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"People love westerns worldwide. There's something fantasy like about an individual fighting the elements. Or even bad guys and the elements. It's a simpler time." ~Clint Eastwood.

This fic was born by reading an old Jim Lee interview that Gambit in degisn was inspired by Clint Eastwood's The Man With No Name of the Dollar Trilogy. Which you can really see in the cover art I chose for this Fic. If you haven't seen it, watch it. Plus, I think American Comics owe a lot to the Old West and the Western.

I

Southwest, 1968

A low noon had sheathed itself on the jagged hills surrounding the outskirts of the Southwest, drunk on it sacrament and sin; where farmer and bandit both hailed Madre Maria, and drought and heat killed as often as Thieves an' Assassins, and the sun offering the natural backdrop for the eternal dance of predator and prey. All around those dusty tombstone for hills, the deserts' finest instructors in the art of killing and hard livin' were coming out to roll in the dust, from the brown little owl scanning the ground from the firmament, to the coyotes who ran with yellow torches for eyes after their mark. Here was torment, wonder, freedom, madness. But the animals' snug little world of eat and eaten was undisturbed by the low clomp of hooves on a fine brown horse and inaudible crush of spurs, as a one such predator slides into town with bleeding dust turned red by the low noon.

A Thief.

Of hearts, money, life, yo' girl. Pick the poison.

He wears a long brown trench coat over nondescript clothing -the gray remains of days serving for a fou of a Lost Cause. A black Cordovan hat rims low over reined back auburn hair and red-gleaming eyes, leaving only an unshaven chin and grin visual to greet the citizenry of this Mexican town, along with a deck of ever shuffling cards.

Aces for victory. Hearts for a pretty lady. Spades for death.

He's a tall man, lean and fit, in the last stages of his twenties, a figure of shadows and ambivalence. His gun is for hire -but his loyalties never is. Though various other services maybe offer...if you ask him humble townsfolk look at him and cross themselves as they see his devil eyes stray freely as bullets as they look at the new surroundings. And they bemoan when they notice their young impressible cow-eyed daughters following him, as the man called Gambit goes to tie up his horse, eyes hungry for the strength and skill this stranger shows simply by not not broadcasting it.

Their elders simply shake their heads, and fathers finger their guns -though for the stranger for their daughters is undecided. The Gambit simply passes on with a smirk.

The towns one hotel is run a brown little dwarf named Silvanito, married to a buxamous gypsy who see's the gold on her finger as just another babble, and has no scruples about stripping the Gambit bare before her husband's eyes.

So it's no surprise when Silvanito declares there is not rooms available, and sent the drifter back out into the dust. He goes without complaint -unless it is for a job, he does not force himself where he is not invited. Sides the road is where he is most comfortable.

"Never seen a sight dat didn' look better lookin' back..." he murmurs up to a werewolf moon in his own patios as he lights a cigarillo on the heel of his boot.

II

He wanders the night, a trickster coyote like the Indians spun tales about: wild, scruffy, wholly incorrigible. Mais, the ladies like it that way, and he liked the ladies.

As the Gambit passes the Hellfire saloon, their is the roaring of broken glass and curse words. The music of the West, in other words. He's about to grin and enter when that's shot dead as the tiniest oriental fille he'd seen, dressed in yellow with forcibly short hair and a face too cake with mack-up for a young girl, comes barreling out the saloon doors like a sinner escaping hell.

If she hadn't been the size of a fruit fly, she might of run Gambit down like a hay stack. As it where...

"Jubilee!" bellows one nasty sounding devil from inside the hell. The girl trembles and dives behind the Gambit like that would make her invisible, before deciding her chances are better to run. While she does, a man comes out the doors, black haired and large spiting curses and eyes filled with murder.

"Second rate little whore!" he snarls, staring after her before Gambit calmly steps in his way, blocks him off.

"Is dere a problème 'ere mon ami?" he inquires, all thoughtfulness, hands spread offering peace. His voice is all hush and hint and whisper and rasp and authoritative without being rancorous. The cohorts of the night can hardly believe their eyes. Sabastion Shaw, Black King of the Hellfire saloon, is no man to take lightly. Neither is the main ice queen whore of his set, but that's another story.

Shaw's lip curls at the insult to his loud cries, showing wolfish fangs. "Yes, I tried to brake in the new girl I just hired and she got loose. No if you don't mine, I better catch her before she gets too far..."

He tries to side step the younger man, but Gambit merely moves as if he were liquor in an other life and blocks him again.

"Girl don' want t' be caug't, homme," he advised, the coyote to the wolf. "Let her go."

Gambit's careful to put a shooting distant between them, half gloved hands creeping swards his belt. "Hope y' got de brains t' make the right decision."

Well, Shaw's face got all interesting shades of red now, and his hand reached for his gun in a stupid man's grab, and Gambit put a hole in his chest before he could blink.

III

Business done, Gambit re-hostelers, and turns to go.

So he doesn't see the bullet that enters his lower back, bringing him to his knees. Blowing smock from her pistol in the window of her room, the White Queen sniff dismissive in her corset of diamonds. Really, the stranger might have done her a favor by getting rid of Shaw, but decorum had to be maintain -that oriental was going to bring in a lot of money with the blood of her innocence. That's the last thought she gives it before she returns to the world of her sins.

Gambit hisses, to stubborn to merely blackout and die, and forces himself to his feet simply because it's hard. He stumbles, blindy, and some unseen hands and voices of the towns people pushing along that one extra inch, offering advice -they may not of liked the stranger with his devil eyes and cocky manner, but they liked Shaw a lot less. And they respected courage, and the decency show to the girl.

"Go to Padre Wagner," they mutter pointing to the structure on the hill. "Go to the church, he was a doctor in the War, he can help you."

With no other choice Gambit does, even if churches and him don't get on too well.

The church was small but well crafted, made in the Spanish, southwest style with a bright roof, and image of suffering crucified to the front door he pounds.

"Faddah Wagner," he shouts, feeling his life bleeding. "Faddah Wagner!"

"Jésus et Marie..." he hisses as the world spins. But just as he topples, the doors open to the most belle green eyes in a white dress and green rebozo, who gaps as he took her down with him with an "Urupmh!" of a squeal as his mouth lands one right on her, before she wiggles him into her lap, stares at the blood, and starts calling for help.

IV

Gambit made it a habit not to dream -had to many nightmares for that. So he knows the snippets he hears are real and informative.

"I've gotten ze last bullet fragment out, praise Gott," a harmonious voice states.

"Course I did nothin' bub," someone snorts,and a woman gives a sigh.

"It is a combination Logan," she said wearily. "Now who will stay with him tonight?"

"Ah will." The last voice is the softest of all. M'sieu Bub starts -Gambit doesn't need his eyes open to know that.

"Marie -ya think that's a good idea darlin'-"

"Ah doubt he'll cause any trouble tonight," Soft Voice affirmed and there was the dragging of a chair before she set herself down. "Saids, from what Jubes tells us, he ain't a bad kinda man."

He tried to open his eyes. Too hard. He tries for one, barely cracking it, but its enough to glimpse emerald green eyes again, and decide that despite the pain in his back, he most definitely wasn't in hell.

"It is settled then," the stately women declares. "Call if he wakes...and here, take these extra blankets, it's cold tonight."

"Thank ya, Ro."

There was the sound of feet walking way, leaving Gambit alone with the touch of an angel's hand on his hair.

"Good night sugah," was breathed, before he got a quick and shy kiss to his temple, one that was too embarrassed to linger, for she blows her candle out.

V

He heard curtains being drawn, and groaned, dispute the warm morning breeze. He moved his head and hopes to see Soft Voice and Emerald Eyes, and doesn't sigh when a regal Negro woman in black nun's habit greets him instead.

"Good morning, senor," she salutes him with a nod of her head and bright blue eyes. "It would appear that Padre Kurt was right, and you will live."

Then her lips pull. "I suspect Logan shall be disappointed."

Gambit tries to speak but can only cough instead, and the woman immediately turns to fetch a ceramic cup filled with water and gives it to him.

"Slowly, now," she cautions, hand raise in benediction. "Slowly..."

He licks his lips when he's done. "Wish it were bourbon, chere."

The woman chuckled. "Oh, yes, I believe you shall be just fine."

Then she smiles. "My name is Ororo, I am the Madre Superiora of this convent."

Convent. Not merely a church. Gambit looked around at the white plaster walls with arched room and his homely but comfortable bed...there were worse places to be when recovering from a bullet wound.

He took his eyes from where all his gear and clothes rest, save his trench coat -he wore trousers, with only bandages covering his upper half- and looked at Ororo.

"Merci."

She shook her hand. "No need. It is our duty. And from what another of our guests said, you've merited this good deed with another."

He nodded slowly, allowing that. "All the same, I'll be out of yo' hair soon as can be..."

"Why are you so eager to leave?"

He raised an eyebrow. "I be a mighty big sinner madam. Don' go with the decor."

"Hemm. With eyes of the devil at that," Ororo mused, smiling, though she stopped when she saw frown, ever so slightly. Her bright eyes softened. "We are all sinners before God."

Gambit shook his head. "Not like me petite."

VI

Ororo hummed, brown fingers raising to her lips. "We are a spectacle to the world and the angels senor..."

"Gambit be just fine, Mere."

A delicate white brow arched, but before she could comment, the door barged open in a whirl of white-brown hair, and the smell of sunflowers. Soft Voice was back carrying his trench coat in a bundle, a brown stain in her arms against the white of her dress.

"Finally got all the blood of o' it Ro," she huffed as she placed the artical with the rest of his gear. "Thought it would nevah...come..."

She stopped, blinking those large green eyes when it registered to her that their visitor was awake and aware. She immediately straightened, hand pushing hair behind her ear. She was young...not much pass the last stage of girlhood. Seventeen he would guess.

Mother Ororo cleared her throat. "Gambit, this is Senorita Anna-Marie D'Ancanto...the godsister and ward of Father Wagner. She was the one who opened the door-"

"I know it," Gambit said, allowing a bit of warm to enter his voice when the girl reddened and squirmed under the praise. "Couldn't fo'get if I tried."

She reddened further, but huffed and smiled wryly as she let herself come closer. "Nice ta hear, Cajun. But please, call meh Rogue, everyone does -well save for Logan, Kurt and Ro."

"Well I can speak for the others, but until you grow out of the heathen name, I shall never call you that,"Ororo sniffed, though her eyes smile.

Rogue giggle-snort, catching it in one delicate, sun kissed hand, before turning back to Gambit.

"Well, welcome to Saint Xavier's House o' Charity, Cajun," she grinned, holding out a hand. "Hope ya survive the experience."

I think this will be a three chapter fic. I hope you enjoy it so far cause Gambit as a cowboy/outlaw/ Man With No Name...I'm sure that has to be illegal. Blushes. References to Westerns abound. Bonus points if you can spot them. Romy ahead next chapter, put to Gambit's credit, in this universe, he's already managed to land a kiss on her...may have to bump up the rating later.