For a change, this time BamfIsAwesome was the beta (thank you so very much).

Disclaimer: I don't own anything but the characters; the X-Men universe is the property of Marvel.

I like NES games too, though back in the 90's I didn't have a NES but its Polish clone, the Pegasus console (a cult one in here where I live).

"A Dealer"

I, Maddox Rice, am the best drug dealer in the whole of Hadley. Well… actually to the best of my knowledge, I'm the only one. I'm sure you haven't even heard of Hadley and I'm not surprised by this at all. It's a very small village off the coast of England – maybe two dozen farms that squat down among the patchwork squares of boundless fields, a store serving as an inn and post office at the same time and a school building, housing a primary as well as secondary school. All the kids from our village and the neighboring ones attend it.

And almost all of them are my clients. You hear many times that villagers are narrow minded and don't like things out of the norm, yet in this very case this rule doesn't work – luckily. I never saw anyone pester our neighbor Miss Palfrey in any way in spite of the orange fur covering her whole body. Actually though, I suspect if they did, she would instantly treat them to an electric discharge. That's her power. So maybe they are not so very tolerant but just really careful. Never mind. There are also two other mutants in my school. Well, three, if you count me in too. I'm not a visible one, nevertheless everybody knows. I outed myself to them. That's really strange that I ever discovered my powers – it's one of those you may not ever discover in your whole life, until you do it accidentally. And I did so. So I'm a mutant and a drug dealer at the same time, who could have thought?

They come to me during school breaks, asking for the stuff. That's funny, who could think even in a small sleepy village there are junkies too? I chuckle a bit every time when I think about their parents who are convinced their kids are so innocent. But they aren't and almost every day I give them what they want. Boys and girls, though it's mostly boys. Girls are typically too scared to take it or just too disgusted. Girls are really strange. I really don't know what it is so scary about it. My stuff gets them immersed in a delirious ecstasy for about two hours and doesn't addict at all. I know as I take it too.

They pay me with small, symbolic sums. Sometimes they give me things they don't need any more or serve me with other services. Aiden Palfrey, Miss Palfrey's nephew gave me a Metallica T-shirt he had gotten and which was too small for him. Claire Palfrey (in a village that small, almost everybody is related to one another in this or that way) paid me for the whole month of my giving it to her with a real cool big collection of NES games from the 90's she found in the attic of her house. Yes, it may seem strange but even now I still like playing those old games. Brandon McNeil who, unlike myself, is really good at writing essays, helped me with my last one, correcting all the spelling mistakes. Ian Rice brought me a basket of carrots from his parents' garden. Most of my schoolmates are my clients. Sometimes I'm afraid I won't be able to produce enough stuff for everybody but I always do. Even if every week I get more clients. Sometimes they are those who claimed before that they would never do it. Never ever. That all those who come to me are disgusting, miserable junkies. That my drugs are disgusting and someone like me should be expelled from our school. I laugh silently at them then – I knew they would come to me; a bunch of hypocrites. Like the Browne sisters today. Holly from my class and Melody who is a grade younger. I knew they would come to me one day, asking for just one sip of my stuff, I just knew it. I gave them it willingly and for free. Isn't the first time always for free to attract customers? So I gave it to them for free, laughing a bit at the thought of their disgusted faces. Until they started to express the purest delight, their faces reflected disgust they weren't even trying to hide. But they'll get used to it, like all my customers do. Well, I'm not surprised by this disgust, to be honest. I'm a dealer and a mutant. My body secretions are a natural drug I sell to my schoolmates. In short, one sip of my urine gives them up to two hours of ecstasy. Disgusting but well, you just get used to it.