1. Character Guide

Full summary in the OC submitting...thing.

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><p>Before the story is started, I felt like giving you a key of every OC and a quick rundown of they're powers, age, and codename. I'll update this as the story goes on.<p>

If any of them seem to powerful, don't worry. I've taken all of that into account and have created limitations where they're needed and there's also all of the weaknesses I received when they're OC was submitted. Also, none of them are at their full potential, they're still learning.

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><p><strong>Girls:<strong>

Lila Andrews By: Cloudy-TheNightMareQueen

Age: 15

Codename: Tiger Lily/Tigerlily

Power: Omniscience. The ability to know everything about everyone and everything.

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><p>Tonia Hart <span>By: El' Caliente<span>

Age: 16

Codename: Puff

Power: Sublimation (Ability to transform into a gaseous, mist, or fog-like form and phase through solid objects if its electronic it will short out she also has the ability to shoot acid like fog along with icey wind breath that can freeze anything) As well as slight clairvoyance.

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><p>Maya Olivia Hughes <span>By: Mew Phong<span>

Age: 17

Codename: Memoir

Power: Memories. She has a photographic memory, eidetic memory and a muscle memory. So basically anything she sees done that is physically possible after a few tries she can do it too.

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><p>Avalon 'Ava' Rose Bronte <span>By: Ember Ice<span>

Age: 17

Codename: Tempest

Power: She controls the more violent side of weather. She is most capable at calling thunderstorms and commanding lightning (which is amaranth, rather than white/silver) however, she is working steadily at commanding other storms, like snow, hail and ice. She can also create cyclones, derechos and other strong winds. When the environment allows, she can manipulate tidal waves and create fire storms, dust devils. Her greatest weakness is calling fog or other forms or cloud cover. She can manipulate air currents enough to levitate, but wants to learn to fly.

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><p>Skylar 'Sky' Mills <span>By: RawrMeans I Love U In Dinosaur<span>

Age: 16

Codename: Marina

Power: Skylar can breathe and swim faster than normal while underwater. She can also control the temperates of moisture. Skylar can cool water which allows her to freeze it as well as other things with moisture in it, create ice, cool down hot objects, and even lower bodily temperatures. Besides that, she can heat and boil water, create steam, make objects super hot, and raise bodily temperatures. She also has slight empathy towards underwater creatures, this is not a real power and it only makes them not afraid of her when she's in the water.

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><p>Flora Farren <span>By: Tigereye13<span>

Age: 15

Codename: Aqua

Power: She can control the movement of water (liquid form). Sometimes she can see images on the water.

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><p><strong>Boys:<strong>

Leo Fulton By: SilverKing32

Age: 16

Codename: Reflection

Power: Can create mirrors out of thin air that can absorb just about everything. Example: Can absorb a train in one mirror and can make it go out the other as if nothing happen(Just and example he's not well-versed in his powers to do that yet).The mirrors can block attacks as well, and be use as a cutting saucer that he can throw. Also he can use the mirrors for transportation but he needs to know the exact place.

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><p>James 'Jay' Robert McRea <span>By: Ember Ice<span>

Age: 18

Codename: Blaze

Power: has enhanced strength and is Pyrokenetic, naturally elevated body temperature, can withstand immense heat and does not feel the heat.

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><p>Nathan "Nat" Morgan <span>By: Silverstone007<span>

Age: 17

Codename: Darkheart

Power: has the power to become invisible, can phase through object and the power to take over someone's body (Over Shadowing).

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><p>Alex Hepburn <span>By: Mew Phong<span>

Age: 18

Codename: Memory Snake

Power: he has the ability to rearrange memories, making it seem like no one was there or something.

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><p>Billy Theivings <span>By: <span>fantasamigoricalproductions

Age: 16

Codename: Guster

Power: he can manipulate the wind. He can make the wind go fast enough to cut somebody or knock them over. He can move certain light weight objects.

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><p>Alex Rogers <span>By: A-Rog<span>

Age: 18

Codename: Dynamo

Power: His body generates immense amounts of energy which he can channel into destructive blasts. This energy prevents him from sleeping and speeds up his metabolism so he eats a lot and heals quickly.

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><p>Benjamin Rivers <span>By: Dracarot <span>

Age: 16

Codename: Ranger

Power: Can go invisible, with the added benefits that he also can't be heard or smelt in this state, nor be detected by telepaths, even if by a friendly one (I.E Jean or Professor X couldn't find him even if he wanted to be found in that state). Also posseses enhanced reflexes (similar to but not equal to Spider-mans) and enhanced sight, smell, and hearing. Posseses a different style of heal factor that he can call upon of his own free will rather than having it run through his body constantly. Also possesses an immunity to natural poisons, and can predict weather up to a week in advance, barring mutant or meta human interference with the weather. Finally can identify plants and their properties, be they for food or health.

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><p>This key will be your safety net as you read in case you start confusing people and their mutations. Also, you may have noticed that a lot of their power descriptions look suspiciously like what they submitted to me…Well that's because it is^^ I may have corrected some spelling or simplified something on a few of them though.<p> 


	2. Video Games, Water, and Books! Oh My!

**A/N: So there's probably many grammar problems in this chapter and I apologize. I was just excited to get this story started.**

**Sorry if this chapter isn't particularly interesting, I was trying to get used to the characters ^^ If I'm doing something wrong with your character, PM me and tell what it is I need to fix please.**

**Disclaimer: Nothing except the plot is mine as of right now.**

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><p>Maya Olive Hughes opened her brown eyes with a groan. At 4:30 that morning, Logan had decided that waking up her and her teammates for a surprise two-hour long danger room session was a good idea. If she recalled the session right, they had completely bombed it. Luckily it was Saturday; otherwise she'd be a zombie at school.<p>

Maya stretched and quietly walked out of the room so as not to wake Tonia Hart, her roommate. As she made her way to the kitchen, Maya was surprised at how quiet and empty it was in the mansion.

"There's a note on the fridge," a voice said, startling Maya, "They went to the park but left us here so we could sleep. We can join them if we want to," the voice continued. Maya turned to see Alex Rogers sitting on the counter eating a bagel.

"Why didn't you go? You don't sleep," Maya asked as she put some bread in the toaster.

"I didn't know they were leaving," the older boy stated.

"Why not?"

"I was working on my motorcycle," Alex beamed, his green eyes dancing as he thought about his pride and joy.

"If they didn't come to the garage where your motorcycle is, they must've walked to the park. Isn't that kind of far to walk?" while Maya spoke, she started to hit the toaster, her toast was starting to burn and it hadn't popped up yet.

"Not really," Alex said as he walked over and unplugged the toaster causing the toast to pop up in Maya's face.

"Thanks," she mumbled, grabbing a dish towel to wipe her face clean of toast remnants.

"Anytime!" Alex said with a bright smile.

"Coffee now!" a girl with dirty blonde hair, blue eyes, and freckles said as she barged into the kitchen, heading straight towards the coffee pot.

"Hey Sky!" Maya greeted happily.

"No, it's too early to be happy," Skylar Mills said as she poured coffee into a glass.

"Aren't you supposed to be drinking that in a mug, not a glass?" James Robert McRea, also known as Jay, said with a slight smirk as he walked into the kitchen already dressed and ready for the day, unlike the others.

"Someone's a morning person today," Sky grumbled as she chugged her coffee.

"Well I decided that with you lot around, the others would want _someone_ who isn't going to bite their head off," Jay joked, grabbing an apple from the fruit bowel.

"Sky's the only one who's grumpy," Maya pointed out as she hopped down from the counter she'd been sitting on to eat.

"Hey, where is everybody?" Sky asked, no longer dead to the world since she had her coffee.

"Park. They left a note," Alex said handing her the note.

"Well, as much fun as this little breakfast has been," Maya said, "I would much rather be outside so I'm headed to the park to join the others,"

"Maya, do you even know what time it is?" Jay asked.

"It's noon, isn't it?"

"Nope. It's about 3:00 in the afternoon. I don't know about you all, but I don't want to go to the park just in time for the mosquitoes to eat me alive," After Jay said that everyone visibly shivered, nobody wanted a repeat of last week's mosquito incident.

"So…What do we do?" Alex asked. Jay just smiled as he walked away. The others looked at each other before following after him, curious about what he was going to do.

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><p>"I'M GOING TO FREAKIN' KILL WHOEVER DID THIS!" was the scream that woke up Nathan 'Nat' Morgan. <em>That girl has some strong lungs <em>he thought as he fell out of bed, to lazy to get out of it normally, _I wonder if it's related to her mutation_. Nat was throwing on a T-shirt when he heard feet come pounding past his room.

"I HAVE SEVEN YOUNGER SIBLINGS, YOU THINK I DON'T KNOW HOW TO DEAL WITH YOU PEOPLE!" there was that scream again. Nat ran his hand through his hair when the door was thrown open to reveal a very angry, as well as wet, Flora Farren.

"Where is that roommate of yours!" the red-head seethed, green eyes blazing.

"I don't know," Nat said throwing up his hands to show he meant no harm.

"Well if you see Jay, tell him he's a dead man,"

"He threw water on your head… Can't you move the water off of yourself and be dry? No harm no foul?"

"I tried already! I'm too angry to focus! Now tell me where that…Hey, where'd you go?" Flora asked looking around; while she was talking Nat had turned invisible.

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><p>Minus the danger room session, Ava Bronte had been having a pretty good day. She'd avoided her roommate's fury when water had been dumped on her head by Jay, Alex Rogers, Sky, and Maya, she had the last two frozen waffles, and she managed to flirt with Billy before he flirted with her.<p>

Ava and Billy had an unofficial contest going on. Both of them were huge flirts so each morning they'd get up and see which one would flirt with the other first. Sometimes they'd shock the other into silence, which is what Ava had done, adding to her good day.

As Ava walked down the hallway, looking for Flora to see if she'd found one of the bucket-of-water-on-head pranksters, she ran right into Nat who had just reappeared.

"What the hell!" she shouted, trying not to fall.

"Oh, sorry," Nat apologized while trying to regain his balance as well.

"Well look where you're going next time, okay?" Ava said, tone instantly changing as she tried to flirt with Nat.

Unfortunately her flirting plans were interrupted by the arrival of Tonia Hart, the platinum blonde, pixie cut, pink highlighted, mocha skinned, silver eyed, bane of her existence. Tonia and Ava both liked to get around with the guys and this caused the two girls to constantly fight. It got so bad once that Logan had to put inhibitor collars on them as well as lock them in separate supply closets so that they wouldn't kill each other.

"Why are you here Tonia?" Ava snapped, just seeing the girl had completely ruined her day.

"Let's think, shall we? My parents loved each other very much. So one night my father-"

"Ugh no! That's not what I meant! Ew!" Ava interrupted Tonia's story.

"Why are you so grossed out with my story?" Tonia asked innocently.

"I don't want to know about the deal with the devil your parents made so that they could spawn you!"

"Oh, now look what you did! Nat left!" Tonia said pointing to the spot the boy had previously been standing.

"Me! You're the one who was going to talk to him about reproduction!"

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><p>"Avalon and Tonia are arguing again," Lila Andrews said quietly from her chair in the rec room. She'd been reading, or attempting to read, for the past hour or so. Sprawled out on and in front of the couch to her right were Leo Fulton, Alex Hepburn, and Billy Theivings who were playing video games. When the three boys realized that there wasn't anyone around to order them to do something productive they decided to gather around the TV for a video game marathon. Anything from <em>Just Dance <em>to _Halo _was on the list of games to be played.

"Hahaha! Yeah, you slip on that banana Yoshi! There's more where that came from!" Leo shouted as he bounced up and down in excitement, not even noticing that Lila had spoken.

"Run, run like the wind you puny little cars! Bowser is going to squish you all!" Alex exclaimed. Lila gave a sigh in annoyance; _Mario Kart _was definitely the game that made the boys act the most like children. Lila didn't understand why though, it wasn't even real competition. Billy was winning by so much he was almost lapping second place. Not last place, second place; he'd already lapped everyone else. _Then again, it's not surprising, _Lila thought, _Billy has been playing this game two hours straight every night for the past month_.

"Hey Lila, do you know where Flora is?" Jay asked as he snuck into the room just as Billy finished the race.

Lila jumped slightly and then said, "She's in the library right now. Apparently she caught Rogers," Alex Rogers was usually referred to by his last name whenever the other Alex was around. This was decided rather early on when someone called Alex Hepburn by his last name and he gave them a long, not to mention boring, speech about why he shouldn't be called that.

"Ouch," Jay winced, "That means that I'm the only one who-"

"She's headed over here,"

"Oh crap!" Jay quickly ducked behind a plant hidden in the corner of the room.

"Alright," Flora said walking in, "I know you're in here Jay! Your co-conspirators told me this was all your idea so you get out here right now or I'll put years of babysitting skills to good use!"

"SHHH! You almost made me drive Bowser off the rainbow road!" Alex hissed.

"…Excuse me?" Flora asked, slightly confused.

"Mario Kart," Billy explained. Flora's face brightened.

"Ooooh! I want to play!" she exclaimed, diving for the fourth controller.

Lila rolled her eyes before glancing back at her book. It was a book written in 2000 in the United States and published by-NO! Lila mentally stopped the tirade of information before it became too much. She then closed her eyes and took a deep breath. Through her sessions with the Professor, Lila learned that closing her eyes and relaxing often helped stem the tirade of information that threatened to overwhelm her every day. Her impromptu relaxation was quickly cut short by Sky who at that moment walked in and plopped down on the floor.

"Hey," the freckled blonde said casually with only a tinge of worry lacing her words, "Shouldn't the others be back by now?"

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><p><strong>AN: So there's chapter one! Tell me what you think ^^**

**I'll try to update once a week on average. Some might come faster or slower depending on the circumstances.**

**My goal is nothing slower than once a month.**


	3. Gathering Information

**A/N: So things did not go according to plan. Team leader is not revealed in this chapter :( I changed everything. It was going to be straight forward, now it's a bit different :)**

**I made this chapter extra long because school starts back up again Monday and I wanted to get another chapter published and I couldn't stop typing it!...Anyway, updates will not be up as fast anymore :(**

**Sorry if it appears a bit sloppy, my brain works faster than my tying capabilities sometimes.**

**PM me if your character is screwed up ^^**

**Disclaimer: All grammatical errors are mine. The plot is mine. The characters belong to their respectable owners. Yes, including the X-Men. I don't own them either...Or Casablanca**

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><p>"<em>Louis, I think this is the beginning of a beautiful friendship…"<em> and cue the credits. After Sky had asked why nobody was back yet, Jay came out of his hiding place behind the plant (only to have a pillow promptly thrown at his head by Flora) and suggested they all watch some movies so they wouldn't worry. The only problem with his plan was that Tonia and Ava couldn't be in the same room for more than five seconds without arguing, so he did the only thing he could think of.

"I always knew that they'd fall for me one day," Billy said with a huge mega watt smile. Jay had separated Ava and Tonia by making Billy sit between the two. Unfortunately he hadn't thought about how Billy would handle it. He especially hadn't thought about how Billy would handle it if both girls fell asleep on him, which is what they'd done.

"If he makes one more crack about girls falling for him, I'm going to kill him," Sky growled to Flora.

"Aw, don't tell me you're jealous," Billy called over, having heard Sky. Sky and Flora both rolled their eyes, both well aware that he loved using cheesy lines to hit on girls. When Sky had first come to the mansion, Billy's first words to her were, "Your eyes are blue like the ocean, and baby I'm lost at sea," she crinkled her nose at the memory.

"_That_ was a very boring movie," Leo stated, lying on the couch upside down, head touching the floor and feet sprawled in the air.

"Casablanca? Dude, that movie's a classic," Alex Rogers said as he popped it out of the VCR (yes, the mansion still had one of those).

"Dude," Leo said, moving so that he was sitting right side up, "That movie was in black and white,"

"Just because it was black and white doesn't mean that-"

"It won three Oscars," Lila said tiredly, not even seeming to notice that she'd spoken. Her head was on Nat's shoulder and she didn't seem to notice that either. Lila's human pillow, Nat, had his eyes closed and was resting his head on his chest.

"See!" Rogers said triumphantly, "It's a very good movie!"

"You had the human encyclopedia on your side," Leo somewhat whined as he went and turned on the lights. During the movie Ava, Tonia, Nat, Maya, Alex Hepburn, and almost Lila (who was slowly closing her eyes) had fallen asleep. With the sudden appearance of light Maya begrudgingly woke up as did Alex Hepburn who made a long, over exaggerated, yawn.

"What time is it?" Maya asked while rubbing her eyes.

"Umm," Jay looked at his cell phone, "It's almost midnight,"

"Oh. Did the others come back while I was asleep?"

"No,"

"Oh," there was an awkward silence after that was spoken. Everyone (who was awake at least) started running scenarios through their heads as to why the rest of the mansion's occupants hadn't returned from their trip to the park. Before their imaginations could run to far, the door to the mansion was thrown open and slammed shut.

"Quiet down. Some of us are trying to sleep" Ava mumbled, eyes still closed as she tried to fall back into a deep sleep. Ava then snuggled in closer to Billy causing him to smile even more. Tonia, on the other hand, decided to wake up, "Who's that?" she asked.

"They sound angry," Alex said. Rogers just gave him a look that seemed to say "no duh."

"Who wants to find out who it is?" Maya asked, upset that Lila had finally succumbed to sleep and couldn't just tell them who it was.

The twelve occupants of the room looked at each other (actually nine, three of them were still asleep) as the door opened and closed a second time. Whoever entered second had entered much quieter than the first.

"Logan," a voice belonging to Storm filtered into the rec room as its occupants relaxed now that they knew who had entered the mansion, "Please try to calm down," Storm's voice continued in a calm, level tone.

"Calm down! How can I! She took the kid without me even knowin'!" Logan's voice growled. Maya could practically picture him grinding his teeth so that he didn't yell too loud. Did they seriously expect all of the teens to be asleep at midnight on a weekend?

"You do not want to alert the other children," Storm stated.

"I should be out there trackin' the kid. Not here holdin' down the fort,"

"I know Logan but you said his trail went cold. Charles is calling back the search parties now, so the other children should be returning soon anyway. It is late, we all need rest," just as Storm said that the door opened again and many voices could be heard. One voice in particular stood out.

"Miss Munroe?" a little girl asked. It was one of the younger students; she was about ten years old. "Why did we have to leave to park to walk around the city?"

"We lost something and had to look for it," Storm said. Flora couldn't help but snort at that, Storm had made a little girl wander the city to look for something? She'd bet money that that was a lie. Some_one_ was missing. Not something.

"Hey!" Jay called out as he saw a sixteen-year-old boy with bone tendrils growing out of his wrists walk by, the boy's name was Drew Tent A.K.A Tendril.

"Yeah?" Drew asked, stopping mid stride to look at Jay.

"What's going on?"

"At the park Mystique nabbed that little boy Rogue recruited about a week ago. Named Tristan I think,"

"Why'd she take Tristan?" Maya asked in concern, she talked to the boy once or twice, he was adorable.

"I don't know. The higher ups at this place aren't telling us nothing," Drew started to fidget where he was standing.

"What do you mean?" Ava asked. She had officially woken up when the majority of the mansion had returned. Nat and Lila were still out.

"Listen," Drew's voice lowered, "I don't know what's happening but I do know that something big is going down. Bigger than what they want us to think,"

"And how do you know-"

"Listen!" Drew cut Alex Hepburn off, "I got to go. I really, really have to take a shower…and wash my hands…and disinfect…not necessarily in that order. Who knows what diseases I caught from roaming around the city all night," always the germophobe, Drew ran off to do just that.

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><p>"What are they not telling us?" Flora asked as she paced across the rec room. The noise of students going to their rooms had long since died down.<p>

"You heard what Drew said, only the higher ups know what's going on," Leo said from his perch on the couch's armrest. The "higher ups" are what normal members at the institute called the teachers, senior X-Men, and New Recruits due to the fact that they were allowed to fight and go on missions while everyone else had to sit by and do nothing.

"Well then, we should ask the higher ups," Ava said simply.

"They're not going to outright tell us," Tonia objected, "We can't just go up to Scott and say 'Hey, I heard that there's something you're not telling us about the trip to the park, what is it?' and have him tell us the truth,"

"Then we try to make them slip up," Nat said, making everyone jump. They all thought that Lila and him were still asleep, clearly they were wrong.

"How do you suggest we do that?" Sky asked.

"Oh, I have an idea," Jay said smiling. Maya, Sky, and Alex Rogers all glanced at each other nervously, that was the same look he had on his face when he suggested that they dump water on Flora's head.

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><p><em>This is a terrible idea<em>, Nat thought as he invisibly followed Rogue to the Professor's office. _With any luck Rogue's psyches will prevent the Professor from noticing me. _Before heading to their rooms the previous night, everyone was assigned someone to get information from. Nat was just thankful he wasn't Leo. Leo had drawn the short straw and was assigned Wolverine.

"Professah, did ya find anythin' yet?" Rogue asked anxiously.

"I am sorry Rogue but after Mystique's story, we have no new leads," Professor Xavier said, Nat was surprised when he detected a hint of worry in the normally composed voice.

"So we're just gonna wait for somethin' ta happen! Ah don't think he has that kind of time! What if the people who took him are hurtin' him!" Rogue shouted. Her eyes ablaze with fury and- was that guilt?

"Rogue, it isn't your fault," the Professor assured. He too had seen the guilt in her eyes.

"He was tryin' to tell me somethin' and Ah wouldn't listen ta him. He'd be here with us if Ah wasn't so selfish,"

"Rogue, you had no way of knowing,"

"Ah know Professah. It doesn't change the fact that- HEY!" Rogue shouted, looking directly at Nat. Nat looked at his hands and was horrified when he saw them, his cover was blown.

"Nathan. I thought I sensed an extra presence in here," the Professor said looking at Nat for an explanation.

"Oh…Um, I'd love to tell you about….Look a duck!" Nat said in a panic before phasing through the floor, Rogue's glare being the last thing he saw.

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><p>Billy was thrilled with who he was assigned to get information from. Kitty was hot, talkative, and she blushed easily.<p>

"Hello and what is someone as beautiful as yourself doing here?" He asked smoothly as he leaned against the refrigerator. Billy had found Kitty in the kitchen.

"Oh, um, I, like, live here," Kitty said, and as expected, she blushed.

"Ah, but shouldn't someone as angelic as you be in heaven," Billy pasted on a bright smile, impressed with his line.

"Oh," Kitty giggled, "Thank you,"

"So, I heard that you're good with computers," Billy said, smile never leaving his face.

"Yeah, like, I'm really good at hacking into programs, I, like, steal the information from other computers when we're on, like, missions," Kitty said proudly.

"Oh really? Beautiful _and_ smart? I don't believe you; nobody can be _that _perfect,"

"Well then, come on," Kitty said with a smile, tugging Billy's hand, "I'm going to, like, teach you the basics of hacking into computers and, like, prove to you that I'm smart,"

"Well then, if you insist. Lead the way," if Billy's smile could get any bigger, it would have. He was about to learn how to hack into the mansion's computers _and_ hang out with Kitty at the same time. Life was good.

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><p>Tonia was furious. She was assigned Jean. Goody-goody, red haired, telepathic, Jean freakin' Grey. How was she supposed to question her? She was a telepath! <em>She probably already knows what I'm thinking, <em>Tonia thought, _Might as well get this over with_.

"Hey, Jean!" Tonia shouted as she jogged to catch up with Jean. Why Jean had decided to take a walk in the forest was beyond her knowledge, all Tonia knew was that she didn't want to be with Jean any longer than she had to.

"Yeah?" the older girl asked curiously. As far as Jean knew, Tonia hated her.

"Mind if I join you?" _No, no! Bad Tonia! You do not want to join her!_ Tonia berated herself mentally; Jean didn't seem to pick it up.

"Um…Sure," Jean said, slightly confused. The girls walked on in silence, neither really knowing what to say. "…So, how about the weather," Jean tried.

"Cold. Wet. Can't Storm make it nice outside?" Tonia asked.

"Well the weather usually relates to her mood until she realizes she's manipulating it," _Perfect opening!_ Tonia thought in triumph.

"So, cold and wet would mean she's upset. Why is that?" Tonia's voice took on a mock psychiatrist tone.

"Well," Jean didn't seem to notice Tonia's psychiatrist act, "yesterday at the park Tristan and some little girl wandered off. Turns out the little girl was Mystique and-" Jean cut herself off, realizing she'd said too much.

"Okay, well this has been a wonderful walk," Tonia said sarcastically, "but I got to go. Let's hang out again sometime…or not. Bye!" Tonia sprinted off before Jean could say anything.

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><p>Jay had Scott right where he wanted him. Scott just needed to take one more step and then- POOF!<p>

"What the!" Scott's voice called out as buckets of honey and feathers fell on top of him. Jay smiled; the idea was a mixture of Leo's and Flora's past pranks, although less extreme. Jay just needed a reason to talk to Scott. "Who is responsible for this?" Scott yelled as he walked into the rec room, stifled laughs could be heard from various people throughout the room.

"Oh, sorry man!" Jay said sincerely, walking over to Scott, "That was supposed to hit Alex H." _No it wasn't,_ Jay thought as he continued to apologize.

"Just be more careful next time, okay?" Scott asked as he tried to calm down and not blast the other boy.

"Oh, is that your mission uniform?" Jay asked as he faked a horrified expression.

"Yeah, it's no big deal. I have just enough time to get it cleaned before I have to be anywhere,"

"War room or X-jet?"

"We're meeting in the war room,"

"Really? Why?"

"It's none of your business. Now, I've got to go clean all of this off. Please don't let me catch you doing anything this stupid again James," Scott said dryly, using Jay's real name to show he was serious.

"Sorry," Jay apologized before moving away from Scott. _Being team leader sure made him grow up fast, _Jay thought before his phone buzzed. He looked at the text he received and smiled.

It was time to go over information.

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><p>"They're in the war room right now, so we've got about half an hour before we need to take any caution," Jay said to the group assembled on the roof, "So what have we got?"<p>

"Well since you were the last to arrive," Flora said, "You don't know that we've already come up with a story based off of the bits of information we each individually received,"

"Actually Billy and Leo are last, they haven't shown up yet," Tonia pointed out casually.

"Whatever! Just tell him what we've come up with," Ava said, nodding at Flora to continue.

"The story that we've come up with is-" Flora started, only to get interrupted when Billy arrived, hiding something behind his back.

"Hello ladies," he said, completely ignoring the guys, "How much time do we have until you all have to go back to heaven?"

"Shut up and sit down," Tonia said angrily, "Flora, tell the late arrivals-"

"I'm dead!" Leo said as he came up to the roof, "Logan figured out I was stalking him and he asked me why and I kept lying and he kept telling me he could smell me lying and now I have one on one danger room sessions with him!" he took a breath, "So, I'm dead,"

"I'll take it you didn't get any information off of him," Sky said, shaking her head in disappointment.

"Well of course I didn't! Weren't you paying attention to the story?"

"EXCUSE ME!" Flora shouted causing everyone to stop talking, "Thank you. Now, the story we've come up with so far is as follows. Tristan met some girl his age at the playground. He got upset when she brought up his mother because he doesn't know who or where she is anymore since he was kidnapped as a toddler and the Prof hasn't located her using Cerebro yet. Tristan then pushed the little girl on the ground because, as previously stated, he was upset. He then went over to Rogue, who was having a one on one with the Prof, for some comfort. You all know how he looks up to Rogue. Anyway, she was annoyed with having Tristan following her around and treating her like his hero, so she told him to go away basically. Then, now here's where things get a bit shaky, Tristan may or may not have read Rogue's mind…Either way, he had a sort of meltdown and told Rogue he hated her,"

"So," Ava said, taking over for Flora, "He ran off back to the playground where Kitty found him and forced him to apologize to the girl. Tristan and the girl chatted for a while and played some pointless kiddy game or another. All we know is that at some point during their game the girl led Tristan away from the view of the X-Men and all of the other mansion dwellers,"

"Except," Rogers said taking over, "the little girl wasn't actually a little girl,"

"She was Mystique," Alex continued for him, "And Mystique, for some reason, wanted Tristan. So, she chloroformed him and took him away," the blonde said, yanking his ponytail and walking in the direction he was yanking it for emphasis on the "took him away" part.

"Except they were able to track down Mystique," Tonia said, glaring at Alex for his little show.

"They found her unconscious in an alley," Maya confirmed.

"Wolverine manager to- um- interrogate her about the whereabouts of Tristan once they woke her up," Sky said, "She didn't have him anymore apparently,"

"That's all we got," Nat said with a shrug, "So, that leaves us with some questions. Why did Mystique kidnap Tristan? Why didn't she have him when they found her? Where is he now?"

"Billy may be able to help," Lila said quietly.

"Right you are gorgeous!" Billy said with a smile, pulling a folder out from behind his back, "Kitty taught me how to hack computers today. So I hacked into the mansion's database for practice. Honestly, they need better security-"

"Thank you!" Jay said, cutting Billy off as he grabbed the folder out of the green eyed boy's hand.

"Well, what does it say?" Maya asked curiously.

"Wait, if they realize that they were hacked, can't they trace it back to you?" the ever cynical Tonia asked.

"Nope," Billy said with a smile and a wink, "I also learned how to cover my tracks. If they ever find out they were hacked, Kurt's going to get a nasty surprise,"

"We're going to have to go over the folder later," Lila said, rubbing her temples, "The meeting in the war room just got out,"

* * *

><p>Hours later, Jay wandered around outside going over information in his head. The team had managed to go over the information in the folder right before dinner; this left them with plenty of free time to plan their next move.<p>

The folder had contained Mystique's story about how something had exploded near her, causing her to go unconscious which is when she lost Tristan. The folder also had the story about Tristan's recruitment, his abilities, his potential, and his weaknesses.

_Well, at least the weather isn't as bad now_, Jay thought as he sat down on a log. Maya had wanted to go on the walk with him, but she had a paper due Tuesday to finish and wasn't allowed to. Luckily they had Monday off due to teacher conferences, that's where the Professor and Storm would be all day since they represented all of the students at the Institute.

Jay was about to get up and continue his walk when something white caught his eye. Walking over to it, Jay identified it as a dog. Or, to be more exact, an origami dog. How the folder of the paper had even managed that, he'd never know. Upon closer inspection, Jay saw writing on the paper. After carefully unfolding the paper, Jay smiled.

There was an address.

Underneath the address there was a small note.

It said:

_Heard of your problem. Address may give you new leads._

_~Ranger_

The next move, no matter how suspicious it may be, had been made. Whoever Ranger was…Well, Jay was just happy he had an ace up his sleeve. He quickly ran off to gather up the others, completely unaware of the figure dressed in brown sitting in the tree above where the dog had been.

* * *

><p><strong>AN: Chapter 2 is finished! I have the next few chapters all planned out... Either Ch.3 will be super long or super short...Depending on whether or not I want to split it up or something.**

**Ranger belongs to Dracarot**

**Drew Tent belongs to L-Dog Z**


	4. Room 16B

**A/N: Ta-Da Chapter 3! It was actually shorter than what I wanted but I randomly got volunteered for something that completely set off my schedule.**

**I'd like to thank all of my wonderful reviewers ^^ The reviews actually make me want to update faster and with longer chapters. **

**Tristan, the plot, and all of the errors found are mine. The characters belong to their owners. **

**PM me if there's anything you'd like to see happen in this story (canon characters you'd like to see, pairings, random events, etc.) also PM me if I messed up your character.**

* * *

><p>"A dog?" Tonia asked incredulously.<p>

"I know it sounds kind of sketchy but it's the only lead we got," Jay said. After discovering the origami dog, Jay gathered up the team (minus Maya who was still doing her report. Storm wouldn't let her do anything until she saw that it was finished) to see what they thought about it. Once again, they were meeting on the roof so that they weren't discovered, Wolverine would not be happy to learn that they were conducting their own investigation.

"Yeah, I don't know. What if it's a trap?" Flora asked.

"I think we should try it. There's twelve of us and most likely one of them," Ava said, agreeing with Jay.

"How do you know?" Tonia asked.

"I told her that the address was an apartment," Lila said, "A one room apartment. At most there'd be three people,"

"Three?" Rogers asked, not seeing how it worked out.

"There's a couch," Ava explained, "and a double bed,"

"Oh…but even with Storm and the Prof gone tomorrow, Wolverine, the senior X-Men, and New Recruits will notice if twelve people aren't around tomorrow. Remember what the Prof said at dinner? Nobody's allowed outside of the mansion grounds tomorrow. Mystique was only after Tristan though, it's not like anyone else is in danger,"

"Better safe than sorry," Leo said massaging his left shoulder, Wolverine had decided he wanted them to have their first one on one danger room session right after dinner, suffice to say, Leo didn't do to well.

"So, we're going to need to leave some people behind for cover," Nat suggested.

"About how many should stay behind? If whoever's at the apartment tries to fight us, we want a clear advantage in numbers," Jay said.

"Three," Alex suggested, "Nat, because his powers might help, Lila, because the nice little shield Xavier set up for her doesn't reach beyond the mansion grounds, and Leo because he's good at talking,"

"Hey, you're good at talking too! Why do I have to stay behind?" Leo complained.

"I'm going because I said so _and_ I can use my mutation if there's any trouble, make it seem like we were never there,"

"Alex makes some good points Leo. You're going to have to stay," Nat said, perfectly content to stay at the mansion.

"Cool… We may need a diversion so that we can sneak out tomorrow morning though," Tonia said, "I suggest we just throw Ava into the rec room wearing her mission outfit, _that_ would distract half of the population here,"

"Really, and I suppose _yours _is any better?" Ava asked, jabbing her finger at Tonia's chest.

"It's better than yours!"

"Well at least mine's like that so that I'm able to use my powers better. What's your excuse?"

"Oh, that's it! I'm going to-"

"HEY!" Flora shouted, interrupting the girls before their argument could go anywhere, say, violent, "Both of your uniforms are a bit showy, live with it! Now can you please act professional for ten more minutes!"

"Leo, Flora, you're the most devious out of us. What do you two suggest for a distraction?" Rogers asked. Leo and Flora glanced at each other, bright smiles on their faces.

Ava and Tonia continued to glare at each other a bit longer before listening to the plan that the others were making.

* * *

><p>"So, Professor Xavier has a shield helping you control your powers?" Nat asked as him and Lila walked down the hallway the next day. Those who were going to the address had already left during a "mishap" that involved Bobby icing a few of Amara's clothes after she had "singed" his carpet and "melted" his doorknob.<p>

"Yeah, if you'd call it that. It only stops information from outside the mansion coming in and tormenting me," Lila said, "I still have to suffer through all the stuff that goes on around here, but I'm getting better control. Each day I know less and less about what others are doing. Unfortunately, in the general scheme of things, that amounts to almost nothing," Lila was a quiet girl who didn't get close to others, except for Nathan. Nat, who was quite considerate of people's feelings, quickly bonded with Lila and soon became one of the only people she felt open with.

"Oh…So you know all the answers to my science homework?" Nat asked, he'd already done it but he didn't know if all of his answers were correct.

"You got numbers five, eight, and fifteen wrong. Number two is at only half credit right now,"

"Crap, I could've sworn number five was right," Nat grumbled to himself. The two walked in silence for a while until Leo appeared out of one of his mirrors behind them, although Lila knew he was there, she still jumped slightly.

"Hey!" he said, "So, I inconspicuously implied that everyone was on the roof playing cards. That story should buy the others a few hours as they go to the address on the origami dog…Why a dog?"

"Symbolically dogs represent faithfulness, guardianship, companionship, and other things along those lines," Lila said as her cheeks flushed a bit. Sometimes she blurted out information that popped into her head without being able to stop it.

"So the dude who wrote the note wants us to know he's loyal to us? He could have just said so!"

"Or maybe he's just showing off his paper folding skills," Nat said, "Either way, we should head to the roof so that if anyone suspects anything they'll hear people up there,"

"I'll go get some cards!" Leo said before running off.

* * *

><p>While Leo rummaged through drawers looking for cards, the nine who had gone to town were nearing their destination.<p>

"This is so exciting!" Maya gushed happily, "I mean, think about it! This is technically our first actual field mission! There's no off switch or Logan to help us. It's like how it'll be when we're official,"

At the Institute a team wasn't considered official until the teachers deemed it to be. It usually means that the members of the team work well together when fighting and leave behind all of their personal issues. Also, if the teachers believed that the team would most likely fall apart under pressure (which would probably end up killing them all) then they wouldn't make the team official until the team proves otherwise. Once it was proclaimed official, the team would be assigned missions and the more the team members proved themselves, the bigger and better missions they'd get. Until such time, the unofficial teams had to stay behind and watch the others do all of the work, which could get quite annoying.

"We _should_ be official already," Tonia huffed.

"We should. Why aren't we yet anyway?" Sky asked.

"I think it's because we talk about school and that kind of crap when we should actually be _doing_ the danger room session," Rogers said, giving a pointed look towards Ava and Tonia.

"When we become official, what would our team name be?" Flora asked.

"I don't know. Junior Team, Team 3, C-Team," Jay said.

"Or X-Men Newbies, Newer Recruits, Younglings," Billy suggested.

"I got it!" Alex shouted, his ponytail bobbing up and down as he walked, "Team Extremus!" he stopped in the middle of the sidewalk, giving his best superhero pose, as he used a fake narrator voice to amplify the affect.

"Team Extremus?" Tonia asked with a raised eyebrow.

"I kind of like it," Ava said, "I mean we're all extreme in some way... Even Tonia,"

"I think it has a nice ring to it," Sky agreed as they all continued walking, going right past Alex who was still in his superhero pose.

"It's better than New Recruits," Rogers said.

"And the ladies on our team are _extremely _beautiful," Billy said as he winked at Ava.

"You know, waiting for people is considered a nice thing to do," Alex said as he caught back up with everyone.

"Well, you shouldn't have stopped walking," Tonia pointed out.

"Hey," Jay called out, gathering everyone's attention, "Is this the right building?" he pointed to a run down brick building across the street.

"Um…" Maya looked at the address on the piece of paper that had previously been the origami dog, "Yeah, the addresses match up. We need apartment 16-B,"

"Let's do this!" Sky clapped before crossing the street. Jay followed; apologizing to the drivers Sky had carelessly walked in front of as he went.

* * *

><p>"14-B, 15-B, 16-B! I found it!" Ava turned and shouted to the others.<p>

"Shh! You don't want to alert whoever's in there that we're here," Rogers hissed.

"After dat, he already knows _mon ami_," a voice said casually from the far end of the hallway. A man with auburn hair pulled into a ponytail stood in front of the stairwell holding two grocery bags. He wore dark sunglasses, a long brown trench coat, and tennis shoes. On his hands he wore black gloves without three of the fingers, revealing his bare thumb, pointer finger, and pinky.

As the man swaggered over to the group, Jay deduced him to be slightly older than he himself was. When he got even closer, the group could see a plain white T-shirt hidden behind the grocery bags and underneath the large trench coat. The man wore faded jeans that seemed to be a bit too baggy, but worked on him none the less.

"So, is dere a reason y' _petits _are standin' in front o' dat door?" he asked once he reached them.

"Yes, well, we wish to speak to the person living in apartment 16-B. You said he'd know we were here, so why hasn't he opened the door yet?" Jay spoke up; clearly he'd have to talk for the girls who were busy gawking over the attractive young man.

"Ah, but de _homme_ wasn't expectin' anyone. So why would he open de door?" the man with the grocery bags said, not even noticing the way the girls were looking at him…Or if he did know he seemed used to it and unaffected.

"Well, we just want to ask him a few questions," Billy said, glaring at the young man. The girls _never_ looked at him that way and he was a bit jealous.

"Does he owe y' money?"

"No," Jay said.

"Are y' gonna question some o' his less den legal activities?"

"No," Jay said, getting a bit confused.

"Oh…Well den, why're y' here t' speak wit' him?"

"We told you. We're just going to ask him some questions," Rogers said, hoping that the young man would leave.

"What kind o' questions?" as he spoke, the man set his grocery bags on the ground and leaned against the wall.

"Well…" Rogers trailed off.

"Is that a French accent?" Flora asked, fawning over the young man.

"_Non_, but y' were close. It's Cajun,"

"You're from New Orleans?" Ava asked.

"_Mais Oui!_" the man said with a smirk that irritated Billy even more, he really didn't like this guy.

"Can you get the guy who lives her to come out?" Jay asked, taking control of the situation.

"_Pourquoi pas,_" the man shrugged. He picked up his grocery bags and walked up to the door. "Step back, _s'il vous plaît_," he said, so the others did as asked, only to be shocked when the man pulled out a key from his pocket, opened the door, got in, and closed the door behind him before anyone could react.

"Did he just-!" Tonia spluttered angrily.

"Yeah he did!" Sky exclaimed.

"_That_, was a bit unexpected," Jay said, the only one who was calm and not angry.

"I'm going to wring that guy's hot neck!" Ava growled.

"Tonia, get in there and get that guy out," Rogers said, glaring at the door.

"On it!" Tonia said before turning into a fog-like smoke and going through the door. Not even five seconds later an explosion was heard and Tonia crashed into the door, knocking it down.

"Now Gambit's expectin' company," the man, Gambit apparently, said with a smirk. He pulled out three cards and everyone stared in amazement as they started glowing magenta. "Now," he said smirk still in place, "Y' gonna tell Gambit what y' want, or t'ings are goin' t' ugly real fast,"

"Alright," Jay said, picking up his hands in surrender, "We don't want any trouble," he looked over at Tonia who finally stood up, albeit painfully.

"If y' didn't want any trouble, y' wouldn't o' sent de _femme_ into Gambit's room," Gambit said before muttering something in French.

"Well maybe you shouldn't have closed the door in our faces!" Tonia shouted, rubbing the back of her head where it had hit the door.

"_Excusez-moi de ne pas vouloir être interrogés par des gens qui ne m'ont pas dit ce qu'ils veulent!_" Gambit shouted and the magenta glow on the cards became more intense.

"Umm… I'm not sure what you just said, but I don't want to stay here any longer so," Maya said as she rummaged through her purse, "Have you seen this boy?" she pulled out a picture of Tristan and showed it to Gambit.

"_Oui, _Gambit saved him from de blue _femme_," Gambit said, retracting the charge from the cards.

"Great!" Sky said with a huge smile, "So where is he?"

"Gambit don't have de _petit _anymore." He said with a shrug.

"WHAT!"

* * *

><p><strong>Roughly the French Definitions<strong>

Mon ami...My friend

Petits...Little ones

Homme...Man

Mais oui...But of course

Puorquoi pas...Why not

S'il vous plait...Please

Femme...Woman

Excusez-moi de ne pas vouloir être interrogés par des gens qui ne m'ont pas dit ce qu'ils veulent... Excuse me for not wanting to be interviewed by people who do not tell me what they want

(I'm a beginner in French so I apologize if something is incorrect)

* * *

><p><strong>AN: Sorry if Gambit isn't completely correct. I'm really trying to figure out his accent. In case you're questioning his T-shit and jeans outfit, he was serious when he said he wasn't expecting visitors. He was dressed casually, not in a mission outfit or something like that. Also, I'm leaning more towards Gambit's comic book look (no goatee).**

**In case you haven't realized it yet, Gambit's my favorite canon character ^^**

**Another apology, if there is no such thing as a 16-B in an apartment, sorry! **

**WARNING: Next chapter is probably going to be a bit dark towards the end.**

**Feel free to review. :D**


	5. The Fate of the Morlocks Part 1

**A/N:...I got a bit carried away with this chapter but there was so much I needed to add! I didn't even get to where I wanted to go.**

**So, my first attempt at an actual fight scene...like ever...is in this chapter so please be easy on me. **

**WARNING: Death! and some cussing (I try to avoid that as much as possible ^^) and some violence.**

**Also, I have a ton of papers and what not due soon so updates may not be a weekly thing. **

**I own nothing but Tristan and my "Oh so wonderful" grammar. **

**Sorry if some of your characters are a bit different in this chapter... It's just not a happy chapter so... PM me with major problems.**

**Review please ^^ THANKS TO EVERYONE WHO HAS REVIEWED IN THE PAST! You all are awesome ^^**

**Due to many scene changes, I labeled when we are at the X-Mansion...The end of the random Author's note is...Now!**

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><p>"Sure, why don't y' make y'selves at home," Gambit said sarcastically to the teenagers sprawled throughout his apartment room. His day had started off wonderfully; he robbed a jewelry store, won every single game of poker (again), and he bought himself some more bourbon. Unfortunately when he found teenagers gathered around his door as he returned with the recently bought bourbon he knew his day was ruined. He was proven correct when the teenagers turned out to be mutants who were obviously overwhelmed and out of their league. The way they acted proved as much to Gambit.<p>

First, there was their complete lack of leadership. Sure, the brunette guy with blue eyes-Jay right? - tried to keep things from chaos, but that didn't really help much. He wasn't an established leader so the others didn't feel like they _had_ to do what he said. Like, for example, when he said, "Just because there isn't a door keeping you out anymore doesn't mean you can barge into some guy's apartment!" nobody listened, hence the unplanned party in Gambit's room.

Another thing Gambit noticed was their inability to stay professional when they needed to. When the platinum blonde with silver eyes who could turn into smoke started shouting at the brunette girl with pink highlights, he knew that they weren't ready for whatever little mission they were doing. They had mentioned that they were from Xavier's and Gambit couldn't help but wonder how stupid the faculty there was if they let this group come out and question him. Truthfully, Gambit knew he'd be able to beat all of them simply by pitting them against each other.

Then there was the blonde, almost white, haired boy with the ponytail. He introduced himself as Alex, right? That boy never knew when to shut up. By now his chatter was just a small buzzing in Gambit's ears. _And Gambit t'ought he talked a lot._

"You know Gambit," the pink highlighted girl, Amy? Annie? Ava! Definitely Ava, said, "When Rogue described you, she described you way differently,"

"_Oui,_" Gambit said as he opened one of the bourbons, "but Gambit decided ta change up his appearance a bit. Would y' prefer he looked de way _chere _described him?"

"No!" the red head with green eyes blurted out, "I mean, you look fine now…Why change?"

"Gambit always looks fine, Flora," Gambit said with a smirk that only grew when the girl blushed. Gambit was just thankful he guessed her name right.

After he gave up on the mental checklist of everything the teenagers were doing wrong, Gambit finally pulled up one of the wooden chairs he had near a small table and sat down. "So," he said casually, "Why y' be lookin' for de _petit_?"

"He was kidnapped during an outing by Mystique…and then apparently _saved _by you," the athletic looking boy with brown hair and green eyes, Billy, said while glaring at him. Gambit quickly assessed that the boy didn't like him.

"Yeah, if you saved him why don't you have him anymore?" the annoying blonde with the ponytail asked.

"Why don't you fill in the gaps for us first," Jay suggested, "So you saw Mystique with Tristan,"

"_Oui_, Gambit saw de _femme _wit' de _petit_. Was carryin' him 'round like a sack o' potatoes, de _petit_ was still out o' it from chloroform I t'ink. Since Gambit isn't workin' for de Bucket Head no more and he finds kidnappin' children morally wrong, he decided t' help out. One six o' spades and nine o' clubs later de _petit _was conked out here wit' an ice pack on his head," Gambit said as he drank more bourbon, he wasn't meant to be a storyteller. Especially a storyteller to a group of untrained X-Men.

"So why isn't he here now?" Skylar, the girl with blonde hair and big blue eyes, asked.

"Believe it o' not, Gambit _does_ have a job," he leaned back in his chair and propped his feet on the table next to him. Gambit, despite his calm appearance, _wasn't_ in the mood for twenty questions and he was getting very annoyed.

"Ah, if I recall correctly, you're _job_ is being a thief," Maya, the girl with brown eyes and light brown hair, stated.

"Believe it o' not, at Xavier's we do actually learn who to stay away from," Alex said with a fake Cajun accent to mimic Gambit.

"Den why y' here, _hein_?" Gambit asked in frustration, "If y' leaned anyt'ing y' woulda attack _moi _on sight. Didn't recognize _moi_, dat it?"

"You had sunglasses on," Jay pointed out. Gambit had taken off the sunglasses when he entered his room earlier, before Tonia had phased through his door as smoke.

"Y' listen here _homme_," Gambit said in a chilling voice, red on black eyes burning into Jay (figuratively of course), "_Mes yeux appartiennent au diable, et je préfère oublier ce fait précis. Donc, en anglais_: Don't. Mention. De. Eyes. _Comprendre_?" by the time he finished talking, Gambit's eyes were glowing, as was the table his hands were clenching. He'd decided that the best way to get rid of his unwelcome visitors was to drop the façade and let them see how crazy he truly was, even if it meant blowing up a table in his face. _Merde, mon head truly be fucked up,_ Gambit thought dryly as the table proceeded to glow brighter.

"Okay, Okay!" the other blonde guy with green eyes spoke up for the first time, hands up and eyes wide. He'd been introduced as Alex, but after a long story that Gambit didn't care about, said to call him Rogers instead. "Take the charge back! Just tell us where the kid is and we'll be on our way. Heck, the other students at Xavier's don't even need to know that you're here,"

"Can't tell y' where de _petit_ is," Gambit said as he pulled back the charge.

"Ugh! Why not? You want us gone as much as we want to leave!" The smoke- lady, Tonia, shouted in exasperation.

"Won't be able ta find de entrance. He's wit' de sewer people and dey hide demselves pretty well. Only someone who knows de tunnels can find dem…on purpose dat is, dey have a few accidental visitors now and den,"

"And I suppose you know the tunnels?"

"_Oui,_ told y', Gambit has a job. De _petit _saw a girl he knew and said dat dey could see him safely_ accueil_ so Gambit left him in dere caring hands,"

"Well then, take us to the tunnels!" Maya said relieved, the wild goose chase was finally over.

* * *

><p><strong>X-Mansion<strong>

Leo wandered the halls of Xavier's. He was getting a bit worried, Storm and the Professor would be back in about two hours, the plan now had a time crunch and the rest of the team didn't appear to be showing up anytime soon. _We should have used radios or something…at least used cell phones, _Leo thought, slightly upset as he remembered how easily they'd turned down his cell phone idea. "We'll be easy to trace," Jay had said. _Who's going to trace you? _Leo thought angrily as he created a mirror in front of him. He walked into it and appeared in the kitchen.

"Hello Leo," he was greeted by a cheerful Jean Grey. He really didn't understand why so many of the girls at the mansion hated her, she wasn't mean and was only ever caring and nice and…oooh, he got it. She must seem too nice and goody-goody to some people. To bad those people didn't see it when goody-goody Jean Grey and Boy Scout Scott Summers decided to-

"I wouldn't finish that thought if I were you Leo. You're projecting," Jean called from the other side of the room, a slight blush on her cheeks because of the fact somebody knew the little secret she and Scott had.

"Sorry…So…Know any good jokes?" Leo asked hopefully.

* * *

><p>"I've been here before, there's no entrance to the Morlocks' tunnels from here," Ava said as Gambit led them into an alley.<p>

"Why were you in here?" Flora asked curiously as she scrunched up her nose, the alley reeked.

"My mother brought me to New York six months after my mutation developed. Apparently there was a big party or something going on. While we were here she tried to get me to visit a doctor to see if he could 'turn off' my mutation. I ran off and hid in here for a few hours until I called my mother and told her _exactly _what I thought about that doctor. This alley smelled better then,"

"How do you know this is the exact alley you hid in?" Sky asked curiously as she watched Gambit move a dumpster with Alex, Rogers, Billy and Jay's help, it was a big dumpster that was completely full.

"That," Ava pointed towards a huge scorch mark on the wall, "I was angry and shot lightning at the wall,"

"I think my dad went to that party," Tonia said absentmindedly.

"What?" Maya asked, not having been paying attention because she'd been watching Gambit. All of the girls had to admit, the Cajun was hot.

"My family all went actually. Well, it was probably the same party. The location and time match up,"

"So you and Ava already knew each other?" Maya asked. She always enjoyed learning about people's pasts. Mutants tended to have very interesting lives after all.

"She wasn't there," Ava said.

"Where Ava's parents liked her making appearances, my parents tried to hide me," explained Tonia, watching in awe as Gambit pointed out a hardly noticeable hatch in the ground that had been under the dumpster.

"Did you guys discuss this already?" Flora asked confused.

"Believe it or not, we didn't hate each other the moment we met. It took about a week," Tonia said. Before anyone could respond, they all felt the urge to gag. The stench in the alley got ten times as worse when Gambit opened the hatch.

"_Mon Dieu,_" Gambit mumbled, face suddenly pale.

"What's wrong Gambit?" Jay asked concerned as he watched Billy, completely oblivious to the sudden tension, flirt with the girls.

"Do y' know what dat smell is _homme_?" Gambit asked with no humor in his voice at all.

"No, I-" whatever Jay had been going to say was cut off by the sound of a gunshot coming from wherever the hatch led to.

"_Merde!_" Gambit cursed in French, "Dat smell be blood, dat smell is death!" he said before jumping down into the hatch, followed closely by nine of the members of Team Extremus.

* * *

><p><strong>X-Mansion<strong>

From the trees near Xavier's Institute, an invisible figure stood perched on a branch as he watched the boy and girl walk over to the nearby lake (it was actually a pond but he wasn't going to spoil their fun). He watched as the boy talked animatedly to the girl who would occasionally put in her own comments. The girl looked a few years younger than the boy, not that it was a major age difference.

The figure absentmindedly tapped his finger on his leg. Where was the older boy with the brown hair and blue eyes? He should have been back already. The figure sighed in frustration; he had to get back home before his mother noted his absence. Originally from Massachusetts, the figure couldn't help but wonder what made his parents randomly decide to move to Bayville New York, the town with Xavier's Institute without even enrolling him in it. It seemed a bit too coincidental and odd for his taste. _Add that to the list of things to find out,_ he thought before silently jumping out of the tree.

He took a piece of paper and a pencil out of one of his pockets and quickly wrote:

"_Abused patience turns to fury."- Thomas Fuller_

_Luckily, I have plenty of patience. Be back here Friday at eight at night. We need a face to face of sorts. Come alone._

_~Ranger_

* * *

><p>Annalee saw him coming. To weak to do anything she waited. She looked around one last time, taking in all the horror around her. They were all dead. All of them that were down there. Cybelle, Piper, Tommy, Zeek, even Ray. Ray wasn't supposed to be there. He was with the X-Men, why was he down in the tunnels dying? That's right, he left the X-Men about two weeks ago. She was happy to see him then, Annalee was. Now, she couldn't help but wish he hadn't ever met her. If he hadn't met her, certainly he hadn't met the Morlocks, and certainly he wouldn't be dead.<p>

Annalee felt a tear roll down her cheek. His death had been cruel, Ray's had. The one called Scrambler caused him to electrocute himself to death. Who'd tell the X-Men of his demise if all of the witnesses died?

The last thing Annalee ever saw on Earth was the barrel of a gun as it went off.

And that was the tragic end of Annalee the empath.

* * *

><p><strong>X-Mansion<strong>

"So, Roberto huh?" Nat asked in amusement.

"So, Jean huh?" Lila mocked him.

"Hey, the telepath is hot," he defended himself.

"You're pathetic,"

Lila and Nat had gotten impatient waiting for the others to come back so they decided to take a trip to the lake. Storm and Xavier would be back any minute and once they was arrived, the teens were all screwed. So to relax and not worry for a bit, Nat and Lila decided the lake was the best place to hang out. It was always peaceful and quiet, the lake was. When students of Xavier's went to the lake they forgot about all of their troubles for a while. Completely untouched by all of the polluters of the world, the lake always shown brightly beneath the moonlight.

"Why aren't they back yet?" Lila asked worriedly.

"I don't know. They're probably having more fun than us though," Nat replied nonchalantly as he sat down on the grass.

* * *

><p>BANG! BANG! BANG! Bullet after bullet.<p>

"OH GOD!" "HELP SOMEBODY!" "SAVE US" Blood curdling scream after blood curdling scream.

Cry after cry.

Whimper after whimper.

Last breath after last breath.

Death after death after death after death.

Gambit was oblivious to the teens following him like lost puppies as he listened to chaos unfolding within the tunnels. No matter how fast he or the others ran, they'd be too late. They all knew it too.

After turning a particularly slippery corner (nobody wanted to see what they were slipping on) a figure came into view. The figure was inhumanly big and it was standing over what appeared to be a little girl with bones growing out of her.

Without a second thought Gambit charged a card and threw it at the figure. It was a dead hit but since it wasn't a strong charge the figure was able to recompose himself fairly quick, not quick enough to kill the girl, however, who Gambit had scooped into his arms.

Getting the hint, Jay stuck out his hands and enveloped the figure in black flames, his eyes now burning black as well. Everyone but Gambit seemed to think that that ended the fight, so they were surprised the figure charged through the flames towards Team Extremus. Jay, who was about to get plowed into, dived out of the way, revealing a very much unprepared Ava.

Ava was saved when a flying card hit the massive figure in the side, sending him flying away, for the moment. Gambit stood to the side, an unrecognizable expression on his face.

"We didn't bring our uniforms!" Flora shouted, horrified with the fact that the little girl Gambit was holding could have died if they'd arrived a second later.

"I don't think it really matters!" Alex shouted, mostly due to the noise deeper in the tunnel where most of the screams and explosions were coming from.

"Respite over!" Tonia shouted pointing at the giant man as he came back. She turned into smoke just as he made a grab for her.

"Eh, Blockbuster!" Gambit shouted glowing cards in hand, before the bigger man could attack someone else.

"Gambit, what a surprise!" Blockbuster sneered as Billy sent a huge gale wind his way. The wind proved useless as it didn't move the giant man. "That map you gave us was very helpful by the way," the huge man chuckled as rage filled Gambit's eyes.

"What's he talking about Gambit?" Flora asked as Gambit handed her the girl so he could join the fight. There was a lack of water in the area so it was decided that Flora's mutation wouldn't be particularly helpful.

Gambit didn't answer Flora's question. He just glared at the man whose name apparently was Blockbuster. Then Ava took advantage at the momentary cease fire and zapped Blockbuster in the back with pink lightning.

"Sky, lower his body temperature! It'll slow him down!" Jay ordered. Sky did as told and an obvious change of pace was made when Blockbuster took twice as long to get up.

"That's it!" the giant man shouted as he charged Sky, only to stop midway and look at where she was standing in confusion. "Where'd she go?"

Sky gave a strained smile to Alex. He'd done something to Blockbuster's head to make it seem as if Sky wasn't there.

"Rogers, I can't keep his body temperature this low anymore. I think it's time you blasted him!" Sky said her jaw clenched in pain.

"Right," Rogers said before a bright concussive blast left his hands and hit Blockbuster. The burly man stumbled back a few paces and did something completely unexpected. With each of his massive hands, he reached out and grabbed Tonia and Rogers. Tonia quickly turned into smoke and got out of his hold, Rogers wasn't so lucky. He threw the boy at the perfect angle to nail Jay. Both boys flew backwards and a loud smack was heard as Jay's head collided with the concrete floor.

"Sky, take the girl while I check on Jay and Rogers!" Flora ordered the girl who looked like she was about to pass out.

"But, his body temperature…" Sky objected weekly.

"If you keep that up you'll pass out, that won't help anything. Do as you're told!" Flora said before taking off to check on the downed boys.

* * *

><p><strong>X-Mansion<strong>

Wolverine stood up with a grunt as he made his way towards the door to let Ororo and Charles Xavier in.

"How'd it go?" he asked in a gruff voice.

"All of the students are doing rather well. Some better than others, I won't lie, but overall everyone has made some kind of improvement. There have been many complaints over their inability to stay still though," Ororo summarized for the Canadian who really didn't seem to care.

"Where is Maya? I wish to congratulate her on her high marks in physical education," Charles asked curiously.

"Isn't she in the mansion?" Logan asked.

"I do not sense her,"

"Try finding Alex Rogers or Avalon. She spends a lot of time with them," Ororo suggested.

"They are not here either," Charles said, worry starting to appear in his eyes. Just then, an unfortunate Leo walked by only to be quickly grabbed by a suspicious Logan.

"Hey, what's your problem? Can't a guy walk to the bathroom without getting attacked by a feral mutant?" the boy asked as he struggled against Logan's hold, "Didn't I suffer enough last night after dinner? Or this afternoon before lunch? Sheesh, way to single people out!"

"You were stalkin' me yesterday bub. Now yer friends are all gone. Seems a bit suspicious,"

"Now that you mention it, I had a rather odd experience with Nathan yesterday. I believe he said something about a duck before leaving my office," Xavier said thoughtfully.

Logan popped out his claws and stuck them underneath Leo's chin. "Start talkin' bub," he threatened.

"Hey now! No need for the claws! I'll talk!" Leo said with wide eyes.

"Good, now tell us everything" Logan said, releasing the boy. Leo opened his mouth and did just that, told them everything.

* * *

><p>"Billy! You just messed me up!" Maya yelled, her attack at Blockbuster having been ruined when Billy sent a strong wind her way.<p>

"Sorry Maya, but I couldn't let your beautiful hands get dirty fighting him," Billy attempted as he dodged a slab of concrete,

"Just focus!" Maya ordered before flipping over a particularly sharp rock. Blockbuster had figured out how to use their numbers against them a few minutes ago and had since been throwing deadly rocks and concrete at them. Whenever someone dodged, they'd run into someone else and then both of them would have to avoid being hit by the next thing thrown their way.

Alex cried out as a particularly sharp rock hit his shoulder. He put his hand to the wound and quickly pulled it back. His hand was sticky. He was bleeding. Flora, who had quickly taken over the role of nurse, led him around the corner away from the fight.

At one point, nobody knew when, Tonia had disappeared from the fight only to return moments later with ice packs, bandages, and gauze wraps. Nobody questioned her about how she got those items and a silent agreement had been made that whenever the opportunity presented itself she was to go get more.

Alex looked down and saw that Jay was still unconscious; a white bandage wrapped around his head that was slowly turning red where his head had hit the concrete. Rogers, although conscious, looked dazed as he held an ice pack to his head. Alex was sickened more with the fact that Rogers was here than Jay's bleeding head. Alex had never seen Rogers injured, which was pretty surprising, and now he realized that the other boy was far from indestructible, he was as easily injured as the rest of them. That was probably what affected Alex the most out of the whole ordeal, although they were mutants, they could potentially die in the tunnels before they even got the chance to reach the main Morlock encampment.

"Will you stop talking," Flora snapped. Alex hadn't even noticed he was saying anything. _What was I talking about? _He wondered as Flora wrapped his shoulder. "Hey Sky?" Flora asked the girl who was taking an aspirin.

"Yeah?"

"How's the girl doing?" Just as Flora had taken up the nurse role, Sky had, against her will, taken up the babysitter role. This was mostly due to the fact that Blockbuster had too much body fluids and it gave Sky headaches when she tried to alter all of its temperature. Occasionally she'd go out and help but she always came back when a headache started to come. Recently though she stopped leaving altogether due to the fact that there was nothing to drink and she was quickly becoming dehydrated, a problem that occurred quite often due to her powers.

"She's fine. Just fell asleep," Sky pointed towards the sleeping girl, "She keeps saying she wants 'Red Eyes' I can only assume that she means Gambit,"

"Gambit's hiding something," Alex stated.

"I know! He knows who's doing this. We'll ask him about it later. We don't want-" Flora's sentence was abruptly cut off by a loud magenta explosion.

* * *

><p><strong>X-Mansion<strong>

The ringing never stopped. Three phones left to try before the adults would believe them. Leo was getting impatient. It was late at night, a school night, and his teammates had yet to return. He looked over at Lila and Nat, the two of them had walked into the mansion only to receive the same treatment Leo had had previously. Luckily, their stories had matched up. That didn't stop Wolverine from insisting that they call every single cell phone.

"Give it a rest dude," Bobby 'Iceman' Drake said casually, "They don't have their cells with them," Bobby, for some unfathomable reason was the leader of the New Recruits which was why he was allowed into the war room for the meeting. The meeting just consisted of Storm, Wolverine, Xavier, Cyclops who was the leader of the senior X-Men, and, of course, Bobby. Along with the three conspirators who helped the rest of their team sneak out.

"That's what I've been trying to tell him!" Leo exclaimed.

"Just makin' sure yer were tellin' the truth," Wolverine said hanging up the phone.

"Excuse me, Professor?" Lila asked quietly.

"Yes Lila?" Charles said calmly, he couldn't let his students see how worried he was.

"Something is happening. I don't know what it is…"

"Yes well, something is always happening Lila," Cyclops said annoyed. He'd been in the middle of having a wonderful dessert with Jean when the Professor had mentally called him to the war room.

"No!" the fifteen year old girl screamed, "You don't understand! There's so much! They don't know!" she grasped her head and clenched her eyes shut.

"Lila, I need you to relax, okay?" the Professor asked as calmly as he could. Truthfully he, as well as everyone else in the room, was surprised by her outburst.

"I can't! It's everywhere!" Lila gasped.

"Child, what is everywhere?" Storm asked concerned.

"Blood! Death! God, make it stop!" Lila cried out before collapsing, only to get caught by Leo.

"I think it's time we use Cerebro to find the others," Nat said, his hazel eyes unreadable.

* * *

><p>"Is he…dead?" Maya asked quietly as she stood over the remains of Blockbuster.<p>

"I'm guessing yes," Billy said as he stared at the body. He poked it with his foot just to be safe.

"Oh. My. God. We just- just killed someone!" Ava said horrified.

"_Non,_ I'm pretty sure I killed de _homme_," Gambit said without emotion. Just then, Flora, Sky, the bandaged Alex, and the dazed Rogers all rushed around the corner to stare in shock at the dead mutant.

"W-what happened?" Rogers asked.

"I don't know. I saw glowing pink {a muttered 'magenta' was heard} knives fly through the air and hit him in the back and then they exploded and then- then- _this_!" Maya said in near hysterics.

"Calm down Maya. Remember, we still have to get the rest of the way," Sky said a slight wavering in her voice.

Silence ascended the group. There hadn't been silence in a while, what with all the crying, gunshots, explosions, screams, not to mention the fight… Wait, if there was silence then that meant that the killers weren't killing anymore…Uh-Oh.

"_Allons!_" Gambit shouted, taking off.

"You guys go ahead; I'll wait for Tonia to return with more supplies. Bring the injured here," Flora said, so the others ran off after Gambit.

* * *

><p><strong>X-Mansion<strong>

"Oh my stars and garters!" Dr. Hank McCoy said upon the arrival of an unconscious Lila to his lab. "What happened?"

"Something made it through her shield," Cyclops said as he laid the girl down on a bed. "It was pretty bad,"

"Any news on our missing party?" Hank asked as he set up an IV.

"The Professor is searching for them on Cerebro now. First Tristan and now this! I feel like I'm way out of my league here. Lila was right; something _is_ happening…I just wish I knew what"

"Ah, but the doorstep to the temple of wisdom is a knowledge of our own ignorance. I believe Benjamin Franklin said that,"

"Well, I've acknowledged what I don't know, so where's this temple of wisdom?" just then, as if some great power heard Scott, Rogue rushed into the room.

"Hey Cyke," she said, "Suit up. They found 'em,"

* * *

><p>The scent of blood was the most prominent stench that filled Maya's nostrils. She didn't know what to expect once she reached the main Morlock encampment with the others. She knew it wouldn't be good…and she was scared.<p>

Blood. Carnage. Decay. Death.

Billy didn't want to flirt. He didn't want to crack a joke. He didn't even want to talk. He knew he was nearing something horrible and yet he couldn't go back. For the first time in a long time, Billy was nervous…and he was scared.

Slaughter. Massacre. Killing. Death.

Ava was in shock. That's the only word that could describe how she felt. She kept following the others; she didn't trust herself to lead. Flora probably wanted to come with them and Ava couldn't understand why. Curiosity most likely. Ava had thought watching Blockbuster's back explode was bad but she knew what lay in head was a lot worse…and she was scared.

Despair. Horror. Chaos. Death.

Rogers' head hurt but he kept running. Maybe they could still find the killers. Although he hadn't seen one body (besides Blockbuster's, but that didn't count) Alex Rogers knew for a fact that there were many. Maybe they weren't here, but up ahead, where for so many years the Morlocks found sanctuary, Rogers knew. He was about to witness the result of a massacre…and he was scared.

Victim. Traumatized. Silence. Death.

Gambit ran faster than he could ever remember. Faster than that time on the street when a mob tried to take out his eyes. Faster than when he ran away from the assassins trying to kill him after he accidentally blew up Julien. Faster than after the incident in Seattle with the movie theatre. Faster than when he realized the Devil was after him. Gambit ran. Remy LeBeau ran. He knew deep down that it was all his fault. He all but led them to the Morlocks. He didn't want to see what he had caused. Yet he ran towards the chaos instead of away. He kept hearing the same thing. It's all your fault. It's all your fault. It's all your fault…and he, Remy LeBeau, was guilty.

Guilt. Guilt. Guilt. Guilt.

Guilt. Guilt. Guilt. Guilt.

Death.

And then they reached what was left of the Morlocks.

* * *

><p>AN: Chapter four is complete. The section with Annalee made me sad :(

For some reason my French to English definitions won't show up so...I guess an online translator might help if you're super curious...Remember, I'm a beginner in French.

**Sorry to include the Mutant Massacre (with my own evil twist) but I find it to be a major and important plotline that was never included in the actual X-Men Evolution series... Probably because it wasn't good for children...**


	6. The Fate of the Morlocks Part 2

**A/N: You can thank a terrible case of insomnia this week for the extra long chapter. Sorry if there's any spelling or grammar issues at all, Microsoft Office's (which I don't own) spell and grammar check kind of stopped working on my computer...which also stopped working halfway through the chapter.**

**Sorry if some character's are under-used in this chapter while others are over-used, I just felt some characters were closer to the events than others...**

**WARNING: Language! Not very bad though. Blood, gore, unpleasantness, sadness.**

**I only own Tristan and the occasional dead or injured Morlock I created ^^ Everything else belongs to its or their respectable owner(s).**

* * *

><p>"Are you, like, sure this is where they're at?" Shadowcat asked, staring at the open hatch in dismay. "It smells, like, awful,"<p>

"Cyclops, Ah think we found somethin'," Rogue said into her com badge, ignoring Shadowcat.

"Alright. You two check it out; we'll be over there shortly." Cyclops' voice answered over the com.

"…I'll, like, take that as a yes," Shadowcat grumbled as she climbed into the dark tunnel after Rogue.

* * *

><p>Flora was worried…No, worried would be putting it lightly. She was freaking out. To begin with, Jay only seemed to be doing worse. His head wound kept bleeding and as it turned out, he had a deep gash in his side that he'd failed to tell anyone about, and to top it all off he was getting a fever.<p>

Another thing, she hadn't heard from the ones who had went ahead to check out the damage done to the Morlocks. Were they okay? Were there too many injured to bring back to her? Were there so many dead that it was hard to search for the injured? Or worse, were the killers still there, killing off her friends?

"Hey, Flora?" a voice asked, startling her out of her reverie. Flora turned around to see that Tonia was back, more supplies in hand, staring at Jay worriedly.

"Y-yes?" the red head asked trying to sound calm, but failing.

"Is he…?" 'Going to make it' were the unspoken words. Tonia being worried. Rogers being injured. Maya not being happy. Billy not flirting. Jay. Always strong, cool, and collected Jay possibly dying…Everything and everyone was off kilter and the world outside of the tunnels had no idea.

"I don't know Tonia," Flora whispered with tears in her eyes, "I really don't know," and Tonia knew that her Irish friend wasn't just referring to Jay's fate.

* * *

><p>They stared. Nobody spoke. Nobody moved. What were they supposed to do? Time stood still. Any sound fell upon deaf ears. Until, suddenly, many things happened at once.<p>

Maya whispered "Oh my God," as tears fell down her cheeks.

Gambit, for the first time in a long time, crossed himself.

Sky fell to her knees and covered he mouth.

Alex puked.

Rogers got angry and kicked and blasted a wall as he cried.

Billy felt the closest body's neck for a pulse, and received none.

And Ava saw the body of Ray Crisp.

* * *

><p>"Ugh! I, like, think it smells worse the farther we, like, walk!" Shadowcat complained as she covered her nose.<p>

"Ah know, and Ah can't figure out what it is!" Rogue said frustrated.

"Hey, look!" Shadowcat pointed ahead, "I, like, see light!" Sure enough, up ahead in the tunnel was a light, it appeared to be a lamp, along with a few shadowy figures.

"It kinda looks like a nurse station," Rogue said as she noticed one of the figures kneeling over another one, doing what appeared to be feeling their forehead.

"Like, why would there be a nurse station here?"

"Well, the Morlocks are in these tunnels…But not here,"

"If it's, like, nurses, we don't have to, like, attack them…Do we?"

"No. Just try ta stay alert in case,"

"But, like, what if-"

"Rogue! Kitty! Thank God!" a hysterical voice interrupted. One of the figures quickly ran two X-Men. Once closer, the figure turned out to be Flora who had tears cascading down her face.

"Flora what-" Rogue tried only to be interrupted.

"Please tell me that Mr. McCoy is coming!" Flora all but begged.

"Why would-"

"Come here!" Flora ordered as she pulled the two girls behind her over towards the apparent nurse station. Once they got closer, Rogue and Shadowcat gasped in horror.

Lying on a makeshift bed, which appeared to be a whole bunch of blankets stacked on top of each other, was Jay. The boy was pale and his dark hair clung to his forehead with sweat beading all around his face. He had a bandage wrapped around his head that was red where blood had seeped through and another bloody bandage was wrapped around his side. It appeared that his shirt had been cut off and thrown carelessly aside in order to wrap up the side. All in all, the eighteen year old did not look so good.

"Oh mah Gawd! What happened?" Rogue exclaimed, worry evident in her voice.

"We got into a fight with Blockbuster. Walk around the corner up ahead and you'll see what's left of him," Tonia said as she appeared with pillows in her hands.

"Who's Blockbuster?" and "Why do ya need all of those pillows?" was asked at the same time by the two very confused, as well as concerned, X-Women.

"We're not very sure who Blockbuster is…All we know is that he's dead now. The excess amount of pillows, as well as supplies, is for the Morlocks,"

Again, Rogue and Kitty asked questions at the same time. This time they asked, "Why, like, do the Morlocks need so much supplies?" and "Who's that kid?"

"We heard shooting…That's why we came down here. Please don't make me explain anymore of that right now!" Flora pleaded, "And that," she nodded her head towards the still sleeping bone covered girl Gambit had saved, "That's a Morlock. The one Blockbuster was going to kill,"

"Where're, like, the other six of you?" Shadowcat asked.

"They headed to the main Morlock encampment with Gambit. They're bringing the injured, if there is any, over here. That's why I'm happy you're here, now someone with real medical experience can help,"

"Hold on! The Swamp Rat is here?" Rogue asked.

"Yeah, he showed us into the tunnels and…Crap! Flora, he's still hiding something!" Tonia said.

"Just wait until this mess gets fixed up before you give him the third degree Tonia," Flora said as she put an icepack on Jay's head.

"That's just it! This mess will _never_ get fixed! Nothing is ever going to be the same again! We've all changed…are still changing! Nobody can call us innocent or naïve anymore, Flora. We've seen terrible things, I'm just glad I'm not seeing what's up ahead. That's probably even worse than watching Blockbuster explode," Tonia's fuse had finally reached the dynamite. It was clear to everyone that Tonia was about to explode at any second and nobody wanted to see it when it happened.

Flora was the first to give in to the need to get away from Tonia before she officially lost it. _Everyone deals in their own way I suppose,_ the red head thought as she picked up the purse Maya had carelessly thrown onto the ground before the fight with Blockbuster.

"Where're ya goin'?" Rogue asked, watching Flora empty out the purse's contents and filling it as full as it could get with ice packs and bandages.

"To the Morlocks. Not all of the injured will be able to make it over here without basic medical aid. Hey, Shadowcat, can you toss me two water bottles? They're in the cooler," Flora said, and then caught the water bottles Shadowcat threw at her.

"Ah'm comin' too,"

"No, if you can, help Jay and get more supplies. When the rest of the X-Men get here you can go to the Morlocks,"

"Fahne," Rogue consented, out of all of them she had the most medical knowledge. She picked up two boxes of garbage bags and held them out to Flora, "ta cover up the...ya know…" Flora nodded accepting the bags and then left.

* * *

><p>Maya slowly swallowed the bile that made its way up her throat. The day wasn't supposed to end like this. It was supposed to be simple. Go to the address, get the kid back, and return to the mansion to be praised for such great work…and possibly punished later for breaking the rules.<p>

Either way, nowhere in that plan was there anything that even mentioned walking among dead bodies looking for even the most remote signs of life. Nowhere had it been stated that she'd be trying to avoid walking on blood, in her civilian clothes no less, as cold, lifeless eyes stared at her everywhere she went. It hadn't been brought up that she'd have to feel dead people's cold flesh, hoping for a pulse.

"_Petits,_" Gambit's voice spoke up, the first thing said that had been directed towards a living being since they'd reached the sea of death, "If y' can, try t' close dere eyes. Nobody should be left lookin' out on a world dey can't see no longer," Maya nodded in acknowledgement.

She didn't know how long she'd been walking over the black ground. Black? The concrete tunnels were grey…_Oh God! _Maya fought back the urge to puke and visibly flinched in revulsion. She took a step back to get out of the dried blood and tripped over something soft, and landed square on her butt in a puddle… Except it wasn't a puddle…That's when Maya failed at controlling her gag reflexes. She puked and couldn't help but cry as some of her vomit hit the body of a girl a bit younger than her.

Maya stood up slowly, hair disheveled, legs and butt covered in blood and puke, hands dirty and red. She felt disgusted in herself and was positive if she went to the surface people would assume she was a sociopathic serial killers like in the horror movies.

_I should close her eyes_, Maya thought as she looked at the girl her vomit had hit. Maya couldn't help but be glad when she noticed that the eyes were already half closed. She didn't want to touch the dead girl any longer than she had to. Mostly out of habit by now, Maya put her finger to the girl's neck to check for a pulse. She wasn't expecting to find one.

And she didn't.

* * *

><p>Ava hadn't left Ray's side since discovering his body. His face was on the ground and Ava couldn't quite find it within herself to flip him over. It wasn't her place to do so anyway. It was probably Flora's job, if anyone's. The Irish girl and Ray had been off and on dating when he was still at the mansion. After their last breakup he had decided to leave the mansion, get away for a while. He was only going to be gone for about a month. He was supposed to come back to the Institute and start dating Flora again; the two were madly in love and wouldn't admit it.<p>

Now they never could.

Ava took it upon herself to see to it that Ray's body was buried at the mansion. It's where his home was. Where his family still is at, oblivious that the next time they see him he'll be in a casket.

"You know Ray," Ava said to the body of her friend as if nothing was wrong, "The saying about never knowing what you have until it's gone doesn't really make sense. I mean, sure, everybody understands that they take things for granted, but truthfully, nobody can even begin to comprehend what they have, even after it's gone. You can't understand why people act the way they do or why you enjoy certain things, you certainly don't know how those people who have nothing, not even family, can still smile. Even when all that's gone, the smiles, the enjoyment, the little quirks people have, you don't know why it was there to begin with, especially just so it could get taken away…" she let out a wet laugh, "I probably don't make any sense right now do I?

"Not really, but it sounded good," Billy's voice startled Ava out of her reverie. She watched as he found a space on the ground not covered in blood and sat down beside her.

"Billy, I'm not in the mood for…well anything right now," Ava said without emotion, she just stared straight ahead, not really seeing anything.

"Things will get better. We just have to get through it, but we're a team so we'll do it together. Even if our unofficial leader is conked out and bleeding; we'll just have to adjust,"

"Wow, that was really inspiring Billy. But look around! Nothing will get better for _them_! A lot of them were children; they had their whole lives ahead of them!" she gasped suddenly, "Oh God! Evan! Storm may want his- you know…"

"I'll look for him," Billy stood up, a smirk forming on his face, "Don't want him seeing such a fine woman such as yourself and start thinking that you're his own personal angel, you're already mine," he winked and walked off.

Ava looked at Ray's body once more, "At least some things don't change," she said with a new confidence. If Billy could go back to flirting, poorly too, there was hope for the rest of them right? She looked around her and gave a defeated sigh, who was she fooling? Things were changing.

* * *

><p>"I found one!" Rogers's voice echoed throughout the Morlocks' old home.<p>

"Found one what?" Sky asked closing the eyes of someone else. _Number twelve_, she counted off in her head.

"She's alive!" he shouted. Everybody held their breath at his statement. There had already been several false alarms already.

"Let me see," Sky carefully stepped over several bodies to get over to Rogers. He looked at her with a sort of sad desperation; he really wanted the Morlock to be alive. Sky inhaled deeply and crinkled her nose; she really hated the copper smell that still filled the air. The blonde felt the Morlock's neck for a pulse…and she found one. "Oh. My. God."

Rogers furrowed his eyebrows "What?" he asked confused.

"She's alive," Sky whispered in shock, a smile forming on her face, "She's actually alive!"

"Quick! We have to take her to Flora!" Rogers interrupted Sky's glee, bringing her back to the current situation. The Morlock girl, though alive, could quite possibly be dying.

"Let's check for any external bleeding that we can stop before we carry down the tunnel, don't want her bleeding to death right when we're about to save her,"

"Right,"

Several minutes, and makeshift bandages using what used to be Rogers's sleeves, later, the Morlock girl was proclaimed good enough to be transported. She was rather lucky with only a bullet wound too high on her shoulder to do real damage and a gash on her forehead. The gash was probably why she was still alive, head wounds tend to bleed a lot and look worse than what they are, the killers probably assumed she was as good as dead and let her be.

As Sky and Roger made their way back towards where Flora, and most likely Tonia, were at they couldn't help but feel a tinge of happiness. They may not have been able to save everyone, but at least two lives would continue. Maybe even more if they received help in time.

Rogers looked at the injured girl he was carrying bridal style. She looked maybe twelve or thirteen and had mossy green colored skin, the sign she was a mutant. Her hair was brown and in a tied into a messy braid. She was breathing sounded healthy, if anything a tiny bit fast but not something to worry about.

"Hey look, it's Flora," Sky pointed ahead of them at the girl making her way down the tunnel. She stopped and looked at Rogers and Sky then at the girl.

"Guys, is she-" Flora started.

"The first survivor we found who'll make it. Why are you leaving?" Rogers asked in confusion.

"The senior X-Men are coming so I left," she held up Maya's purse, "Figured I'd bring you guys some supplies. How bad is it back there?"

"The worst thing you'll ever witness. Blockbuster's body is nothing in comparison. Then there's Ray…" he trailed off realizing his mistake when Flora's eyes widened in fear.

"What about him?" she choked out, as her breathing started to speed up.

"Listen, you really shouldn't go all the way down there. How about I take that purse and-" Sky tried to calm down the red head.

"NO DAMN IT!" Flora shouted, face red, tears streaming down her cheeks, "WHAT. ABOUT. RAY!"

"..I'm sorry Flora. Ava saw him when we arrived and…" Rogers trailed off when Flora dropped the purse and ran towards the Morlock's home as fast as she could go.

"You take her the rest of the way," Sky said, picking up the dropped supplies, "I'll take this stuff back to the Morlocks. Maybe we can help more people,"

"Okay. Make sure Flora will be alright… You know how close Ray and her were," with that said Rogers continued walking, taking the Morlock girl even farther away from the bloodshed.

* * *

><p>"Ray, no! You can hear me right? Please tell me you can hear me! You're not dead!" Flora wailed in anguish. She didn't even notice that she was sitting in a puddle of blood, or that she was surrounded by dead bodies, she didn't even notice that the others were staring at her. Flora felt like her heart had been ripped in two. <em>If only we hadn't broken up again. He wouldn't be in this mess. <em>"Ray, I swear to God, if you don't wake up right now I'll kill you! WAKE UP!"

Ray was still lying on his stomach, nobody had flipped him over yet, not even Flora when she'd practically sprinted over to his side. Truthfully, she was scared about what she'd find when she did flip him. She knew Ray was dead, the hand she was grasping for dear life was stone cold, but she refused to admit it to herself.

"Flora," Alex's voice spoke up, it was a bit unsettling that this was the first he'd spoken since arriving at the gruesome scene.

"What! Can't you see he needs a doctor! Go get one! Now!" Flora screamed.

"Flora, I don't think that a doctor can help him,"

"I DON'T GIVE A DAMN WHAT YOU THINK! GET HIM SOME HELP!"

Alex was shocked, he'd never heard Flora cuss before, "Flora pull yourself together! If you give medical assistance to those already dead who's going to help the living?"

"He's not dead," Flora seethed.

"I'm sorry Flora, I really am. He was all of our friends but we can't mourn him while there are others still alive. Look around you for Christ's sake! See Billy? He's putting pressure to that Morlock's wound so that he doesn't bleed out. He's helping someone who has a chance of living,"

"He's not dead," Flora whispered.

"Are you even listening to me?"

"He's not dead,"

"Flora…"

"I'll prove it!" Flora shouted suddenly. She stood up, flipped Ray's body over, and then screamed.

"Holy freaking God!" Alex cried out in horror once he saw what had become of Ray's face. However he'd died, it must not have been quick and it was probably very painful. Ray's face no longer had skin on it, just charred flesh that had, at points, been burnt so badly his skull could be seen. His eyes were open, but there were no eyelids left to close.

"Oh no. No. No, no, no. This can't be happening. Who could do this to you Ray? No, this is someone else. That's it," Flora mumbled incoherently as tears streamed down her face.

"Flora, I don't know what to say," Flora quickly turned to Alex eyes blazing.

"Promise me this," she said, determination and turmoil filled her voice, "Promise me, Alex Hepburn, that if- no when- when we catch whoever did this they will die. Every last one of them. Promise me,"

Alex was scared. Flora didn't want to kill people, that's not who she is. He finally came to terms with the fact that the night's traumatic events had dramatically affected everybody. Not knowing what to do, Alex gulped, "I promise,"

* * *

><p>Twenty minutes after the arrival of Rogue and Shadowcat, the rest of the senior X-Men showed up, along with Beast. By that time, a total of five Morlocks had been taken to the makeshift nurse station and two Morlocks were lying back where the massacre was located with serious injuries that prevented them from being moved. There was still no sign of Evan and no improvement in Jay's condition. To top it all off, sometime during Flora's meltdown, Gambit had disappeared and he was their only source that could possibly explain why the massacre had happened.<p>

"I do not like that the children are seeing this," Storm said as she walked around the bodies, looking for survivors or her nephew, because by the Goddess he was not dead! She had long since gotten over her initial reaction to devastation, outwardly at least. The massacre would probably haunt her dreams for a long time.

"Half-Pint, Stripes, and Smoky haven't seen any of this yet. I expect it to stay that way. The mirror kid's helpin' them with the injured, the smart girl is still unconscious back at the mansion, and her boyfriend…just showed up in here," Logan said, irritated that there were only five kids, plus the New Recruits, who hadn't seen the disaster that was the Mutant Massacre. He was hoping that it would stay at six but Nat just _had_ to show up.

"U-um…Mr. Logan, uh, I-I mean Wolverine," Nat stuttered, eyes wide as he looked at the scene in front of him. By now many of the bodies were covered in garbage bags so it wasn't as bad as it had been, but it was still pretty bad.

"Yeah kid?" Wolverine wasn't happy. He was furious actually and if it hadn't been for all of the kids around, he'd probably have gone feral long ago.

"Beast needs your help with something," Nat was still staring at all of the bodies.

"What?"

Nat turned his attention towards the Canadian, concern evident in his eyes, "Jay's fever got worse and his powers are going haywire. You're the only one who can get close to him without burning to a crisp so he wants you to give Jay a sedative or something,"

Wolverine nodded and walked off mumbling something about kids not listening and walking into trouble.

"Nathan," Storm called the boy over when he'd started to walk away.

"Yeah?" he asked, turning around hesitantly.

"I would like you to walk through the tunnels to see if you can find Evan. He is not here and I'm starting to think he doesn't even know that this massacre has happened,"

"Sure, I'll do that," Nat nodded before taking off down a side tunnel.

* * *

><p>The first thing Lila was aware of when she became conscious was a searing pain in her head. Then she heard an annoying beeping. She crinkled her face in distaste as the beeping persisted. She couldn't think straight with that noise.<p>

Beep.

_Why was it still going on? Someone should turn it off._

Beep.

_What if it can't be turned off? Then will would I do?_

Beep. Beep.

_Oh crap!_ _I can't stand it! It has to be able to stop!_

Beep. Beep. Beep.

_It's speeding up! Why is it-_

_Lila, please calm down. _The Professor's voice spoke in her head.

_Sorry Professor. It's just…the beeping…_Lila thought, focusing on her mind so that she and the Professor were standing in a large hallway with walls lined with filing cabinets.

"I see that you're getting better at reaching your mindscape," the Professor spoke, looking around at the hallway.

"Yeah. Our sessions have helped and when I'm unconscious I have plenty of time to get organized," Lila waved here hands around the place proudly.

"It appears that one of the files has fallen out of place though," he nodded towards a single file on the ground. In Lila's mind, all of the information that she received was in the form of a file. The thicker the file, the more information she had on that subject. The one on the ground was thin and red.

Lila stared at the file in confusion. "How'd this get in here? It's red so it's from outside of the mansion. How'd it get into my head?" she was talking more to herself than the Professor.

"Do you remember what is in the file?"

"No… I remember blood and pain…a man with red eyes… and that's it," Lila stuck the file in one of the less crowded cabinets. Both the Professor and she knew how hazardous it could be to her mind if she left the files lying all over the place. There'd already been one experience when that had happened, luckily Rogue knew how to deal with having too much in stuff in her head so she'd been a great help during Lila's recovery afterwards.

"Lila, I'm going to ask you to open your eyes now. Then we will wait for the others to come back with an explanation as to why they disappeared and where they have been. I'm am sensing emotional pain, so it will probably be a long night,"

"Alright Professor," Lila nodded before the hallway and filing cabinets slowly disappeared.

Lila opened her eyes.

* * *

><p>"Come on kid! If you tell me what you're looking for it'll be faster and we can get food for everyone like we said we'd do!" Ava said in frustration. The little girl who Gambit had saved from Blockbuster woke up shortly after the majority of the X-Men had shown up. She was scared at first, only wanting to see "the guy with the red and black eyes," but after much coaxing, she opened up to the X-Men. She'd told everyone her name was Sarah and she was ten years old.<p>

When Flora had shown up at Ray's side, Ava left the scene and decided to reprieve someone from babysitting duty. Tonia had been more than happy to take over Flora's old role and stop watching a kid who was only sleeping. That was all before the senior X-Men had showed up, of course.

The senior X-Men had been fast and efficient when it came to setting up and organizing themselves. They all listened to Cyclops even if they didn't like what they were told to do. Ava found it amazing that they worked that well together… she blamed Apocalypse. A senior X-Man, Ava was not. That's why, when she was ordered to go get food she fought tooth and nail against it… until Wolverine came in. Then she had taken off as fast as she could because the Wolverine did not look happy.

Sarah had tagged along with Ava but once they reached one of the tunnels, Sarah had gone crazy. She started looking around the ground, feeling the walls with her hands; she even threw stones at the ceiling, which led to Ava becoming extremely confused. When she asked Sarah what she was doing, the girl had responded with, "Looking for it," whatever "it" was. Growing frustrated, Ava asked the question stated previously.

"I can't find it!" the bone covered girl cried, instead of answering Ava.

"Why's it so important that you find 'it'?"

"'Cause if I don't find it, I can't find him and if I don't find him he'll end up like the others," Sarah cried.

"Who's him?" Ava asked suspiciously, it just occurred to her that they had yet to encounter the reason they were in the tunnels in the first place. Tristan was still missing and for some reason, Ava had a feeling that little Sarah knew why.

"Tristan," Sarah whimpered, confirming Ava's suspicions, "the man who had the guns grabbed him and then this black portal appeared in here. He threw Tristan through it 'cause he was unconscious. I didn't help him, I ran away and then the big guy chased me and then the man with the red and black eyes saved me and then he left and- and- and-" Sarah broke down into sobs. Ava gathered the girl into her arms, careful to avoid the particularly sharp bones sticking out of her, and carried Sarah back to the others. Forget about the food!

* * *

><p>"I don't see why I have to go along," Billy complained as he followed Nat and Alex down yet another tunnel.<p>

"I told you, I was going to go alone but apparently the tunnels are still 'too dangerous'" Nat said, balancing his flashlight on his pointer finger.

"Actually, I think that the higher ups just wanted to get rid of us," Alex said.

"Tell us something that isn't blatantly obvious," Billy said.

Alex opened his mouth to say something when Nat's flashlight suddenly went dark. "What happened?" both he and Billy asked Nat at the same time.

"Well…it appears that the battery died," Nat said, hitting the flashlight against his hand.

"So, now what do we do?" Billy asked while he looked around the dark tunnel, hoping to see something.

"I don't know…maybe we could-"

"Nowhere left to go but up! Or forward as the case may be," Alex butted in. Billy and Nat just nodded, not like anyone could see. All three boys started to walk forward.

"You could also go straight into a wall," Billy muttered after a while. He couldn't have timed that remark any better because right after the words left his mouth, there was a loud -whap!- followed by the sound of someone plopping onto the ground. Nat and Billy both stopped in their tracks, they didn't want the same thing to happen to them.

"Hey Alex, you okay?" Nat asked from the still complete darkness. Nobody knew exactly where he was standing.

"'M fine," came Alex's muffled reply.

"Is your nose bleeding?" Billy asked.

"Mm hmm,"

"I thought so," Billy said. Suddenly the tunnel was filled with the sound of laughter, the first laughter since before the massacre. It was so good to laugh they couldn't stop. The boys laughed until tears came to their eyes and they were grasping their sides because they hurt so much. They weren't sure how much time had passed before they had calmed down enough to breathe properly.

"I'm glad that my pain is a source of entertainment," Alex said sourly, although he was smiling in the darkness.

"Hey guys?" Nat asked.

"Yeah" "What?" the other two asked at the same time.

"Guess what I found in my pocket while we were laughing?"

"I swear, if you say batteries," Billy started to say.

"Nope," suddenly the light of a cell phone shone throughout the tunnel, "I forgot I brought this in case Lila woke up…Apparently she has," Nat said as he looked through his texts.

"Don't you find it kind of creepy that the Prof knows how to text?" Alex asked as he carefully avoided the wall he'd run into previously.

"What's creepy is when he text talks," Billy said with a shiver.

"He knows that?" Alex was incredulous.

"Some. He doesn't understand 'WTF' yet,"

"How do you know?"

"When he asked me what it meant, I told him it meant 'water the flowers'"

"He believed you?"

"Well, he texted it to Storm once so…For someone as advanced in technology as the Professor, he understands text abbreviations just like any other normal adult," Billy said with a shrug.

"Is that a light up ahead?" Nat asked suddenly, pointing down the tunnel.

"Yep, sure looks like it," Alex nodded.

"Yo! Evan! That you!" Billy shouted only to receive glares from Alex and Nat, "What?"

"What if it's one of the killers?" Alex asked.

"News flash, they're gone!" Billy said, rolling his eyes.

"Nope. That's definitely Evan, who else has bones growing out of their body like _that_?" Nat said, referring the one of the two silhouettes walking towards them.

"Well, it's not my fault I came just after he left," Alex whined just as Evan and the other Morlock, Leach, reached them.

"Hey," Evan said confused, "What are you guys doing down here? And who's this?" he nodded towards Alex.

"That's Alex Hepburn. He came about two days after you left. He does something to memories, mixes them up and he can make it appear like someone's not there. Problem is, the real memories are still there so it's only temporary I suppose," Nat explained, then he turned on the earpiece Cyclops had lent him (he wasn't allowed to have a com badge yet), "Storm," he said into it, "We found your nephew…Yes he's fine… Leach is here too…The kid who nullifies powers….Yes, Dorian. Although I think he prefers his middle name…His middle name is Jimmy…No I haven't told them…We'll drop the kid off with Ava or whoever's on babysitting duty and take Evan to the main camp…He deserves to see…You found Callisto? That's great...Of course I sound happy, I'm not where you all are…Listen, Storm, you can tell me everything when we get back, bye!" he turned off the earpiece.

"What's going on?" Leach asked, about as confused as Evan.

"Follow us. Evan, your aunt will explain when we get there," Nat said leading the way.

"Where were you at anyway?" Alex asked casually.

"Leach and I were getting him something special for his birthday. It was last week and he didn't tell us so we didn't know," Evan explained.

"I got a jumbo milkshake!" the boy added happily.

"That's a lot of milkshake," Billy played along with the boy's enthusiasm.

"Wait, doesn't Jimmy live with his mom?" Nat asked curiously.

"She's away on business over in California for two months and we're the only people she trusts with her son, what with all of the anti-mutant campaigns and what not," Evan gritted his teeth when he thought about all of the people against mutants.

After that, the conversation died. The three members of Team Extremus sobered up due to the fact that they knew that they were nearing the scene of the massacre. The two Morlocks got quiet because they had no idea what was going on but whatever it was, they didn't like it.

* * *

><p>"And then we showed Evan the scene that we had found. He didn't like it very much," Tonia explained to the group gathered in the war room. It was about 3:00 in the morning and nobody could sleep anyway, so they'd decided to do the debriefing that night...or morning. The surviving Morlocks were all staying at the mansion until they found somewhere else to go, or decided to stay permanently.<p>

Jay's condition had improved greatly with the help of the professional care of Hank and, once moved to the mansion, the better technology. The med-bay was full of Morlocks, some more injured than others. So far only two of the injured they'd found had died, mostly because of the extent of their injuries. The night…or morning… of the Mutant Massacre ordeal, there were officially eighteen survivors. Many, many, many more were dead.

After much debate as to where to bury the dead, it was decided that a section on the woods behind Xavier's would be cleared out and turned into a cemetery. That way surviving Morlocks who wanted to mourn could do so without hassle. Callisto, who had been conscious since shortly after arriving at the Institute, agreed to the arrangement as long as there was some means to arrive at the cemetery without being seen by humans.

An issue of a whole new scale was Gambit. Finding him had been made one of the X-Men and New Recruit's top priorities. That was a hard task in and of itself. Gambit was a master thief who'd never been caught as far as they knew. He knew how to remain hidden and fall off of the grid entirely. The fact that his mutation didn't react with Cerebro also added a layer of difficulty. Furthermore, they'd been ordered to bring Gambit relatively unharmed…everybody who'd met the Cajun knew he wouldn't stop fighting until it was physically impossible, if even then.

"Well of course I didn't like it very much!" Evan exclaimed from his chair next to Callisto, they were the only two Morlocks present, "everyone was dead! How'd you feel if you came back from a perfectly nice trip only to see that the students at the Institute had been slaughtered while you were away!"

"Shut it! I'm almost done retelling the event to the Professor, wait until I'm finished!" Tonia ordered before continuing, "So shortly after that all of the bodies were covered and injured prepared to be transported safely then we came here. Now I'm finished…Remember that that was only a summary. I never actually saw the bodies soaking in their own blood or anything,"

"Thank you for being so descriptive," Ava muttered sarcastically.

"I can't help but notice a few gaps in your story Smoky. Let's start with: How'd you know how to get to Gumbo's?" Team Extremus looked at each other with hollow eyes; they'd had a very emotionally draining day… They all had.

As if some silent agreement had been made, Nat stood up and said, "I'm sorry Logan but we, Team Extremus, refuse to answer any questions about our team's actions while our leader isn't present,"

Everyone, minus Team Extremus, stared in shock at Nat. He'd spoken to Logan, not Wolverine or Mr. Logan, but actual Logan. The New Recruits were still too scared to do that! He'd also claimed that they had a leader; only official teams had actual team leaders so Nat had just made his team official without teacher approval.

"We will gladly answer any questions related to our individual actions though," Flora said evenly. The way the members of Team Extremus spoke, made it sound almost as if they were in some sort of political meeting.

After about a five minute silence, Sky spoke up, "So if we're done here for today, I'd like to get some sleep. We have school tomorrow, unless the kind Professor is willing to give us the day off,"

"I'll be able to give you all tomorrow off," the young drama teacher, Natasha Dugan, said. Natasha was a twenty six year old mutant who worked at Bayville High School but resided at Xavier's. She had blue eyes and long dark brown hair that could usually be found tied up into a braid. Her mutation was cyberpathy which allowed her to mentally enter and manipulate machines, electronics, etc. "I won't be able to pull any strings to get you Wednesday off. So if you'll have a one day recover period, that's all I can do," she added with sad smile. She looked at Xavier to see if he was okay with it and he nodded his approval causing her to give a slight sigh of relief.

"That works out for us. We can have a more…in depth meeting once Jay recovers. He is our leader after all," Alex said, a bit upset with the fact that _he_ was in charge.

"Alright. Meeting dismissed!" Scott said tiredly, happy that he'd get the day off of school.

* * *

><p>Ranger walked through the tunnels. Nobody in his house knew he was down there, but that was the wonderful thing about his mutation, he could sneak out easier. The cement floor was turning black from the dried blood. Thankful that the X-Men had removed the bodies, Ranger continued on his way until he spotted him.<p>

Gambit was leaning against the wall, staring blankly ahead with a smoke in one hand, alcohol in the other. Slowly Gambit gave a tiny smirk. "_Bonjour _Ranger," the Cajun said casually, "Y' know dat y' can't hide from ol' Gambit,"

Ranger made himself visible, "It's your empathy's fault. Telepaths can't find me when I'm like that but you stupid empaths can," he grumbled.

"Well don't worry _homme_ 'cause Gambit be de only empath left on dis side o' de Atlantic now,"

"Annalee died,"

"_Oui_," Gambit took a long drag of his cigarette. Ranger crinkled his nose in distaste.

The two were silent for a while until, almost hesitantly, Ranger asked, "So, what are you going to do now?"

"_Je ne sais pas_. Can't go back t' N'Awlins, not going back t' _le diable_, and not wort' de risk t' stay here,"

"I'll try to clear up this whole mess, then I'll call you," Ranger said, determination in his voice.

"_Bonne Chance petit_," that was all that needed to be said. Gambit pushed himself off of the wall and gave Ranger the jack of spades, there was a phone number written along the top. "It's a one time use. Make sure t' use it wisely," the Cajun said before crossing himself, the second time that day, leaving.

Ranger put the card in his pocket. He looked around the tunnels then beck to where Gambit had been standing before he'd left. On the ground was a tiny cross. One look at it and Ranger knew, Gambit was probably never going to forgive himself, even if the rest of the world did.

* * *

><p><strong>AN: Natasha Dugan belongs to StormyNightengale**

**PM me with issues (Yes, I realise some of your OCs are off) ^^ **

**Reviews are welcome. :D**

**(I just edited like three little things in the chapter...just in case you're wondering why a new one isn't available ^^)**


	7. Three Months Later

**A/N:...So after finishing the Morlock Massacre I wasn't quite sure how to proceed...So this is a transition chapter. I'm not quite sure how long it takes to at least act somewhat normal after a traumatic experience so I went with three months^^**

**I'm not very happy with this chapter but it needed to be done. **

**OH! I have a poll on my profile so please feel free to take it.**

**Disclaimer: Anything you recognize, I don't own. I only own Jim and Tristan. Everything belongs to it's/their owners.**

**Warning: I think there's like one bad word.**

* * *

><p><strong>Three Months Later<strong>

"Memory Snake, make sure that guard doesn't know we're here," Blaze said over his com badge. In reality Memory Snake was actually Alex Hepburn and Blaze was actually James Robert McRea.

"I can do better than that," Memory Snake's voice replied, "I can make him think he's on our side,"

Blaze looked over at Aqua A.K.A. Flora and Darkheart A.K.A. Nat, the other two people in his group. "What do you think?" he asked.

"He's not strong enough to keep it up," Darkheart said with a shake of his head.

"I think he should try. It'd make breaking in a whole lot easier," said Aqua while she messed with the tank of water she now carried around on her back. The idea had come to her when she saw Pyro doing something similar so he could manipulate fire; Aqua couldn't create water just like Pyro couldn't create fire.

"Alright," Blaze nodded. He brought the com badge back to his mouth, "Okay Memory Snake, you're clear to go on that idea," Darkheart just looked at the group's leader and shook his head again.

* * *

><p>"And we are good to go!" Memory Snake said happily to the others in his group; Reflection and Tigerlily.<p>

"Awesome! How long do you think you can keep it up before his real memories get through?" Reflection, who was really Leo, asked curiously from his crouched position to the left of Memory Snake.

"Long enough," Memory Snake replied casually as he watched the guard walk towards them again. The three of them had been hiding behind the same crate since arriving; they were all starting to get cramps.

"I wouldn't…" Tigerlily, better known as Lila, started but trailed off when Memory Snake jumped over the crate and started mixing up the guard's memories.

* * *

><p>Puff, Memoir, and Guster crept down the long corridor. Their job, to clear out any guards found in the area, had been accomplished eons ago. The three teens were loitering until they received further orders.<p>

"I've got to say Tonia, your uniform-" Guster attempted to say before Puff turned around and covered his mouth.

"Billy," she hissed, "We're on a mission. While on missions I'm Puff, Maya's Memoir, and you're Guster. Understand?"

"Mmpth omp cmr," Guster nodded.

Puff smiled brightly as she removed her hand, "Good," she said lightly, "I'm glad we're on the same page,"

"Guys, there's guards coming! Listen!" Memoir said frantically.

"Go up against the wall. We'll try to surprise them," Puff said as she did just that, the other two not far behind. Puff got ready to attack, no way was she going down without a fight, when suddenly Guster let out an audible sigh of- was that relief?

"Relax," the boy said casually, "Memory Snake just said he was headed our way. Blaze said to go with,"

"Oh. Okay good," Memoir said happily as she ran over to the other group who were now visible.

* * *

><p>Dynamo…or Rogers…or Alex…hid behind a tree for cover as yet another volley of bullets sailed towards him. Tempest and Marina quickly followed Dynamo's lead.<p>

"Dang! It's like those guns have infinite ammo!" Marina A.K.A Sky shouted in frustration. She hated being part of the distraction. Tempest also known as Avalon nodded her head in agreement.

"Let's just hope that the guys inside get done soon so we can leave. This is getting seriously old!" Tempest said as she shot a bolt of amaranth lightning at the guards. Over the past few months she'd gotten more adept with using lighting. Wolverine started to call her Thundercat once he found out about her rapidly growing affinity with that ability.

In fact, many members at Xavier's had started to have bursts of power recently. The Professor said that it was because many of them were reaching the age when their bodies could finally sustain the full potential of their mutations. All of the senior X-Men had already been through their own power surges and were helping out Team Extremus as well as the New Recruits who had yet to reach their power surge. Luckily nobody's powers had grown so much that they went haywire and blew up the mansion…again.

"Blaze, you guys almost done in there?" Dynamo asked over his com badge, blasting a guard as he spoke.

The com badge crackled a bit until Blaze's voice said, "Yeah. Darkheart, Aqua, and I are done. Memoir, Guster, and Puff just joined up with Memory Snake, Reflection, and Tigerlily. They should be finishing up soon if Memory Snake can keep the guard's memories at bay long enough. If he can't…we're screwed…Either way, do you guys need backup?"

"Yep. That'd be nice; the girls are looking a bit worn out,"

Blaze sighed on his side of the line, "Alright. My group's coming from behind the guards. It's still raining, right?"

"Yeah," Dynamo stared at the com badge in confusion, "Why?"

Right after he asked that, all of the rain changed direction mid-fall and charged the guards full force. Without the rain distracting them, Tempest, Marina, and Dynamo could focus solely on the guards; the guards on their part had ceased fire as they tried to shield their faces from the tyrannical rain attacking them.

"Way to come through Blaze!" Marina cheered into her com badge as she heated up the temperature of the rain so that it scorched the guards.

"Excuse me!" Aqua's voice came on offended, "I believe I'm the one doing all the work here- Ouch!"

"What happened?" Tempest asked in concern, adding hale to the mix of heated rain that was attacking the now retreating guards.

"Nothing, I just got hit in the hand with some of that rain…I feel bad for those men. It hurt a lot!" Aqua's voice said while the rain slowly spread out, going back to normal; Marina having already cooled it off.

"Hey guys!" Blaze said, jogging over to the other group with a bright smile on his face, Darkheart and Aqua not far behind.

"Hi," Dynamo said before turning his head to Aqua, "Thanks for the help; Tempest couldn't control the rain and attack at the same time, rain is not her forte," Dynamo said relaxing his shoulders now that the threat of getting shot was gone.

"Well, that was the first time I controlled the direction of a rain storm. I'm really excited to learn what else-"

"Guys, we can socialize back at the rendezvous point," Blaze said, cutting Aqua off. She crossed her arms and gave a huff in annoyance but started heading over towards the assigned meeting point anyway.

* * *

><p>"…and then I said to him that he should go with the blue socks!" Memory Snake finished the story as he and the guard, named Jim, cracked up laughing.<p>

"And he wonders why he can't get a girlfriend," Puff told Memoir from behind the laughing men.

"I'm sure if he asked Rahne…" Memoir said with a giggle.

"Rahne wouldn't know what she was getting into,"

"Ah, here we are!" Jim said gaily, pointing at a door, "The computer room. Where we keep all of our information I might add,"

"Thanks man!" Memory Snake said giving Jim a high five, "Now why don't you go find a kitchen and make us some snacks,"

"Okay," Jim shrugged before walking off down the hallway. Everyone looked at the guard in confusion.

"He thinks we're the repairmen he called," Memory Snake explained once Jim was gone.

"You do realize," Tigerlily said offhandedly, "that I could have found this place without the guard's help,"

"You could have said something earlier," Reflection grumbled, creating a mirror that everyone could walk through to get into the computer room which happened to be locked; Jim forgot to unlock the door.

"I tried," Tigerlily said, stepping through the mirror into the computer room, "but nobody listened,"

"'Cause you're too quiet. You should try to speak louder, I mean, people listen to your boyfriend," that caused Tigerlily to blush furiously.

"Darkheart and me?" Reflection nodded as he watched the last of the group walk through the mirror before getting rid of it. "We're just friends,"

"You talk to him more than anyone else. I mean, don't get me wrong, you're definitely more talkative now than when you first came… I'd still classify you as quiet though," Reflection smirked and then started searching for the information they needed. It took a total of three minutes of searching before Tigerlily found the information and had it downloaded; a new record. While making their getaway, Jim returned…he did not look happy.

"Hiya Jimmy!" Memory Snake said happily, not noticing Jim's enraged facial expression.

"Shut up mutie!" Jim yelled as he pulled out a gun and pointed it straight at Memoir. Guster, seeing what was going on, made a blast of wind hit Jim square in the chest. Everyone stared in shock as the wind cut a hole straight through Jim; Guster most of all. He stared at Jim's body in shock, then at his hands, then back at Jim.

"Computer: end mission 1725-K warehouse infiltration B," Puff ordered. Slowly the walls, Jim's body, trees, grass, rain, and everything else disappeared revealing a bare, plain metal room. In the far corner stood the other half of Team Extremus; they looked very confused.

"Why'd you stop the mission?" Jay asked irritation clear in his voice.

"Billy's powers…he's at his power surge and needs to see the Professor," Maya said. Having already dealt with the shock of a power surge, in which she suddenly developed eidetic memory, Maya knew that the longer someone waited to see the Professor, the more problematic their mutation would become.

"On a _real_ mission we can't pause what we're doing just because one of us can't control our mutation," Jay stated, crossing his arms.

"Well this isn't a _real_ mission," Alex pointed out.

"But we're supposed to act like it is!" Jay gave a heavy sigh, "What time is it anyway?"

"About 7:00…at night… on a Friday," Leo complained and then grumbled something about stupid Cyclops stealing the time right after school.

Jay's eyes widened, "Crap! I got to go! Great work guys," he shouted as he ran out of the danger room leaving behind a befuddled team.

* * *

><p>"You know why Jay left in such a rush?" Leo asked his roommate Alex while he wiped his wet hair with a towel; he just finished taking a shower.<p>

"I don't know. Isn't this the fifth time he's done that since the…you know…massacre?" Alex asked as he threw more clay onto his desk. Leo looked at the sculpture in progress critically; Alex made a new work of art every week but he hardly ever used clay.

"Well we did kind of make him our leader while he was unconscious without asking his permission…maybe he just needs to cool off for a while,"

"I bet he just basks in the glory of being our team's leader," Alex said, either not hearing or caring what Leo said.

"…Sure," Leo said shortly before his face brightened, "Want to play Halo?"

"Yeah! Shooting aliens or each other?"

"Well let's see if Rogers wants to play too. If so, we're going to have to team up on him; that guy's a Halo protégée!"

"I'm the Halo master," Alex exclaimed in a sing-song voice as he left the room. Leo rolled his eyes and followed the other boy out.

* * *

><p>Nat reclined on the roof waiting for his mark. He knew it was only a matter of time before- There! - Jay's car drove up the drive way. Wherever the team's leader had gone off to in such a rush after the DR session, he sure hadn't been gone long.<p>

Nat had a suspicion that Jay had been meeting someone…A certain informant who had led them indirectly to the Morlock Massacre. A certain informant who the team had voted not to make contact with because of that reason… that and they just didn't trust his intentions. Who could trust anyone after they led you to _that_?

Nat knew that for some odd reason Jay trusted Ranger, but that didn't affect the situation whatsoever. The team's leader was sneaking around behind their back and Nat felt like he had to do something before things got out of hand (like if Alex found out). He gave a deep sigh before turning invisible and focusing the rest of his attention on phasing through the ceiling.

* * *

><p>Jay looked at the paper again, reclining against his car. Once a student turned eighteen, the Professor bought them a car. Jay assumed it was a sort of incentive to stay at the mansion instead of joining Magneto.<p>

_Someone knows about me. There's a traitor on Team Extremus. I don't know who it is. Keep this low key; I don't want you guys killing each other over suspicions._

_~Ranger_

A traitor. On _his_ team. Jay couldn't even begin to fathom who it was. Tonia was a bit cold hearted… But Alex always challenged his authority…Flora could have turned after Ray's death so she could get revenge…Lila was maybe a bit too quiet…_Oh, now I know why this needs to remain a secret,_ Jay thought, _if I'm throwing around accusations in my head I can't even begin to imagine what the rest of the team would do if they knew_.

"If you ask me," a voice said casually from beside Jay, "I'd say it was you," Jay turned his head and looked towards speaker, but saw nobody. "Oh, sorry," Nat suddenly became visible.

"Why would I be the traitor?" Jay asked incredulously; he ignored the fact that Nat had caught him red-handed with proof that he was visiting Ranger.

"You're sneaking off behind the team's back and meeting someone we decided was a threat,"

"This is exactly why Ranger said not to tell anyone! You're already blaming me!" Jay cried in frustration.

"Hey! Relax, I was kidding," Nat held up his hands in surrender, "I'm just voicing what the team would start thinking if they found out there was a traitor…"

Jay sighed and looked his best friend in the eyes, "I'd be at the top of the list,"

"Think about it. Everyone always tries to find faults in leaders and you're kind of new at it…the whole leading thing," Nat pointed out.

"Do you think I'm in way over my head being the leader of the team?"

"No!" Nat almost shouted, "Listen, I think you're the best suited person to lead this team. Just try not to become to Scott-like. You've been starting to act like him recently,"

Jay chuckled, "Well now I know what he has to go through," an awkward silence descended upon the two boys.

"I won't tell anyone about the whole traitor thing if you don't want them to know," Nat said suddenly.

"I'll tell everyone, don't worry…just, I'm not going to say anything yet... Oh, by the way, thanks,"

"For what?"

"I was going to show this to Flora," Jay held up the paper, "But wasn't sure how to bring it up to her. Now, since you're officially part of the inner circle of Team Extremus, you can help me explain," Jay started to walk out of the garage.

"So does this make me third in charge?" Nat called out as he ran to catch up to the team's leader. Flora had been named second in command despite the fact that she was one of the youngest members on the team.

"Ugh…no,"

* * *

><p>"Orlando Bloom looks like a puppy in this movie," Tonia stated to the other girls in the room. After getting cleaned up from the danger room session, the girls decided to have a movie marathon in Ava and Flora's room. First movie on the list was the first Pirates of the Caribbean.<p>

"…eh….a bit," Maya said, shoving a handful of popcorn into her mouth.

"You know what's depressing?" Sky asked from where she sat on Ava's bed, "That we, six beautiful young women, are sitting indoors on a perfectly nice day instead of going out on dates or outdoors or something,"

"Sky, it's the middle of December in New York. Just because it's sunny outside doesn't mean that we can actually hang out outside," Ava said glumly.

"But watching movies? Well at least _some _of us should be out on a date," Sky groaned.

"Sorry, no dates until January for me," Tonia said, "Ava and I have a bet going,"

"What about you Maya?" asked Sky curiously, "You and Bobby have been rather friendly lately,"

"He's friendly with every girl," Flora said with a roll of her eyes.

"What about you?" Sky's attention was now completely focused on the Irish girl.

"What about me?" Flora asked a bit irked. Although she, as well as everyone else, refused to admit it, her mind was still focused on the day in the tunnels. She still hadn't forgotten the way Ray looked when she'd flipped him over or how devastated she'd been when Ray, who always had a free spirit, had to have a closed coffin at his funeral.

"Nat and Jay are looking for you Flora," Lila interrupted before Flora could say something she'd regret later.

"Okay. Don't pause the movie; I've already seen it like twenty times," the red head said standing up. She was dismissed by a chorus of disinterested "See you later"'s and "Bye"'s.

* * *

><p>The blonde woman heaved a sigh, holding the briefcase in her left hand with a death grip. She had finally reached Xavier's Institute. The blonde looked to her left and saw three teens deep in conversation. There were two boys, one with wild black hair and dark eyes and the other with slightly lighter hair, dark brown it looked like, and almost aquamarine blue eyes. There was also a young girl with red hair and green eyes. Whatever they were talking about looked serious so the blonde woman didn't want to interrupt them.<p>

Instead she walked straight up to the Institute's front door and knocked. After a few minutes of waiting she rang the doorbell and was promptly greeted by boy in his late teens with blonde hair and green eyes. He looked friendly enough but slightly nervous. Then another guy who was pale with almost white hair came into view.

"Hi!" the pale guy said enthusiastically, "I'm Alex and the other blondie is Alex. He goes by Rogers though…that's his last name. Who're you?"

"I'm-" the blonde woman started, only to have the boisterous boy interrupt her.

"It doesn't matter," he said, "I'll take you to the Prof…you are here to see him, right?" the blonde woman nodded, "Good. Follow me!"

* * *

><p>"So Billy's in there right now…Something to do with a surge…Anyway, I got to go. Rogers and Leo, you haven't met Leo yet, are waiting for me before they continue our Halo game…Unless they already un-paused the game…Those no good…I'll be off now, see you!" Alex said before running off down the hallway hoping desperately that he hadn't been killed a million times in the video game. The blonde woman just stared after him in confused amusement.<p>

The blonde woman waited patiently outside of Xavier's office before the door opened to reveal a brunette teen boy with green eyes. He looked her up and down before smiling, "Hello gorgeous, I'm Billy. To what do I owe the pleasure?" he asked appearing to be honestly curious.

"I'm here to see Xavier," the blonde said simply.

"He's in there," the boy nodded towards the office.

"Thanks…By the way, you're a bit too young for my taste," the blonde smiled as she watched Billy smile and walk away before she entered.

"Ah, I see you made it. No trouble of course?" Professor Xavier greeted with a smile.

"Of course not," the woman said as she sat down in a chair across from Xavier's desk.

"Well, that is good to hear,"

"Listen," the woman leaned forward, ending the small talk, "Three months ago you told me to call you if I got a hit on our Cajun thief," she pulled a file out of the briefcase and slid it over to the Professor, "Never underestimate a child's ability to get into more trouble," she offered with a slight shrug.

Xavier looked through the file skeptically; "Are you completely positive that this is Gambit?" he pulled out a newspaper clipping and read through it, "I know that he's rather skilled in his selected field, but I think this is a bit above his capabilities,"

"Charles, no mere _human_ could have accomplished that heist. This was Gambit showing off what he could do," the woman was standing, her hands firmly placed on Xavier's desk, "S.H.I.E.L.D. does not take lightly to being robbed," she hissed, "I suggest _you_ and your X-Men dig into this because once S.H.I.E.L.D. gets a hold of Gambit he'll never see the light of day again," she plopped back down in the chair with a sigh and massaged her temples, "Fury thinks that it'd be more beneficial if you guys found him first, that's why he sent me to give you this information,"

"And what about you? What do you think?" Xavier asked as he stared at the only evidence that Gambit had committed any crime at all; the ace of spades.

"Personally," the woman leaned forward again and stared Charles right in the eyes, "I think Gambit's not a bad guy; he's just deep into serious affairs that are starting a dark spiral downwards. I think his past transactions are catching up to him and we should help him before he's beyond help. The Molocks are just an example of the, excuse my language, shit he's into."

"You need to understand that we are still trying to locate the now nine-year-old Tristan. The longer his is missing the worse his condition may get,"

"And _you_ need to understand that Gambit is the only known connection to Tristan. He knows who has him, if not where they're at. It'd be in everyone's best interest if the X-Men got to Gambit first," the woman seemed to hesitate a bit before adding, "And I'm going to be staying here until Gambit is safely in your custody,"

That made the Professor look at her with a new interest, "Why would you do that?"

The woman lowered her voice, "Fury believes one of your students is leaking information, if you know what I mean. He thinks it'd be safer if I stayed around and kept my eyes and ears open," Charles furrowed his brow. One of his students was a traitor, and he hadn't known…that was a new feeling for Xavier and he didn't like it.

"We'll look for Gambit," Xavier consented, "In the meantime Ororo show you to your room," he added just as the white haired woman walked in.

"Thank you Charles. I'll let Fury know you agreed so he'll call his men off of the Gambit case," the blonde woman said as she left the room behind Ororo.

As she walked down the hallway, the thirty-year-old blonde let out a sigh of relief. She'd been expecting hatred and distrust because of whom she worked for but apparently the X-Men didn't hate S.H.I.E.L.D. as much as she'd originally thought. That was perfectly fine by her.

The blonde woman was named Carol Danvers.

Carol Danvers had arrived at the X-Mansion and nobody could even begin to realize just what her arrival would lead to.

* * *

><p><strong>AN: I made Carol Danvers with my own little twist so she's not exactly in character.**

**PM me with grievances. **

**Review please. (Yes, I know that the massacre was probably better written. It's an important story to me so I had to go all out)**


	8. They Found Him

**A/N: An update! I will not bother you with the reasons why it took so long.**

**Disclaimer: Anything you recognize is not mine. The OCs aren't mine either. **

**Warnings: Nothing serious, just don't yell at me for my cultural errors. ^^**

**All grammar and spelling mistakes are mine and my computer's since it no longer allows spell check to work.**

* * *

><p>"Here's the files," the teen said holding their arm out as far as it would go, files in hand, so as not to get too close to the maniacal, sociopathic, terrifying mutant before them, "Everything the mansion has on Scott Summers, Jean Grey, and Gambit."<p>

The mutant looked at the third file with disdain, "I was expecting more," he said in, what the teen could only assume was, a disappointed voice.

"Give me a break Sinister! Gambit's a sort of enigma to the X-Men; they don't have much on him,"

"That is true; the boy has learned a bit too well, hasn't he?" the mutant, Sinister, said more to himself than the teen. Sinister was a tall, very pale, man who haunted the teen's dreams. He had teeth so sharp that the teen was reminded of a shark and pure red eyes. Sinister said that everything he did was for science and he had almost no emotions in regards to his "specimens" or anything at all basically; to sum it all up, Sinister was not a pleasant man.

"Why are these three so special to you anyway?" the teen asked curiously.

"Because," Sinister's predator teeth spread into a smile that would cause any sane being to quiver in fear, "they're the keys to perfection,"

* * *

><p><strong>Present<strong>

Gambit smiled to himself as he stared at the computer screen. He never knew that so much information could be found in one place and yet S.H.I.E.L.D. had all of this on one computer. Robbing S.H.I.E.L.D. had probably been one of his most difficult heists ever. But Remy Lebeau was the best; even if he wasn't an official Guild member any more.

Remy's benefactor for the S.H.I.E.L.D. operation had been some man named Bolivar Trask. He, apparently, was high on the food chain of the Purifiers. Clearly Bolivar hadn't known that Gambit was a mutant, and with a twenty million dollar paycheck, Gambit wasn't about to correct him. Besides, all Trask had wanted was the list of mutants S.H.I.E.L.D. had made over the years. What harm could that do?

After he'd successfully downloaded all of the information onto a specially designed flash-drive, gotten out of the S.H.I.E.L.D. base undetected, and safely returned to his hotel room, Gambit went to work. First he found the list of mutants amongst all of the information he acquired; Gambit had stolen all of it, not just the list. Then he checked to see if his name was on the list. It was. So Gambit quickly removed it. Finally, he downloaded the revised list onto another flash-drive and gave it to Trask for the second half of his twenty million; the Thieves Guild always asked for half up front and the other half once the job was done.

Despite popular belief, Remy Lebeau was not a heartless idiot. When Trask asked to see the list, just to make sure Gambit had actually gotten the information, Remy distracted him long enough to install a virus into the flash-drive so that the next time it was used all of the information would be gone. So when the time comes, the Purifiers will know that Remy definitely did his job, and it will be assumed that Trask ruined the flash-drive while it was in transit. It was a win-win situation for Gambit.

After the official completion of his job Remy decided to start going through all of the information. That's why now, over a week later, Remy Lebeau was still at the same hotel going over the last bit of info: himself.

Remy scrolled down on the list of mutants before he reached the part where his name was, it was time to see what exactly S.H.I.E.L.D. had on him.

**Name: Remy Lebeau**

**Codename: Gambit**

**Age: 19**

**Gender: Male**

Remy heaved a sigh; he already knew all of that. He wanted to see …_Hello? _He thought once he spotted something of interest, _What's dis?_

**Full capabilities unknown. Potential Omega Level.**

Remy gave a dry laugh, "_Non, mon ami,_" he said to the computer, "Y' be in need o' an update, _hein_? Remy don't have dat problem anymore," he stood up from the computer chair and pulled the flash-drive out of the computer. "Or have y' forgotten de doctor who messed wit' _mon_ head," he tapped his head for added affect, "Remy doubts dat y' even heard o' de doctor…O' course it might be hidden on dis flash-drive somewhere dat Remy missed," Remy shrugged and turned the computer off before he gave it a light charge, completely frying the inside of it. That's what he loved about fancy hotels, he sometimes got a computer in his room which he could ruin and say short-circuited on him; the hotel would then apologize for the "inconvenience" and give him a coupon or something.

Remy walked over to the room's phone to report the damaged computer when something out of the window caught his eye. The thing Remy enjoyed about being on the third floor was that he could easily see the details of people outside and spot potential threats to his person through the window as well as have a nice view and plenty of time to escape. What caught his eye was not a potential threat so much as a shock. Nine very familiar teens, the X-Men, a blonde chick, and three not so familiar teens were headed towards his hotel. When the brown haired boy-Jay! That was his name! - made eye contact with him, Remy was hopeful that he wouldn't tell anyone. His hopes were dashed and brutally stomped on when Jay got everyone else's attention and pointed up at him. When the blonde chick flew towards his room, Remy could only do one thing. "_Merde_!" he cursed.

* * *

><p><strong>Four Hours Earlier<strong>

"GIVE IT BACK!" Sky's scream could be heard throughout the mansion. It had been officially one week since Carol Danvers's arrival and by now she was use to the shouts and screams that woke her up every morning.

"NOT UNTIL YOU GIVE ME BACK MY NECKLACE!" came Flora's returning shout.

"I DON'T HAVE YOUR FREAKING NECKLACE!"

"WELL THEN WHO DOES!"

"BOTH OF YOU, SHUT UP!" a new voice, Ava apparently, cut in. Carol sighed and went into the shower, successfully missing the rest of the argument. Although, as far as Carol knew, only the teachers knew about the traitor, tensions at the X-mansion had been growing increasingly high. Most likely due to the upcoming holiday season and the fact that Tristan may have to spend his first Christmas away from his "papa" in the clutches of an unknown kidnapper.

As Carol threw on a t-shirt Xavier's voice sounded in her head, _All teams and teachers meet me in the war room. _The blonde woman frowned in irritation, no breakfast for her.

* * *

><p>"You have got to tell me how to do that move!" Alex Rogers begged Maya on their way to the war room for the meeting. They'd been sparring in the danger room when Xavier had sent the message.<p>

"I'm not sure I can. I just saw it on TV…" Maya shrugged.

Rogers raised an eyebrow, "What were you watching to learn that? Some Fast and Furious, James Bond, Die Hard triple combination thing?"

"No," Maya giggled, "I was watching Kung Fu Panda,"

"Really?"

"Yeah, remember when they fight over that dumpling and the panda-"

"Oh yeah! I remember that! You're powers work on animated movies too?"

"Well not exactly. See in order for me to-"

"Hey guys!" Billy said running over to Maya and Rogers, "Looking as stunning as ever Maya," he winked at her once he'd caught up with them, "So I guess we're all running a bit late,"

"Seems like it," Rogers said. The three of them walked on in silence, the only sound being their footsteps and breathing.

Suddenly Billy smirked and Maya cringed, waiting for whatever pick-up line Billy had in store, "So Maya," he started, "I bet if you stood in front of a mirror held up eleven roses, you'd see twelve of the most beautiful things in the world."

"Wow…" Maya breathed, "You know, Billy, that one was kind of sweet," She didn't notice Rogers's curious glance at her and Billy.

"Yeah, I know," Billy said with a smile, "Do you know why?"

"Why?"

"I realized that when I'm older, I'll look back at all of my crowning memories, and I'll think of the day my children were born, the day I got married, and the day that I met you."

Rogers rolled his eyes, "What, did you find a new website Billy?"

Maya slapped his arm, "Alex Rogers, Billy's just being nice. No need to be so rude to him," Billy just stood smiling, "Oh we're here!" Maya exclaimed suddenly. The three of them entered the war room.

* * *

><p>Professor Charles Xavier was not a happy man. The traitor had acted and not been caught. Since all of his students were still at the mansion, Xavier could only assume the traitor was still there. As he watched the last of the stragglers file into the war room, Charles nodded towards Logan to start. The Canadian stood up, "Listen up punks!" silence ascended the room, "Last night, someone broke into Chuck's office and made off with a few files," murmurs started up, many of the students worrying about which files were stolen or how anyone could have stolen them.<p>

"Wolverine, sir," Leo's hand shot up into the air.

"Now, we're not entirely sure who could've broken into his office, it's wired pretty good," Logan continued, ignoring Leo who was about to fly out of his chair with how high his hand was raised.

"Could a teleporter have gotten in?" Jay asked. Leo's hand was still in the air.

"Not unless they're able to completely avoid the security system, and I've seen the way it's set up, it's not easy," Scott said from his spot beside Jean.

"What about a phaser?" Nat chimed in, "If they remained phased out would they be able to get in and out without triggering an alarm?"

"Theoretically they could," Jean said, glancing at Leo who was almost standing up with his hand in the air so high, "But the motion sensors would pick them up,"

"So an invisible phaser," Tonia said, sending a suspicious glance at Nat.

"No. There are heat sensors as well. Even in a phased out invisible form the body still gives off heat," Storm said. The room grew silent as everyone thought up more theories, Leo's hand still in the air.

"Leo you can talk so tell us what you're thinking already!" Alex Hepburn finally shouted in exasperation, his arms hurt when he thought about how long Leo's hand had been in the air.

Leo put his hand down, all eyes on him, "Fail-safe!" he exclaimed and smiled to himself like it explained everything. His smile faded once he saw all of the blank expressions, but he was slightly proud when he saw realization dawn on the Professor and Hank's faces.

"Care to elaborate?" Sky asked.

"A fail-safe is a devise that, in case of failure, responds in a way that will cause no harm, or at least not much harm, to other devices," Leo explained.

"I still don't get it," Bobby said.

"Think of it this way, in case the Professor fails…or dies… he needs someone he trusts to get into his office eventually who will cause the least amount of damage. You know, not trash the place or steal all of his valuables. Therefore, there has to be a key somewhere not in the Professor's possession," Leo said smugly. Everyone stared at him in amazement, who'd have thought Leo could have figured all of that out. "You should have called on me to begin with," Leo said and reclined in his chair.

"So where's the extra key Professor?" Roberto asked.

"It wouldn't be safe of we all knew where it was, now would it?" Tonia snapped.

"I say only the leaders learn where the key or keys are," Ava suggested.

"Sounds reasonable," Flora agreed.

"Aww why can't everyone over the age of seventeen learn where the keys are instead?" Alex complained.

"Well that would entail you knowing where the keys are," Tonia said, "And that would end badly for all involved," that caused several others to laugh.

"Professor," Lila's quiet voice piped up once the laughter died down.

"Yes Lila?" the bald man asked curiously.

"I found him,"

"Who?" Xavier asked, Carol leaning in closer to hear what the girl had to say.

"He's at 4441 Collins Avenue, in Miami, Florida at the Fontainebleau Hotel. Zip code is 33140. On the third floor, room-"

"Lila, you're rambling. Remember how to stop?" the girl nodded her head, "Good, now deep breaths," Xavier instructed. Lila obediently closed her eyes and focused on breathing. From across the room, Nat looked on in concern.

"Can you tell us who you found now?" Carol asked impatiently, only to receive a glare from everyone in the room, "Sorry," she mumbled, she would never understand how the mansion functioned.

"It's fine," Lila said, opening up her eyes, her cheeks flushed either from embarrassment or strain.

"Now, if you're up to it, would you please fill us in?" Carol asked, nicer this time.

"Ever since he disappeared I've been trying to find him. It kept giving me headaches; sorry Rogue, I had to use some of your Advil," Lila said.

"Ah don't mind," Rogue waved off her apology.

"But just now, I found him… Well not him, but his name,"

"Like, who'd you find?" Kitty asked.

"Gambit. I found Gambit,"

After that, it was quickly decided that the New Recruits along with Hank and Natasha Dugan would stay at the mansion and make sure nothing blew up. Everyone else suited up and went to the X-Jet. Upon their arrival in Florida, the X-Men and Team Extremus quickly found the Fontainebleau. Everything was going surprisingly easy, especially when Jay looked up and met eyes with the Ragin Cajun.

* * *

><p><strong>Present<strong>

If asked, Remy would say he was the Prince of Thieves, although it would be said in a Cajun accent. Proving true to his name, Remy managed to gather up all of his things and leave his hotel room before the blonde chick reached it. He even managed to leave her a present in the form of an exploding computer.

Not even the best, however, can avoid that many of Xavier's students at once. So Gambit did the only reasonable thing he could think of. The students were down, so Gambit went up. He managed to make it to the roof before encounter number _deux_ happened in the form of Storm. Knowing that he couldn't escape her easily if she was on the offensive, Gambit did the thing he did best…Well, the second thing he did best… he talked, "Stormy! What a surprise, _non_? Come down sout' t' get a little sun?"

"We have come to get you Gambit. We do not wish to harm you, please surrender," Storm pleaded, floating in the air above the right side of the building. She didn't seem bothered by the fact that the Cajun was inching away from her. "And do not call me that," she added as an after thought.

"What? Stormy?" he smirked, "Well _Stormy _y' should know by now dat Gambit don't give up wit'out a fight," he took another step backwards.

"I do not wish to fight you,"

"Not all fightin' has t' be confrontational," another step back.

"Oh really?" she raised an eyebrow.

"_Oui_, in fact de greatest fighters never hurt people physically. Ever heard of Frank Abagnale?" another step back, he took his bo staff out and leaned on it.

"No I do not believe so. Gambit, step away from that ledge please," Storm ordered, worry lacing her voice. _She finally noticed, _Gambit thought.

"How 'bout Gandhi den, everyone's heard o' him," another step, this time Storm inched forward too.

"Yes I have heard of him," Storm said quickly, "Please, Gambit step away from the ledge. Dying is not a way to fight,"

"Unless y'r tryin' t' be a martyr," another step, almost there, "Is dat what Gandhi was? Or was he just anot'er assassination victim? _Qui pensez-vous_?"

"Gambit! Do not make me force you away from that ledge!" Storm yelled at him.

"Oh well. _C'est la vie_. T'anks fo' de wonderful chat Stormy!" Gambit charged a card and threw it at Storm who wasn't expecting it. While Storm was momentarily distracted, Gambit jumped off of the roof.

* * *

><p>"What do you mean he jumped off of the roof?" Marina asked into her com badge in shock, Reflection and Tigerlily stepping in closer to listen to her conversation, "Is he suicidal?" there was a muffled response on the other end, "Alright, we'll check to see if there's a body," Marina walked over to where they said Gambit's body would be, Reflection and Tigerlily not far behind, only to see the supposedly dead man hop out of a second story balcony and land on his feet seemingly unharmed. The three teens stood with their mouths open.<p>

"That would be enhanced agility," Tigerlily blurted out before she could stop herself. Marina glared at her while Reflection watched as Gambit quickly turned around to face them.

"_Bonjour _Sky," Gambit said casually as he sauntered over to the group, "Gambit don't believe he's been introduced t' your _amis_ here," he indicated Reflection and Tigerlily.

"Oh," Marina blushed as she stared into Gambit's red on black eyes, getting lost in them, she felt relaxed and open, "The girl is Lila Andrew or Tigerlily and the boy is Leo Fulton or Reflection,"

"_Echantée_," Gambit kissed Tigerlily's hand.

Reflection just stood back, staring at the two girls in shock, they were like putty in that man's hands. He took out his com badge and very quietly said, "Hey we found him, he's not dead but he's doing something odd to the girls, they're like hypnotized or something and…he just left," While Reflection had been talking Gambit had run away.

* * *

><p>Someone was out to get him in life. That's all Remy could think of as he avoided the group Jay, Flora, and a black haired kid he didn't know were in. Remy could have sworn the black haired kid spotted him, but he had just sneezed. He thought it again as he dove behind a dumpster to avoid the girl who could phase and the blue elf thing, Kitty and Kurt, right?<p>

Of course, when he saw Rogue all alone, without a group, guarding the jet…alone… Remy felt super tempted to go over and talk to her, and then maybe steal the plane, but he resisted the urge once he saw Wolverine creeping around not very far off. Remy then became super thankful for the whole jump behind a dumpster maneuver he'd done earlier.

Remy was about to walk off when he noticed a group with the talkative blonde, the quieter blonde, and Maya in it. He quickly changed direction and actually made some distance before he reached another group. He instantaneously stopped in his tracks with what he saw. The boy named Billy was kissing the girl with pink highlights while the platinum blonde glared daggers at the girl with pink highlights. Deciding he'd be better off not knowing, Gambit started to leave when he heard Scooter shout, "What do you think you're doing?" deciding it'd be interesting with Ol' One-Eye there, Gambit decided to watch what happened next.

"They're kissing, what does it look like?" The platinum blonde, Tonia, pointed out the obvious.

"I can see that," Scooter then rounded on the two lovers, "We are on a mission, not at some social event, so act professional!" he then left to search for Gambit some more.

"Come on, let's look for Gambit," Tonia said flatly and the teens all left, leaving Gambit all alone. Feeling very successful, Remy backed up, only to hit something solid that wasn't there a minute ago. Turning around slowly, Gambit saw the one person he'd been trying to avoid the most: Wolverine. Of course, he wasn't going to let him know that.

"_Salut Monsieur Claws,_ how's it goin'?" Remy asked a bit too happily.

"Game's over kid, c'mon," Wolverine growled at him, surprising Remy by not taking out the claws.

"Umm…_Non_, _merci_. Gambit's good right here,"

"It's not open for discussion," never mind, the claws were out now.

"Gambit t'inks it is," suddenly there was an explosion and both men were sent flying backwards. Gambit regained his footing first and ran straight into the first crowded street he could find.

* * *

><p>As he tried to hide, Gambit finally became aware of all of the people from the X-mansion roaming the streets looking for him; there was no escape the master thief could find…until he saw <em>him<em>. He sighed in annoyance before quickly making his way over to the sixteen year old who happened to be eating a soft pretzel.

"Hey Gambit," the boy said casually, "What a coincidence. My family takes a vacation to Miami, you're here, and the X-Men are looking for you, such a small world,"

"Let's all get our ha-has at Gambit's expense, _after_ we help him o' course," Gambit said pointedly.

"Alright, Ranger to the rescue," the boy took the last bite of his pretzel before leading Gambit somewhere nobody would see them. He then grabbed onto Remy's hand, "For the record," Ranger stated, "I hate this just as much as you do," then he turned both of them invisible. The special thing about Ranger's invisibility is that while invisible he can't be sensed, whether it be from telepaths or people like Logan.

Once they were safely away from the X-Men and Team Extremus, Gambit and Ranger became visible again. "T'anks Benny, I owe y' one," Gambit said happily.

"You can start by not calling me Benny," Benjamin Rivers A.K.A. Ranger said.

"So, what is it y' want from Gambit?"

"What makes you think I want something?"

"Y' helped _moi_ and stopped de X-Men, your heroes, from gettin' me," Remy said pointedly.

Benjamin's brown eyes stared hard at Gambit, finally he gave a heavy sigh, "I need your help," he said, "It regards a mutual enemy of ours,"

"And de X-Men can't help 'cause…"

"The X-Men are predictable and easy to keep tabs on. Trust me. I need information and you're the only person I know who either already has it, or can get it,"

"Tell Gambit what y' want t' know, and he'll see what he can do,"

"I want to know where Sinister and his Marauders are at, what their goal is, and how I can stop it,"

Gambit smiled darkly, "Gambit already knows all o' dat. What y' need t' do _petit _find some _homes _crazy 'nough t' help and Gambit t'inks he knows just de people for de job."

* * *

><p><strong>AN: Sorry for the over usage of Gambit and the under usage of the OCs...but it had to be done at some point. **

**I typed this up super late so I'm probably not in my right mind right now^^ Anyway, the explanation and details behind Ava and Billy's kiss are in the next chapter.**

**If things go according to plan SPOILER ALERT the traitor will be revealed next chapter and the Carol Danvers incident is coming up soon. As well as the first actual introduction of Tristan.**

**PM me with your issues**


	9. The Traitor? Nope, False Alarm!

**A/N:... So I'm probably going to get killed after you people read this chapter. So I'll warn you in head of time that some of the characters may be a bit OOC. Also, I made the traitor a bit more obvious. A lot of you may be able to figure it out. **

**I made a few White Collar references in this chapter. White Collar (I don't own it) is a really great TV show... Anyway, if you have seen it, tell me if you figure out where the references are. There is also one sentence inspired by a line from Pirates of the Caribbean: At World's End (I think you get the picture. I don't own it). I think only crazy people will notice it. **

**General disclaimer: I own nothing. Except for Tristan :D.**

**Warnings: Maybe language? Possible innuendo if I have the meaning of the word right and you manage to notice it.**

* * *

><p>The teen walked down another hall in Sinister's most recent lab. It was a well hidden building, being built into the side of a mountain, and pretty big. The teen had already gotten lost in it several times.<p>

The teen looked at his/her cell phone's clock and gave a sigh of relief. He/she had another hour before he/she had to get back. That's when the teen spotted the "brotherhood's" notorious zombie, nineteen year old Dane Shepard.

"Hey, Dane?" the teen asked as he/she approached the gray skinned, rotted flesh looking mutant, "Have you seen Tristan?"

"He was with Scalphunter last I checked," the gray double agent said as he passed by the teen. Just like the teen was helping Sinister gather information on the X-Men, Dane was helping Sinister gather information on the Brotherhood.

"Thanks," the X-Men traitor said as he/she headed towards Scalphunter's usual, for lack of a better term, hangout.

Before going in the teen gave a heavy sigh. He/she knew that the time was coming for his/her identity to be released and the teen regretted all of the people he/she would have to betray, one person stood out in particular. What's done is done though, it was the only way. The teen walked into the room and was greeted by a smiling Tristan.

The boy stared up at the teen and said, "Hi-"

* * *

><p><strong>Present <strong>

Walking down the hallway, Ava Bronte was about to do something she never EVER did. She was about to apologize for kissing a boy. The reasons behind her sudden urge to apologize? Well for one thing, she had to live under the same roof as the boy she kissed. Another reason? She had to fight along side him. Just like she'd learned to remain somewhat civil with Tonia once they became an official team, Ava needed everything to be settled before a life or death situation came up otherwise someone could get hurt. Finally, the most important reason was the look of shock that crossed _his_ face when Ava had pulled him into the kiss. He wasn't expecting it, hell, Ava herself wasn't expecting it. She'd just…done it.

As far as she knew, only Tonia, the boy on the receiving end of her kiss, maybe Lila, and Scott "I don't gossip" Summers knew the event had even transpired. Lila was quiet and probably wouldn't say anything, and Tonia, as far as Ava knew, wasn't much of a gossiper so she didn't have much to worry about in that respect. She was, however, worried that her friendship with the kiss recipient, A.K.A. Billy, would suffer…or worse! What if he hadn't liked it? Ava stopped walking once that thought reached her head and she couldn't suppress a slight laugh. Of _course_ he'd liked it. He'd kissed freaking Ava Rose Bronte for Christ's sake!

Finally Ava saw the source of her search. Billy was in the rec room playing pool with Leo and Alex H. "Hey Billy?" she asked, walking into the room, "Can I talk to you?"

The brunette in question shrugged and said, "Sure gorgeous, shoot,"

"I was hoping to do so privately," she said, annoyance in her voice.

Billy looked at the other two boys in the room questioningly, when they both shrugged Billy sighed, "Sure," he flashed Ava a bright smile, "Any time I get to spend alone with such a beautiful young woman is time well spent,"

Rolling her eyes, Ava grabbed Billy's wrist and yanked him out of the room. After a few seconds Billy asked Ava, "So…Where are we going?"

"The roof. Don't talk until we get there," she responded curtly.

"Anything for the loveliest being at the Institute," Billy said and remained silent the rest of the way to the roof.

Once there, Billy walked to the center of the roof as Ava shut the entrance behind her. Billy looked around for a while before finding a nice spot and sitting. "So what's this important issue that needs discussing?" he asked, "And why is it so urgent that it interrupts my game of pool and prevents you from showing the rest of the mansion how stunning you look today?" he smirked and waggled his eyebrow in an attempt to look more attractive.

Ava answered by frowning at him.

"Hey now, don't frown. You never know who might fall in love with your smile,"

"Stop it," Ava said tersely.

"Stop what, my angel in human form?"

"That! Stop that!"

"Flirting? I thought you liked it?" Billy asked as he stood up again.

"I do! It's just that…After yesterday… Ugh!" Ava huffed. This was harder than she'd originally thought.

"Oh right!" Billy exclaimed, finally realizing what Ava's odd behavior was about. "I suppose if we want things back to being somewhat normal we should _talk_ about it," he said with an overly dramatic shiver when he said talk.

"Yeah, look it was-"

"Hot," Billy interrupted as he gave a shrug.

"Hot?" Ava asked confused, she was not expecting that.

"Well…I mean I thought so,"

"No, I know! Florida, on a mission, it was almost rebelliously romantic!" after a pause Ava asked, "So where does this leave us?"

"I don't know. We can't let it distract us,"

"I know, especially with all that's going on,"

"So, we'll return to normal until this whole 'Gambit, Tristan, Mutant Massacre' issue is sorted out and then we will see what happens," Billy suggested.

"Procrastinate, sounds good, and _please_ return to your old pick-up lines until then. They were cheesy, not as sweet, and made me want to roll my eyes at you; not kiss you,"

Billy smiled mischievously, "Like this?" he asked before puffing out his chest and saying, "Do you believe in love at first sight? Or should I walk by again?"

Ava laughed and said, "Yep. Exactly like that,"

* * *

><p>Lila was startled awake by someone throwing her coat at her. Looking around confused, Lila finally relaxed once she saw Nat standing to her right, his own coat in hand. "Are you going somewhere?" Lila asked with a raised eyebrow.<p>

"Nope, _we _are going somewhere," Nat said as he threw on his coat.

The small girl gave a depressed sigh, "But Nat, you know I can't go out in public without-"

"These?" Nat asked holding up two silver bracelets.

"Yeah, but how did you-"

"Swiped them from the med lab. Dr. McCoy was busy with something or other and didn't notice,"

"But-" Nat sighed good-naturedly as Lila once again used the word, "The Professor said I'm only supposed to use them on missions and at school, otherwise I'll start wanting to use them all the time," she ignored Nat's sigh.

"Lila, you're cooped up in the mansion all the time because of the Prof's barriers helping your mutation. What's the harm in spending one night on the town with suppressed powers via shiny bracelets?" he waved the bracelets for emphasis.

"I suppose there isn't any harm… But-"

"Stop right there! You will not utter that word one more time for the rest of the evening. Look, it's five thirty right now, we'll be back in plenty of time to get a good night's sleep before school tomorrow. So put on that coat and follow me to the garage, Scott was kind enough to loan me his car for the day," Nat handed the bracelets to Lila as he dug in his pocket for the keys.

"Oh, so that's why you've been gone all day! You've been joyriding,"

Nat smiled, "Yep, and now you can experience how good I am at it,"

"Wait!" Lila hollered as she put on her coat, "Where are we going?"

"It's a surprise," Nat's plain smile then turned into a mega-watt smile.

* * *

><p>"Wow, Flora, Ava is gonna kill you once she sees what you've done to the room," Sky said as she walked past the red-head's room which had the door open.<p>

"I can't find it!" Flora practically screamed at the other girl who had strolled into the demolished room. Drawers had been emptied, mattresses had been thrown off of the bed, and clothes, jewelry, papers, as well as miscellaneous items were scattered across the floor.

Being careful not to step on anything of value, Sky made her way over to Flora, "Is this about that stupid necklace again?" she asked curiously.

"IT'S NOT STUPID!" Flora wailed, now crying.

"What's so special about it, anyway?" Sky asked, unsure what to do now that there were tears falling down her friend's face.

"The- the last time we dated Ray gave it to me. He said he'd always had it with him growing up. He said it was special to him, just like- just like me!" Flora bawled from her spot on the floor, an emptied drawer in her lap. "And- and- and we broke it off three weeks later! I broke up with him! And you know what he told me? He told me I could keep the necklace! He- He- He- Ray, he said it would always belong to me! That even if he got it back, I- I'd be the only person he could see owning it!" Flora was in hysterics, so Sky did the only thing she could think of, she ran over and hugged the other girl.

Sky knew that Flora never had any time to actually come to terms with Ray's death. With all that's been happening to her, like becoming second in command, helping in the relocation of the surviving Morlocks, looking for Tristan, looking for Gambit, schoolwork, and who knows what else, Flora was one busy girl destined for a breakdown at any moment. Losing the necklace was the final straw for Flora, she couldn't keep being strong anymore, and Sky was impressed how long she had lasted.

"I really hope you're not the traitor Sky," Flora mumbled having finally calmed down. "'cause that would really suck,"

"Relax, anyone in the mansion could have stolen those files," Sky comforted.

"The traitor is on Team Extremus, Jay said so," That got Sky's attention.

"How does Jay know?"

"Ranger,"

"I thought we agreed, no more Ranger information,"

"We did, Jay has a lot of faith in this guy though," Flora pulled away from Sky and wiped her tear stained face with her sleeve.

"So, our leader has been dealing with someone we agreed not to deal with," Sky was getting ticked off.

"Yeah, basically,"

"Isn't that kind of a reason to be alarmed?" Sky asked incredulously, did Flora seriously not see the problem?

"Well I thought so too at first, but he told me…and why would a traitor warn his team that there's a traitor? It makes no sense," Flora looked around at the damage she'd done to the room and laughed.

"What's so funny?" Sky snapped; she needed some coffee.

"I didn't realize how badly I tore this place up,"

"Yeah, it's already been established that Ava's gonna kill you,"

"…Crap," Flora said, ceasing her laughter.

"I'll say so; you are in a world of trouble!" Sky said, agreeing with Flora's choice of word.

"Well spoken, kid," a gruff voice said from the hallway. Both girls turned around, startled to see Wolverine standing in the doorway with Carol, Storm, the Professor, Beast, and Hack A.K.A. Natasha Dugan.

"Umm…What's going on?" Flora asked, slightly confused.

"Found this underneath Chuck's filing cabinet," Wolverine said as he held up a small silver necklace.

"That's mine!" the Irish native exclaimed in shock.

"We know, that's why we're here," Hack said, an edge of disappointment in her voice.

"Wait, didn't someone steal files out of that cabinet a couple days ago?" Flora asked.

"Yes, it was stolen from," Storm said.

"…and you think I stole the files," Flora stated simply to which all of the adults nodded their heads.

* * *

><p>Leo wasn't one to eavesdrop… Okay, Leo eavesdropped a lot, but could you blame him? He lived in a mansion with boat loads of hormonal teens, hidden plans, and covert operations, so it's almost impossible <em>not <em>to eavesdrop every once in a while. If he could be given a dollar for every secret he'd heard…well he'd be filthy rich.

After Billy left the pool game, Alex and Leo had picked up everything and went there separate ways. Leo, deciding to be nosy, made a mirror and walked through it only to come out behind the roof's entrance. Pressing his ear against the door, Leo heard everything. How he'd known that was where Ava led Billy, Leo would never know.

With the shocking discovery of Billy and Ava's possible future relationship still in his head, Leo walked down to the library so he could get on a computer. He was greeted by the sight of Nat and Lila at the far end of the room talking next to one of the reading chairs. Hiding behind a bookshelf, Leo heard all of their conversation as well. He was shocked to hear that Nat stole from Dr. McCoy but was more surprised when Lila agreed to go into town, fully aware of the fact that the suppression bracelets were stolen.

Unable to hold all of his knowledge anymore, Leo made another mirror, walked through it, and realized, to his horror, that he'd made a mistake in his transporting. He'd walked right into a bathroom. A dorm's bathroom. A girl's bathroom. Judging by the crying he heard in the actual room next door, the owner of the bathroom was out there. Leo sent out a mental "thank you" to whatever force made it so that the door separating the bathroom from the bedroom was closed. That's when he heard shouting about Ranger in the room. Apparently the people out there were Sky and Flora. Before he could leave, Wolverine's voice spoke up on the other side of the door. To Leo's amazement, he heard the teachers accuse Flora of being the file thief. Outraged that they would do that, Leo barged out of the bathroom only to have many eyes stare at him.

* * *

><p>Tick tock, tick tock, tick tock, tick tock, tick tock.<p>

Maya was bored.

Tick tock, tick tock, tick tock, tick tock, tick tock.

She'd been lying on her bed for the past hour staring at the ceiling. It's not like there wasn't anything to do, there was a lot. Maya just didn't feel like doing any of it. She did the same things all the time. Deciding not to let the boredom claim her, Maya got up and started looking for, perhaps, the most interesting person on Team Extremus: Alex Hepburn.

The key to finding Alex was to find Leo, the two always hung out together. It was probably because of their mutual interest in Mario Kart…even if they both sucked at it. Unfortunately for Maya, her quest for Leo was proven fruitless. He was gone. Alex wasn't anywhere obvious either. Neither of the boys were in the kitchen, dining room, rec room, library, their rooms, or on the roof. Not knowing where else to look, Maya put on her heaviest coat and went outside into the cold December evening.

"Hey Maya! Welcome to the outdoors!" a voice called over to her. Maya jumped slightly and saw both of the Alex's walking over to her. Alex Hepburn had been the one who greeted her. His nose and cheeks were both red from being out in the cold and he was wearing a big puffy coat that made him look like a marshmallow. Alex Rodgers, on the other hand, didn't look cold in the slightest. He was wearing a small jacket meant for early autumn, not freezing December.

"What brings you out here?" Rodgers asked curiously.

"I was looking for him," she nodded towards Alex H.

"Like Ava looking for Billy 'looking' or something else that doesn't make me fear for my life?" Alex asked.

Maya looked confused for a minute before saying, "I was bored and needed something to do so I decided to look for you. Is that a problem?"

"Nope. Not at all. You didn't happen to see Leo did you? We were going to have an all out snowball war with all of the guys on Team Extremus but he hasn't showed. Billy said he'd be out once he found his boots and Jay's coming as soon as he's done fixing his car's engine but Leo hasn't answered any of his texts," Alex rambled.

"Wait, what about Nat?"

"Him and Lila went out, if you know what I mean,"

"…No…Not really,"

"Oh," Alex mumbled, "Well they're on a date I think,"

"Well, doesn't that mean you'll have odd numbers once everyone shows up?" Maya asked.

"Well, considering Leo's probably a no show it'll be even,"

"But you can join if you want," Rogers butted in, "Billy's unfair considering he can blow the snowballs away from him as well as destroy them with wind…So it'll all work out in the end,"

"That's true! Billy cheats all the time! Well sure we only had one battle before this one but…Nat cheated last time too. He phased through all of the snowballs and then he turned invisible so we couldn't find him. Remember that? Wait! Rogers, you cheated! Remember, you blasted away some of the snowballs. Even I cheated! Holy crap! All of our snowball battles have been filled with cheats! We need to make new laws and set them in stone…Actually, Leo's cheat was kid of cool. Remember it Rogers? He had us throw the snowballs into a mirror and then he made them come out of a separate mirror behind someone. I don't think Jay cheated….But then again, he's a tricky one. Remember that time when-"

"ALEX!" Rogers and Maya shouted in unison.

"What?" the other boy asked, halting his one sided discussion.

"Please, and I'm saying this with the utmost respect, shut up," Rogers said.

"Now, even if there was an ounce of respect in that sentence, it's still offensive. I mean it's like saying 'With all due respect, I just killed your wife' it doesn't help anything and-" Alex's speech was cut off when two simultaneous snowballs hit him in the face. Glaring at the throwers of the evil snowballs, Alex picked up some snow and shouted, "FOR NARNIA!" before he attacked.

* * *

><p>"…Leo, what were you doing in Flora's bathroom?" Sky asked, breaking the awkward silence that followed the boy's sudden entrance.<p>

"Umm," his cheeks turned slightly pink, "I was just, ya know, walking through mirrors and I kinda sorta…Ya know… accidentally went into her bathroom,"

"Exactly how much of our conversation did you hear?" Hack asked Leo curiously.

"Oh…All of it I think," Leo said sheepishly, all of the adrenaline and anger he'd felt when he barged out of the bathroom officially gone.

"Is there a reason you decided to storm out of the bathroom like that?" Carol asked impatiently. They'd found the traitor, why couldn't they just grab her and go?

"Yeah!" the silver eyed boy said as his anger returned, "How could you just blame Flora like that? What's your proof? That necklace? Have any of you teachers ever seen a CSI show? It's called setting someone up. The _real_ traitor is clearly trying to get the blame to fall on someone else," somewhere during his tirade Leo had started pacing, "I mean, you can even prove that Flora's innocent! Wolverine can smell lies; the Professor can read freaking minds! There are lie detectors too. Don't go giving me the 'We don't have that kind of technology,' or 'I don't use my powers like that,' BS because I know we have technology way more advanced than a measly lie detector, Wolverine has no fear in hiding his feral-ness, and Professor, even you've made exceptions to your own rules every once in a while," Leo stopped pacing and stared at the crowd who'd been listening to his rant, "So why don't we just _ask_ Flora if she's the traitor and when she's proven innocent by one of the methods I've already mentioned, we can get on with our lives." When Leo finished, silence ascended the group as everyone thought over what he'd said.

"THANK YOU!" Flora shouted after a while, her glare intense as she stared at the accusers, "At least _somebody_ thinks around here! You should be ashamed that you didn't come up with any of this before Leo,"

"Is that a good or a bad thing?" the boy in question asked only to be ignored.

"So Prof, just scan my head. I'm giving you permission, that's agreeable to your morals right? Please, just admit my innocence, and give me the necklace, and go!"

Sky stared at the red-head in amazement. Sure, the adults had acted without thinking for once but that didn't mean that she had the right to order them around…But then again, they had accused her of a serious offence.

Sky looked over at Leo who was inching away from Wolverine. When he'd halted his pacing Leo had ended up next to the feral mutant. Sky internally smiled when she thought about how badly Leo and Logan got along. It really wasn't Leo's fault that whenever he stepped even slightly out of line, Wolverine was right there with danger room sessions already lined up.

"Alright Flora," the Professor finally conceded, "I will do a basic sweep of your mind to see if you are telling the truth about being innocent."

* * *

><p>Jay wanted a new car. It's as simple as that. Sure, his was stylish and cool but it was also a piece of crap. The only reason it looked good was because he'd cleaned it up. He could stand the broken heater, clicking radio, and squealing breaks but the smoking engine was something he could not. After spending well over two hours trying to fix it, Jay had given up. Wolverine could probably help him but Jay would rather just get a new car and keep his ego.<p>

Not wanting to clean up and go just yet, Jay sat on the ground, back resting against the front left tire of his car. Looking around, the pyrokinetic couldn't help but admire the other vehicles parked throughout the garage. People could say what they wanted about Xavier's School for Gifted Youngsters, but what they couldn't say was that they had bad taste in motorized vehicles…Well except for the big black creeper van. That thing was just plain odd.

"I always thought guys _worked_ in a garage. If all they do is sit, it's a wonder Logan is in such good shape." the voice of Tonia Hart said to Jay's right. He hadn't noticed her appear next to him.

"Well us guys also get frustrated when we can't fix something, like a car, so some of us just quit," Jay said, nodding for the girl to sit down.

Obliging, Tonia sat and said, "Well that's not good for our team leader to say. Shouldn't you just try a… different approach to solving the problem?" she spoke with a smooth voice, almost as if she was trying to seduce Jay with words.

"Oh…Well umm….Cars and whatever you're talking about are probably not the same thing… really. So I don't think giving up on a car is actually relevant," Jay could feel his ears turning red.

"Now," Tonia leaned closer towards him, "What makes you think I wasn't referring to cars? There are many problems that need solved when it comes to cars, some of them are just less noticeable than others,"

Jay felt his entire face flush, "Tonia," he winced when his voice cracked a bit, "I don't think we're on the same page here,"

"I think we are," she traced her hand along Jay's arm so he quickly pulled it away from her.

"I really don't"

Leaning in so that her torso was almost pressed again Jay's side and her lips were close to his ear, Tonia whispered, "I_ really_ think we are Jay," backing away slightly she added, "We're both attractive people, you just need to live a little. Maybe you'll look less like a tomato next time," turning to walk away, Tonia stopped and pointed at a wrench, "Try using that one on your car, it'll work better," then she left.

Utterly confused Jay did the only thing he could. He went back to fixing his car. Speaking of which, Jay wanted a new car.

* * *

><p>"I TOLD YOU!" Flora shouted once the Professor was done with the mind sweep and agreed that she hadn't stolen the files, "ITOLDYOU ITOLDYOUITOLDYOU! I! TOLD! YOU!"<p>

"Brilliant," Carol said sarcastically, "Our suspect is innocent. Hoorah! Oh wait; now we have a small problem," she gave a slight pause, "We have no more leads!"

"Maybe we could test every student here…" Sky suggested.

"We would lose all trust if we did so. You saw how Flora acted," Hack said.

"We will have to wait once again," Storm said sadly, "It is all we can do,"

"But what if they kill someone next time?" Leo asked.

"Nothin' we can do to stop it, kid," Wolverine growled in frustration.

"So, potentially, someone could die before we uncover the traitor," Flora said angrily, "All because you don't want to lose our trust,"

"Wait Flora! Remember what you told me earlier?" Sky asked suddenly.

"What did I tell you?"

"It involved Team Extremus and the traitor…" Sky pushed on.

"But I'm not supposed to… Oh alright, fine! I'll spill! But Leo's here and we all know how well he can keep a secret!" Flora said with an edge of sarcasm.

"I resent that!" Leo exclaimed.

"What do you have to tell us Flora?" Beast asked kindly.

"Well I heard from someone who heard from a source, who for some reason knows a bunch of crap, trust me he does…anyway, the traitor is on Team Extremus. As you can tell, it's clearly not me. And I assume everyone in this room is clean, so that leaves nine possible people. I doubt that it's Jay so therefore, there's eight left," Flora explained.

"You have a source?" the Professor asked with a raised eyebrow.

"Yes. We believe he is a mutant, but that's all we know," Sky said, "He's…He's how we got the original address for Gambit's apartment back before the massacre,"

"Do ya trust the guy?" Wolverine asked.

"Not really…but he seems to be trying to help," Flora admitted.

"Enough about the source! What about the traitor? Or Gambit? Those are my priorities, not some random guy," Carol shouted.

"This mystery man, what did you call him?" Storm asked.

"We didn't…but his name's Ranger," Leo said.

"Right. Well, Ranger may very well be putting the pieces of this puzzle together for us. I believe if we give him time, this Ranger, will lead us to Gambit, the traitor, and possibly even Tristan," the white haired woman said.

"But do we have enough time to wait? That is the real question," Leo mumbled solemnly.

* * *

><p>"It's about time you showed up!" Billy shouted as he ducked out of the way of a snowball. It had been decided that powers would be off limits until everyone had shown up.<p>

"Sorry," Jay mumbled, still dumbfounded and confused about his earlier discussion with Tonia.

"Fix your car?" Roger asked while he attempted to hit Billy with his snowy projectile.

"Yep," the team leader said with a shrug, "But I think I'm just going to get a new car the next time mine breaks down,"

Rogers pulled Jay in front of him as a human shield, "Good call," he said.

"Does this mean we can use our powers now?" Maya asked as she and Alex jogged over.

"I guess so," Alex said, "Because now that Billy's out here and Jay's done messing with his car everyone who's expected to show has…But we can't have even teams. There's five of us. Rogers, me, Billy, Maya, and now Jay. So which team should have an extra? We want everything to be as even as possible because it's fair… Unless of course it's my team that has the advantage because then we'd win,"

"I think that Maya has the highest advantage. She can avoid anything we throw at her and probably do impossible moves that allow her to still hit us with a snowball while she's dodging," Jay said practically.

"Sounds about right," Rogers agreed as Maya and Billy nodded behind him.

"Alright then," Alex took control again, "Maya will be on the team with one less person," opening his mouth to continue, Alex quickly shut it with a loud click of his teeth when Jay took control of the situation.

"It should be Maya and Billy on one team because Billy probably has a slight advantage too. Then Rogers, Alex, and I on the other one," the dark haired boy suggested. The others nodded their agreement.

Gritting his teeth and glaring at Jay, with false happiness Alex said, "So it's decided. Maya and Billy versus everyone else. I think that's a great set up and-"

"Hey!" Tonia waved at them from the mansion's doorway, interrupting Alex, "I hope I'm not interrupting your _precious_ game or anything but the Prof wants to see Team Extremus pronto. I'll call up the two lovebirds out on their date. Billy, go hunt down your girlfriend. Everyone else, head to the war room."

"Why?" Maya asked, "What's going on?"

"Beats me," the other girl replied.

"I think I know," Jay said, his voice quieter than normal.

"Really Loverboy?" Tonia raised an eyebrow, "What do you know?"

Heaving a sigh, Jay, in a voice so fast Pietro would have been proud of it, said "The-traitor-is-on-our-team."

"WHAT!" everyone else shouted in unison.

"The traitor," Jay gulped, "is on Team Extremus."

* * *

><p><strong>AN: Dane Shepard belongs to Haretrigger.**

**PM me if you hate me right now.**

**I'm a liar, SPOILER ALERT traitor is definately next chapter... as well as my twist on the Carol Danvers incident. Maybe you'll see what Ranger's been up to. No Gambit I'm afraid :(**


	10. Traitor Revealed

**A/N: HAAHAHAHAHAHAHAA the chapter is finished!**

**Anyway, I own NOTHING! **

**Sorry for my absence. Soccer picked up again...**

* * *

><p>"Will you relax?" Nat asked with a slight laugh when he noticed how stiff Lila was in the passenger's seat of the car, "The Prof's not going to send Logan into the restaurant, claws blazing, to drag us back to the Institute."<p>

Lila smiled at the thought, "He probably wouldn't even have to send Logan. Wolverine would come by himself," she teased.

Rolling his eyes good naturedly, Nat said "Come on," before unbuckling his seat belt and exiting the car. Lila and Nat had been a couple for the past two months. Due to Lila's inability to control her powers, their dates consisted of private meals and movies on the mansion grounds. This was the couple's first off the reservation date.

"You coming Blondie?" Nat called from the other side of the parking lot. Lila had yet to get out of the car. With a slight blush, the fifteen year old exited the vehicle and joined her boyfriend.

"Are you sure you can afford this?" Lila asked Nat as they walked into the fancy Italian restaurant.

"Yeah, don't worry. As long as you don't get anything unreasonably expensive we'll be okay," he reassured.

Having already made a reservation, the two members of Team Extremus were seated pretty fast. The meal went by quickly with idle chatter during sporadic intervals. Once the food was gone and the bill paid, Nat and Lila decided to take a walk.

"Look at that," Lila said pointing towards an apartment building after about ten minutes of walking.

"What about it?" Nat asked as he flicked a spec of snow off of his coat.

"It's the building that Gambit was at before the massacre,"

Looking at the address Nat agreed with her. The two of them stood still, just staring at the apartment for a while before a particularly rude man shoved his way past them. "We should probably start walking again," Nat said pulling Lila's hand. She didn't move.

"You know what I think is kind of suspicious?" Lila asked quietly, not seeming to notice Nat's attempt to make her move.

"What's suspicious?" he asked giving up on trying to get Lila to move, choosing instead to just hold her hand.

"All of the people I need to know everything about are the ones I can't get information from…Gambit, Ranger, Tristan… Even Rogers, Kitty, you and the Professor are blips on my radar. Why is it that random people are immune to my mutation?" Lila leaned her head on Nat's shoulder, "I hope Tristan's okay," she mumbled as an afterthought.

"He's a strong kid," Nat reassured, stroking Lila's hair, "He probably just thinks that he's away on some extended trip. I bet when you find him he'll be smiling and telling you about all of the adventures he's been on,"

Pulling he head up Lila objected, "You mean we. When _we _find him he'll be smiling,"

"That's what I said," Nat argued, confused.

"No it isn't,"

"Oh, oops," he said unenthusiastically. Clearly it wasn't an accident.

"You're hiding something," Lila stated.

"It's nothing, really," he refused to make eye contact with the girl who'd stolen his heart.

"Nat…"

"Just leave it," he said harshly. Upon seeing the hurt flash across Lila's face Nat quickly looked down and whispered, "Please. I don't want to think about any of that just yet,"

Lila pulled Nat's chin up so that he was looking into her eyes. She studied him for a while before saying, "Nat, whatever you're going through, you don't have to go through it alone. You've always helped me out when I go through a hard time, I want to do the sa-" she was cut off when Nat pulled her into a kiss. Something about that particular kiss seemed different from the others to Lila, she just couldn't figure out what. Nat pulled away once his phone rang.

"Hello?" he answered his cell, "…Why?...About what?...My phone isn't tapped, you can tell me…Fine, we'll head back,"

"Who was it?" Lila asked once Nat hung up.

"Tonia. The Prof's called for some meeting in the war room with our team and the senior X-Men,"

"Do you know why?"

"Nope. We'll find out soon though. Let's go," this time when Nat pulled Lila's hand she followed him.

* * *

><p>Maya never thought of herself as a very judgmental person. She liked people. She craved social interaction and being in the company of others. Maya supposed that's why she got along so well with Rogers. He hated being alone and she was drawn to other people. It just made sense. Of course, for some odd reason, he wasn't in the war room yet. That got Maya thinking. Maybe he was the traitor. Maybe he was just pretending to be her friend so that people trusted him more. <em>NO!<em> Maya mentally berated herself, _Rogers is possibly the sweetest guy you know. _Then again, it always was the person you least expect.

"No, it can't be him," Maya accidentally mumbled out loud.

"What can't be who?" Flora asked to Maya's left, mystery novel covering her face.

"The traitor…Who do you think it is?"

Sighing, Flora set her book down, "Truthfully, I'd rather not think about it," the red-head said.

"But if you had to guess…Who would you say it is?"

"Billy,"

"Why him?" a voice belonging to Jay asked curiously as he sat down to the right of Maya.

"He's a flirt," Flora said, nodding towards Jay in greeting, "My guess is that he uses those stupid pick up lines to make us all think he's incompetent so that we won't suspect him. It makes perfect sense,"

"Really? How do we know it isn't you? I mean, you were pretty fast at blaming someone else…" Maya stated her suspicion out loud.

"The Prof scanned my head. I'm clean. That's probably why we've been called here, so that he can scan all of your minds to find the traitor,"

"What do you think Maya?" Jay asked suddenly, "Who do you think it is?"

"I don't know. I mean, it's hard to accuse anyone because I'm so used to working as a team with these people and the prospect that one of us is playing the others terrifies me," Maya thought for a moment, "What if it's Alex?"

"Which one?" Flora and Jay asked at the same time.

"Hepburn. Just think about it Jay! Whenever you take charge he glares at you, he hates it that you steal _his_ so called limelight… He wanted to be the leader so now that he's not, he wants revenge! Alex fits the bill one hundred percent!"

"That makes sense I suppose… What about Tonia?" Jay asked.

"She's got an attitude, I admit, but I don't think there's anything malicious there… Just moderately aggravated," Flora said.

"And Rogers?" Maya asked quietly.

"I don't think he'd do anything wrong. He's a good guy… But maybe that's what he wants, he wants us to think he can do no wrong just so he can stab us with a knife once our backs are turned," Jay rambled.

"How about Nat?" Flora offered.

"Nat's possibly one of the most amazing guys I've ever met! Have you seen how he got Lila to open up? I doubt it's him, he's too kind," Maya said.

"…So then it's Lila," Jay said simply.

"It's always the quiet ones," Flora offered.

"But she's too sweet, besides, what motive does she have? The Prof is the one who makes her powers manageable," Maya argued.

"We're running out of people here!" Jay threw up his hands in exasperation.

"I don't think this is supposed to be a pick and choose thing," Flora said, "No matter who the traitor turns out to be, it's going to be a surprise,"

"So you think we should just wait and see what happens?" Maya asked.

"No, we should prepare as much as we can," Jay said.

"We just need to be aware of the fact that everything is going to change anyway," Flora added. In that moment, Maya knew why it was Jay and Flora who were in charge of the team. Both of them possessed major leadership qualities, they were just different stages. Jay was the original tactician. He made the plans and set everything up. Flora was like the back up plan. She was there to fine tune everything and help pick up the pieces if something went wrong.

_Jay and Flora,_ Maya thought, _are an awful lot like Scott and Jean_.

* * *

><p>"And we are back," Nat said as he parked the car in the garage.<p>

"Yep…So what do you think this urgent meeting is about?" Lila asked with some uncertainty.

"What do I think it's about? Well…Ugh, Lila, I need to tell you something. It's been bothering me ever since I found out and tonight everything was great and it made me feel even worse…" he trailed off.

Looking concerned, Lila asked, "What is it?"

Nat hesitated but then said, "About a week ago, the day Miss Danvers arrived actually, I learned that the traitor is on Team Extremus,"

"Our team 'Team Extremus'? Or some other one?"

"Is there another one?" Nat asked with a chuckle.

"There might be," with that, Lila got out of the car followed by Nat.

"Why would anyone call their team 'Team Extremus'?" Nat asked curiously as the two of them stood in front of the hood of Scott's car.

"I don't know, it has a nice ring to it," she tried.

"Sure it does…It's something Alex H. came up with, it's pathetic,"

"Be nice," Lila swatted Nat's shoulder playfully, "He could have tried really hard to come up with that name,"

"Doubt it,"

Lila furrowed her eyebrows, "Are you and Alex in a fight? You've been mean to him all night,"

"What?" Nat looked confused, "No, I'm joking…Being sarcastic,"

"Oh. Well, come on. We don't want to keep the others waiting,"

"Not so fast, give me the bracelets,"

"Why?" Lila asked.

"Because you're not supposed to have them and I don't want you getting in trouble because I stole them for you. I'm going to put them back while everyone's in the war room," Nat explained. Frowning, Lila slowly pulled off the bracelets as once again she was assaulted by endless information. The tires on Scott's car had recently been replaced. Billy was headed towards the war room. Hank just exited the med lab. Maya use to take drugs. The short cut in Wario's Gold Mine in Mario Kart is located… Wait, where did that one come from?

"Lila? Hey," Nat snapped his fingers in front of the girl's face, taking her out of her reverie, "You all right?" he asked concerned.

"Yeah I'm fine," she dismissed.

"You do realize that you're one of the bravest girls I've ever met," Nat said looking into Lila's eyes.

"How so?"

"I can't even begin to fathom what it is you go through every day with all of the information you gather,"

"It's not as bad as Rogue…"

"I love you," Nat stated suddenly with so much passion that Lila was momentarily stunned.

"I-I think I love you too," she responded after a while, just comprehending that that was indeed how she felt about the boy in front of her.

Nat smiled, his eyes shining with joy and… something else? Suddenly they pulled each other into a kiss more passionate than the one shared earlier that day. This time it was Lila who broke apart the kiss, although she hadn't really wanted to. "Don't you have stolen bracelets to return?" she asked a bit breathlessly. Nat's only response was a smile as he walked out of the garage.

* * *

><p>"Attention everyone," Professor Charles Xavier called to the congregation of students, "As there are four people still missing, we will proceed with the meeting in about fifteen minutes. Hopefully we will be able to get everything sorted out before ten so that you all can get a good night's rest before school tomorrow," The meeting called for the teachers, senior X-Men, and Team Extremus that way once the traitor was discovered they could be safely reprimanded… power in numbers and what not. Lila, Nathan, Kurt, and Kitty were the four still missing.<p>

"Like, sorry I'm late," now there were three people missing, "I was just cleaning up the mess someone, like, left in the kitchen," Kitty started grumbling things about Bobby being an idiot while she sat down next to Rogue.

Across the table Leo and Alex were cracking up as they watched Jay turn bright red when Tonia sat down to his right.

"What do you think that's about?" Leo asked curiously.

"I don't want to know!" Alex laughed.

Suddenly becoming serious Leo asked, "Who do you think it is?"

"What?" Alex was busy paying attention to Ava as she slipped out of the room without anyone else noticing.

"Dude!" an irate Leo exclaimed, "Pay attention!"

Turning his attention to the other boy Alex said, "Sorry I was distracted,"

"Well if you keep getting distracted people will start getting suspicious,"

"Are you saying you think I'm the traitor? Me? Really?"

"…Well…."

"Oh, and you're so innocent? Your mutation alone is cause for alarm! I mean, you can go anywhere and back before anyone realizes you're gone!"

"That's true but-"

"Besides," Alex interrupted, seeming to not notice Leo had been speaking, "I'm here aren't I? If I were the traitor why would I show up to the meeting that's supposed expose me? I'd just make a run for it. My bet is on Ava since she just ditched,"

Looking around Leo realized that what Alex had said was true, Ava had left. Focusing back on his friend Leo realized that the other boy was still rambling on about something, "…is that not cause for alarm? She's hot with an attitude. Both of them are actually,"

"I'm sorry," Leo said blinking his eyes, "Who are we talking about?"

"Tonia and Ava. Weren't you paying attention? And you said I was starting to look suspicious! Now look whose getting distracted. Do you know who gets distracted easily? Pietro. You know, from the Brotherhood. Speaking of them, have you seen their new guy? Dane something or other. Of course you have! He's been with them for a few months…About the time Tristan disappeared. You don't think he knows something do you? We should ask him tomorrow if he shows up at school. Speaking of school, why would he go there? He looks like a freakin' zombie. Does he have a code name? Hey I got it! Let's call him…Wait for it… Patient Zero! Has a nice ring, don't it?" Leo stared at the talkative boy in amazement, only Alex could go from to hot girls to the Brotherhood's new zombie recruit in a matter of seconds. "Hey," Alex continued, "Let's make a bet!"

"What?" was all Leo could ask; he was really lost in the eighteen-year-old's constant change of topic.

"Whoever guesses the traitor right does the other's chores for a month!"

Playing along Leo said, "And if we both guess wrong?"

"Nothing happens. You already know my bet. Who's yours?"

"Um…" Looking around the room Leo saw that Rogers was the only person not interacting with someone else. Eh, why not? "Rogers I guess,"

"Well then, I believe we have an accord!"

* * *

><p>Rogers rested his forehead on his hands. How could this have happened? After everything that they'd been through together, finding Gambit, surviving the massacre, laughing at movie nights, and working during danger room sessions… They were a team and now one of them was a back-stabbing no-good dirty, rotten, turncoat! It ticked Rogers off and what made matters worse was that until the traitor was revealed he couldn't trust anyone he'd learned to call a friend.<p>

Picking up his head, Rogers looked around the room. Suspicious glances were being sent all around. Scott sent one to Tonia, _probably because she tried to win him over while Jean was in the room,_ Rogers mused. Sky sent one to Alex H. Flora sent one to Billy…Jay just stared at the table, face red, Tonia smirking triumphantly.

This was torture in its truest form. Sure, no pain was being inflicted on Rogers physically, but the mental strain was killing him. Maya was his best friend, how could he fight her if she was an enemy? Leo and Alex were his pool and video game buddies; they couldn't be willing to go against everything they know, right? Jay was their leader. He always planned ahead and knew how to diffuse a situation. He knew how to make people smile when times got rough; Jay would never do anything to harm his team… Unless that's what he wanted everyone to think. Nat was the one everyone turned to when they just needed to talk; he understood pain because he'd been through it when his mother died. He would never inflict those emotions- hurt, anger, sadness, pain- on others. Of course, nobody ever bothered to ask if Nat had any problems he needed to get off of his chest…Then there was Lila. She was quiet and, Rogers noted, she was pretty judgmental. Maybe she judged the X-Men negatively and was seeking revenge… Rogers stopped himself there, he was being paranoid.

Not being able to sit and deal with his thought any longer Rogers stood up and began pacing behind his chair. He didn't miss the wary looks sent his way as he did so. _This is pathetic! _He mentally shouted strong enough that he was positive Jean picked it up; _we're sitting around waiting to see which friend is the one selling out information while a nine year old boy is God knows where and possibly in need of help! It really shouldn't be this difficult to get our priorities straight!_

Rogers stopped the rant in his head when he saw Lila walk into the room. She was radiating joy- what had she and Nat been doing? Speaking of which… "Where's Nat?" Rogers asked the younger girl.

He watched as Lila jumped slightly before saying, albeit quietly, "He's parking the car," then she made a beeline for the nearest chair…Rogers couldn't even begin to fathom what was running through her head.

Making a mental checklist of everyone that was there, Rogers couldn't help but notice Ava had disappeared. That was suspicious. Before he could broach the topic in his mind, Kurt ported in causing various complaints about the smell.

"Sorry I'm late," he apologized, "I vas trying to beat ze level in angry birds,"

* * *

><p>Ava didn't like the situation one bit. The Professor was going to probe her mind to see if she was a traitor. Probe. Her. Mind. She was a teenage girl; she didn't want some old bald handicapped man knowing all of her secrets! She had some pretty profound thoughts!<p>

Knowing exactly what she was going to do, Ava headed towards the garage, passing Nat as she did so. He sent her a confused glance before going on his way, probably to the meeting. The very meeting Ava had no intention of attending.

When she made it to the overly sized garage, Ava walked around until she found a motorcycle she liked. Not caring whose it was, she started the bike and sat on it. Where did she intend on going? Would she leave forever? Right now it didn't really matter, the storm controller just wanted to high tail it out of the mansion, away from the stress and chaos in the war room.

Ava took off down the driveway.

* * *

><p>"As you all are aware of by now, there is someone smuggling delicate information out of the Institute. I believe it is time I told you what exactly what has been stolen," Professor X said once the meeting started, "At first it was unnoticeable because the smuggler simply made copies. We have only recently discovered this with the help of Miss Dugan. The copies made were of the general information of every student here. Normally that is not much to worry about because all that is listed is name, age, and mutation. The real cause for alarm was when, more recently, this thief broke into my office and stole the more in depth information of three people,"<p>

"Oh yeah, that was before the whole Gambit fiasco…I thought you weren't going to give us the specific information," Jay said his interest obtained.

"That was before today when we received a valuable piece of information that has been kept from us; the traitor is on our newest team, Team Extremus. Now, back to what was being said previously, three people's files have been stolen. Scott, your and Jean's files are two of them and the third file isn't even of one of my student's," Xavier trailed off.

"Well… Whose is the third?" Tonia asked rather impolitely.

"Gambit's. As of now there is no particular reason why those are the only three missing that we can think of. We wish to delve into this once the traitor is revealed. That is our purpose for this evening. After our success in eliminating Flora from the suspect list earlier with a simple mind, I shall conduct one on every member of Team Extremus. If you are appalled to this idea please tell me instead of leaving on one of Logan's motorcycles as Avalon has already done," The Professor finished. When nobody spoke up against it, not wanting to be suspected probably, Xavier asked for a volunteer to go first. Jay decided it should be him.

* * *

><p>"I can't believe she'd do that. It's probably her you know," Tonia whispered to Sky while Xavier explained to Jay exactly what he was going to do.<p>

"Well she probably didn't want to feel violated. I mean think about it, high and mighty Professor Xavier is going to be poking around in your head. What if he finds something you don't want him to find?" Sky defended.

"I've got nothing to hide so that's not a problem,"

"Really? Not even…that chick flick collection in your dresser?" Sky said slyly.

"I don't know what you're talking about," Tonia's eyes were wide, clearly showing that she'd been caught. Realizing this she sighed, "How'd you find out?"

"Lila knows everything. You just need to be near her when she blurts something out,"

"This is just great! Lila probably knows all about my...other secrets too!" Tonia huffed in annoyance and glared daggers at Lila who didn't appear to notice.

"So what are you two beautiful ladies discussing?" Billy asked as he slid into the chair Jay had previously occupied.

"Our suspicion in Ava," Tonia said, her voice turning slightly seductive.

Rolling her eyes, Sky said, "_Her_ suspicion is more like it. I understand why Ava left. Nat on the other hand is who I'm questioning. He's not here yet,"

"The Prof seems to think he's here somewhere otherwise he'd be called out like Ava…" Billy thought out loud.

"He's probably just lurking in the shadows somewhere," Tonia said offhandedly. Sky and Billy looked around the room but saw no trace of their Hispanic friend.

* * *

><p>Carol Danvers reclined in her chair and looked at the boy next to her. Scott. He was pretty high up in the food chain at Xavier's being one of his oldest students. Scott was around nineteen to twenty years old so he was also one of the youngest to be included in the adult's business. Perfect.<p>

"So Scott," the blonde said casually, "Do you have any theories as to who is behind all of this?" of course Carol should know this…

With a raised eyebrow the young man said, "Well no. We thought Magneto but this isn't what he typically does and it doesn't benefit him very much…You should know this unless you weren't paying attention,"

"Right, sorry. What do you think they wanted with only those three files?"

"We talked about this too…"

"Sorry I just, uh, had a headache when we discussed this stuff so I'm trying to get filled in now,"

Scott nodded, clearly buying it. "At first we assumed that they were just interested in Jean and me because we've been at the mansion the longest. The fact that Gambit's file was stolen sets us off a bit. That is, unless his file was stolen by accident. We really don't know much about him anyway so the thief didn't get much on him. There's also the theory of mutations. Gambit and I both have energy related mutations. He converts it into explosions and I convert it into my optic blasts. In this theory Jean is the odd one out because her mutation involves the mind. The only way this theory would work would be if Gambit has a secret mental based power like empathy or telepathy,"

"So basically we have nothing but theories and ideas. Nothing solid," Carol summed up.

"Yeah, pretty much,"

Carol smiled to herself, that's all she needed to know.

* * *

><p>Lila was panicking. Where was Nat? How hard could it be to return stolen bracelets? People were starting to accuse him and Lila was not just going to sit down and watch them do that to her boyfriend. No. Lila was not one for passive actions.<p>

Standing up, Lila was over to the door and peaked her head out…No Nat in sight. To her left stood Carol Danvers, the older woman just giving her a curious look. Something about Carol was off. She seemed more relaxed. Maybe it was because part of her job was about to be accomplished. She was about to figure out who the traitor is.

Lila was so caught up in her thoughts that she didn't notice Carol reach into her pocket until it was too late. For inside of Carol Danvers' pocket was a switchblade which she flicked open as soon as Jay's mind probe ended. Before Xavier could even announce the team leader's innocence Carol had the blade firmly pressed against Lila's throat. This of course led to general chaos.

* * *

><p>Backing out of the room slowly, Carol could feel all of the eyes on her. Confusion, disbelief, anger, disapproval, confusion… This was the moment Carol hadn't been looking forward to. It's not like she didn't like it at Xavier's. She did. Really. It was just that her employer had a much better offer. Revenge. Carol Danvers craved revenge on her mother's murderers. The Institute just didn't allow that.<p>

Revenge.

It was her obsession with revenge that led her to this moment, holding a knife to the least threatening member in the room as she makes her escape. Carol would have left sooner but her employer wanted to know how close the X-Men were to finding him, so she had to hang around a bit longer. Scot had provided all of the answers she needed anyway.

"Why are you doing this Carol?" Xavier asked once she had successfully moved herself and her stiff as a board hostage out into the hallway.

_Think like Carol_ she told herself, "S.H.I.E.L.D. wasn't paying enough," she spat, "I found someone who could give me what I want," that wasn't a lie.

"I haven't known you to be one to get paid off Carol," Ororo said. Everyone was in the hallway now.

"Well clearly nobody knows me. Now all of you just go back inside that precious little war room of yours so I can leave," Carol pressed the knife a little harder to Lila's throat but pulled back a bit in horror when she saw a little bit of blood.

Noticing Carol's momentary lapse, Rogue took her glove off and grabbed the blonde's bare forearm. This didn't go unnoticed by Carol.

Feeling the pull of Rogue's mutation Carol shoved Lila away before holding Rogue's bare wrist with her free hand.

Rogue couldn't pull away.

Carol screamed.

Rogue screamed.

Nat fell out of Carol's body.

Carol and Rogue collapsed.

Everyone stared at Nat in shock.

* * *

><p><em>This wasn't supposed to happen<em>, Nat thought as he quickly pulled a second knife out of his boot and grabbed the closest person to him.

"Sorry Lila," he whispered in the poor girl's ear. He just had to back up a few more steps before he was home free… or Sinister's lab free.

"Why?" was her choked out response.

"I need revenge and this was the only way," he whispered back before turning to Wolverine who was getting ready to charge, "Please don't think about it," three steps left.

"Why not, bub?" the feral mutant snarled. Yep. Everyone was pissed off at him. He saw this coming.

"I really don't want to kill Lila. Please don't make me do something we'd all regret tomorrow," two steps left.

"If you don't want to do this, then why are you?" Professor Xavier asked.

"He offered the one thing I want. The reason I joined in the first place," Nat explained. One step left.

"Who is _he_?" Billy asked, betrayal written all over his face.

"The man who has Tristan," Nat mumbled before phasing through the ground.

* * *

><p><strong>AN: So I was going to involve more aftermath type stuff but decided not to in this chapter. **

**Anyway, if you're wondering why nobody attacked Nat it's because mostly everyone is in shock. **

**No flames.**

**I should probably find a beta reader person.**


	11. Aftershock

**A/N: Ah yes, the long awaited chapter. It's particularly long... Anyway, school is back so updates are going to be terrible for quite some time. sorry. If things go according to plan this story shall be complete in about three to four chapters. **

**In this chapter I changed some things to better fit this story. Nothing too big though. I'm also planning to do several other OC stories revolving around this one.**

**WARNING: language**

**Disclaimer: I own Tristan. Nothing else.**

* * *

><p>"The children have made coffee. I do not think that they will be sleeping tonight," Ororo Munroe said as she offered coffee to the gathered adults in Xavier's office.<p>

"Thank you," Natasha Dugan mumbled upon receiving her mug, then she said, "I don't think anyone's going to get sleep tonight…Well, anyone who just witnessed Nathan's betrayal at least,"

"It was…unexpected," the weather goddess stated while she sat in a chair.

Logan growled from his spot by the door, "We shoulda seen this comin',"

"We couldn't have possibly known that Nathan was the traitor. He's never given us reason to distrust him," Jean calmly reasoned.

"It doesn't matter! We invited the punk in here! We opened our doors to a spy! Why didn't we see this comin'!"

"Logan!" Ororo shouted, slamming her coffee mug on a nearby table, "I was there the day Nathan was recruited! He reacted just like any other child does when we come!" she sighed heavily, rubbing her temples, and in a calmer voice said, "Something happened that caused him to turn against us; he was NOT our enemy upon his arrival."

"But he's our enemy now," Scott muttered receiving curious glances from around the room. They wanted to know what he was getting at. "I'm just saying he's an enemy. Whether we like the idea or not we're going to have to accept it. We can't go on pretending that his reasoning is justified and that when we find him he'll side with us. He told Lila he wanted revenge and apparently he'll do anything to get it,"

"What are you tryin' say Slim?" Logan asked.

"We can't keep calling him Nathan. We have to call him by his codename like we do all enemies,"

"Darkheart," Jean whispered sadly. It always hurt when they had to start calling a friend by their codename.

"So, now what do we do?" Natasha asked in defeat, "I have to work tomorrow. The children have to go to school…How are we supposed to focus with everything that's going on?"

"You don't focus, darlin'. You just have to show up. Pop in a movie or somethin' for your class. Problem solved," Logan said.

"No, problem not solved! The students were supposed to give reports tomorrow! A lot of them have to bring in things; I don't want to make them lug in their crap again!"

Before Natasha and Logan could continue, Storm's calm voice spoke up, "Now the problem is solved. There will be a cancellation due to snow tomorrow,"

"Thanks Ororo," Natasha sighed happily.

Slowly the room flowed into casual discussions, although they were forced. The real reason that the authority figures around the mansion were crowded into the Professor's study was so that they could get an update on Rogue and Carol. Xavier and Hank had whisked off the two unconscious girls to the med lab shortly after Nat made his getaway. This led to scarce information about what was going on. That's why when Xavier wheeled into his office after hours of absence, the room silenced instantly. He looked tired and resigned.

"Professor, is Rogue alright?" Jean asked hesitantly.

"Yes, Rogue will make a full recovery…" the Professor answered truthfully.

"And Carol?" Scott asked.

Xavier sighed, "She's in a coma that I fear may be permanent,"

Ororo covered her mouth as tears threatened to spill out of her eyes. "How is this possible?" the weather goddess asked.

"We believe that Rogue held onto her for so long that Carol's psyche was absorbed fully,"

"So Stripes has two minds in her head?" Logan questioned.

"Not quite. Rogue is still the dominant presence in her head. I believe that Carol will act just like the other psyches Rogue has obtained…albeit slightly louder," Xavier explained.

"The other pyches still cause Stripes grief. I don't think a louder one will help at all,"

"That's where it gets interesting. Carol isn't like the other psyches. Where they are only pieces of one's subconscious, Carol's psyche is her entire subconscious. For lack of a better way of putting it, Carol is located in Rogue's head. Her entire self is there, not just snippets,"

"You're losing me Chuck,"

"Carol has the ability to completely override all of Rogue's psyches. She could possibly be the only voice. Carol can potentially help us unlock the secrets of Rogue's mutation,"

"What if Carol doesn't want to help?" Scott asked; he wasn't a big fan of Ms. Danvers.

"That's why I was in the med lab. I met with Rogue and Carol in Rogue's mind. Ms. Danvers seemed accepting of her fate and said she would do what had to be done. She also told Rogue that she wouldn't try to take over; that is always promising to hear," Xavier said.

"So Carol's psyche is busy taming all of the psyches in Rogue's head like a gardener," Scott started and when he noticed the Professor open his mouth to use better terms he quickly continued, "Leaving Rogue in complete control of herself while Carol's body just sits there?"

"S.H.I.E.L.D. has been contacted and they'll get Carol's body in the next few days. With both us and them searching for a way to put Carol back in her body, it will happen eventually,"

"And until then?"

"Carol's body will remain in its vegetative state,"

Logan growled from his spot in the room, "I don't like this Chuck. Whatever's goin' on is some serious shit."

"Yes Logan…It is," Xavier ignored Logan's use of bad language, "It may even be more complicated than what the X-Men can handle,"

"Are you saying what I think you're saying?" Scott asked his mentor with a raised eyebrow.

"The X-Men can't go against this unknown enemy by themselves, "Xavier explained, "Either the New Recruits or Team Extremus will need to go too once the time arrives,"

"Team Extremus shouldn't go. It's too personal for them now," Jean reasoned.

Chuckling, Logan said, "If I know them as good as I think I do, those punks won't stay put once we know where to go. The fact that Darkheart- or whatever he's called now- is against us only fuels those kids' determination to fight whoever this bad guy is."

"It's true. Trust me," Scott said while nodding in agreement, "The more personal something gets to them, the more indomitable they become."

"So it's agreed that Team Extremus will go with us once this enemy is found…The New Recruits must be getting stir crazy with the number of times we've left them behind," Natasha said.

"Charles I have discovered something very curious!" Hank said, bursting into the office with clipboard in hand. This, of course, caught the attention of everyone gathered, "It appears that Rogue, after absorbing Carol, took so much of her psyche that the powers Rogue has taken from Carol are now permanent,"

"I'm sorry, what?" Jean asked amazed.

"It appears that Rogue shall forever be in possession of Miss Carol Danvers' powers,"

* * *

><p><em>Dear Lila,<em>

_So, at this point, I really don't think you want anything to do with me…I don't even know why I'm writing this…Ease a guilty conscience? Truthfully, if you've made it this far without ripping this letter to shreds I'm amazed…Well, back to the purpose of this pathetic excuse of an apology letter._

_There's not much information I can go into without giving too much away so I'll go with the basic outline here. A few months ago, shortly after the massacre, a man approached me and asked for my services. I said no. Then he made me an offer I couldn't refuse…Something the X-Men disagree with…He offered me a chance at revenge. Did I know I'd have to screw you all over at the time? Nope. Did I trust this guy? Nope. Did I accept his offer?...Well you're reading this letter, you tell me._

_Earlier the task was simple. If something happened that could cause the X-Men to find him, I'd just warn him. Simple as that. But things changed. The jobs became riskier and riskier, eventually leading up to the info stealing. Once that job was accomplished I was no longer required to stay here. In fact, I was ordered to out myself. Hence what you've probably just witnessed._

_I completely back up all of my decisions. Don't you start thinking otherwise... The only reason I feel guilty is because I had to turn my back on you and the rest of the team. To you all, I'm probably the essence of all that is evil. The antagonist. The X-Men's most wanted, if you will. Think about it, I know the security codes, the blind spots, and I know everyone's weakness. If I were you people I'd be desperately trying to haul my ass back there right now in order to throw me into a holding cell. But I'm not "you people" anymore, am I? I'm getting off topic again._

_My betrayal is strictly business, just like the reason I accepted the offer to Xavier's. I think you know what the "business" is by now so I don't feel like giving you a huge rant, else I risk sounding like the villain you believe me to be. Of course with every business comes pleasure, and Lila, you were that pleasure to me. Every smile, every laugh, every hug, and every kiss, Lila, all of those were genuine. Every time I was with you I was of the clock and just being me. Did it start that way?...I admit it, I was after your powers. You blurted out so much information I could have left months ago. But I didn't. That's the defining factor. I never used anything I gained from our time together, even if that was my original intent._

_Now, depending on how the "big reveal" went, you're either mildly furious or severely pissed off…Hopefully everything goes according to plan and nobody gets hurt. Everything is, of course, strictly business._

_Darkheart_

Lila read the letter. She read it again. She ripped it up. She squeaked in horror. She put it back together. She read it another time. She folded it up. She put it under her pillow. She went into the kitchen. She grabbed a coffee. Flora tried to talk to her. She returned to her room. She took the letter back out. She read it again. She cried. She cried some more. She got angry. She tore the letter up again. She cried again. She fixed the letter. She sat on her bed. She stared at the torn up, fixed, torn up again, and fixed again paper. She didn't notice when her door opened.

* * *

><p>Skylar's record was officially broken. Twelve coffee's in three hours. She deserved an award or something. The team had gathered in the kitchen right after Nat's hasty retreat, minus Lila and the still MIA Ava. Billy had wandered off with Leo an hour or so ago, as well as Rogers and Maya. This left Jay, Alex, Flora, Tonia, and herself waiting for Ava to turn up. Sky's mind, however, was not on the missing girl but on her, most likely, traumatized roommate.<p>

Lila had arrived in the kitchen about two hours ago. She'd walked straight in, grabbed a coffee, and left, her eyes had been unseeing the whole time. Sky couldn't blame Lila for being more of a recluse than normal. The love of that poor girl's life used her as a human shield for Christ's sake!

"Flora," Sky's voice, slightly husky from not being used for a while, echoed throughout the silent kitchen, "We should check on Lila,"

"Hmm?" the red-head looked up startled.

"Come on, Lila needs our support right now," Leaving without waiting for Flora, Sky smiled in relief when the young girl ran up to her.

The two girls walked down the hallway, both wanting to say something, but what was there to say? Nat was the traitor. End of discussion. As unexpected as it was, they had to accept it.

Finally Flora said, "Wow,"

"I'm sorry, what?" Sky was confused.

"Well, I've been thinking. What word can describe tonight? I thought wow was a good word,"

"Why?"

Flora glared at Sky as if she should know exactly what she was talking about. "It's not that hard to figure out," upon seeing Sky's blank look, Flora continued, "Everything's just been so unexpected. What do you say when you don't expect something?" Sky could think of many things she'd say but decided against it when Flora sent her a warning glance. "You say wow," the red-head finished.

"Oh," Sky stated, and then the two girls fell silent again.

After a while Flora decided to start a conversation again, "I never really got to know Nat,"

"What do you mean by that?" Sky asked absentmindedly, she didn't remember if she had her key with her.

"Well, he was always so open emotionally I never thought that he had something in his past dragging him down. Maybe if we'd known we could have prevented this,"

Sky had to laugh at that statement, "Flora, none of us know much about our teammates' pasts,"

"Not true! Everyone knows my past. I know all about Maya's, Alex's, Rogers's, Tonia's, yours, Lila's, and Ava's past,"

"Well, we don't know Leo's, Billy's, or, and this one's a biggy, Jay's! We know nothing about where our leader is from, but we still follow him regardless,"

"Well maybe we should find out," Silence again.

The two girls finally reached the hall where Sky and Lila's room was located when Flora decided to talk again, "So, do you think that Ranger knew this was going to happen? I mean, he's been awfully quiet for a while. Maybe something bad happened!"

"…You don't handle coffee well, do you?"

"I don't normally drink caffeinated. Why do you ask?"

"No reason...Hey, why is the door to my room open?"

* * *

><p>"Go fish," Alex said.<p>

"Hey, you definitely have a two!" Jay exclaimed, slamming his cards face down on the dining room table.

"How do you know?"

"I saw it when you picked it up!"

"Cheater! Now give me the king I know you have!"

"Not until I get the- Wait! How do you know I have a king?"

"I have x-ray vision,"

"Oh man, that's disgusting…Wait, have you seen -"

"Dude! I was joking!"

"I knew that,"

"No you didn't."

"Yes I did."

"No. You didn't,"

"Uh, yes. I did,"

"Did not!"

"Did too!"

"Did not!"

"Did too!"

"Didn't!"

"Did!"

"Didn't!"

"Did!"

"Didn't!"

"Did!"

"Didn't!"

"Didn't!"

"Did!"

"Didn't!"

"Did!"

"Alright! Fine I did know it!"

"What the- Oh hell, did you just Bugs Bunny me!"

"Yep,"

"I can't believe that works…"

"OH MY GOD! You are so immature!" Tonia, the third person at the table, finally spoke up.

"Hey," Alex said, handing Jay the two, "I warned you I was competitive,"

"You didn't say you were this stupid,"

"I'm running on coffee,"

"Jay! You let him have coffee!"

Jay looked up sheepishly, "Well everyone else was having some,"

"So if everyone else jumped off a cliff, you'd let Alex follow?"

"Well, I probably led everyone there so I'd be dead,"

"Whatever," Tonia said, rolling her eyes, "Do you have any kings?"

"Go fish,"

"Seriously?"

"I said he was a cheater," Alex piped in.

"Well, I was mistaken. It's a jack," Jay defended.

"I asked if you had a jack two turns ago!"

"Well, I just picked it up,"

"No you didn't!" Tonia shouted, "You picked up a seven!"

"You cheated!" Jay accused.

"I knew it!" Alex stood up and pointed at Tonia, "Jay I warned you she'd cheat! We never should have let her play! I did warn you didn't I?" Jay nodded. "Good. Well, we can't keep playing this game if Tonia's going to keep cheating, can we?"

Jay started picking up cards, "Nope. Maybe next time you should think twice before cheating,"

Tonia just stared at the two boys in amazement.

* * *

><p>Leo wasn't sure what to do…at all. There were hundreds of buttons, strike that, thousands…The red one looked like a good choice…<em>NO! You never EVER push the red button!<em> He scolded himself. Crap, there was a lever too. Was he supposed to pull it? Maybe he was supposed to push one of the black buttons, or yellow, possibly a blue…

"What's the holdup?" Billy asked from over Leo's shoulder.

"Well, for one, I'm not, nor have I ever been, a telepath. For another, I don't even know how to turn this thing on!" Leo snapped from where he was sitting in front of the machine.

"I knew I should have hunted down Lila…"

"What do you want to do once this thing's on, Billy? You're not a telepath and as far as I know, there isn't one on our team to help,"

"I'm going to find where the son of a bitch went; I don't need a telepath for that."

"Um…I'm pretty sure you need one in order to operate Cerebro,"

"You're just being lazy. Move," Billy motioned for Leo to leave the chair.

"Um…" the other boy got out of the chair before the unstable Billy could do something unreasonable. "I don't think you should…Never mind. Do whatever you want. I'm not sticking around for this disaster to happen," Leo knew there was no use trying to reason with Billy when he was like this, so he turned and started to leave. Had he been facing Billy, Leo would have seen that his friend was about to do the one thing he had had enough sense not to do. Had he been looking, Leo could have stopped the disaster he was going to get caught in. Had he been looking, Leo would have seen Billy's finger heading towards the red button.

* * *

><p>"What's that?" Flora asked pointing to a ratty piece of paper on the floor of Sky's room. After finding the door open the two girls had rushed in only to find the room abandoned.<p>

"I'm not sure," Sky walked over to the paper and picked it up, "It appears to be a letter,"

"From who?"

"Uh… It's from-"suddenly Sky gasped and dropped the letter like it had bitten her.

"What is it Sky? Who's the letter from? Give me something to work with here!"

"It's from Nat…Er…Darkheart,"

"He wrote her a letter! Hasn't he done enough damage!"

"Apparently not,"

"What does it say?"

Staring at the paper that was still on the floor, Sky asked, "Don't you think that's a bit of an invasion of Lila's privacy?"

"Yeah. I know as a fact it is. But the thing is, if Lila isn't on our side like Nat wasn't, I'd prefer to find out now. We need to stop thinking like everyone's a friend who can't do wrong. Those days ended the day of the massacre."

"Flora, if this is about-"

"It's not about him!" Flora snapped before Sky could finish her sentence, "It's about us wanting to play hero because some random guy gave us a hint! Do you remember what we were thinking when we decided to go to Gambit's address?"

"Not particularly, no. But, Flora, I don't think that-"

"We were thinking how unfair it was that we were treated like children while the Senior X-Men, who're our age basically, were allowed to go out on adventures. We were thinking how great it'd be once we were 'official'. Well, we're official now and these 'adventures' aren't as glorious as we thought they'd be. We played with fire, now we're burning. We already lost one friend because of our over zealousness, if I'm going to lose another, I'd like to know now."

Sky sighed, "Flora, this isn't about Lila and Nat, is it?"

"Sky, I don't think I can do this anymore. I'm second in command, I shouldn't doubt Xavier's but… How will we achieve his dream if we can't even get along amongst our own kind?" Flora admitted sadly.

"Maybe the reason mutants are against each other is because some, like us, got lucky, while others, like Gambit, didn't,"

"What do you mean?"

"Xavier found us, but Gambit had to deal with his mutation himself, well as far as I know. Ideals change based off of experiences, Gambit and Nat have had experiences that haven't resolved themselves yet. You and I, we both know what our future holds, but there are many mutants out there who have mutations or are discovering their powers that don't know. Xavier is only one man, he can't help everyone,"

"So then _we_ have to help them," a new voice said from the doorway. Flora and Sky's heads snapped to look so fast that they almost gave themselves whiplash.

"God, Lila, where have you been?" Flora asked as she rubbed her neck.

"I went to the supply closet. We were out of shampoo," Lila said quietly. She then turned her head and saw the new location of Nat's letter. She opened her mouth to say something, but Sky beat her to the punch.

"What do you mean _we_ have to help them?" the Hawaiian asked.

"You said the Professor can't help everyone, so why not help them instead of fighting like the New Recruits and X-Men. There are enough fighters," Lila explained. She already knew what had been going on anyway so the need to question the other girls wasn't very big.

"Are you suggesting we hunt down mutants and offer them space at Xavier's? We might run out of room," Sky said.

"No, I get what she's trying to say. California is strongly anti-mutant, like New York. Put another Institute there and more people can be helped. This Institute doesn't have to be the only one," Flora's eyes lit up as she spoke, she liked the sound of building a new Institute in California…or anywhere really. The number of mutants working towards the Dream would increase exponentially, and help would arrive sooner for many. There'd be fewer Gambits and less Darkhearts, heck, Magneto would have two places to worry about stealing his possible recruits, not just one.

Smiling, the letter completely forgotten, Sky said, "Come on; let's go watch a movie,"

"Lila you pick," Flora said as they all left the room.

* * *

><p>Ava walked towards the door to the mansion. She'd half expected to be greeted by her furious peers, but there was nobody there. Cautiously entering the mansion, she was greeted with silence…it was a bit creepy. There was <em>always <em>noise in the mansion. Maybe the traitor killed everyone.

That was the thought going through Ava's head once she reached the kitchen and ran into Jay.

"You're back?" the startled team leader asked.

"Yeah…"Ava said cautiously, she didn't know what had happened so Jay being the only person around was a bit suspicious.

"Hurry up Jay! You need a queen to win the round!" Alex's voice called from the dining room.

"Just go for me! I'll be a while!" Jay shouted back, and then he turned his attention towards Ava and whispered harshly, "What the hell did you think you were doing? You can't just take off like that! Storm's been making a blizzard for at least an hour; do you know how dangerous it is for a teen driver to be on the road, on a _motorcycle_ none the less, in these conditions at _night_? It's extremely dangerous!" Ava was about to give Jay a piece of her mind when he continued to speak, "I'm not your mother or father...or whoever you were going to say I'm not. I am your teammate though. Not just that, I'm your team leader! I have to make sure everyone is safe, and tonight has felt like enough of a failure to me, that means your reckless behavior is monumentally more infuriating. Why did you even leave to begin with?"

Taken aback slightly by Jay's comment, Ava quickly recovered and said, "I didn't want the old man going in my head,"

"Nice try," Jay smiled, "Now what's the real reason?"

"I told you, I didn't want a mind probe,"

"Liar. Try again,"

"I'm telling the truth!"

"Ooh, that's strike three. One week of danger room sessions with Wolverine,"

"What!" Ava yelled furiously. Both Jay and Ava could feel the electricity in the air as Ava's temper spiked, "You can't do that!"

"Yes I can actually," Jay replied coolly even though there was a possibility he'd get zapped by lightning, "Wolverine said I could order however many sessions with him as I wanted until I felt you were properly punished. Now, the real reason you took off?"

Ava gritted her teeth, "I already told you-"

"Two weeks,"

"I didn't want the Professor to look in my head,"

"Three weeks,"

"Jay, I'm telling the truth!" Ava shouted, a bolt of amaranth electricity scorching the wall just above Jay's head as Ava's anger threatened to overwhelm her.

Not even batting an eyelash, Jay calmly stated, "One month," Ava screamed in frustration. "Tell you what Ava," Jay said once the girl was done, "I'll count to three and if you don't tell me why you really left, I'll leave you alone,"

"What's the catch?" Ava asked in anger.

"If I reach three and you have yet to tell me, I'll give you six months, and then continue the game of war in the dining room with Alex and Tonia,"

"Six months!" Ava was incredulous, ever since they'd become an official team, Jay had not once acted upon his authority. The fact that he was doing this as if it was an everyday occurrence astounded Ava, if she'd ever doubted Jay being the leader, she didn't now. This, however, didn't mean that she wasn't going down with the old count to three bit.

"One,"

"Really? You expect this to work?"

"Two," Jay's face revealed absolutely no emotion.

"I'm not going to change my story. It's the truth," Ava was adamant.

"Thr-"

"Alright!" she wasn't adamant enough though, "Fine you caught me! I was afraid! I was afraid that the Professor would find something in my head he wouldn't like and kick me out. I was afraid of the looks people were sending me. I was afraid to find out who the traitor was!"

Nodding, and still looking emotionless, Jay said, "Nat was the traitor,"

All of the anger Ava had been feeling towards Jay quickly dissipated. Everyone at the mansion knew that Nat and Jay were close enough to be brothers. They arrived at the mansion around the same time, they were roommates, they constantly saved the other's butts, and now they were on opposing sides. "I'm sorry Jay," was the only consolation Ava could come up with.

"It's fine," Jay said a bit too casually, "Let's gather up Tonia," Ava winced when she heard the other girl's name, "and Alex so that we can join some of the others for a movie,"

"How do we explain the yelling?"

Jay smirked, although his eyes didn't shine like they usually did, "We came up with code words. They know _everything_ that happened,"

* * *

><p>BANG.<p>

BANG.

BANG.

BANG.

"Will you please stop that!" Billy chided from where he sat next to Leo.

BANG.

BANG.

"I'm so bored. You just _had_ to push the red button, didn't you?"

BANG.

BANG.

BANG.

BANG.

"Stop it! How was I supposed to know what the red button does?"

BANG.

"Ever heard someone shout out not to push the red button on TV?"

BANG.

BANG.

"I swear to God, Leo if you hit the back of your head against that door one more time-"

BANG.

"You'll what? Lock me up? News flash, we're already locked up!"

BANG.

BANG.

BANG.

"Once again, how was I supposed to know what it does?"

BANG.

BANG.

"Well, at least I agree with you in one department,"

BANG.

"What's that?"

BANG.

BANG.

BANG.

BANG.

"Neither of us expected the red button to lock us up in Cerebro's room…Hey, do you think the yellow button will free us?"

BANG.

BANG.

"Oh no! I am _not_ pushing another one of those buttons!...And Leo?"

BANG.

BANG.

BANG.

"Yes?"

BANG.

"You're giving me a headache with you're constant hitting of the door with your head,"

"I guess we agree in two departments,"

BANG.

BANG.

"Then why are you still doing it?"

BANG.

BANG.

BANG.

"It's something to do,"

BANG.

"Great,"

BANG.

Silence fell upon the metal room, minus Leo's constant head banging. That is until Leo started to sing.

"_I know a song,"_

BANG.

"_That gets on everybody's nerves,"_

BANG.

"_Everybody's nerves,"_

BANG.

"_Everybody's nerves,"_

BANG.

"_I know a song that gets on everybody's nerves,"_

BANG.

"_And it goes a lot,"_

BANG.

"_Like,"_

BANG.

"_This,"_

BANG.

BANG.

"_I know a song,"_

BANG.

"_That gets on everybody's nerves,"_

BANG.

"_Everybody's nerves,"_

BANG.

"_Everybody's nerves,"_

BANG.

"_I know a song that gets on everybody's nerves,"_

BANG.

"_And it goes a lot,"_

BANG.

"_Like,"_

BANG.

"_This,"_

BANG.

BANG.

"HOLY MOTHER OF-! GET ME OUT OF HERE!" Billy cried as he stood up and pounded on the door. The whole time Billy was pounding, Leo was singing and banging his head on the door. The result was a lot of chaotic noise that eventually drew Wolverine down to the sound proof room.

Imagine the surprise on Logan's face when he opened the door to Cerebro only to have two boys stumble out. See, Leo had been mid head bang and Billy had been putting pressure on the door as he was pounding on it, so when the door had opened it resulted in a dog pile on top of Wolverine.

"Get. Off. Now," Logan snarled causing the two boys to quickly pick themselves up. "What exactly were you two doin' in Cerebro?"

"Um…We got lost…in a mirror…I made a mirror and we got lost in it," Leo attempted.

"Nice try, two weeks of early mornin' sessions with me, kid. Windy, what's yer excuse?"

"Uh…I wanted to find Nat?" Billy tried.

"That a question or an answer?" Logan growled.

"Both," Leo said like a smart aleck. He shrank back when Logan glared at him.

"Ya got a month now punk,"

"It's an answer," Billy butted in before Leo did something stupid causing both of them to have even more time in the danger room.

"Good. You only got a week. I'll lecture ya later. Now scram both of ya before I change my mind,"

Not needing to be told twice, Leo and Billy sprinted out of the basement area so fast Pietro would have been impressed.

Once safely upstairs, Leo said, "We should do that again sometime…Except when some models are in town and Wolverine isn't,"

"You have a death wish. I think I got off pretty light. Probably due to my amazing talking skills," Billy bragged. Leo just checked his text messages.

"Hey, they're watching a movie in the rec room! Let's go!" the black haired boy exclaimed after reading some of his texts.

"Heck yeah! Ava, Tonia, Sky, Flora, Maya, Lila! All of my girls in one room! I'm all for it!"

* * *

><p>"Wow, Alex, this is amazing!" Rogers just laughed at what Maya had said, "What's so funny?"<p>

"You called me Alex," Rogers said as if it was obvious, "I haven't been called that in so long I almost forgot it's my name. At school, sometimes I literally just write Rogers on my papers,"

"Do you not like being called Rogers?" Maya asked, staring at the moon's reflection on the lake. After leaving the kitchen, Rogers had led Maya to the boathouse near the back of the mansion grounds.

"Well it's not my name,"

"That's where you're wrong. Your name is what you go by. You go by Rogers so therefore it's your name," when she put it like that, Rogers found it hard to disagree.

"So why is this boathouse here?" Rogers asked, changing the topic.

"I don't know. When do you think this thing was built?" Maya asked as she wandered around the porch.

"Beats me…what are you doing?"

"Looking for some way to tell how old this building is,"

"Oh," Rogers mumbled, and then an idea hit him, "Check the cement porch in front! Maybe someone wrote something in it while it was drying,"

"Good idea!"

The two teens walked around the boathouse admiring the landscape around it. Although nobody lived in the boathouse, its garden was a work of art. The plants glistened in the falling snow, and already the evergreens nearby were looking like Christmas trees.

Maya was the first on the concrete porch, and right away she noticed a problem. There wasn't a canopy above the front porch so it, like the plants, were covered is the freshly fallen snow.

"Hey Rogers…" Maya prompted her companion.

"I'm on it, just get off the porch first," Once Maya was clear of the blasting range Rogers used his concussive energy blasts to melt most of the snow. He would have melted all of it but he didn't want to risk damaging the concrete.

"Thanks. Let's check it out now!" Maya said in excitement. Something about the snow always made her happy, even though it was freezing cold.

After several minutes of searching Rogers found irregular indents in the snow he'd mad shallow. The indents looked like hand prints. Figuring he should uncover more, Rogers started to dust of the snow carefully.

"Really Rogers? You don't have to be delicate, rub it harder!" Maya cheered.

Rogers stopped wiping away the snow, "Maya,"

"Yeah?"

"That's what she said,"

"…Oh," and then she started laughing. She didn't stop laughing until Rogers said he was done, and even then Maya had small giggles escape her.

"Ricky and Maggie…Do you know who they are?" Rogers asked upon reading the names under the small hand prints.

"No…but apparently this was done about twenty years ago, see," Maya pointed to the date above the hand prints.

"This house is clearly being cared for though; I mean if it's twenty-ish years old and this is its condition…Do you think Logan repairs it?"

"Probably," Maya said, and then her mood suddenly turned somber, "I don't want to go back to the mansion. Can't we just stay here?"

"Why don't you want to go back?" Rogers asked in confusion.

"Everyone's so upset about Nat. I'm not ready to think about that yet. I'm glad that while here I didn't think about him, Carol, Rogue, or Tristan…It was just you and me, nothing else. Please, stay here with me for the night!"

Rogers was starting to feel a bit awkward, here was his best friend that's a girl begging him to stay the night with her, what's a guy to do?

Rogers looked Maya in the eye, walked over to her, and grabbed her gloved hands in his, "Maya we have to go back, more for the team's sake than for ours. I think they're watching a movie, don't want to miss it do we?"

"I guess you're right…" Maya sighed.

Rogers looked at Maya. Maya looked at Rogers. Then the space between them became nonexistent as Rogers and Maya shared their first, very brief, kiss. Pulling apart, both of them blushed, they'd had feelings for each other for a while, but acting on those feelings was a new step.

Rogers cleared his throat, "So, we should probably head back,"

"Yeah," Maya agreed, "They might be waiting for us to arrive before they start the movie," However, somehow on the way back, Maya's hand slipped into Rogers's hand.

* * *

><p>"Déjà vu, big time," Tonia said as Billy sat between her and Ava, saying something about them being beautiful as he did so.<p>

"What do you mean?" Leo asked. He was lying upside down on the couch.

"Look how you're sitting! Look at the order of Ava, Billy, and me! It's all exactly how it was months ago when we first learned about Tristan's disappearance!"

"NO!" an unexpected voice snapped from their spot, "It's not exactly the same!" Everyone's head snapped over to Lila for her unusual outburst. "Back then we were carefree. We were all just teens hanging out. Now we're battle hardened fighters. We're fighters who just watched one of their own go against them. It's not the same and it never will be again!"

"She's right," Flora agreed, "I was saying the same thing earlier today,"

"Maya and I considered not coming back," Rogers added, "Too much angst,"

"Amen to that!" Leo cheered.

"I know I'm never going to get over the betrayal of someone who is…was basically my brother. Those are things you don't get over fast. But what I'm hearing from you all is that you're done working on Team Extremus because of what Nat's done," Jay said, "Nat's betrayal has _nothing_ to do with us or our team. He betrayed us because he wants revenge. He was prepared to work for anyone who offered it to him. Everyone who knew about Nat's mother knew he wanted to avenge her but nobody could have seen this. So stop complaining about how things have changed. Remember, _we _wanted to be official. _We_ wanted to be like the X-Men. And now _we _are giving up because there's a snag in the road. Well what did you all suspect the X-Men did? What they do isn't easy, and now that's what _we_ do because_ we _wanted it,"

"But there's something _we _forgot," Jay continued, "_We_ forgot the reason behind all of this…Well maybe we haven't forgotten but it definitely left center stage. The reason _we_ are doing any of this is to bring home a little boy who's probably missing Rogue like mad right about now. Tristan is our main objective now. Forget about Darkheart, the massacre, Gambit, and Ranger. The _only _thing _we _need to focus on right now is getting Tristan back…So; let's watch that movie, shall we?" Jay asked happily once his lecture was over. The rest of the team was silent, even Billy who'd been flirting with Tonia and Ava nonstop since sitting down. Leave it to Jay to make movie night uncomfortable.

* * *

><p>Benjamin Rivers held his backpack over his shoulder. After months of preparing, he finally had everything he needed. Sinister's operation was going down once the X-Men burst into his lab. All Benjamin had to do was ring the doorbell and explain everything to the Professor…providing everything goes according to plan.<p>

Taking a deep breath, Benjamin prepared himself for the moment he'd been waiting for, for quite some time. Meeting the X-Men. His heroes. Benjamin had the first step to achieving Xavier's dream in his backpack, take out enemy mutants and the job becomes easier. Especially when Sabertooth's involved.

After taking several minutes to prepare himself, Benjamin finally rang the doorbell. He waited about five minutes until a pajama-clad guy he recognized right away as James 'Jay' Robert Mcrea opened the door with a raised eyebrow.

"Can I help you? At 2:30am?" Jay asked, they'd been in the middle of their third movie and yet nobody from Team Extremus had fallen asleep.

"Yes. My name is Benjamin Rivers and I'd like to speak with your professor,"

"I'm sorry but I'm not going to let in some random kid at 2:30 in the morning, you can come back tomorrow," Jay started to close the door.

"Actually I came to discuss the location of one Mr. Sinister with the Professor…Sinister happens to be the guy who has a kidnapped child by the name of Tristan in his possession,"

Opening the door a bit, Jay asked, "Who'd you say you were again?"

"Benjamin Rivers. But you probably know me as Ranger,"

* * *

><p><strong>AN: Ta da! Oh yeah, half of this chapter was typed at around 2 in the morning so... yeah...anyway, no flames please! Review are always welcome!**


	12. Ranger's Tale and Gambit's Involvement

**A/N: Sorry for the long time it took me to update! I do plan on finishing! In 3-4 Chapters too!**

**Writers block sucks! **

**Truthfully, this isn't one of my better chapters...Anyway, Ranger is about to explain everything.**

**This chapter will have italics for a flashback and normal for regular time. I may have molded the show to fit into my timeline a bit...Nothing glaringly obvious I don't think.**

**Dracarot, sorry if Ranger is a bit off but this chapter is all**** about him so I pretty much invented if I didn't know a fact about him ^^**

* * *

><p>"I did what you asked! You said that after my job was done you'd tell me where they are!" Darkheart shouted at the man known as Sinister.<p>

"All in due time, as it stands, your job has yet to be completed," Sinister stated as if he were speaking to a young child.

Voice leaking with suspicion, Darkheart asked, "What do you mean?"

"You agreed to be under my employment. I never specified when your job would be finished,"

"Well then, I quit!" Darkheart turned to leave but what Sinister said next stopped him dead in his tracks.

"Patrick Jennings,"

"I'm sorry what?"

"You accomplish a job for me; I give you one name. Consider that payment,"

A dark look crossed over Darkheart's face as he turned towards Sinister, "Where is he at?"

Sinister smiled that toothy smile of his and said, "Spoken like a true Marauder,"

* * *

><p>Benjamin held his bleeding nose and stared at Jay in shock. "Did you just punch me in the face?" Normally Benjamin knew exactly what to say but in this instance he was a bit stunned. The punch delivered by the leader of Team Extremus had been quick and unexpected leaving him no time to dodge it even with his enhanced reflexes.<p>

"Yes," Jay replied shortly, he still stood in the doorway preventing Benjamin from entering the mansion.

"Why?" the younger boy was incredulous.

Jay shrugged.

"You punched me for no reason?"

"You deserved it,"

"I deserved- What? Why?"

"This is your entire fault!" Jay's tense control finally slipped and he was now yelling.

"My fault!" If there was one thing that Benjamin hated more than Sabertooth, it was when someone accused him of something without proof.

"Yes your fault! " Jay's eyes were blazing now with black fire and Benjamin could see the beginnings of a flame flickering around the older boy's hands.

"What did I do?"

"You led us to the massacre! I never should have trusted _anything_ you had to say!" Benjamin was invisible and out of the way before Jay's flame could hit him. He'd been prepared that time. "Where'd you go?" Jay angrily shouted as he looked around for Benjamin, black flames still surrounding his hands.

Benjamin knew he had to cool down Jay fast, but he couldn't talk down Jay if he was invisible…and if he became visible again, Benjamin knew Jay wasn't going to give him any time to speak before sautéing him. Then as if a great power noticed his plight, about ten pajama clad teens arrived at the scene. Presumably they were the rest of Team Extremus.

"Umm… Jay," the girl Benjamin knew was called Sky said, "Why are you outside using your powers?" During the course of their mini one-sided skirmish, Jay apparently left the doorway.

"Ranger is here," Jay growled in response.

"Uh, I don't see anyone," Benjamin knew that the speaker was called Leo.

"He's invisible,"

Now at this point, Jay seemed like a loon to his team which was never a good thing. Before anyone could express their doubt, the girl named Lila stepped in as the saving grace, "Jay's right,"

"Do you know where he is?" Flora, the second in command, asked.

"No. His mutation hides him,"

"Well crap," Alex summed up.

There was silence for a full minute before chaos erupted amongst the sleep deprived mutants.

"You scared him off!"

"What were you thinking?"

"I can't believe you! How could you let him get away!"

"What if he was trying to help us!"

Benjamin just stared in amusement as everyone yelled at Jay; he was starting to look pretty sheepish. "I suppose I could have handled that better," he laughed dryly.

"You think?" Billy asked sarcastically while trying to slide an arm around Maya's waist.

"Well…I have an idea to bring Ranger back!" the brunette girl exclaimed as she skillfully avoided Billy's arm.

"What is it?" Rogers asked.

Stepping forward, Maya cleared her throat and shouted, "Ranger, if you're out there that is, please show yourself! I promise that we won't do anything! Jay here just overreacted a bit!"

Taking that as his cue, Benjamin became visible again about five feet to Maya's right. "I'll say!" he agreed, and the he turned towards Jay, "And for the record, I had no clue about the massacre when I gave you the address,"

"Then how did you know Gambit had Tristan? In fact, how did you know any of the things you told us?" Jay asked skeptically.

"That's why I'm here, so I can tell you all everything. But you kind of punched me and then tried to fry me before I could get far enough to tell you this!"

"Well if it wasn't for your information none of this would have happened!"

"…So I'll take it you found the traitor today," Benjamin stated coolly. That of course caused a few raised eyebrows and questioning looks, so he quickly explained himself, "Jay's more furious than I would've expected, everyone sort of looks like a kicked puppy, and I'm pretty sure there's supposed to be twelve of you, not eleven,"

"Oh," Leo stated.

There was a small silence before Alex said quite boisterously, "It's freezing out here! How about we bring this little party inside! I'll make popcorn, you know, since we just ran out. And good ol' Ranger…Wait what's your real name? Doesn't matter! Ranger can tell his little story and we can listen. Then we can make a plan or something…or we could watch another movie. I think some Shakespeare movie was next on the list….What was it?"

"erm…" Leo thought about it, "_Gnomeo and Juliet _was next,"

"Oh of course! Duh! Anyway, I just really want to get inside where the heater is!" Alex finished. Leo quickly agreed.

* * *

><p>"How about you all make your way to the war room instead," a new voice spoke from behind the crowd in the doorway and front porch steps. Benjamin had to stifle a small gasp as THE Professor Charles Xavier came into view. He was in the presence of his hero.<p>

Cyclops, Nightcrawler, Storm, Rogue, Jean Grey, the Wolverine! Benjamin could hardly contain his excitement! The X-Men were all in the same room, waiting to hear what he had to say.

"Now, Ranger-" the Professor started only to have the boy interrupt.

"You can call me Benjamin, sir,"

"Very well, Benjamin, can you please give your account of everything you know that relates to the current issue?"

"Yes sir," Team Extremus couldn't believe it, Ranger had been an issue for them for so long that they assumed he was a freelance like Gambit, but instead they find a boy who's prepared to follow orders. Since arriving Benjamin hadn't done one thing that the Professor would have disapproved of, instead he simply said "yes sir," or "no sir," as it fit. The puzzle that was Ranger or Benjamin Rivers or whatever else he was called did not seem to be an easy one to solve. "Where would you like me to start, sir?"

"From the beginning please,"

"Well it all started when I moved here some months back…It was probably around the time Tristan got recruited…"

* * *

><p>"<em>There, that's the last of them." Benjamin's mother said happily as the last book was removed from the box. <em>

"_Here that son? We are officially moved in!" his father added._

_Benjamin walked around his new house still a bit overwhelmed. He'd barely had anytime to get use to being home again when his family had whisked him off to Bayville, New York. Now, Benjamin Rivers knew how to keep a level head but something in his gut was telling him something…He just couldn't quite figure out what._

_"…right Ben?" the voice of his mother shook Benjamin from his thoughts._

_"I'm sorry…What?" he asked confused._

_His mother gave a good natured sigh, "I was just double checking to see if you wanted to take the online classes offered by Bayville High School,"_

_"Yeah I do. Do we have to talk with the Principal first?"_

_"Yes, we're actually doing that after lunch, which will be ready in ten minutes. Are you okay with that?"_

_"Yep. Hey, would you like me to go get Grandpa?"_

_"Go ahead, that man, I swear he's avoiding my cooking,"_

_Benjamin let out a laugh as he went off in search of his grandfather._

_"Hello Adrienne. This must be your son Benjamin. I'm Principal Kelly, and I believe you wish to take our online courses?"_

_Benjamin cringed, this guy was too happy, too fake, for his own good. He reminded Benjamin of a neatly trimmed Iago from Shakespeare's Othello. _

_"Yes, it's always hard on children to move, especially in high school, so we find that this is best until he becomes more comfortable in the city. Don't you agree Ben?" his mother asked._

_"Yeah…" Something outside of Kelly's office caught Ben's attention. Out of the glass office he could see a group of teens walking in. The most recognizable was the tall one with the sunglasses._

_Picking up on the boy's interest in the group of students, Kelly quickly said, "I wouldn't associate with that group, boy. The whole lot of them shouldn't even be aloud to attend school with us regular humans. They only tarnish this school's good name,"_

_"Why?" Although Ben was suspecting he knew very well why._

_"They attend Xavier's prep school. Although it's now public knowledge that it's a mutant freak school. It's a menace to the town!" turning to Adrienne he said, "As long as your family avoids that mansion and the ratty house for the dropouts who call themselves the 'brotherhood' you're life in this town will be great,"_

_"Thank you for the advice," Ben's mother said coldly, although Kelly didn't pick up on it, "Now please sign the forms. We have a lot of unpacking to do still, don't we Ben?" _

_Knowing fully well that they finished unpacking earlier that morning, Ben nodded in agreement, "I haven't even set up my computer yet,"_

_"Well then who am I to slow you down," Kelly said with a smile as he signed, "I will be talking about the Xavier Institute this Saturday at the City Hall meeting. If you want more information, here's my card," Kelly passed the forms to Ben's mother and a small business card to Ben. In big bolded letters in the center of the card was:_

_**Friends of Humanity**_

* * *

><p>"No wonder everyone hates us!" Tonia exclaimed, "That bastard Kelly is preaching to the new kids!"<p>

"Calm yourself Tonia and please watch your language," Storm scolded.

"Online courses, that explains why we've never seen you," Jay said as if everything now made sense.

"But wouldn't we have seen you around town at least once? I mean, there are only so many places people our age can hang out and there are quite a few of us here," Flora piped in.

"Oh you probably would have seen more of me but on the car ride home from the school I saw someone I recognized…and hate with a burning passion…"

* * *

><p><em>"I do not like that man!" Adrienne raved for the tenth time that minute.<em>

_"I don't either," Ben mumbled, when his mother started ranting there was no stopping her._

_"Who is he to just order us to stay away from people? I can decide for myself, I am a grown woman!"_

_"He's part of the Friends of Humanity. I bet that if Xavier-"_

_"Stop right there young man!" Ben's mother snapped, cutting off the end of his sentence, "We already talked about this. You are not to get involved with these issues. You're priority is being a student until you turn eighteen. Then you'll be an adult able to make your own decisions,"_

_"I know but we just found out Xavier's is here in this town! Now we know that their principal is in some mutant hate group, they need to know about this!"_

_"I'm sure they already know, honey,"_

"Actually we didn't" Alex interrupted only to receive death glares from everyone, "Sorry, continue please."

_"But mom, we should tell them-"_

_"That's enough!" Adrienne shouted at her son, "Please, just wait until you're older,"_

_"Sure," Ben mumbled before looking out the window. What he saw made his bones go cold; it's actually more like who he saw that did it. Since his mother had been stopped by a red light, Ben had plenty of time to stare at the man. Six foot something, hairy, dirty, claws, and fangs. It was definitely the man. _

_"Hey honey," Adrienne spoke up from the driver's seat as she pulled the car over barely beyond the light she'd been stopped at, "why don't you check out the city. You know the way home right?" Ben nodded, still shaken from spotting the man in Bayville of all places. "Good. Here's twenty dollars. Be home by nine and have fun. Try to make some new friends," Adrienne handed him the money and shooed him out of the car. _

* * *

><p>"Your mom just handed you twenty bucks?" Ava asked incredulously.<p>

"Yeah, she comes up with little schemes like that sometimes," Benjamin said fondly.

"So, she knows that you're a mutant and is okay with it?" Scott Summers asked.

Ecstatic that the field leader of the X-Men addressed him, Benjamin straightened up and said, "My whole family knows. They just didn't want me getting involved with anything until I was older,"

"Since you're here does that mean you're eighteen?" Sky asked a bit confused.

"No, they just saw the importance of the information I have to give,"

"Go on with the story, bub," Wolverine growled, he recognized the description of Sabertooth and was honestly curious about what happened.

"Sure. Once I left the car and my mother drove off…"

* * *

><p><em>Benjamin was proud of his ability to track. A normal person wouldn't have found the signs but Ben had, which led to his dilemma. Sabertooth's trail ended at an alleyway in probably the sketchiest part of Bayville. Realizing that things would probably be getting dangerous once he entered the alley he was currently standing in front of, Ben ducked behind a nearby fire escape and turned invisible. The dilemma however was his mother's voice in his head telling him not to do anything reckless. Ben was pretty sure that stalking Sabertooth was the most reckless thing anyone could possibly do…ever. <em>

_Shaking off his doubts, Ben entered the alley and found a group of five men talking…or arguing to be more exact. There was Sabertooth of course, but there were others too and they all seemed to be threatening the youngest one who could barely be older than eighteen. The man getting threatened was leaning nonchalantly on the brick wall at the back of the alley as he watched the others argue amongst themselves about what they were going to do to him._

_After the group bickered for about ten more minutes, the big Native American looking man, the leader apparently, silenced everyone by raising his hand. Gambit, for that was who Ben realized the young man was (he knew about how he fought the X-Men), just raised an eyebrow. "How about we compromise then," the man started._

_Gambit would have none of that, eyes blazing dangerously he snapped, "I ain't makin' no deals wit' you. Already got one devil ownin' my soul. Don't need no more,"_

_"But this is a one time deal, do this and you're done,"_

_"Not betrayin' their trustby leadin' you down dere," Gambit was adamant._

_The big Native American looked a bit peeved now, "Remy we won't harm them-"_

_"Tu penses à moi comme un imbécile!"_

_"Remy! How about you do this and the boss will let you go. You're done,"_

_"Quoi?" _

_"You heard me. The boss has his sights on a new target; he says that he's willing to end your debt,"_

_"Just like dat?"_

_"Just like d- that," Ben almost laughed when the man almost fell into a Cajun accent._

_"Remy don't believe ya,"_

_"He still wants you Remy but he's starting a new side project that you're not involved in,"_

_"Ah, so de diable is willin' ta let poor Remy go…Least until his new project is done…No deal,"_

_"Temporary freedom is better than none at all. Besides, you probably won't make catching you again easy on any of us,"_

_"Yeah, joined Mags last time," Sabertooth growled. Ben always wondered why Sabertooth had joined Magneto, now that mystery was solved. He was watching Gambit._

_"So…I do dis for y' and den I'll be free ta walk. Dere won't be no tabs kept on moi. I'll be free ta go till he wants me 'gain and by dat time I'll be off you're radar…"_

_"Exactly. So do we have a deal?" the leader man asked as he took over again._

_"Non. I'm not doin' no killin''cause I know dat you're gonna be doin' that somewhere…but I will map out de sewers fo' ya, is dat good 'nough?"_

_"Yes, that will work just as well as you leading us,"_

_"So what is dis mission o' yours and why do ya need ta know 'bout de sewers?" Gambit asked curiously._

_"Your job is to map it out, nothing more. We will collect it in three days time,"_

_"Gambit will be dere."_

* * *

><p>"Hold on, I'm lost… Who's Sabertooth working for?" Billy asked.<p>

"I was wondering the same thing," Ava agreed.

Rogers, catching something that no one else seemed to have asked, "Why is Gambit in debt with this mystery boss guy?"

"Yeah, and who was the Native American guy?" Tonia added.

"I'm getting to all of that. You see, after Gambit agreed the other guys, including Sabertooth, left. The Native American, whose name is Scalphunter, opened up some type of black portal a…" Benjamin opened up the folder he'd brought with him and flipped through a few pages, "tesseract portal it's called."

Everyone shifted nervously. The portal matched what Sarah had said Tristan was thrown into on the night of the massacre. "Ranger, can you go on?" Jay asked in order to get the massacre out of his head…Although he knew it'd come back up later in the boy's story.

Benjamin nodded, he was a bit disappointed that Jay didn't call him Benjamin but then again, Ben hadn't given Jay reason to treat him as a teammate yet. "So after the others left Gambit left the alley. My mom wasn't expecting me back yet, so I followed him…"

* * *

><p><em>Unlike many mutants, Ranger saw his mutation as a wonderful gift. He could turn invisible with the added bonus of being completely untraceably. He couldn't be heard, smelled, even his mind was silent to telepaths. He knew these facts and yet he felt as if Gambit knew a sixteen year old was following him…but that was impossible of course. Gambit's mutation was turning potential energy into kinetic energy nothing else…right?<em>

_Then again, not much was known about the elusive Cajun. Not even the X-Men had much on him. For example, Ben knew that they suspected Gambit of robbing that jewelry store last week but they had no proof. Gambit was good._

_"Hey, whoever's followin' moi, show yourself!" Gambit's shout startled Ben. He hadn't even noticed that the older man had led him into an abandoned warehouse. Benjamin looked around, nobody else was following Gambit…and it was impossible for Gambit to have heard him…Ben looked at his hands to make sure he was still invisible, he was. "'Kay mon ami, ya have trois seconds before dis card goes your way."_

_That being said, Gambit took out a card (the eight of diamonds) and charged it._

_"Un…"_

_The card started to glow brighter._

_"Deux…" _

_Gambit turned towards where Benjamin was standing._

_"Trois!" _

_Ben barely got of the way before the card exploded where he'd previously been standing. In the process of dodging, however, the teen forgot about his invisibility and appeared sprawled on the ground in front of a very irate Cajun. _

_"What'cha t'inkin' homme! Do ya know what woulda happened if de other guys knew y' were dere, hein? Non, ya don't!" Gaping, Ben couldn't think of anything to say…How did Gambit know he'd been there? _

_Meanwhile, Gambit held the bridge of his nose before looking down at Ben's look of shock. Then as fast as lightening he bent down and picked the teen up by the collar of his shirt. "What's wrong homme? It Gambit's eyes? De fact he be a mutant? Non, can't be none o' those 'cause you're a mutant aussi, I saw you're little disappearin' act…And I'm still wearin' mes sunglasses…"_

_"How'd you know I was there?" Ben blurted out, "How did you know I was following? Nobody's supposed to be able to sense me while I'm invisible, I don't understand"_

_"I sensed you're emotions mon ami," Gambit said casually as he tossed Ben aside like yesterday's newspaper._

_Rubbing his back where it had hit the cement ground, Ben stood up and asked, "You're an empath?"_

_Gambit winced; apparently he hadn't meant to give it away, "Oui."_

* * *

><p>"Ugh! No wonder that Swamp Rat always knows what ta say!" Rogue shouted making everyone jump in their chairs.<p>

"That explains why he was able to put the girls in a trance when we went to Florida," Leo reasoned.

Ben cleared his throat, "Can I continue now?"

Leo and Rogue both nodded.

* * *

><p><em>Ben's mind was reeling<em>. _Holy crap! The X-Men DEFINITELY didn't know that fact about Gambit! Deciding to push for more information, Benjamin asked, "Who were those guys? Who do they work for? What's-"_

_"Listen petit, Gambit just met y' and he's already told ya more than he should 'ave. T' top it all off, y' were stalkin' moi! Why woul I tell y'anyt'ing?" Gambit interrupted._

_"Because I can help you,"_

_"Don't need nobody's help," Gambit turned to leave but Ben ran over and intercepted him._

_"Yes you do. I heard what they were saying. You're in debt to some man, if I find out who I can tell the X-Men and-"_

_"De X-Men? Dey wouldn't help moi, Gambit happens to be de bad guy mon ami,"_

_"But they help mutants in need. Last I checked, you're a mutant and you're most definitely in need," _

_"Petit, Gambit's problems be bigger den what de X-Men can handle. Dose guys are de baddest o' de bad. De X-Men would stand no chance 'gainst dem,"_

* * *

><p>"Thanks for the confidence, Gambit," Scott mumbled. Jean just smirked.<p>

* * *

><p><em>"Alone, probably not," Benjamin agreed.<em>

* * *

><p>"You too Benjamin," Scott mumbled again, this time Ranger smiled at him sheepishly.<p>

* * *

><p><em>"What'cha getting' at petit?"<em>

_"For starters, I'm Benjamin also known as Ranger. I am not called petit,"_

_"Désolé…What'cha getting' at Benny?_

_"Don't call me Benny. What I'm getting at is that the X-Men aren't the only group at Xavier's,"_

_"De New Recruits ain't ready fo' dis!"_

_"I'm not talking about them. You see, Xavier has a lot of teams that aren't prepared for missions yet, but they're good. There's one in particular that I believe has potential, Team 4B. There are twelve members and their pretty tough. Infighting is why they can't go on missions yet,"_

_"How do ya know all o' dis?"_

_Ben smirked, "I'm interested in Xavier's so I did some computer based research,"_

_"..You hacked dem, didn't ya?"_

_"Give me a computer and I'm a beast, give me any other electronic and I'm a safety hazard," _

_"You're not dat bad Benny," Ben glared at Gambit when he called him Benny, "Here's my number and mon address, it's getting' late and I've got a long story t' tell…Call preferably in quatre days…" Gambit handed Ben a playing card (the jack of spades) and the two of them went their separate ways._

* * *

><p>"You just let him go!" Tonia yelled at Ben.<p>

"That day I did, but the next day I began my Gambit stalking," Ben explained.

"But he knows when you follow him," Flora said.

"Yes, and he knew as I continuously followed him that week after my online courses. My mom thought I was hanging with friends so all was well… And then Saturday night came. That was the day Gambit and I decided he'd explain everything to me. I told my folks that I was going to a party so I was allowed to stay out later. We were supposed to meet at the warehouse…but on my way there…"

_Ben was finally going to learn about the mysterious employer who had Gambit on a leash and Sabertooth in his employment. He was excited to say the least, he'd be able to join the X-Men, tip them off about a villain, and convince them to make a new team…Except he hadn't told his parents this plan yet, but he knew he could convince them. Of course nothing ever goes according to plan, that's why the two magenta explosions didn't shock Ben as much as they should have. That still didn't stop the teen from running to the scene._

_Boy was he surprised to see an unconscious Mystique and Gambit carrying an equally as unconscious child. _

* * *

><p><em>"What's going on?" he asked running up to Gambit.<em>

_"Dunno," the Cajun answered._

_"You can't just blow up Mystique of all people, take a child, and not know what you're doing!"_

_"Gambit's improvising, Benny,"_

_"Stop it with the Benny! Anyway, do you know who that kid is?"_

_"Nope, saw de blue femme takin' him so I saved him. De blue femme's bad news,"_

_"I know that. The kid's name is Tristan; he's a new recruit at Xavier's. Recruited the day we met actually by Rogue. Potential telepath and can force people to do things by simply telling them to. Possible healing factor as well,"_

_"Hacked Carlie's recently I'm guessin'" Gambit said as he handed Tristan to Ben and then started to jumpstart a nearby car._

_"It's good to stay informed…You can't just steal a car!" Ben scolded._

_"Would ya prefer t'carry de petit ta mon apartement?"_

_"I suppose as long as we return it there's no problem,"_

_"Bon, put de petit in de back, sit wit' him in case anyt'ing in his condition changes, d'accord?"_

_"Okay." _

* * *

><p>"I know this part. You took Tristan back to Gambit's apartment, gave him an ice pack, and then Gambit explained everything while he was still out like a light," Ava guessed.<p>

"That's exactly what happened," Ben agreed, "Except you skipped the part when Gambit looked for bourbon and realized he had none so he poured himself a small cup of scotch instead,"

Jay rolled his eyes, "Funny," he droned sarcastically.

"What's Gambit's story?" Maya asked eagerly, too eagerly for Rogers's liking.

"The gist of it is," Ben started, "Gambit's powers went berserk on him because he was actually Omega level. After blowing some things up that I will not disclose to you because it's something Gambit wouldn't want the world to know about, a scientist who calls himself Mr. Sinister offered to help. Gambit, being desperate for help at that point, accepted. After Sinister got Gambit's power down to a controllable level by removing some of his brain tissue, he claimed that Gambit was indebted to him. Sinister forced Gambit to do jobs for him, something else that I won't disclose with you. At one point, Gambit got fed up and joined the Acolytes. Sinister didn't want to mess with Magneto's business because that'd make his name known so he sent Sabertooth to keep track of Gambit in case he ever left the Acolytes,"

"Which he did when his father needed help and he kidnapped meh," Rogue said, horror drawn on her face.

"Yeah, not even a week after you left Sabertooth went to New Orleans, found Gambit, and Sinister had him again,"

"Oh God," Jean gasped, "I wish we could have found him sooner,"

"A lot of mutants would be better off if they'd been found sooner," Flora said, Sky and Lila nodded solemnly.

"Ranger, continue please," Jays voice cut through the room like a knife.

"Well, the next day I went to check up on Tristan to find he wasn't there. Gambit told me he was making sure the Morloks were safe when Tristan wanted to stay with a friend. See, Gambit was checking on them because he had a suspicion that his map was going to cause them problems…"

* * *

><p><em>"Remy, if you think they're in danger tell the X-Men," Ben practically begged Gambit.<em>

_"Non, dey would rather lock moi in one o' their fancy cells," Gambit argued, "'sides, it's been 'bout trois days since dey got de map…Maaybe Grey Crow ain't gonna do anyt'ing t' dem. Maybe he just wanted t' know his way 'round de sewers,"_

_"You're leaving a lot to chance here Remy…"_

_"Well, if y' aren't happy 'bout it, you tell dem,"_

_"You know I can't!"_

_"Non, Benny can't. Last I checked, Ranger's mère said not'in' 'bout him helpin' de X-Men,"_

_"Remy, we're the same person,"_

_"Non y'ain't. Ranger's de one who stalks Gambit et he hacks computers. Benny's de one who argues wit' Remy et helps 'round de house,"_

_"Strangely your logic makes sense…"_

_"Bon, be scared if it didn't"_

_"But, how do I get their attention?"_

_"Dey be missin' a kid, bet dey miss de petit. Start from dere,"_

_Ranger smiled, "I think I got an idea,"_

* * *

><p>"So Gambit was in on your little address note," Sky stated.<p>

"Not really," Benjamin explained, "He told me to ask the X-Men for help. I knew that they'd take to long to get anything done so I asked Team 4B better known as Team Extremus. I mean no offense to the X-Men or anything it's just that they know not to rush into anything…unlike Team Extremus who were dying to prove themselves…I had to give you Gambit's address since I didn't know where the Morlocks were…but everything was too late…"

"Poor Gambit…He must feel terrible!" Kitty cried.

"What happened after that," Jay questioned. He wanted to get past this part quickly.

"I tracked you guys to the Morlocks hours later. By that time everything was cleaned up mostly. Gambit and I talked, he gave me his new number and we parted ways. Everything calmed down after that, my parents were suspicious of course, but they never could find any evidence of me getting involved in anything. Of course then Gambit e-mailed me. I don't even know how he got my e-mail. He warned me that someone was onto me, he warned me of the traitor. I narrowed it down to Team Extremus because they were the only ones who heard of me. So, I told Jay…"

"And Nat saw me reading the note with the warning on it," Jay said sadly.

"Then they told me," Flora muttered.

"While the rest of us were oblivious," Tonia said venomously, "How could you keep something like that from us?"

"Because we'd play the blame game," Lila said.

"Which is what happened earlier this evening…or yesterday evening…It's like 5:00 in the morning now," Sky added.

"Now to end the story so I can move on," Ben butted in before they could go even more off topic, "I finished some of my classes for the semester early so my family took a vacation in Florida the same week that you all discovered that Gambit was there. You had him trapped so I helped him escape,"

"You did that!" Alex shouted, "Do you know how long they made us wander around looking for him! A long time! I felt like my feet were bleeding!"

"…Proceed," Leo said once Alex calmed down.

"Well, in exchange for helping him out Gambit gave me everything he had on Sinister plus some; he decided to gather more information a few days after the Florida incident and gave that to me as well. That's what I have in this folder," Ben held up the folder before throwing it on the table in front of Jay. The leader of Team Extremus nodded at Ben in thanks before he picked up the folder and started to flip through it. When he got to the very back page, Jay smiled a bit.

"It appears that Gambit really wants us to win," Jay said, still smiling.

"What make you say that?" Billy asked curiously.

"He gave us the location of Sinister's base,"

* * *

><p><strong>AN: Thank you to everyone who has stuck with me and reviews! **

**Tons of action coming up! I will be attempting my 2nd and up fight scenes!**

**Oh yeah, I'm killing someone in a few chapters...not sure who yet :)**


	13. The Battle Part 1

**A/N: Holy crap, I updated! Yeah…No excuses. Anyway, I'd like to say/ warn the world now; the next update will probably take just as long. I'm very inefficient. But I promise I will absolutely finish this story even if I die trying! Eventually I'm going to fix my least favorite chapter too…But I haven't gotten around to it yet.**

**Just a heads up, if the words **_look like this_, **it's mind speak. If the words **_"Look like this"_** then it's being said out loud on the opposite end of a phone or something.**

* * *

><p><strong>In Sinister's Base<strong>

"They're here…" Dane Shepard said casually from the doorway. He'd severed his ties with the Brotherhood the same night that Darkheart had been ordered to leave the mansion.

Sinister smiled, "Then I suppose we should greet them," turning his attention to Darkheart he added, "Make sure the boy is hidden. His tests are not quite complete."

With a nod of his head, the mutant formerly known as Nathan Morgan left to follow his orders. He couldn't believe he was doing this. He was about to witness the death of everyone he'd once called his friend. Surely they didn't stand a chance against the Marauders; it had taken nine of Xavier's students to hold off one of Sinister's men…and Gambit, the ex-Marauder apparently, had been the person to end the battle anyway.

_No, _he mentally berated himself. _You've gone too far to stop now. You promised to avenge your mother and that's what you're going to do Nat. _He stopped mid-step. He was Darkheart! Not Nat! Nat died the day he left the Xavier Institute…Right? Darkheart shook his head and continued walking. Doubt was not a good look for him. _Neither is being the villain._

* * *

><p><strong>The<strong> **X-Jet**

Wolverine was in full drill-sergeant mode. Every single team Xavier had was on board the X-Jet flying towards a secret base hidden in the Appalachian Mountains. The plan was for the New Recruits, with the help of Storm and Ranger, to attack the base head on as a distraction. The senior X-Men would then enter through the hidden back entrance. Team Extremus would split in half. Six of them would enter on the right with Hack and the other five would enter on the left with Wolverine and Beast.

Thanks to the information graciously given by Gambit and delivered by Ranger, the X-Men knew that the Marauders would be spread out throughout the base. So that led to the group method being thought up. A massive group of X-Men could most likely take down two or three Marauders. Gambit had been very specific on the enemies that'd be located at the base.

First there was Scalphunter. He was the Native American leader of Sinister's Marauders. All the X-Men really needed to know about him was that he was deadly accurate with a gun. Then there was Arclight. She could create little earth tremors like Lance. She was also deadly at hand to hand combat. Prism, Gambit had written next to his name in the folder, would probably be the easiest to defeat if Wolverine was around. Prism was cocky and he could deflect/reflect most forms of energy attacks due to his crystalline body. Gambit had written that his crystalline frame didn't protect him from physical attacks, hence Wolverine's advantage. Scrambler was probably the one that every single mutant on the X-Jet wanted to kill. His ability to disrupt powers or systems by touch is what Gambit said killed Ray. Scrambler was able to make Ray's mutation work in overdrive causing him to electrocute himself from the inside out. Those were only a few of them too. There was also Riptide, Sabretooth of course, Vertigo, Harpoon, and Malice.

To top all of that off, Gambit had put in a small tag of information saying that he suspected Sinister of creating a second set of Marauders. Dane Shepard (or Patient Zero as the X-Men now called him thanks to Alex's pestering) and Darkheart were two examples of this. Unfortunately, there was no information on what Tristan was needed for…or if he was even alive.

* * *

><p><strong>Deep in Sinister's Base<strong>

"Nat! Mr. Greycrow let me shoot his laser gun today!" Tristan exclaimed happily as he followed Darkheart down the corridor.

"Did he now?" the older boy played along as he searched for Sinister's most guarded room.

"Yeah!" after a small pause the little boy continued, "Are you taking me to Essex? I don't like it when he needs me…"

"Nope," Darkheart led Tristan into the room he'd been looking for. It just so happened to be the exact room where Sinister kept all of his information, "We are going to stay in here while everyone else deals with some guests,"

Tristan looked confused, "Are they having a party? Why aren't you going?" Over the course of his stay at Sinister's lab Tristan had been led to the information room many times. Each time he was given the excuse that there were guests over and they were having a grown up party. Normally Greycrow just told him to go to the room, he was never chaperoned.

As Tristan was an observant child, the change in what was normal instantly set off some bells for him. So in order to get some answers he did the one thing he promised Rogue he wouldn't do all those months ago. Tristan used his mutation on a friend to settle his own curiosity.

"Nat," the boy said, "Tell me the truth."

* * *

><p><strong>The X-Jet<strong>

"Alright X-Men, the New Recruits are doing their job. Now it's our turn. Rogue, your main priority is to find Tristan. We don't know what state he is in so out of all of us he will probably trust you the most. Are you sure you can handle it?" Cyclops, the fearless leader and nitpicky strategist questioned.

"The incident with Carol happened days ago, Ah can handle mahself," Rogue thought for a bit and then added, "If Ah see Darkheart though, that boy ain't gonna be whole aftah Ah'm through with him,"

"That's good to know Stripes," Wolverine butted in, "Now all of you go before Storm starts to wonder where the cavalry is,"

"You heard him! Let's go!" Cyclops ordered. The senior X-Men then all hopped out of the X-Jet onto the ledge just outside of their targeted entrance. Inching their way forward, Cyclops in the lead, every one of the seasoned vigilante team couldn't help but share two emotions.

One emotion was fear. They didn't know what was going to happen once they were inside the base. They didn't know the condition Tristan was in. They didn't know the true extent of Sinister's apparent psychosis. The X-Men were afraid of what they didn't know. However, the fear they felt was minimum in comparison to the other emotion. Even if it wasn't, the senior X-Men never let fear stop them before. They weren't going to let it stop them this time either.

The second emotion was anger. How dare Sinister kidnap (and most likely experiment on) a child! What gave that megalomaniac the right? Furthermore, he turned one of their friends against them. The X-Men had never had one of their own betray them to such a degree before. Sure, they've had to fight a teammate in the past, but never because the person just wanted revenge. Typically their teammate wasn't even in their right mind! Due to Sinister's meddling, Carol Danvers was in a coma that she'll probably never wake from, Darkheart was no longer a friend, Gambit was on the run (again), and Tristan didn't get to turn nine within the comfort of the Xavier Institute.

Sinister most definitely messed with the wrong people.

Cyclops had that exact thought in his head as he blasted open the door in front of him.

Prism, Vertigo, and Harpoon were there as the welcoming committee.

* * *

><p><strong>Back on<strong> **the X-Jet**

Wolverine turned to the remaining team after he received a quick message from Storm over his com. "Apparently," he said gruffly, "Sinister felt like sending his mini Marauders to fight the New Recruits. Patient Zero was with them but Darkheart wasn't. Odds are he's probably hiding Tristan,"

"What makes you say that?" Tempest asked as she stood with her group over by the door.

"Sinister probably knows we're here for Tristan," Hack answered for Wolverine, "There's no way a man like him would just leave the kid alone without one of his men as a guard."

"And since Darkheart can phase, it makes for an easy escape," Puff finished.

"Guys," Aqua interrupted the conversation, "We're six seconds behind schedule. We've got to go now."

The other five members in the group nodded. Hack left first followed by Tempest, Reflection, Memory Snake, Memoir, and Guster. Before Aqua could exit, Blaze pulled her aside.

"Fiona," he started while holding up a small black device, "Your goal is to download and destroy all of Sinister's data. This is a chip with a virus on it. After you successfully download everything onto the flash drive Forge made for you, plug this baby in. Make sure to tell us over the coms once you do so because this virus is gonna make the whole place blow about ten minutes after it takes affect."

With a nod, Aqua took the chip and hopped out of the jet to follow her teammates. She sighed in annoyance when she found that they'd already gone inside without her. Making her way towards the door, the young red-head had to hold back a yelp of surprise when a bolt of lightning flew past her face.

Aqua peeked around the corner and saw her friends engaged in a full on battle against Riptide, Malice, and Scalphunter.

* * *

><p><strong>New Recruits<strong>

Ranger jumped back as another poisoned arrow almost hit him. The girl shooting the arrow was nowhere to be found. The only reason that Ranger even knew it was a girl was because she'd laughed when her first shot surprised him causing him to trip in the process of dodging.

A quick scope of the room made Ranger aware that Patient Zero had yet to do anything drastic. All he'd done so far was give Iceman a headache and Wolfsbane a cold. It was almost as though he was waiting for something to happen…

Ranger couldn't ponder the older guy's motives for long as yet another volley of arrows came at him. Truthfully, the sixteen year old wasn't all that worried about the poison being sent his way by the sharpshooting girl…He _was_ worried about the pointy tips of the arrows though. At any point he could make a mistake and take an arrow through the brain.

As if to prove his point, an arrow skimmed his already short hair. Thankfully, Storm chose that moment to shoot a bolt of lightning at some girl with wings. The lightning lit up the rafters revealing a figure with a compound bow aimed at the ready, arrow nocked and pointed at him.

Ranger dodged and decided to fight fire with fire. Reaching into one of his many pockets, Ranger pulled out a small rod. He then pushed a button on said rod and it extended into a brown compound bow. Over the raging sounds of battle, he could swear he heard the girl laugh.

* * *

><p><strong>Deep in Sinister's Base<strong>

"Sorry to tie you up kid. It's really nothing personal…Same goes for taping your mouth closed, but that one is your fault anyway. Don't want you using your powers again only to have you wander into the middle of a deadly battle after I unwillingly let you go," Darkheart said, back turned to the bound child as he typed furiously on the massive computer in front of him.

"Mph mfffp mhmfp!" was all Tristan could manage to say through the gag. When the nine-year-old had told the older boy to tell him the truth, he hadn't said to stay still. So Darkheart had managed to tie and smack some duct tape on the kid as he told the kid what was happening.

"Relax kiddo; I'll be out of here shortly. Just have to get the info I need first."

Tristan cocked his head to the side, "Hmfm?"

"You think I'm loyal to _that_ psycho? HA! Don't make me laugh. I just need what he has on the men responsible for my mother's murder. Despite the current popular belief, I'm not heartless. What he's doing is just cruel, especially to a kid your age," Darkheart shook his head, "When all of his experiments catch up to you in a few years…"

_Experiments?_ Darkheart started in surprise at the unexpected voice in his head. He turned and looked at the child tied to the computer chair.

"Did you just talk in my head?" the ex- Team Extremus member asked.

_What's he talking about? I can't talk in people's head. _There it was again! Darkheart stared into the kid's innocent blue eyes and decided to try something.

_Hey Tristan, can you hear me? _He thought.

_Whoa! _Tristan's voice sounded again inside of Darkheart's mind, _Is Nat a telepath? How's he in my head?_

_Sorry to burst your bubble kid, but you're in my head._

"MPFH PHFMF MFFP!" Tristan's muffled shouts of surprise broke the silence that'd settled in the room during the telepathic conversation.

"I don't understand a word you're saying," Darkheart deadpanned, "Try talking to me in my head instead…Wow that sounded odd," he turned back to the computer to continue searching.

A few minutes later Tristan's voice shouted inside of the older teen's head, _CAN YOU HEAR ME NOW!_

_Ouch! Don't shout inside of someone else's head, it hurts._

_You deserve it._

_That's a matter of opinion._

_Besides, you didn't answer the first hundred times I tried to talk to you. Shouting got your attention._

_Did it ever occur to you that maybe you weren't in my head for the first hundred times you asked?_

_I'm nine. I shouldn't even have my mutation yet, let alone know exactly when it's working._

_You're one sassy little kid._

_I learned it all from Rogue._

_Whatever._

Silence finally fell over the room, and in Darkheart's mind…Only to be broken by the sound of a giant explosion from somewhere above them.

_What was that? _Tristan's childish voice asked. Darkheart groaned in annoyance, he just wanted to find…A smile formed on the traitor's lips as he reached the file he'd been looking for. He quickly copied it onto a disk.

_Hellllooooo? _Tristan's voice piped in, _I can hear you, you know. That means you can hear me. So answer my question!_

Darkheart sighed audibly, "It was probably from the fight."

_They're gonna win y'know._

"Who?" Darkheart was much too tired to speak in his head to a curious child.

_The X-Men. They're gonna kick your guys' butts!_

"I'm not technically one of them, so more power to the X-Men if they win. I've got what I came for," he raised the disk which he then tucked safely into a small backpack.

_Wait you're leaving? You can't kill those guys! I am not snooping around your head!_

Darkheart ripped the duct tape gag off of Tristan and glared, "Do. Not. Do. That. AGAIN!"

Tears started forming in the boy's big blue eyes.

"Hey, I'm sorry, no crying...God, why'd you have to have blue eyes…Okay, um…People don't like it when telepaths read their minds, Tristan…That's why the Professor and Jean don't read everyone's minds all the time. It makes non-telepaths…um… upset," Darkheart comforted, sort of.

"Sorry," Tristan mumbled.

"You don't have to apologize, kid, I should…Anyway, I'm going to untie you. After that you can either leave the room while possibly getting hurt in the cross fire, or you can stay here and wait to either be saved by the X-Men or recaptured by the Marauders, your choice."

"Why can't I go with you?" it was asked so quietly that Darkheart had to strain his ears to hear it.

"Why would you want to?"

"I know that you're not really mean…I accidentally read your mind remember? And I like you. I don't want you to go away forever!"

Nathan Morgan crouched down in front of the young boy, "Tristan, if I could, I would take you with me, but you need to grow up with the relatively normal lifestyle Xavier's has to offer. If you came with me…you'd always be on the move with a not so moral goal. I can't drag you into this with me."

"But I don't want you to go!"

"How about we make a deal then," Nat offered with a smile.

"O-okay," Tristan agreed, trying hard not to cry.

"I'll visit, or call, heck, I'll even write to you whenever I can, if you promise not to tell the X-Men anything you saw in my head, deal?"

Tristan nodded vigorously, "Deal!"

Darkheart smiled, "Good," then he untied Tristan and phased out of the room.

* * *

><p><strong>Team Extremus Group 1<strong>

"Tempest," Reflection's strained voice caught the girl's attention, "Please, just zap this guy already, I don't know how much longer I can hold him off!" As if to prove his point, Riptide sent another wave of bone spikes from the tornado around his body. The spikes all hit the mirror Reflection was using as a shield. The mirror was incredibly cracked and one more attack would most definitely shatter it.

"I'm a bit preoccupied," Tempest shouted as she jumped out of the way of a metal pole sent courtesy of Malice. Everyone knew that Lorna Dane, the unfortunate body Malice was using as a host, didn't actually want to fight them. Had it not been for Gambit's notes though, Team Extremus wouldn't have known.

Reflection winced in pain as the mirror finally shattered and disappeared, leaving him completely exposed. Riptide leered at the worn out and defenseless boy in front of him. Reflection just glared. Suddenly, out of nowhere, Memoir came down and landed directly on top of Riptide's head, successfully knocking him out.

"Maya," Reflection huffed trying to catch his breath, "I think I'm in love with you."

"Come on, we have to collar him before he wakes up," Memoir stated as she unlatched a negation collar from the belt that also held her com badge.

"Yeah, right," Reflection followed Memoir over to the fallen enemy as she attached the collar.

"GET DOWN!" Tempest's voice cried out. Memoir and Reflection both looked up just in time to see a long metal pole coming at them. Memoir, with her better reflexes, managed to jump and only get hit in the ankles which caused her to flip and land on her stomach. Reflection, on the other hand, wasn't so fortunate. The pole hit him right under the ribs and sent him flying into a nearby wall. His head smashed into it with a resounding crack. He was unconscious immediately.

Malice smiled triumphantly and was about to finish the two downed teens off when they suddenly disappeared. She didn't know that Memory Snake was using his mutation to save his friends.

Memory Snake's stomach dropped at that thought of anyone on his team possibly dying and anger overcame him. He was about to charge Malice when a hand went over his mouth and pulled him aside. Turning to look at his assaulter, he visibly relaxed when he saw Aqua.

"Keep quiet," the red-head who'd been conspicuously absent during the battle thus far whispered as she removed her hand.

"Where have you been? What's going on? Why aren't you fighting? Is Leo okay? What about Maya? Wait, why are we this far away from the fight? Shouldn't we-" Memory Snake's whispered questioning was interrupted by Aqua.

"Blaze gave me a different objective," Aqua explained, "And I need help," she proceeded to tell Alex all about Jay's virus plan, "So, are you in?"

"Yep. I'm always glad to help where I'm needed…Although that's everywhere, because, honestly, everyone needs my help. It's always, Alex, do this. Yo, Alex H. I need you're help! Alex, we are in need of-"

"Shh!" Aqua hissed, "This is a stealth mission. Now follow me and keep quiet. Gambit's map will lead us right to Sinister's main computer."

"Yeah quiet. I can do quiet. I'm as silent as a mouse. Then again mice aren't very quiet…"

At least he was whispering.

* * *

><p><strong>Team Extremus Group 2<strong>

Scrambler, Sabretooth, and Arclight…Actually it was just Scrambler and Arclight. Wolverine and Sabretooth had disappeared around a corner trying to tear the other's limbs off the instant they saw each other.

Blaze was currently locked in a deadly battle with Arclight. He knew that everyone was needed to take down Scrambler, and everyone wanted to. So just like Wolverine was distracting Sabretooth, Blaze was distracting Arclight. As the fight progressed, however, Blaze found him self relying on his mutation more and more as he tired out.

Arclight seemed to pick up on this too as a smirk appeared on her face. Quickly, before Blaze could even react, the Marauder charged. The leader of Team Extremus in retaliation quickly shot a stream of black fire out at her, which she jumped over with ease. She then swiped Blaze's feet from under him causing him to land painfully on his back.

Not one to be taken out so easily, Blaze reached for a nearby rock which had fallen from the ceiling earlier due to Wolverine and Sabretooth's fight (he still had no idea how they'd gotten up there) and threw it at the woman standing over him. As she leaned backwards to avoid the rock, Blaze took her momentary distraction to stand up.

"You're one determined kid, aren't you?" she chuckled, "Unfortunately, I'm going to have to cut our little meeting short." She then feigned a punch in Blaze's direction. He dodged it, but Arclight used the distraction to kick him in the gut, with the added strength of her mutation. The seismic wave she added to the kick sent Blaze flying into a stack of cardboard boxes that had at one point held chemicals and syringes but were now empty, causing his fall to be less painful.

Wincing, Blaze pulled himself up again. He was going to have a lot of bruises in the morning. Arclight just glared at him, not amused. This caused Blaze to smile a bit, "What's wrong?" he asked as he made a small black flame envelope each of his hands, walking back towards the Marauder, "I didn't even get to introduce myself to you and you're already done with our meeting."

"I don't have the time for this, kid," she made to attack him again, but this time Blaze successfully jumped out of the way, shooting several fire balls at Arclight. She dodged them flawlessly.

"I'm a legal adult; I'm not considered a kid in any court of law."

Before she could respond, a blast of energy hit her from the side. She flew through the hole Team Extremus had entered from. Blaze ran over to the hole to see if he could find any sign of her on the side of the mountain…He couldn't.

"You alright?" Dynamo asked, jogging over to the leader.

"Yeah," Blaze was still looking down the mountain. Dynamo looked too, but paled considerably when he saw how high up they were.

"Did she…You know…"

"I think so."

"And I…Oh God…I killed her!" Dynamo's eyes grew big at the realization of what'd happened hit him.

Blaze gave a reassuring squeeze to his friend's shoulder, "You did the right thing. Besides, from what we've seen so far, I don't think she'll stay dead for very long. Sinister probably has the knowledge of how to clone his Marauders anyway."

Dynamo nodded in agreement, "We should go help the others with Scrambler."

"Yeah, what's the status of everyone so far?"

Dynamo looked grim, "Not so good. He caused Tigerlily's power to go into overdrive. She can't stop any information from entering her mind and she passed out before I went to help you. I'm not entirely sure how she's doing mentally…"

"Anyone else?" Blaze asked as he gingerly felt the wound above his eyebrow that wouldn't stop bleeding.

"I'm not quite sure what happened, but he did something to Marina…She's down and won't wake up."

"What about Beast and Puff?"

"Holding him off until we arrive," Dynamo said, "But we've got to hurry."

Blaze nodded in agreement and the two of them took off toward the others.

* * *

><p><strong>New Recruits<strong>

Five…Four…Three…Two…Storm's lightening occurred right on cue illuminating the rafters where the girl's silhouette was. Ranger didn't hesitate at all; he pulled back the string and fired his arrow. It was times like these when he was proud of his perpetual preparedness.

He heard the girl laugh again. Ranger was getting really sick of that laugh, it was mocking him. In his frustration, Ranger almost forgot to dodge the arrow that came at him. Almost. When it landed just to his right, he frowned when he noticed it was the same arrow that he'd just fired at her.

That's how it went for a while. He'd fire at her, and she'd fire back. Sometimes it'd be his arrows, other time hers. Just when Ranger was going to do something rash, the girl with wings Storm shot out of the sky a few minutes ago came back. She formed a yellow orb in her hand and threw it at the veteran X-Man. Storm easily flew out of the way and the orb ended up hitting the rafters, coincidentally right next to where the archery girl was hiding.

Ranger watched as the girl flipped onto an already destroyed rafter that was angled toward the ground. The girl slid down it until her feet hit the concrete floor, compound bow still in hand. When she noticed Ranger watching her, the archery girl casually strolled over to the sixteen year old.

"Hello," she said as she nocked another arrow and aimed it at Ranger's face, "I'm Archer."

"Ranger," he said with a nod. He too nocked another arrow on his bow and pointed it at her. This made Archer laugh…again. "Can you quit it with the laughing?"

"Sorry, I can't do that," and then she laughed again.

Archer had long black hair pulled back into a ponytail. She wore a red jacket over tight fitting maroon full body armor, maroon gloves, and knee length black boots. She was pale with piercing grey eyes and she wore a smirk that had yet to leave.

And quite frankly, at this point in the battle, Ranger just wanted to wipe that smile right off of her face.

* * *

><p><strong>Deep in Sinister's Base<strong>

Tristan paced back in forth in the computer room trying to decide his next course of action. Should he wait? Should he go find someone? Then he remembered something, he was a mutant! He could talk in other people's heads. _If I could reach Nat, _he thought, _then maybe I can reach other people in the building too!_

Closing his eyes, Tristan focused on his breathing. Before he knew it, he was sensing every mind within the base. Feeling overwhelmed, the nine year old boy gasped and snapped his eyes open.

"That was…SO COOL!" he exclaimed to no one in particular. His shout just echoed throughout the room where the only noises either came from him, the battles going on elsewhere, or the constantly beeping computer.

Tristan muttered a quick, "Let's try this again," before he felt everyone's mind again. Not knowing how distinguish one person's mind from another, Tristan went about his business as a door to door salesman would. He went from mind to mind. It was a strange experience for the boy because being in someone else's mind was sort of like being an uninvited guest in someone's home.

_Rogue, is this you? _He asked in mind number one.

_What the hell! _Tristan frowned when it was Scott's mind that he was in. Although it was a bit amusing that mental Scott cussed.

_Sorry Scott, wrong head. Bye!_ The boy was out of there before the fearless leader could respond.

* * *

><p><strong>Team Extremus Group 1<strong>

"_Cyclops to everyone," _the voice spoke through the com badge as Hack and Guster jumped out of the way of yet another metal pole. Tempest and Malice had been going at it for a while now, both girls bleeding from various injuries, and it was coming to the point where their battle was interfering with the other one more than they were actually hitting each other.

"What Cyke?" Tempest snapped into her badge while ducking out of the way of a poorly aimed piece of shrapnel.

"_It appears that Tristan is attempting to make mental contact with Rogue, but can't figure out which mind is hers. If you hear him remain in battle, don't get distracted, but if you are able to, try to get him to say where he is."_

"I kind of figured that out Sherlock," Guster replied. He then proceeded to send out a sharp blast of wind that sliced Scalphunter's gun in half rendering it unusable. Sending a cocky grin to Tempest, Guster said "See that gorgeous? I could take him down all by mysel- OOF!" he was cut off when the leader of the Marauder's punched him in the gut.

Before he could do further damage to the boy, Hack jumped into the air and landed a kick right on the bigger man's head. Scalphunter stumbled away a bit, but remained otherwise alright.

"Guster, go assist Tempest. I'll handle this guy," the teacher ordered.

"Well, seeing as I'm invaluable, you both need my help," Guster blanched slightly when Hack glared at him, "I'll go help Tempest. Stay beautiful, Teach" with that, the boy shot a blast of wind out at a pipe Malice had sent towards Ava.

"Now you're in trouble!" Tempest shouted at the metal manipulator. She sent a smile in Billy's direction.

It was time to finish off their group's second bad guy.

* * *

><p><strong>In a Corridor of Sinister's Base<strong>

"Please, shut up!" Aqua hissed at Memory Snake who had yet to stop his incessant whispering.

"Why, then it'll be too quiet. Some noise is better than no noise if you ask me. How do you think the others are doing? They probably need help. We should go back and help them. Leo and Maya are down for the count, so it's three on two now! Well, Leo's down. I'm not sure how badly Maya's ankles were hit. She might be able to stand…" Memory Snake rambled on.

Aqua face palmed, and zoned the older teen out. Memory Snake did not understand the concept of stealth.

"…Who's that?" that question caused the red-head to pay attention again. She peered down the corridor, and there it was. Another figure was casually walking away from them, it was too far away for any details to really be made out, but he/she was most definitely there.

Aqua smirked, "I can find out." Then she stuck out her hands. The water lines running above the corridor suddenly burst and Aqua manipulated the water so that it flung the figure back towards them.

Memory Snake took that moment to make both him and Flora seemingly disappear within the guy's (it was obviously a dude now) mind. What he wasn't expecting was for the guy to set down the backpack he'd been wearing and laugh.

"Alex, Flora, I know it's you two," he then turned around and they were face to face with their ex-teammate, Nathan Morgan.

* * *

><p><strong>AN: Eh, I've done better. Oh well. I'm still going to kill someone, I just don't know who yet. I'd like the death to surprise everyone though, so if you're alright with me killing you character and don't need me to PM you my plans, tell me somehow please. **

**If you couldn't tell, I finally made my OC do something! Yay! Archer is also mine. But what is her mutation? **

**Nobody else besides Tristan and Archer are mine… Also, I liked the idea of Ranger having a compound bow and arrows on his person, so I hope that's not a huge deal. It seemed like a cool idea to me.**

**Reviews are welcome! Thanks to everyone who is still with me!**


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