibly worse since she last saw him and Hank had told her he was slipping fast. Her guilt at leaving him for the dinner was a weight in her heart, but she forced it down.

"X-Men make their own miracles," she whispered to him.

Quietly, before she could change her mind, she went to his side and began to remove the tubes and wires that covered his body.

"I am sorry for this," she apologized as the removal of a needle from his arm drew blood. "But Henry says you are going to die by tomorrow night. I cannot allow that."

Remy had been forced to have so many tubes put into his body that he had no room for clothing, so Storm wrapped him in a white sheet as she lifted him. He felt painfully light in her arms, his head resting against her shoulder as softly as a child's. Gently, Storm carried him through the house and outside.

It was a beautiful night, filled with stars. Ororo looked up at them for a moment, then summoned a wind to carry her and Remy aloft. Cool breezes blew by, but those which touched them were warm, to heat the Cajun's bare skin. He didn't respond and she began to talk to him.

"Wake up, Remy," she said. "I know that you are still in there. Your soul is still a part of you and it can still save your body." She shook him, but all that happened was that his head fell back limply. Tears filled her eyes and rain began to fall. "You must not give up on yourself. Fight your way back! Just listen and I will show you the way." Thunder crashed as her voice rose. "I will make you hear me!"

She dropped him. Gambit plummeted towards the ground, then his descent stopped as he was pillowed on the same winds she was, the sheet still loosely wrapped around him.

Ororo summoned the lightning and the rain, sent them crashing down around the comatose man, so loud even her ears hurt from the sound of them. Wind raced around her while snow and hail danced in the sky.

Storm could feel the power at her command, see the patterns of energy she manipulated, but she couldn't touch the life in them. Once, she'd been able to sense that life, the Goddess, as far as her powers would reach, and draw it all into her. Now everything was empty to her, as empty as the man who floated in the eye of her storm, untouched and unaware.

Quietly, Ororo let the weather return to normal as she lowered Remy onto a patch of damp grass and knelt beside him. His breathing was shallow and uneven, his skin grey and cold in spite of the warm air she surrounded him with. She reached out a hand and smoothed his hair back from his face.

"I am going to lose you after all, it seems." She sighed regretfully. "Had you died in battle or been hit by a car or even slipped in the shower, I would be able to grieve for you and go on with my life, but this..." Her eyes narrowed as she tried to express to him, and to herself, the depths of the reason for her pain.

"I have seen so much death, all of it such a waste. Disease, neglect, anger, fear - I have seen people die for the most senseless reasons. Pointless deaths, horrible deaths. But to die because you loved a woman with all your soul and were loved in return...

"I have grown hard enough that I can learn to accept a death without meaning, but what has happened to you is so beyond pointless..." The core of her pain came out in a rush.

"How can I believe in a Goddess of life, in myself, when the most selfless of acts leads to such destruction?!"

She bowed her head. "Goddess," she whispered. "Where are you? Why can I not feel you when I need you the most? What is the point of believing?"

A misty rain had sprung up to mirror her mood. Storm looked down at Remy's face and saw a raindrop, missed by her diverting winds, land on his closed eye and roll down his cheek like a tear.

Numbly, Ororo watched the raindrop work its way down his skin. It glowed almost incandescent against his pallor and she caught her breath as it dropped to the ground, striking a blade of grass as it fell.

At its touch, the blade seemed somehow greener than its neighbours. Then she blinked and the rest of them glowed, along with the trees beyond them. Her winds died and she watched as the entire lawn behind the mansion turned a brilliant emerald colour.

Ever since she'd first awoken to her powers, Ororo had been able to see the lifeforce connecting all things. After Remy's accident, she'd forgotten how beautiful it truly was and she reached down to hold his hand, drawing him into its effect as she watched.

The world came back to life as what Ororo called her Goddess spoke to her. Not in words, but in the croak of frogs, the rustle of tree branches and the rush of water. Tears of joy filled her as she saw all that she had pushed away in rage and grief return.

"I had forgotten," she murmured. "Oh, Goddess, thank you for reminding me."

It was all connected, irreversibly one, like an ocean of water contained in separate bottles. Change the bottle and it was still the same water, endless.

Storm closed her eyes as she let go of her resentment, exulting in the purity of that which encompassed all things and gave them meaning, whether good or evil, organic or inorganic, living...

...Or dead.

Wolverine came out of the woods shortly after dawn, smoking a cigar. He walked over to where she knelt beside Gambit, gazing at his face that was turned so peacefully towards the sky.

Logan hunkered down and looked at her intently, then put a hand to Remy's throat. He waited a moment, then looked back at her.

"Cajun's gone, Darlin'," he said simply.

She nodded. "I know. I felt him die."

He tugged the edge of the sheet loose and pulled it over Remy's face. "You wanna talk about it?"

She looked at him without expression. "Charles said his mind was gone. I cannot believe that. Remy waited until I was ready to accept his death, until I could forgive it. Somehow, he had to know I still needed him."

He chewed on his cigar a moment, then ground it out. "I believe you. Seen too many strange things not to. Guess this means you're done grievin'?"

Storm's demeanor cracked. Her lip quivered and it started raining again as she threw herself sobbing into his arms.

"Oh, Logan," she cried. "My friend is gone!"

Wolverine held her tightly. "I know. Just let it out, darlin'."

Storm cried freely, the tears loosening the last of the pain that had festered within her and, in time, washing it away from the memories that were left behind.

"Hey, Stormy!"

Ororo's head jerked around at the sound of Remy's nickname for her, even though she knew he'd been dead for over a month and his ashes were spread across the estate.

It'd only just registered on her that she'd heard a woman's voice when she recognized Rogue standing in the doorway. She was wearing jeans and a sweater and her eyes were still red on black.

"Hi, Ororo," she said shyly, wringing her gloved hands nervously. "How ya'll doin'?" Her eyes begged for her to say something.

In response, Ororo stood and put her arms around the younger woman. "Welcome home, child. I have missed you."

Rogue relaxed. "Ah'm sorry ah stayed away so long." Her voice softened. "Ah heard that Remy's body passed away."

Ororo stepped back to look at her. "It was very peaceful. He did not suffer."

"Mon dieu, chere! I wanted t' get back in dat t'ing, though I guess dere weren't no way. Merde!"

Ororo blinked in surprise at the unexpected change in personality and accent. Rogue shivered and was herself again.

"Ah'm sorry, 'Roro. Ah wanted ta warn everyone first, an' he promised ta behave himself until ah did." The last half of the sentence was fired out as though she was scolding someone else and the corner of her mouth turned up in a grin that wasn't her own.

Storm sat down, shocked, her mouth hanging open.

"Storm?" Two minds looked at her worridly.

"Remy is... in you?"

Rogue shrugged sheepishly. "Ah-- yes. It's like when ah absorbed Carol Danvers way back when, 'cept we get along way better." She shrugged. "At least he hasn't tried to rearrange mah room."

"Hey, I like teddy bears, chere."

Storm shook her head in amazement. Though it should have been obvious, this result of the kiss had never occurred to her. "Has he been with you this entire time?"

"Actually, no." Rogue frowned. "He just... showed up one mornin' 'bout a month or so ago. Scared the heck outta Bobby when he came in ta bring me mah breakfast. Ah don't know where he was b'fore that, but now ah can't imagine him not bein' here. Ah know it sounds crazy, but he keeps me sane."

"Dat's easy for you t' say," Remy groused. "You ain't trapped in a woman's body." He hesitated. "Uh, you know what I mean."

Storm found she couldn't stop smiling. Clouds broke up outside and the sun shone down.

"You okay, Stormy?" Gambit asked.

"Do not call me that!" she ordered him and leaped up with a laugh to hug them to her.

Cyclops was right," she chuckled. "X-Men do make their own miracles."

Not surprisingly, they both agreed.
 
 

 

Well, I hope you enjoyed. Here's a bibliography of the issues I referred to in the order I mentioned them for those of you who haven't read all the billions of back issues there are.

Storm went back in time with three other X-Men during Uncanny X-men # 320-321 and X-Men # 40-41.

Rogue permanently absorbed Carol Danvers powers, psyche and memories in Avengers Annual # 10. (She eventually lost her psyche in Uncanny X-Men # 269.)

Rogue kissed Gambit in X-Men # 41. (This is where I diverged from 'reality'. In the books, he was in a coma for three weeks. In this story, it was obviously a little longer.)

Storm has a flashback at the start of Part Three about the first time she met Gambit. This happened in Uncanny X-Men # 266. Her regression was explained in Uncanny X-Men # 267.

The story about Storm dancing in a club happened in Uncanny X-Men # 244.

The X-Men were all regressed to being the X-Babies in Uncanny X-Men Annual # 10.