MMX was an excellent way to start my Thanksgiving mini-cation.
We open with the recently widowed Gambit who is kneeling in the dust that used to be his wife and Xandra, and trying to make sense of what has just happened.
With Xandra dead, the other players have no reason to stay, and take their leave. Besides, they have to go home to get started on the apology fruit baskets and funeral potatoes.
We flashback to thirty minute earlier, when the battle is in full swing. Gambit is taking Imperial Guard down in his usual graceful, agile manner. He makes Impulse into his own personal Cyclops and shooting the others with his eye beams.
Meanwhile, the Starjammers are squaring off against Titan, with limited success. They get Team Rocketed.
Rogue is protecting Xandra, but realizes that the fight has turned against them when Deathbird and her troops arrive. Cerise takes a hard blast square in the back, and Gambit gets impaled by Deathbird's lance. Xandra also recognizes that they are losing, and proposes a desperate plan to Rogue. She wants to tell Gambit, but Xandra tells her that they can't risk discovery and have to act immediately. Xandra is clearly a messy bitch who lives for drama, because she could telepathically pass that message to Gambit, and chooses not to do so.
Rogue touches Xandra, and they explode. Only to reappear in front of a distraught Gambit once the Imperial Guard, Starjammers, and Deathbirds of Prey have gone. Rogue explains that her death was an illusion. She'd touched Xandra, they'd combined their powers, and made it look as if the absorption had gone terrible wrong. Gambit is furious; rightly, he notes that Rogue has a tendency to act like the boss in the relationship, and forget that he's meant to be her partner and not her underling. She tells him to be grateful they're alive, and not angry that she deceived him.
As they talk, she realizes that she knows exactly how he feels. Literally. His thoughts and feelings are in her head. Something has gone wrong with her powers, and she now absorbs people without touching them. (Perhaps noteworthy: the same thing happened to Gambit in Nicieza's series, where he could charge things without touching them.)
Even as he's being absorbed, Gambit has the presence of mind to hand her the collar, and she puts it on.
In the aftermath, a shocked Rogue lies curled into a little ball under Gambit's space duster. Gambit checks on Cerise and Xandra, and asks them to bring their ship to the planet to collect them. It's clear that he wants alone time with Rogue, and also to give her the luxury of a little more time.
He lies down on the ground next to her, and puts his hand on her shoulder. He tells her that he would give her all the time in the world if he could, but it isn't safe and they need to go. He produces the wedding bands that Bling! made, and forgets to pronounce the exclamation mark in her name in the emotion of the moment. He says to Rogue that they should put them on now, but she is reluctant. With her newly uncontrollable powers, she has no idea what will happen next, except that she is truly doomed. Gambit recognizes this speech as a classic Rogue move: she's pushing him away hard, because she's scared. He refuses to be pushed away, and insists on holding her to her promise that she'll always find her way back to him. She lets him put on the ring, and they kiss. Or, as Cerise puts it, massage tongues. It's a very sweet moment.
Back on the ship, Rogue and Xandra say goodbye. Rogue asks Xandra if she can fix the new problem with her powers, but Xandra says that it would mean lobotomizing her. Instead, as she continues to say, Rogue and her powers are not broken; instead, they are evolved. She needs to learn how to control it.
After Xandra leaves, Gambit proposes they go home. Rogue calls him "husband" for the first time, which is a good, subtle touch. It suggests that she hasn't quite let herself believe it up to this point, that she hadn't accepted he would be that committed to her.
In the epilogue, Rogue and Gambit are back at his penthouse, which is weirdly sparse and cold. He needs to learn about the power of good area rugs. There, they are greeted by the most important characters in the Marvel Universe: Gambit's cats. They immediately attach themselves to Rogue, and bless the addition of another provider of chin-scratches and brushies and foods to the household.
They have a weirdly awkward moment that I understand but find hard to explain. Basically, they've been through a time of intense emotion and significance. Suddenly, they're home, they have a break, they have time to take a breath, and neither of them is quite sure what should be next. They decide to throw a party.
Final thoughts: I almost unreservedly loved this issue. It brought the focus back onto the two title characters in a great way.
It was such a good Gambit issue, where you got to see him stand up for himself and insist on being respected, but also be intensely loving and supportive. Plus, it showcased how quick and quick-witted he is in combat.
I am still processing the new development in Rogue's powers. It seems like they're going to have to get worse before they get better. I don't think she needs to be more powerful, but I can also see the purpose from a narrative perspective. It forces her to deal with them sooner rather than later, as she's unable to use them as is. She can't choose whom to absorb, and will take out her team mates as well as any enemies. Otherwise, she could keep using the collar, and not work on gaining any control.
And it had the cats, which alone makes it an 11/10 issue.
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