Training Shade

[Shade]

Shade´s mental image of course did not connect the word ´sentinel´ to the giant, mutant hunting robot that had been chasing her through the streets, but thought in more simple, to her more likely ways, thinking that a sentinel would rather be a guard post or some kind of cop.
"Why?" she asked. "What did I do? Did you take me along to steal things?"

[Gambit]

"What?" Gambit asked, turning to look at her with a small confused frown.

[Shade]

"Well, you said sentinel," Shade replied, mirroring the confusion. "What kind of sentinel? A guard? A cop?" To Shade-with-a-memory the word ´sentinel´ had automatically triggered the image of the robot, but that, of course, was missing now.

[Gambit]

"A giant mutant-huntin' robot," Gambit said. "Ya happened t' get in its way while walkin' down a street. I don't know much of the details, wasn't there."

[Shade]

Shade gave him a weird look, as if to determine whether he was kidding her. "Ah." she said then. "Didn´t you say that things hadn´t been bad for mutants so far?" She was referring to what he had said as a reply to her inquiring about the meaning of the prophecy.
But on a side note: she had probably been using her powers...and running fast. She tried to remember, but it seemed to be one of the many memories that had not yet reached the gap in the dam.

[Gambit]

"It wasn't so bad," Gambit said. "It was over pretty quickly without too many casualties."

[Shade]

"I see." Shade said, still frowning slightly. They had arrived back at where they had left their stuff and Shade bent down to pick up the nunchakus and put them back into the bag. Then she straightened up again, looking at Gambit. "So that means these things are no longer around then?" she asked.

[Gambit]

"Officially no," Gambit said. "From what I know, most of de people behind that are dead." He knew, however, that projects of this scale never disappeared forever - there were whole networks of people, goals and money behind them, too vast to just disappear into thin air. Besides, the technology used in Wideawake was too precious for those interested in it to not be re-used at some point.

[Shade]

"In other words, they are still a danger but nobody knows when and where they will show up again, same technology, different heads." Shade paused, then gave a shrug. "Well, looks like all this here isn´t a bad idea then."

[Gambit]

Gambit raised his eyebrows once to show that she saw the exact point and that he wasn't going to argument it any further. He gathered the stuff and carried it to the car.

[Shade]

Shade walked next to him, giving him a small smile and a small nudge. "Don´t give me that look," she said. "I know this is important." And I´ll do whatever you think is necessary if that makes you feel more at ease about this and less worried about me, she added in thought.
They arrived at the car and Shade climbed in.

[Shade]

*****

((Takes place the morning after the Hellfire costume party))

Working out and self defence training had become a daily routine over the last weeks. It had made Shade tired at the beginning. Very tired. In a normal, but not too sporty shape, she had been exhausted at first whenever they got home after training, because just as Gambit had said, he was not going easy on her, but instead pushing her to her limits. It did her good and improved her shape and stamina a lot more quickly than it would have done had she tried this on her own, but it was very exhausting and sometimes frustrating nonetheless. More than once she had vented that exhaustion and frustration on Gambit, with glares, with pouting, with snapping at him - something that was not typical for Shade but rather showed that whereas she was very well aware he was just doing this to give her a better protection, she was not used to this kind of thing. The fact that she was still remembering, puzzle piece by puzzle piece being added day by day was sometimes helping, sometimes irritating. A help, because it was like browsing through a long forgotten photo album and many of the photos were pretty, irritating because depending on the memory, they could add to her frustration sometimes, especially when it had been a particularly tiring session and her brain decided to toss in a memory that was not too pleasant.

However, Shade had never been one to give up easily and despite the occasional moment of annoyance (or the in the first few weeks far more frequent moments of exhaustion), she didn´t complain more than was absolutely necessary.

They had been training in normal street clothes so far, after all, the master had told them it would take a few weeks for him to get the costume ready which had made Shade ponder occasionally what the price for such a costume was. Despite, or maybe in particular because of her memory loss, what had never changed about her were quite some things, her inability to just forget about how much money was being spent, being one of them. She didn´t mention it though, there would be no sense in it anyways.

The evening before had been... odd, even by mutant standards and Shade was briefly rewinding it in her head when they were driving to the master´s place to get by now finished costume. After all that had happened, Shade had wanted to know what the conversation with Morph had been about, but Gambit had only given vague answers, confirming her guesses that it was indeed connected to some kind of plan he might have about the murder, had told her to discuss it the other day when he had thought it through a bit more, and ushered her under the shower before bed. It had become a little later than planned however, because the illusion, even though it seemed likely it had merely been another mutant´s powers going haywire under the influence of a little too much alcohol, had unsettled her, so they had spent some time talking it through. However, the more memory was added to the many blanks, the easier things became. She knew there still were tremendous gaps, but at least some faces now had names and some events had more of a background, even the small things of everyday life. Not all memories returned with the same clarity. Just as memories fade over time sometimes, Shade only got back what she had had when the amnesia occured. Some memories would be very clear, others rather faint. But it helped a lot, nonetheless and made her occasional visits to Xavier´s a lot less awkward. People there seemed to buy the version of her powers having backfired pretty well so far and she was glad about that.

The night and some good rest had helped a lot to get it out of her system and the anticipation of finally being able to try on that costume (which her inner child kept referring to as a super hero costume), had her in a good mood the other morning so she was drumming her fingers along the beat of some random (and as so often, completely new) rock song while they were on their way to their destination.

[Gambit]

As soon as Gambit received the message that Shade's costume was ready, he shoved her into the car and they drove off for another try-on.

"I hope he gets it right from de first attempt," he remarked as they were leaving Manhattan. "We'd give it a field test already b'fore lunch."

He was impatient to carry on with the training. His gut feeling told him that time was pressing.

[Shade]

Shade shot him a sideward glance. He was relentless about this, there hadn´t been a day without training ever since they had started it but she didn´t need more memory of him than she had so far to know the reason. Over the time she had spent with him since what had happened at the hotel, she had learned he was protective of her and that this was part of it. It needed no questions or explanations and therefore, despite the occasional pouting, she had never doubted the reason behind this, even though she did not share all of his anxiety. She hadn´t been there when the prophecy had been made, she didn´t have the full memory of the last three years and a growing anti mutant sentiment. However, the night before had added a bit of an anxiety in that area.

"I can´t wait." she said, turning her head back to face the road, a small smirk on her face. "If it doesn´t fit, not my fault. I certainly didn´t gain any weight recently."

[Gambit]

"Gainin' weight ain't your worry here," Gambit remarked, giving her a short glance. "But redistribution of it, changes in shape, even in muscle tension, dat can be a problem in bendin' places, shoulders, elbows, thighs... Dat man knows his stuff, though."