Release, Part Twelve

by Tangerine

"Warren, buddy, come on," Bobby muttered, pulling the drunken man to his feet. Warren swatted him away, muttering indecipherable curses. Remy frowned deeply, aiding in Bobby's task. Warren glared at the Cajun until he removed his hand. "Warren, you're drunk."

"How d'you find me?" He slurred, laying out several hundred dollar bills on the counter for the barkeep. His tab was barely twenty, but he figured the guy needed it for college or for his family or something else Warren couldn't fathom at the moment. The reason was beyond Warren right now, but he knew the boy needed the money more than he did.

"Dat, mon ami, would be me," Remy muttered, dragging Warren across the floor with Bobby holding onto his other arm. "And it was a lucky break, Ange. I found ya here while trying to drown de memories of Roguie away."

"You're gonna lose her," Warren muttered, tears welling in his ice blue eyes. "You gonna lose her because you're stupid, Gumbo. You're gonna make a mistake that's gonna kill your love, and she's gonna say she doesn't want nothing to do with you!"

Remy tried to ignore the intoxicated man's comments, but everybody knew Warren, though barely coherent, was right. "You having trouble with Psylocke, mon ami?"

"I ain't your mon ami," Warren shot back as the room spun uncontrollably. He swallowed loudly, fighting the contents of his stomach as they attempted to emerge from the depths within him. "I didn't do it."

Bobby raised his eyebrow at the whisper, glad Remy had called him when he did. Warren had always been a lousy drunk, but even more so when he was emotionally distraught. Warren didn't drink often, said he didn't care for the horrible hangover binging brought him, but when he did, it was a show to see.

Remy and Bobby dragged the inebriated blond man into the rest room, immediately filling a sink with cold water and plunging his head in. Warren gasped as the shock hit his system as he was pulled out, swore when he was immersed again and cried out underwater when the cold overtook his numb state. After a few minutes of this, he had calmed down greatly and sat on the cold, ceramic floor, holding back his tears.

"She didn't even give me a chance to explain," he murmured into his arms as they crossed tightly over his knees. "I told her it wasn't true, that the memories weren't mine, I know they aren't. I told her I wouldn't do that. I keep my word."

Bobby sat down across from him while Remy took position on the lone, white sink. Bobby looked at him carefully, remembering many a time when he had been the one left to deal with a distraught Warren. Though raised to be proper and respected, emotionally Warren rarely dealt with anything rationally. "You want to talk about it, buddy?"

"I have memories in my head," Warren started then hiccuped, his eyes watering with misery, "that are not mine. I know they aren't. I didn't sleep with that woman, I know I didn't, but I don't know why I'd remember something I didn't do."

Bobby winced, and Warren frowned at him. "No, I know didn't sleep with her, though that's not what you're thinking. I'm not like that anymore, Bobby. I'm not the selfish, immature little playboy I used to be. I love Betsy. I want nobody else."

"I believe you," Bobby replied, and Remy nodded in agreement. Warren wouldn't get this worked up over something that was true. "Do you have any idea why you might be remembering something that never happened?"

Warren shook his head. "The last thing I remember was going to Candy's grave to check it out, I guess to see if it had been disrupted or dug up, but it was untouched. I don't remember anything after that. I'm not even sure how I got home."

"Maybe we should take you to Jean," Bobby suggested, but Warren shook his head violently. "Warren, buddy, you can't just do nothing."

"Can't I?" Warren laughed lightly, an insane, bitter laugh, and Bobby wondered if perhaps Warren was not losing it again. "What difference will it make? It's just as well she threw me out, saves her from being hurt." Warren smiled sadly, pushing his hair out of his eyes with both hands. "It's better you two just leave me alone and let me deal with all of this on my own. It won't be worth it in the end."

"Warren..."

Warren slapped Bobby's hand away and stared at him. "Go now, and forget you ever knew me! It won't be worth it. Trust me, you do not want to see where I'm going, nobody wants to see it."

Remy lit up a cigarette, inhaling deeply before speaking. "Sounds to me like ya givin' up, Ange. Dat don't seem like ya style."

"No, it sounds like your style, LeBeau," Warren retorted angrily, catching those devilish red-on-black eyes with his own for a brief second before they both turned away from the horrifying sight.

"Can you excuse de Ange and me, Robert," Remy muttered, exhaling a thin stream of smoke through his pursed lips. Bobby was about to protest, but the look on Warren's face was painfully obvious. He didn't want Bobby there either.

"Fine, I know when I'm not wanted. I'll buy myself a drink." Bobby frowned before stomping out the rest room to the bar, where the barkeep immediately demanded ID.

Remy kneeled down before Warren, his jeans torn at the knee and his trench coat splaying across the ground. "Jus' what exactly was dat supposed to mean, Ange?" Warren looked away from him, silently protesting his question. Remy snapped his fingers. "Jus' what exactly were ya implyin'?"

"I saw you," Warren whispered darkly. "In the tunnels, during the Massacre. You were there, I'm sure of it. You were thinner and weaker, but it was you." Warren sighed deeply, tapping his thigh with an anxious finger.

Remy remained silent, and that was answer enough for Warren. He looked to the Cajun, seeing the guilty look on his face, the sadness in those evil eyes. "So why haven't ya said anyt'ing, Ange? Cyke would love any excuse to toss me off de team, and I know you ain't got any great love for me."

"I remember you helping me, trying to stop the bleeding with your coat after Harpoon and the others left me to die, before Thor came along and took me down from the wall." Warren closed his eyes, the memories of that horrid night rushing back to him. "I hate you because you were there, but I understand you probably saved my life or tried at any rate. It's not your fault I died anyway. I will never speak of this again, Remy."

"I only joined Sinister 'cause he offered me de truth about my past, but I didn' do anyt'ing dat he said. I saved who I could, but dey kept finding dem anyway, slaughterin' de Morlocks no matter what I did. I left after dat."

"Like Apocalypse did for me," Warren mumbled, distraught and exhausted. His head was throbbing, whether it was because of the alcohol or the memories, he did not know. It only hurt to think, and that pain was only slightly less than the pain he felt in his heart. "I want to go home, I want to go to Betsy."

* * *

Candy stood in the darkened apartment, smiling wickedly over Betsy as she dreamt fitful dreams, muttering urgent noises as she slept. Candy bent near to her face, near enough that the slightest breath would wake the slumbering ninja. "Wakey, wakey, mind witch."

Betsy jerked out of her unconscious state, immediately taking a defensive position in the black apartment. Sleep made her clumsy and lumbering, but she could still defend herself. "What are you doing here?"

"I'm here to offer support in your dire time of need," Candy responded sweetly, slashing at Betsy face with a small, metal needle. Betsy moved to block, but Candy had already drawn a thin bead of blood. "So tell me, Elisabeth, are you feeling okay?"

Betsy stepped away from Candy, hounding herself for being so slow in her response. "What do you want?" Betsy demanded, her usually eloquent voice slurred. She tripped as she stumbled away backwards, hitting the floor with a thud. Something was wrong, she realised, as she felt herself losing control. It was like she had been drugged. God, Candy had drugged her. "I knew... you were... here to... hurt him."

"Having trouble speaking, Elisabeth?" Candy taunted with a sinister smile. "Feeling tired and weak? And surprise, surprise, nimbo, your powers don't work either. It was all part of his plan. Warren will bring you down with him in the fall."

"Go... to... hell," Betsy cursed weakly, falling flat on the carpet.

"He never told you, did he?" Candy asked with a flitting laugh. "The bastard never told you what he really was, what he is. He and I, we live for the same reason, or rather, we exist in this cold, cold world. We are not alive."

Betsy gasped as the numbness spread, her unspoken words unable to pass the barrier of her lips. Her powers were gone, the shadows refused her cries, and her body ignored her demands as she silently writhed against the emptiness.

"He knows, sweet Elisabeth," Candy murmured, stroking her cheek, smearing the blood into tribal-like markings, matching the crimson tattoo that adorned her face. "And he never told you he's a reanimate."

Betsy shook her head, denying the accusations.

"Dead flesh forced to live through the process of reanimation. He's a corpse, Elisabeth, a dying sack of rotted flesh. Without Apocalypse, he can't live, so his body's slowly dying. He doesn't heal as quickly as he used to, he's slowed down, ready to die."

"Not... true," Betsy forced out through several laboured gasps. She would fight until her dying breath if she had to. Candy could not take away her power to speak, to fight, to believe in Warren. God, she believed in him!

Candy circled the fallen woman, wondering how much longer until the witch was unconscious. She had things to do, people to screw. This night would be her last night as a slave, her last night with Warren. She was going to make it count.

"He's lied to you from the beginning, Elisabeth," Candy shouted out, grabbing the picture of herself and Warren and tossing it against the wall, so the glass shattered and the memory tore within the frame.

"He lies to everybody." She threw the framed picture of Betsy and Thomas Lennox, and Betsy winced as she heard it break. Candy took the photo itself and tore it up, letting the pieces flutter down onto Betsy's head.

"And tonight, I'm going to force him back to his lord, and then I can live! I can live!" Candy took the picture of the Original X-Men and stared at it sadly. "He was so innocent back them. He'd deny it, but he was. That's why I loved him so. Everybody thought he was a whore, frivolous and flimsy, but I saw something more there, a real person. Damn him!"

Candy whipped the frame and photograph into the fireplace, turning on the gas and letting the flames ignite. The paper twisted and writhed as the images burned, and ironically enough, the picture of Angel was the last to burn.

Candy clutched the portrait of Betsy and Warren, happy in each other's arms. She turned to look at Psylocke, who had finally fallen unconscious. Candy felt oddly remorseful her show had ended, but the bigger play was just beginning.

Grabbing hold of Betsy's feet, Candy dragged the sleeping woman into the hall, and in her mind spun and twisted the events tonight as she wished them to happen. Warren would regret the day he ever begged Apocalypse to live as he took his final breath. Candy would make him regret, just as she would make him regret he had ever turned her away.

[next part]

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