Chapter 7: I'm Going to Touch You
—
Dust flew around me, thick and choking. The impact of our collision had turned half the Walmart into rubble, and concrete chunks rained down as support columns gave way.
I squinted through the haze, my huge body working on instinct more than sight.
I'd managed to tackle Rogue to the ground in that last exchange. My smaller pair of arms pinned her wrists and waist to the cracked tile floor while my larger arms were cocked back, ready to deliver the knockout blow. Every muscle in my massive red body strained with effort as she struggled beneath me.
As the dust began to clear, I got a better look at our position.
Her legs had somehow wrapped around my waist in the tussle, and despite being pinned, she didn't look worried. Blood trickled from a cut on her forehead, but her eyes gleamed with smug confidence.
"That all ya got, big boy?" Rogue taunted, her Southern drawl somehow more pronounced.
I glared down at her, tightening my grip on her wrists. "Your tone is so proud for someone who's already defeated. Sorry, Southern Belle, but I don't think you're leaving with a prize today. Give up."
She sighed dramatically, looking almost bored despite her position. "I digress."
"Too bad."
"Too bad, indeed… Now, as much as I like being pinned by that huge, muscular body of yours," she said, wiggling out a hand and running it over my shirt, poking my chest. I quickly tried to grab it, but she yanked it away. "I gotta end this. I can't let Animo flee."
Before I could process her words, why she was so confident, she moved her free hand. It moved slowly enough that I managed to grab it with one of my upper arms. But that had been her plan as she smirked, twisting her hand just enough to brush her bare fingertips against my forearm.
The contact lasted less than a second, but it felt like being struck by lightning.
Power surged from my body into hers in a sickening rush that left me gasping. My muscles spasmed as energy drained from them.
Oh shit.
I hadn't forgotten her most dangerous ability—power absorption through skin contact. But I still fell for it.
Beneath me, Rogue's pale skin flushed red. Her body swelled, growing larger as she absorbed my alien DNA and strength. My vision blurred as pain raced through every cell, but I fought through it, gathering what strength remained in my upper arms.
With a roar of pain and desperation, I slammed my fist into her face and pushed off, breaking contact.
I stumbled backward, barely keeping my balance as my legs threatened to give out.
Rogue rose to her feet with a predatory grace that didn't match her now-massive form. She'd grown nearly as tall as me, her body mimicking Four Arms' musculature but with only two arms instead of four. Her eyes widened in surprise.
"Well, ain't you something? Most folks can't break away once I get a hold," she said, flexing her new red muscles. "Still, you shoulda stayed down."
I raised my fists, determined not to show weakness despite feeling like I'd been hollowed out.
Things had gone a little haywire, but it wasn't too bad. I could still take her, she hasn't absorbed much since she only had two arms, while I had the experience of—
She vanished.
One moment she stood ten feet away, the next a sledgehammer blow crashed into my jaw.
– BOOM!
The impact lifted me clear off my feet. I sailed through what remained of the Walmart's front wall, across the parking lot, and into the air above Washington D.C.
The city blurred beneath me as I arced through the sky, my massive body creating a red streak against the blue. Pain radiated from every inch of my battered form. The combination of Captain Marvel's strength with my own Four Arms power had created something devastating.
I crashed into an empty construction site several blocks away, the impact leaving a crater in the bare dirt. Groaning, I pulled myself into a sitting position just in time to see Rogue hovering in the distance, going toward the ruined Walmart rather than pursuing me.
She'd decided Animo was more important than finishing me off. Lucky break.
I tapped the Omnitrix symbol on my chest, a flash of red light washing over me as I reverted to human form. The transformation brought sweet relief as the worst of the pain vanished—technically, I was switching to an entirely different body.
"Ow man… Such a pain, that woman," I grumbled, running a hand through my hair as I climbed out of the crater. I hadn't expected to meet a female Kevin like this.
My fingers found the Omnitrix, and I twisted the dial as I considered my options. This was complicated.
I needed something that could counter her Captain Marvel's powers strengthened by my own Four Arms strength. But at the same time, something that wouldn't be vulnerable to her touch.
I cycled through alien silhouettes, my mind racing. Heatblast? Too risky—she might absorb fire powers. Cannonbolt? Nah, I had no experience with him.
I paused at one rotation as a particular silhouette caught my eye. Slowly, my expression brightened as the perfect solution presented itself.
"Nice," I grinned and tapped the dial.
****
| Rogue's Perspective
She soared through the air, her newly acquired red skin tingling with power. The sensation was intoxicating—raw strength coursing through her veins like liquid fire. Whatever that four-armed creature was, he packed quite the punch.
Not that it had done him much good in the end. Just like everyone, he too was a weakling before her touch.
But he's a strange fella, she thought, flexing her borrowed muscles as she descended toward the ruined Walmart. Never absorbed anything quite like him before. Not human, not mutant... It feels like he's something else entirely.
His words from earlier flickered through her mind. He called himself "Four Arms," which seemed rather unimaginative. But there was something about him that intrigued her.
The determination in his eyes, the way he'd positioned himself between her and that ginger girl... protective instincts that reminded her of—
No. She shook her head, banishing the comparison before it fully formed. Focus on the mission.
She landed amid the rubble, her borrowed strength making the concrete crack beneath her feet. The roof had partially collapsed, walls blown out from their collision. Dust still hung in the air like morning fog.
"Time to collect what belongs to boss Magneto," she muttered, scanning the destruction for signs of Animo.
What she found instead made her blood run cold.
Standing amid the wreckage were three figures she knew all too well. X Men.
Cyclops in his dark visor, Wolverine with his usual scowl, and... Bobby Drake. Ice Man himself, the very person whose hurt words had driven her away from Xavier's school years ago.
"Well, well," she drawled, masking her surprise with contempt. "If it ain't the X-Men, come to ruin my day."
Bobby's eyes widened at the sight of her. "A-Anna? You're here too?"
Her lip curled in disgust. "It's Rogue for you, sugar. So surprised to see me? What you think of my new look, by the way? I like that I ain't runnin' around in spandex pretending to be better than everyone else. Like certain people here."
"That's not—I didn't mean—" Bobby stammered, his face flushing. "Anna, please let's talk. Give me one chance."
"Save it, ice cube. You made yourself perfectly clear last time." She spat the words like venom, old wounds reopening despite her best efforts.
Behind them, she spotted the ginger girl and an older man huddled over Animo's unconscious form. They must have dragged him from the wreckage while she was dealing with Four Arms.
Logan stepped forward, positioning himself between her and the civilians. "Marie, this ain't you. Let's talk this through."
Something in his gruff voice made her hesitate.
Unlike the others, Wolverine had never judged her. Even now, after everything, there was genuine concern in his eyes rather than condemnation.
She averted her gaze. "Ain't nothin' to talk about, Logan."
"We don't want to fight you," Cyclops interjected, his hand hovering near his visor. "Haven't you seen what's already happened here? This destruction is exactly why humans fear us. Every battle like this sets mutant rights back by years."
"Ugh. Spare me the lecture, Scott." Rogue clenched her fists, feeling the borrowed power surging beneath her skin. "Magneto wants Animo. I aim to deliver."
Without waiting for a response, she launched herself at them, a red blur of motion and rage.
Cyclops fired first, a beam of concussive force that she barely dodged. The blast carved through what remained of the ceiling above them, sending chunks of concrete raining down.
Logan moved with surprising speed for someone carrying that much metal, claws extended as he leapt to intercept her.
She caught his arm mid-swing, using her borrowed strength to hurl him into a toppled shelf. "Sorry, old man. Nothin' personal."
A blast of freezing air hit her from behind as Bobby encased her legs in a thick sheet of ice. The cold burned against her borrowed red skin, but she simply flexed, shattering the ice with ease.
"That the best you got?" she taunted, turning to face him.
Cyclops fired again, catching her in the shoulder and spinning her around. Logan was back on his feet, claws slicing through the air inches from her face as she ducked under his swing.
Fighting three X-Men at once was proving challenging even with her enhanced abilities.
Each time she pushed past one, another would intercept her. They worked in seamless coordination, keeping her away from Animo with practiced efficiency.
But they were holding back—afraid of causing more collateral damage. She had no such reservations.
With a roar of frustration, Rogue slammed her fist into the floor, creating a shockwave that knocked all three off their feet. The momentary advantage was all she needed.
She surged forward, shoving past the older man and grabbing the girl by her shirt, tossing her aside like a rag doll.
"Sorry, kid. Wrong place, wrong time," she muttered, reaching for Animo's unconscious form.
Just as her fingers closed around his lab coat, something strange happened. A cold sensation washed over her body, starting at the back of her neck and flooding through every limb. Her vision blurred, muscles suddenly refusing to obey her commands.
What… what the hell? She tried to turn, to fight whatever was happening, but her body had become a prison, movements slowing to a halt against her will.
She felt herself slipping away. Rogue's consciousness faded like water down a drain. The last thing she heard wasn't her own thought, but a triumphant voice echoing inside her mind.
"Nice, I finally did it!"
Then darkness claimed her.
****
Getting into Rogue's head had been a nightmare.
When I transformed into Ghostfreak, I'd banked on his possession abilities being the perfect counter to her power absorption. After all, she couldn't touch what wasn't solid. But I hadn't counted on her mind being so... crowded.
It was honestly a lot to take. It was like swimming through a storm-tossed sea of memories and personalities—fragments of everyone she'd ever absorbed swirling in chaotic eddies. Each time I'd get close to taking control, another consciousness would surge forward to block my path. A burly Canadian lumberjack. A frightened teenage boy. A woman with cosmic power. And beneath it all, the scared Mississippi girl trying to hold herself together.
This Rogue was a mix between the movies and comic book. In the movie, where Mystique tricked her by using Ice Man's face, prompting her to flee, it was Logan who brought her back. This time, that didn't happen. Logan was defeated, and Rogue became an official member of the Brotherhood of Mutants.
That was years ago. Only after that did she somehow encounter Captain Marvel to absorb a portion of her power permanently.
I'd pushed harder, choosing to focus on her consciousness specifically, ignoring the others.
I'd finally broken through when she was distracted by the X-Men.
The borrowed Four Arms power had made her confident—reckless. When she'd reached for Animo, I'd found the crack in her mental defenses I needed and slipped inside.
"Nice!" Now I stood in her body, feeling the strange sensation of being both solid and female. The borrowed red skin from Four Arms was already beginning to fade as her absorption powers wore off. It would still take a few minutes, but she was growing weaker.
It was disorienting, inhabiting someone else's form. Her limbs didn't respond quite the way I expected, and her center of gravity was all wrong.
Everyone around me had frozen, staring with expressions ranging from confusion to alarm. The X-Men had dropped into defensive stances, clearly expecting some new trick.
I grinned at Grandpa Max, who was helping Gwen to her feet. "It's me, Grandpa! I took over her body."
His eyes widened before narrowing in suspicion. "Ben?"
"Yeah!" I nodded, still getting used to controlling Rogue's movements. "It's an alien called Ghostfreak. I possessed her when she got distracted by these guys."
Grandpa's face broke into a relieved smile. "Great!"
Around me, the X-Men exchanged bewildered glances. I wished not to involve myself so openly with them, but it was too late to worry about that.
The one with the visor, Cyclops, stepped forward cautiously. "What's happening?" he demanded. "I'm assuming you're not Rogue… who are you?"
I turned to face them, feeling Rogue's brown and white hair swishing around my shoulders. Weird. "Look, it's hard to explain and it'll take too much time. Can you guys just flee with Animo? I'll trust the X-Men to handle this better than the terrorists."
"Who are you calling 'terrorist,' Anna?" A deep, commanding voice cut through the rubble-strewn Walmart.
Shit.
The air around us seemed to grow heavy, dust and small metal objects rising eerily from the ground. Through the shattered front entrance strode a figure I'd recognize anywhere—tall and imposing in a deep maroon suit, his face partially shadowed by a distinctive helmet.
Magneto.
He walked with calm authority, each step deliberate and unhurried, as if surveying the destruction with mild disappointment rather than anger. And he wasn't the weak, skinny man from the movies. He was built like a fucking tank, with rippling muscles obvious over his clothes.
Behind him stalked a hulking figure with wild blond hair and feral eyes. That had to be Sabretooth, whose claws gleamed as he flexed his massive hands.
"And here I thought I wouldn't need to intervene personally," Magneto continued, his voice carrying effortlessly across the ruined space. With a casual gesture, every piece of metal in the vicinity trembled. "I see you've made quite the mess, my dear."
I swallowed hard, feeling Rogue's throat constrict with nervousness that was entirely my own.
This wasn't some random thud—this was Magneto, one of the most dangerous mutants on the planet.
And he thought I was Rogue.
He stepped forward, metal debris parting before him like water. Sabretooth prowled at his side, sniffing the air and frowning slightly as if sensing something wasn't right.
"Magneto," Wolverine growled, followed by unsheathing his claws with a metallic snikt. "Should've known you'd show your face eventually."
"Logan," Magneto acknowledged with a nod. "A metal man before the Master of Magnetism… It's wonderful how you never understand the irony of that. Still Charles's loyal attack dog, I see. How disappointing."
His cold eyes fixed on me again. "Rogue, bring Animo and let's be done with this."
I stood frozen in Rogue's body, suddenly very aware that I had no idea how to respond. What would Rogue say? How would she act? If I gave myself away...
Uh oh.
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