Summary: AU. ROMY. A young thief named Remy Lebeau's powers manifest in New Orleans and Professor Xavier sends Rogue and Storm to recruit him to join the X-Men. His family, however, is not so willing to let him go. Takes place between Season 1 and 2 of X-Men Evolution.

The Choices We Make

Prologue

Something was wrong. Remy could feel it. As much as he tried to figure out what is was though, the answer remained hidden from him. There was a stillness to the night air that made him uneasy no matter how hard he tried to shake it off. To top it all his hands hurt again. It had been happening on and off for weeks now, starting as a light stinging and then progressing to a hot throbbing. He hadn't mentioned it to anyone, feeling a bit ashamed that he was letting something trivial like this bother him. So, Remy continued ignored the pain, and his uneasiness, in order to concentrate on the task at hand.

He was currently crouched down low on the rooftop of the New Orleans Museum of Art, waiting news from his cousin that he had successfully shut off the alarm system for the shrine figure they were about to steal. The 18th century African sculpture would never be of particular interest to Remy but his father's client was paying a vast amount of money for its theft.

"Status, Lapin?" his brother Henri, who was crouched down next to him, asked into his headset.

"I'm goin', I'm goin'," Emil answered, his voice filled with concentration. "There," he said a few seconds later. "All set for Remy to drop in."

"'K," Henri confirmed. He turned to Remy. "Ready, frère?"

Remy flashed him a smirk. "You know Remy's always ready," he told him arrogantly.

"Oui, mais, Remy better not mess this up or it'll be his funeral when Pére finds out," Henri said exasperatedly.

"Remy's not goin' to mess up. 'S just a routine heist. Why you so worked up, Henri?"

His older brother looked around uneasily before answering. "Somet'ing just don't feel right. Can you just get down there?"

Remy's confident grin faded. Henri felt it too, then. "Mais, oui," Remy answered, strapping on his gear.

This particular museum suffered from a common design flaw that made it simple to break into. All one had to do was shut down the security alarms on the building and drop in from the windows up on the roof. A piece of cake for the Thieves Guild who had quite brilliant (though Remy would never admit that to him) technicians like Lapin. Remy made his way over to one of the windows and effortlessly eased it open. He almost laughed at how easy this was.

He took out his trusty bo staff, a small compact metal cylinder that extended to a long nigh indestructible staff that had tons of other uses, and rigged it up so one end was stuck to the museum ceiling and the other became a long rope, stopping just inches above the museums floor. He slid carefully down the rope, taking care to be a silent as possible. It wouldn't do to be caught by a security guard passing by after all of Lapin's hard work.

He crept over to where he knew the sculpture would be according to the floor plan of the museum. The figure's only defenses against his sticky fingers were a couple red velvet ropes and in less than a minute Remy held the priceless (or maybe not so priceless) artifact in his gloved hands.

"Got it," he whispered smugly into his headpiece.

"Good," his brother's voice came. "Now get out of there."

"Whatever you say," Remy said, slipping the necklace into a pouch in his trench coat. Before he had even begun to take a step towards his bo staff, a sharp, burning pain ran down his arms and his gasped loudly. Without warning, his knees buckled and his fell to the ground.

"Remy?" Henri asked, hearing his gasp. "What's goin' on?"

"Somet'ing's happenin'," Remy grunted out through pain clenched teeth. He couldn't get up. All the energy in his body was been diverted to his hands, which felt like they were on fire. He had never felt pain this intense before. An urge swept through him. He had to get rid of the energy.

"Remy? Remy!" his brother's voice called frantically. "What's wrong?"

"I don't know," Remy moaned. He struggled to keep his eyes open. Suddenly, he saw, through his squinted eyes that his hands were glowing. A bright pink glow was emitting from his gloves. He gasped again as the pain grew worse. Take off your gloves, a voice inside him demanded. With what little strength he had in him, Remy tore off the glove on his right hand and chucked it from him. Remy didn't care where it landed as he focused on getting the other one off. He was too late though. The last thing Remy saw was a brilliant pink light before he felt a searing pain in his left hand. Then, it all went black.

Disclaimer: The characters and world of X-Men Evolution don't belong to me.

A/N: I've been sitting on this story for awhile. I'm of the firm opinion that Gambit should have been a good guy in X-Men Evolution so I came up with this. I know I should be working on the Romy Chronicles but this just keeps begging to be written. Let me know what you guys think. I want to see if I can actually garner some interest in this so please review!!

Melissa