There'll be trouble when the kidz come out

[lucetimods]

Who: All remaining draftees
What: Zombies! Zombies! Zombies!
When: The 29th to 31st
Where: Vaskoth
Summary: Please read here for event information
Rating: B for BRRAAAIIIINSSSS

On the 29th, the Malnosso announce over the radios that the power cap will be lifted to a full 100%. Carol broadcasts a message.

On the 30th, the Malnosso declare Vaskoth completely lost. Those with radio access will discover that the enclosure is to be bombed.

On the 31st, survivors will have one last chance to evacuate or try to find the cure. 3PM is do or die.

Comments

[touchofrogue]

Rogue bit her lip for a moment and then decided just to ask, "Are you mad at me?"

[alloys]

His expression tweaked with confusion. "Why would I be mad at you?"

There were plenty of people to be mad at. Steve. Bucky. Obi-Wan. Luke. Himself. But Rogue was not on that list of people he couldn't irrationally allocate blame to.

[touchofrogue]

"Because... because you were out with me."

Instead of here.

[alloys]

Ah. A similar conversation rose to memory, her asking him if he was mad she'd shot Pepper in that dream. He hadn't been then, and he wasn't now. Somehow, it was easier not to assign the unjustified blame to her. Maybe because she so willingly took on the burden.

"That was my choice. You didn't make me go." He swallowed. "To be perfectly honest, I...probably wouldn't be here if you weren't out with me."

He could have been killed, turned, out there with the rest of them with none of his own mind remaining. He wouldn't be here to support Pepper. To be with her in her pain.

[touchofrogue]

Her shoulders slumped. She couldn't quite believe him, but... well, Tony had no problem ripping into her if he was upset and if he... didn't blame her, then...

Well, that meant he was probably just blaming himself. Especially if the way he couldn't quite look at her meant anything.

"No way of knowin' that." She ran a hand through her hair, a frustrated gesture, a dramatic statement of 'I don't know what to do.' She'd been doing that more and more on this draft. "You need ta talk about this?"

[alloys]

She wasn't wrong. Of anyone responsible, Tony held himself to the greatest blame. How couldn't he? The facts were simple. If he had been there, he could have saved her. But he wasn't.

"...I don't know." It was as honest of an answer as he could give. Part of him ached for yes, because he was nearly suffocating in his thoughts. But he didn't want to burden her, too. He'd already put so much on Pepper, the way she looked at him through watery eyes that were filled with worry for what her state was doing to him.

Just one more thing he hadn't been able to spare her.

[touchofrogue]

Rogue glanced to Pepper's door and then back to Tony. "Can ya walk with me? We'll talk an' pace."

She could take it. She doesn't know how much more or for how long, but Rogue was determined. She'd make it to the end of the draft. She'd do what had to be done. She could take it.

[alloys]

He breathed in, and the nodded minutely. Walking did help, even if only in small measures.

"Yeah." He pushed himself off the wall to walk with her.

[touchofrogue]

She understood. She'd noticed he never did well when he was still. So she got them moving, towards the end of the hall. And after a few steps, she looked at him and said, "I'm listening."

[alloys]

She was listening. She wasn't telling him what to think, wasn't apologizing for his loss like Pepper was already gone. She wasn't reminding him of the hope for a cure, or the other side of that devastating coin - the shift bomb. She wasn't telling him this wasn't his fault. She wasn't railing on him for not taking care of himself. She wasn't doing what so many others had. She was listening.

And that was why he talked.

"She's dying. She's dying and I can't do a goddamn thing to stop it."

[touchofrogue]

Again, Rogue thought of Logan. She bit the inside of her cheek briefly and took a steadying breath. "Yeah."

She's dying. And you can't stop it.

[alloys]

"I keep thinking - what am I doing here? I should be out there - doing, god, I don't know, something, anything to make this cure happen. And then I think of leaving her alone like this, and -"

He sucked in breath, quieting his voice.

"I don't know what to do."

[touchofrogue]

Rogue looked down. That was the question, wasn't it. "It's not good enough, is it," she said quietly. "Either way, it won't be enough. It won't feel right."

[alloys]

He nodded silently, eyes locked on an undetermined point in the hallway in front of them.

"Either way, I could lose."

[touchofrogue]

"I'm bad at this stuff, Tony," she whispered. "I don't know what ta tell you."

[alloys]

A small shrug. "I don't need you to tell me anything. I've had enough people try to tell me what I should think, how I should feel - what I should be doing."

Like they understood. Like they knew what he was going through.

[touchofrogue]

She glanced up at him then, recognizing another area where he may need to vent, "Yeah?"

[alloys]

"Everyone thinks they know what's best. That they just happen to have a solution I haven't thought of. Like I haven't done anything but think of what I'm doing." And they had no right, no right. His hands started to tense at his sides. "They don't get it."

[touchofrogue]

She spoke quietly, watching him carefully, "What don't they get, Tony?"

[alloys]

Despite his best efforts, his voice hitched when he spoke his answer.

"What it's like to watch the person you love - the person you swore you'd protect, at any cost - die a slow, agonizing death that you could have prevented."

How else could it end? It seemed so hopeless. So hopeless. His knuckles were tightly white then, as he desperately clambered for his last threads of composure.

[touchofrogue]

Rogue stopped walking. She put a hand on Tony's arm.

...and then she realized that with the power cap, she didn't have to be afraid of him touching her.

So she tentatively tugged him back around and did what she always wanted to do when someone was hurting, but never could. She slipped her arms around his waist and gave him a hug.

[alloys]

She put her hand on his arm. And in that instant, he knew what the power cap meant for her. And when she wound her arms around him, he knew she knew it, too.

A sob in the back of his throat nearly choked him as he pulls his arms tightly closed around her, desperately holding onto her like she was the only thing left grounding him in the world. And in many respects, that was true. Part of him - and he wasn't sure how large a part - had been resigned to defeat, to this terrible fate that had been forced upon them. In the face of so much bleak devastation, how could he even begin to hope in earnest? Every time he came close to do so, things only got worse. Pepper only suffered more.

But.

But there was this beacon in his arms. A beacon of encouragement, a beacon of comfort that he knew, he knew just how remarkable, how extraordinary it was that she was even able to do this for him. So he held onto her, trembling and fragile and yet unhesitating, trying to keep his tears at bay, but he wasn't entirely successful in that regard. She could hug him without fear, and he would never, ever belittle just how much that meant.

"I'm so afraid," he barely whispered in a voice tightly knotted all the way down to the center of his heart. "What if I lose her?"

[touchofrogue]

Just because she knew she didn't have to be afraid of touching him didn't mean that it was easy for Rogue to relax. There was still that instinctual fear that she'd move the wrong way and hurt him. But heartbeat by heartbeat, she was able to let go of her fear and concentrate on just holding him.

When he whispered his fear, Rogue felt something in her heart break, some instinctive hold on the dam that kept her words so close and her feelings from freely expressing themselves cracked and fell, and she hurt with him.

"It ain't over yet," Rogue whispered. "You be with her now. You stay with her all ya can. She needs you right now."

I'll take care of this.

[alloys]

It ain't over yet.

No, it wasn't.

And Rogue was right. Pepper needed him there. With her was where he was supposed to be. And once, just this once, he could let someone else be the hero.

He'd have to hope, and trust that someone else could do what he couldn't. He'd never been one for leaps of faith, never been comfortable with trusting like that - but this wasn't for him. It was for her, and that's what made the difference. That was the push.

So he nodded, squeezing her tightly for good measure, before he started to pull back.

"I will."

[touchofrogue]

It was very, very strange to be able to hug without fear, but Rogue let Tony go easily enough. It was hard to experience this and know that she'd lose it within the next day or so, but that was the last of her concerns.

She searched his eyes, "You're steady?"

Not all right or okay - on course. Solid. Back.