We Can Explain...

We Can Explain...Chapter Thirteen (NC-17)
Disclaimers Apply

A/N Goddess Foxfeather, Queen of Mad Plotbunnies, BUSIEST WOMAN ALIVE (tm), Prophetic Muse, Hamster Witch and Uberbeta...It's the return of the weird middle of the night Loganish yowl! InterNutter, TC, Maxwell Pink and Dracena get naked muses of their choice for archiving/hosting. ProPhile is alive, I hear... Morgan, whither art thou? Readers/Reviewers: The ducks go marching one by one, hurrah! Hurrah! ;)

"Whoa..."
Todd nearly jumped clear through the ceiling at the sound of Scott's voice. "Damn it! Can't you wear a bell or something?" He glared balefully at the small crowd assembled at the garage door, leading to the mudroom. "Or at least cough?"
Scott pushed past the newly arrived Lance and Amara to peer down at Todd in disbelief. His lips set in a line of stern inquest, he demanded, "How did you end up in the trunk of a car? I thought you told us you hitched..."
Rogue shook her head impatiently, not moving from her spot on the bumper. She was trying to affect a nonchalant cool, a devil may care attitude, trying to look as if being overheard and horned in on was something she did not give a damn about, but in reality, her legs were shaking, her stomach roiling in memory of what Todd's words had painted. In the relative chaos of the week between the car trunk and that moment, she had used every trimagimaginable to distance herself from the terror, crammed her mind full of incidentals, focused on the problems they faced but now, sitting there, she felt it all over again. _Damn Empath for his fucking mutation! _ She spared a flash of guilt for her thoughts and finally rose to her feet, the few seconds between Scott's words and her movement feeling like an eternity. "No, you wanted to hear that so you did. He just told you we got there by car."
Jean narrowed her eyes behind Scott, her lips pursed. "She's right." The tinge of smugness that had adorned her features a moment before vanished. "Sorry," she added, Rogues' intense glare driving the apology. "We're ready to start again but the Professor is still upstairs with Kurt and Kitty..."
Todd frowned mutinously. "I ain't got nothin' else to say. Seems like you just heard it all." He was embarrassed, though he could not discern quite why, but most of all he was scared anew. He hated feeling like he had no control in his life and that one event had triggered every fear response he had possessed, eating up his adrenaline and leaving him on the verge of tears more than once before he and Rogue were freed. Just thinking about it was enough to make him want to vomit.
Rogue tried a different tack. "Why're they still up there?" She hoped to divert Scott and Jean from their line of interest and maybe onto one of the others but it was to no avail.
Jean shook her head mutely as Scott answered, "No idea. Jean won't scan and Emma's not talking. So how'd you get in the trunk?"
Rogue sighed and laid a staying hand on Todd's arm as he started forward, apparently trying to leave. "I'll tell it, okay sweetie?"
Amara made a faintly derisive noise at the endearment. "Please. Get it over with. I smell like the turnpike and would like a shower."
"No one told you to bitch about the lack of oranges instead of showering, Princess Smelly," Jubilee sighed, hopping up to sit on a workbench. "But make it trot, Rogue. I want to nap..."


Rogue choked on a cry as Todd's knees buckled. She bounded the short distance in three steps, skinning her knees as she dove to catch his head before it struck concrete. "Todd? Todd? Don't do this to me, damn it!" She lowered his head gently, turning it to the side in some remembered piece of first aide.1 "Todd? Say something...anything?" Her stomach churned in rising panic as she strove to remember Logan's lectures on what to do in emergencies. Her gloved fingers were useless for checking his pulse so she did the next best thing: she lowered her head to press her ear against his shirt-covered chest and nearly cried out again when she could not find his heartbeat. Before she could swing fully into panic mode, the faint thudding of his pumping heart muscle moved against her ear made her sigh in a whoosh of relief. The irregular sound of his defected heart made her feel insanely happy as it coupled with the slow rise and fall of his lungs, his breath slightly raspy but otherwise seemingly normal as she pressed her hear even harder against him, her mind spinning as she tried to figure out what to do next. _He sounds like he's asleep, _ she thought absurdly. _I didn't think fainters breathed so deep... _ She sat up, dashing away a tear of uselessness with her knuckles. "Okay, now what?" she muttered. The sound of car tires crunching to a halt made her heart lift and she stood, turning to face the occupants of the vehicle.
"Problem?" a cool female voice called. Spanish guitar filtered from the janky speakers to make her words sound like singing as they drifted on a warm breeze.
Rogue nodded. "My boyfriend's...not well. You got a phone?" She did not know quite why, but she hoped the woman and her male companion would say no and leave them there. She did not want them to come near her nor did she want to approach them, her knees locking in protest of even the slightest thought of movement. "Or maybe you can tell me where a payphone is?"
The woman shut off the engine and murmured something to her companion, a bland looking man with hair the color people called brown for lack of a better description. He looked, Rogue thought as the woman eased out of the driver's side door with far more elegance than the old junker of a car bespoke, like someone trying to look average. Someone who was purposefully trying not to be remembered. "No phone, sorry. You two are kind of far out here, aren't y Thi This part of town's too rough even for the thugs." Her smile was odd, a stretched expression in a face that looked more used to languid pursuits, none so frivolous as smiling. "Let me give you two a ride. The hospital's more than half an hour drive from here...you'd never make it walking."
Todd groaned softly and Rogue felt hope and relief war in her breast. He was waking up, she thought, and she could honestly say she did needneed their help now, that she could get him going herself. "You know, I think...OW!"
"You think ow?" the woman drawled in an indefinable accent. "How odd."
Rogue's eyes narrowed and she took a fighting stance almost unconsciously, making sure she was between Todd and the woman. "I think we'll be fine, thanks." Her hand was throbbing, the reason for her exclamation of pain of a moment before. It felt like a thousand fire2 ants plying their trade along her nerves, radiating a blistering heat up her wrist to her elbow and on to her shoulder. A bitter taste flooded her mouth and she began to see double, then triple. "We'll be fine," she repeated. The world careened around her, blue sky replacing blue car in her vision. Rogue's tongue felt thick in her mouth, cutting off her oxygen. She tried to cry out but could only groan as the woman's face filled her sight, blue eyes flashing yellow as Rogue lost consciousness.


1 IIRC, turn the head of an unconscious person to one side so if they vomit, they won't choke on it.
2 The bane of Texas summers. (Watch your ankles, Foxy, lol). If you've never experienced fire ants, thank the god of your choice. Profusely.