Deja Vu Sucks., Warren - Wed. 9/7, morning

[Rogue]

It could have been worse. She could have been killed as soon as she'd arrived or something. That would have been worse. Right? Her eyes were closed and she was slowly banging the back of her head against the wall of the cell. It could have been worse. That was what she just needed to keep on reminding herself, even though she was locked up in a cell again, cold and by herself and maybe they were going to shoot her anyway. Fuck. The bed in that cell was much more padded than the one in the last cell she'd been in, and even though that made it a little bit easier to distance it from Weapon X... it really didn't.

She swallowed, trying to at least remind her stomach that there was nothing left to puke up. That hadn't stopped her from gagging for a good five minutes anyway after they'd first left her in there. Rogue shuddered as she stopped slamming her head back. It was cold. Cold like it had been at Weapon X, but even worse because she could feel how clean the place was. So much more sterile than even the medical facilities there had been, and it almost felt more ominous.

Rogue shifted, turning to lean back against the other wall so she didn't have to look at the door to the cell. There was a dent in the wall from where she'd been hitting it with her head, and she let her eyes linger on it for a moment before clenching them shut again and taking a deep breath. She wasn't going to cry. As much as she wanted to, she couldn't. Not there because they would surely see it as a sign of weakness. Hyperventilating, though, was completely kosher. By the time she was able to get her breathing somewhere near normal, she was dizzy.

They'd locked her up. Threw her in a cell, where she couldn't even hear what they were saying about her or if they were going to kill her. It wasn't for lack of trying, either. She was practically straining to hear even the slightest movements beyond the door to the cells, but the footsteps that she had been able to make out had long faded. She tried to keep optimistic, but every single train of thought led directly to the "you're screwed" station. They'd let her keep her own clothes, but so had Weapon X at first. Unlike Weapon X, they had reason to hate her and want her dead. The terror that was pounding in her head, seemingly keeping the warring psyches at bay, was growing by the minute. What if they just left her there? Kept her in the cell forever? That was worse than killing her. She drew her legs up, resting her chin on her knees and swallowing again. They couldn't do that. They knew what she'd been through, and they had to know what kind of effect the cell was having on her. She whimpered slightly, taking a few deeper breaths and squeezing her eyes shut harder, hoping to dam the tears as she all but sank into the corner of the cell. Any second, she expected Wraith to poke his ugly, shiny head through the doorway and sneer at her or shout about how she was worthless scum.

Maybe he was right.

[Angel]

Apparently, she'd asked that he go through her stuff to make sure there was nothing dangerous in it. He'd been supervised, of course, but Warren had agreed, and as soon as it was done (no suicide bombs, and probably the weirdest thing was a couple of copies of a missing poster, which he figured was about her) he wandered down to visit her in the cells.

Because fuck, they'd put her in a cell. Most of him, his rational brain, understood why and sided with Scott. But a pretty loud part of him was protesting, reminding him how long she'd been in cells before, reminding him how bad six weeks had been let alone the months and months she'd spent in there and how the fuck could they justify locking her up again? Because yeah, it had been years ago? But not one of them would be rational about it if they were the ones being locked up. Hell, he didn't even like locking his bedroom door that much.

She wasn't looking at the door when he walked in, and he hoped she wasn't looking when he closed his eyes and bit his lip at the sound of the lock clicking behind him. He knew it was only temporary, knew that he'd walked in there of his own accord and that someone was outside to let him out whenever he wanted out, but shit. It still felt like a physical blow.

Forcing his eyes open, he crossed to the bed and sat down next to her. It was much nicer than the last one they'd sat on together, true. But it was still a bed in a cell and...

"Hi, Rogue." His voice sounded a little bit gravelly, and he cleared his throat. "Didn't expect to see you here." Didn't expect to be sitting here again.

It didn't occur to him that she could be dangerous. Yeah, they'd had their encounters in the years between Weapon X and now, and yeah, they hadn't exactly shown her to be fluffy and loving and giving orphans ice creams or whatever. But he couldn't think of her as a member of the Brotherhood in here. Couldn't think of her as anything but Rogue, the girl he'd spent the better part of six weeks sharing just a few feet of space with.

[Rogue]

Rogue had heard the footsteps before the door opened. It was too silent in the cell to not hear everything happening outside, even if she wasn’t straining to do so. As they got closer, she swallowed again and pulled her knees in tighter, resting her head on them with eyes closed. If it was someone coming to kick her out or do something worse, she wanted to be ready. She shuddered at the sound of the lock clicking into place, and her breathing started to get a little bit more erratic again. It was a room. It was just a room and she hated that she couldn’t stop reacting to it that way. It wasn’t a cell like Weapon X’s cells, and they were going to help her. Unless they decided to leave her there. Oh, God. What if they left her there?

"Hi, Rogue." Her eyes snapped open and she raised her head up to look at him. Warren. She fought back the initial “oh Jesus, they locked him up in here, too” reaction and reminded herself that this was his team. He wasn’t a prisoner, and they weren’t about to be re-conditioned and turned into weapons and it was going to be okay, but she still had what felt like a giant, heavy ice cube sitting at an odd angle in her stomach. "Didn't expect to see you here."

She laughed, as much from nerves as from the statement itself. It came out as little more than a breath, and she looked at the wall across from her.

“You’re not the only one,” she replied, not sure whether or not he meant that he didn’t expect to see her in the X-Men’s place at all or in a cell in the basement of their big fancy hideout. It didn’t matter, though, because both were true. Taking a deep breath, she used her thumb to wipe away the tears that had managed to make it out and forced herself to look at him again. He looked different. Not too different, but there was something about him that had changed. Not surprising, considering the fact that it had been six years since she’d really seen him up close.

“D’you know how long I’m… I’m gonna be in here?” The words were slow and wavering slightly as she realized that they would probably be justified if they decided to leave her in there for weeks and weeks. She couldn’t do it. If it was that long, she couldn’t do it. As she suddenly remembered that they’d said she could tell them who she wanted to go through her shit, she looked up at him again. “Did they let you do it? Um, my stuff?”