A/N:

Summary: Edward x Rogue. AU both worlds. Rogue moves to Forks to escape bad blood after she takes the cure in X3.

Without her powers, but still struggling with additional personalities that her powers had given her, she tries to blend in with the seemingly normal human world of small town America.

She has made friends with Edward, Alice, and Jasper, and recognizes Jasper from Logan's Civil War memories. She suspects Jasper is empathic and knows that Edward and his family know he is telepathic.

She has been homeless, for a period at least 2 years ago, and is close friends with people on the reservation, though they aren't happen about it. She got very sick after visiting, but in less than a week she recovered.

[Person's thoughts]

Other character's thoughts

'Visions'

Projected thoughts from OC

[Projected or strong personal thoughts]

Previously:

Within 4 hours of the last bead of sweat pouring off her body, Carlisle sponge bathed her until not a drop could be seen. I, rubber gloved, bagged and disposed of her bedding, replacing it with identical look-alikes. We had unconsciously decided to keep this episode from her. Carlisle didn't know about Alice's vision of the beautiful monster and I wondered if I should tell him.

My phone vibrated.

'Not yet' [Alice Cullen]

…

"I'm not going to ask Marie. Just try to be discreet, would you? I mean, Charlie will wake up soon."

"Umm." I felt totally out of my element.

Her brother is a mutie, I think she's okay with it. (Jubilee)

She would have woken the cop on the couch or called her doctor of a father if she wasn't (Bobby)

"Thank you." I hurriedly slipped my shirt over my head and pulled on some gloves.

"It's Thursday – Carlisle dropped a doctor's note by the school, though you should probably have been out a lot longer than a few days." Alice seemed to stop herself, thinking about her words, "Good luck for you, I guess it wasn't the swine flu after all!"

I laughed, "Does that mean Ah am cleared for going to class?"

"Yep!" She smiled, and I couldn't help but smile back.

…

RPOV

I took care during lunch to abandon the Cullens and meditate, and felt like my mental mansion was stronger than it had been since the cure. Surprising, but very welcome. Alice, of course, wouldn't let me get away with totally abandoning them, and strong-armed me, almost literally after gym.

"You can't practice after being sick. And Carlisle should really check you over one last time to make sure you are really out of the woods. I mean, you woke up less than 24 hours ago. Please?"

I couldn't deny her pleading looks. So I found myself bundled into her car, on my way to their house again after school Thursday night, presumably for Dr. Cullen to give me a check-up, but I knew it was more of Alice's manipulations.

The girl is good at engineering consent. She could be a masterful politician for the right cause. (Erik)

She obviously wanted to be my friend, almost desperately, which was odd and comforting all at once. I was a rather prickly, schizophrenic bitch at times.

Gifted (John)

Rough around the edges, but tough where it counts. (Logan)

[yeah yeah]

As we approached the house I noticed a few of the drool-worthy beasts of metal were missing from the garage, namely Carlisle's awesome Mercedes. [Did they go out on a Thursday?]

Entering the house, I scoffed as I heard Edward pound out a Chopin piece. [Anyone can play the hell out of technical piece like that. He plays with the heart of a tinman. You would think he would at least try after the Joplin piece.]

Alice had bounded up the stairs without me and called out to Edward to join her, and I walked into the now vacant room.

The grand piano that stood before me was a tribute to the modern age. It's sleek black curves held high grade plastic keys in black and white; it was shinier than a freshly waxed car. The wing was open and no dust had settled onto the sound board. [Obviously he cares for this thing, even if he can't play it.]

"Do you play?"

The booming voice startled me, and I instinctively turned and crouched, before righting myself. [I thought I was alone. These people are worse than the kids at the mansion when it comes to sneaking up on people.]

"Very little, and not anymore." [I can't even think of it without thinking of Mom.] I crossed my fingers behind my back that he hadn't heard me last week when I not-so-politely showed up his younger brother. I was pretty sure he and Rosalie had been out.

"Oh I doubt that. Play for me, please? Even just a little tune?" Emmett asked, trying to catch my eyes in his golden-toned ones.

I looked away, staring at the very prominent cross over the threshold to the back of the house. "No, Ah really don't play. Ah haven't touched one in years." I smiled slightly, trying to remember the last happy memory I had of Mom playing piano softly, while Cody and I were hanging out in my bedroom, just minutes before that dreadful kiss that started my one-way ticket to Hell.

"I bet you could knock this one off of his pedestal, Marie." Jasper's voice came in from the door to the dining room as he entered the room. [Damn, he might have actually been here.]

"Sorry to disappoint Emmett, but Ah really don't think Ah could even dredge up a scale."

I tried my best to sound completely honest, but in reality, I knew that Mom's nearly instinctual knowledge of tickling the ivories was embedded in my hands permanently. I didn't want to remind myself why. I really hoped Jasper would keep his mouth shut. [Damn empaths]

"Alright how about Guitar Hero then?" He replied, turning on the television and X-box 360 that was gracefully hidden from view in a small cupboard.

"Ah'm up for it!" [I can whip anyone's ass in Guitar Hero. Willing to lend a hand, boys?]

O Hell yes Roguey. This guy is up for a big surprise. (John)

Of course Rogue. (Bobby)

Emmett pulled out two guitars for our duel. "Are you sure you're ready, girlie?"

I was feeling too confident. [I could beat any of you at the mansion, blindfolded.] "I'll beat you down Emmett Cullen."

"Wanna bet?"

"Sure, and when I kick your butt you owe me a week of servitude."

"And you have to do whatever I ask."

"Deal" and we shook hands.

We agreed to three songs: I chose Jordan, it being one of the most kick ass and hardest songs ever on Guitar Hero, Emmett chose PsychoBilly Freakout, and Edward chose Misirlou. The whole family decided to come in and watch. I smirked at Emmett as we started, "I hope you like the whole French maid costume thing."

I set down my guitar in shock. I had never been beaten. [Suck it up Rogue.] I put out my hand for a fair game shake, but Emmett shook his head, laughing. "You remember what you bet?"

I nodded meekly, still dazed by my defeat. "Let me get the rest of them in hear to listen. You are going to serenade us, dear Marie."

He motioned to the piano. My jaw dropped, but quickly shut. [Fuck, I didn't think he'd ask me to do this.] I knew I couldn't get out of it – it was a perfectly fair bet. I sat down at the bench, trying to school my mind for a piece that I could play that wouldn't offend Erik's sensibilities or require me to use my mother's stolen knowledge. I came up dreadfully empty. [This is going to suck so bad.]

They all came in, Alice looking extremely smug, Edward interested and confident [I am going to fix that look – he should know better], Jasper in as much pain as I was in [I wonder why] I thought sarcastically to myself, Rosalie faintly disinterested, and low and behold, Carlisle and Esme were back from where-ever they had been, and looked on curiously.

I sighed, trying to think of what pieces I knew, that would be sufficient to fulfill my debt to Emmett and wipe the confident look off of Edward's face. I don't know why, but it really bugged me that he felt he was a better pianist.

I figured Edward was probably a typical high school student that was being forced to learn piano, so his skill level couldn't be that high; he as playing Chopin's nocturne in C# minor earlier for crying out loud, and very poorly might I add.

One has to love to play to learn to play well. I automatically ruled out any modern pieces, pop or otherwise. They would be too easy and were probably all Edward really studied anyway. "Don't be too disappointed when Ah screw up a little. Like Ah tried to tell Emmett here, Ah haven't actually played in years."

I quickly decided on Chopin's etude Op. 10 #2. It was a quick, technical piece. Short too. And I could play the hell out of it; I had learned it a long time ago, and playing it had always brought me a sense of comfort.

I settled bravely onto the piano bench and let my gloved fingers ghost over the keys, when a horrid thought struck me. I had never played with them on, outside of Edward and I's showdown the other day.

[How can I play this with my gloves on?] I considered changing pieces, but this one was perfect and fit the bill. So, I carefully shed my gloves and placed them next to me on the piano bench. I quickly launched into the piece, and when I finished, put my gloves back on before facing Emmett. "Satisfied?"

He looked disappointed. "Aww, Marie. Can't you play anything longer?"

"But we agreed Ah'd play, not for how long. And that was a complete piece."

I heard Edward mumble under his breath, "Probably can't even play anything longer... doesn't remember. Maple Leaf Rag was a fluke."

That ticked me off, and I could see Jasper's head jerk slightly with the fury that burned in me. [I'll show him.]

I narrowed my choices to two more complicated and traditional pieces that I could attempt to play, Suite bergamasque by Debussy and Moonlight Sonata by Beethoven. They were the last pieces I learned to play, well, I never finished Moonlight Sonata, but I came close.

Debussy was the easier choice – since I had finished learning it, but I knew that it being the last piece my mother had ever played, I wouldn't be able to finish it. Not to mention it was better played as an orchestral arrangement. It was practically a sin to play it without an accompaniment. Moonlight Sonata it was then.

Erik cringed inside of me. Please don't do this Rogue.

I contemplated this piece for a minute. It was last piece my mother was trying to teach me, and I had nearly mastered it. Erik would have a fit though – I knew it was haunting and brought up memories of barbed wire that neither of us wanted to revisit.

[Erik, try to steel yourself for this.] I mentally shut the door to his room and tried to imagine deep soundproofing around it, time spent outside at night with chickadees chirping and mosquitoes buzzing.

I sat down at the bench, carefully tugging at the fingertips of my silk gloves, contemplating removing them. I ultimately decided not to remove them though – they were thin enough that I should be able to play this piece without much trouble. I gently ran my fingers over the keys of Edward's beautiful, but painfully modern, Steinway piano, this time taking in the smoothness of its non-ivory keys and how my gloves slide over the tops.

I played a few scales, to check to tonality and re-judge the action. I realized belatedly that the action was very, very light on the piano, even though it couldn't have been more than a year old. Satisfied, I started in on the first movement.

Almost immediately, Erik's terror washed over me. I held it back though, and continued through the first movement fairly peacefully. His memories were burning through my mental shields - I knew it would only get worse - but this movement was the easy one anyway. I threw myself into its gentle melody and sad story...

As I started in on the second movement, I heard a collective gasp. [Guess they didn't think I knew all three movements. It is sad how many people only learn the first.] Halfway through, Erik's terror started to get tougher to just suppress, and my back started shaking. I knew he couldn't help it, but I struggled not to falter as his memories began to flood my mind.

My fingers were playing the notes perfectly, but my mind was walking in bare feet and ragged clothes towards a barracks. I was staring through a chain-linked fence and watched bodies being dumped in heaps into a warehouse. I recognized one of the faces...I pulled myself from these thoughts at the sounds of someone sobbing, launching into the third movement.

This movement was always the more difficult of the three for me, and I had never perfected it. My mother's fingers, however, knew it perfectly. Its haunting melody and drumming bass brought back Erik's memories in full force, My mother's cold, pale, lifeless and half-rotten face on a barely recognizable body being thrown into a pile...

I know I could have dealt those again, separately, but I was struggling to suppress something far more recent, personal, and powerful, and failing miserably.

I registered tears pooling in my eyes, but blinked them away as my hands jumped lightly between octaves; I could hear what I was playing, but knew that the notes belonged to Mom, and Mom alone. I numbly continued, letting my memories of her teaching me, and failing, to play the last few stanzas.

My upper body jerked as I was pulled into her memories directly, as the movement reached its one happy, star-like moment. I was lost to the room, though my fingers faithfully played what only Mom knew. I was playing it, while my husband sat proudly on the couch, listening and Marie sat nearby on the stairs. My playing was the only thing that could ever pull him away from the damn television.

As the last repeat of the melody repeated beneath my fingertips, I could feel nothing but my emotional control completely shattering; I gave up, and she took over for me, settling into the front seat of my consciousness.

My entire frame shook with residual terror and sadness as my fingers forcefully hit the last notes, signaling the end of the third movement, and thankfully, the end of that dreaded piece.

No one spoke a word as my mother wiped my tears and composed herself mentally, gently pushing Erik and myself back into the mansion, then focusing on being still to stop the shuddering. She wiped my face with my sleeve and adjusted my gloves.

She turned back to where the family was sitting. They were looking at me with shock. Feeling my face form into a big, fake smile, "Did that work for yah, Emmett?" [Her accent sounds so much like mine; I doubt they'll even notice the change, Marie.]

He stared at me for a minutes, and then replied as smoothly as I had, "I'd say that's a hell of a lot better than 'Haven't touched a piano in years'."

She laughed, "Ah really haven't. Tha' was tha last piece tha' Ah evah learned." She turned us to Alice, who was sitting with a very confused and distressed Jasper.

"It's getting a bit late; would you be a dear and take me home now?" MOoOM! I do not call my friends 'dear'. I mentally sighed.

"Sure sure." Alice sounded really distracted, but neither of us could think of why. [They couldn't have realized I was crying, could they?]

Well, I guess that means they won't ask again, mamma. And good riddance for that.

[Goodness gracious child. You once loved to play. I wish you would realize that you still do.]

My eyes spared a glance at where Edward was sitting. He looked, for lack of a better description, in complete disbelief. He was staring at the keys of the piano, but not seeing them, his golden eyes unfocused and yet hard.

My mother mentally snorted. [Thinks my daughter can't do biology, and apparently is shocked to realize he isn't the world's best key-tickler. You had it comin' honey.]

Go figure. Arrogant bastard. I added.

[Marie, you should go take care of Erik. I've got this.]

He looked up at me from his stare at the keys, and gave me a twisted, painful smile – it reeked of pity and sadness, but we couldn't figure out why. He dropped his gaze quickly and took this as my cue to leave.

"Thank y'all for having me over Dr. and Mrs. Cullen. 'Twas a pleasure." She nodded my head towards their forms and followed Alice out the door towards the garage.

APOV

As Marie and I walked out to the garage, something was telling me the night was about to get a lot more interesting. [For one, I'm not having any visions about the drive home, nor anything really until I return to our house. For two, Marie is... acting strange.]

"So Alice, before y'all were adopted, where were yah from?"

[And her accent is a lot stronger, even though she isn't nervous or afraid. "Somewhere in the South. I don't remember it, and I consider the Cullens my only family now."

"That's a shame. Ya know, ya look like... oh neva mind."

That perked my interest. "I look like who?" I looked at her intently, and suddenly realized that her eyes were no longer that favorite chocolaty brown color, but a light hazel, almost green.

"Well, ya look like ole' Irene Adler, but ah know she's nevah been married, and she's far too old-fashioned to have slept around outside of that. Course, between you and meh, Ah think she's... swinging for the othah' side."

I kept my eyes on the road, trying to take this in. [Irene Adler?] But before I could contemplate it much, Marie, again, acting so out of character, kept going. "She's been blind most of her life. She used to babysit Mar... Ah mean, she used to babysit meh. She was a very kind woman."

I nodded my head. [Since when is Marie so talkative?] "She's always known things though. Ah'll nevah forget how one time Ah came ovah to pick up Marie and she was leaned ovah, her nose bleeding and her glasses off. Her eyes were... well they were all white.

She looked up at me with the saddest face and apologized. Ah tried to tell her she had nothing to be sorry for, but she corrected me sayin' 'Enjoy the time ya have with her. Ah am so sorry for what y'all will go through. Keep strong together – she will need ya more than evah just when ya think she needs ya tha least.'"

I almost slammed on the brakes, but kept my head together. [I'm not talking to Marie right now. Were my siblings right? Is she… no there has to be a better explanation?]

"Irene was such a sweet lady, but she neva sat Marie again. John wouldn'tave approved. Yah know, a few days before... oh Ah guess Ah should stop. Ah'm probably talkin' yah ear off."

I shook my head but couldn't bring myself to say anything in response. I would have cried if I could have. [Edward and Rose were right. She's.. schizophrenic.]

"No he wasn't."

I turned to stare at her, still driving though. [Did I say that outloud?]

"Mah daughter has nevah had any mental illnesses. She is not a schizophrenic. Alice... dear, can ya keep a secret?"

I nodded slowly, trying to take in that Marie's alternate personality was talking to me and telling me that Marie wasn't mentally ill.

"Mah name is Elizabeth D'Acanto, and Ah'm Marie's mamma."

I slammed on the breaks, shaking my head. "Oh Marie, I'm so sorry. I should have realized Edward was right. I'm so sorry."

This seemed to infuriate Marie, or at least her personality. "Alice Cullen!" She shouted, slamming her fist against my dashboard. "My daughter is not mentally ill. She... Ah can't tell ya why Ah'm here, and what is goin' on with her, but please, have some faith. Marie needs you. Ah can't be here for her anymore, and the only people she had abandoned her. You and ya family are really all she's got. My brotha, bless his heart, would not understand."

She grabbed my hand across the console, and pushed the side of my head so that I would face her. I gave in. "Please, Alice. Irene was neva wrong, and she told me that a woman who called herself Alice was gonna save my baby girl from herself. Please, do this for meh."

I nodded my head softly, and resumed driving her home in silence.

After she departed my car without a word, I drove back to the house. I knew Edward wouldn't be there, and though Jasper could feel that I was conflicted and confused, he didn't say anything as I looked up on the internet 'Irene Adler.'

When I didn't find anything substantial, I sighed in regret. For a minute, I'd actually believed her.

"Do you want to talk about it, darlin'?"

I shook my head, instead pulling him to me and taking in his dusty, earthen scent.

That night, I ignored the strange looks from my family members. i wasn't in the mood to talk about whatever was wrong with my best friend. I was going to drown my sorrows in my Jasper, but the new dawn brought little peace or satisfaction.

RPOV

_+_+_+_+_Dreamscape_+_+_+_+_+_

I stared into the mirror in my shitty little motel room for hours, overwhelming relief at the image before me. Blue tinted skin, with vibrant red hair, and bewitching yellow eyes. I was back, and there would be hell to pay, but first, I had to get out of here. I had a plan.

I awoke startled, and felt ill. My room was too dark to see anything, so I stumbled to the bathroom blindly. I flipped on the light, but still couldn't see. [What the hell is happening?] I realized I was starting to freak out, and regulated my breathing.

In and out, Marie, nice and slow (Logan)

Slowly, my eyesight came back to me. It was blurry at first, and then as my vision faded in, I came into focus. [Was I panicked? Does panic cause temporary blindness]

My voices were silent. In the bathroom I looked like a mess: my face, pale and bloodied under the nose, my hair chaotic at best, and my nightgown askew.

[What the fuck happened to me?]