Wanda felt the tugging sensation in her navel as she was ripped from her bed in the Fire Nation Palace. Even more panic spread through her when she found she couldn't fight it, and within seconds was pulled away from the place she had called home for the past seven years. Before she even had a chance to process what was going on, she felt herself come into contact with solid ground as she was dumped onto a wooden floor. To her relief she saw that Zuko tumbled out behind her, sprawling across the floor next to her.

"Uh-oh," she heard from behind her. "I think we did somethin' wrong." That voice sounded somewhat familiar, but she couldn't place it… it was as if from a dream. After her head stopped spinning she opened her eyes and took in her surroundings. As soon as she did, familiar anger blazed through her, something she hadn't needed to tap into for several years.

"Toad?!" she asked in horror and wrath.

"Wanda?" he asked incredulously. She looked so different to him. Her hair was long, flowing waves of auburn, much different than the cropped black and red he had known from before. Her clothes were different as well. The tight leather had been replaces with a long, silk red dress that slid off of her shoulders. She didn't even look like the same person. And who was the guy that was lying on the ground next to her?

Even though Toad looked different to her, taller and with short-cropped hair, she would know that voice and those eyes anywhere.

"What did you do?!" she demanded, bringing a scarlet glow to her hands.

"Wanda, calm down." She hadn't been able to focus on anything else, but now Wanda realized there were even more people in the room. A shapely red head sat directly to her right, delicate features currently furrowed in confusion. It took Wanda a moment to recognize this person, but when she did and instant sphere of red circled her and Zuko protectively against Jean Grey.

"JEAN?!" What the fuck was going on? Brotherhood did not mix with X-Men, ever for any reason. Why was Jean here with Toad? Why was she herself even here with these two mutants? She had left that world behind with no way back just three years shy of a decade ago.

"Wanda, you must find a center of focus for your mind," chimed in another, much elderly voice. Directly across from Jean sat her previous mentor and teacher of witchcraft, Agatha. Wanda was more surprised that the old woman was still alive than anything, though it looked as if the elderly witch hadn't aged a day since Wanda was last taught by her.

"What the hell is going on?" asked Zuko as he stood up beside her, careful not to touch the red hex magic that circled him.

"It seems things were a bit different than we realized," observed Jean.

"No fuck," remarked an angry Wanda.

"Child, center yourself. Allow us to explain." Even after so long apart from Agatha, Wanda still felt immediately attuned to the woman's commands. Without even thinking about it, she inhaled to the count of seven, held it, then released it. She fixed her eyes on the elder woman though kept her protective sphere in tact.

"Fine. Care to tell me what you've done and for the love of God, why?" Agatha nodded at Jean, whom Wanda directed her attention to.

"Wanda, you can lower your shields, we're not here to hurt you. Actually, we brought you back to ask for your help."

"Well you can forget that. What makes you think that I would do anything to help you? I left for a reason! To get AWAY from all of this, all of you! I finally found a place where I belong, where I fit, where I'm happy. And you expect me to leave that because you need my help? Fuck off." She noticed Toad looked more than a little wounded at her words, but pushed that from her mind. Jean sighed.

"Ok, let's start at the beginning then: First, we didn't realize that you had…well, gone somewhere else." Wanda scowled.

"Where did you think I went then?" Silence met her words. Finally she fixed her glare on Toad. "Well?"

"We thought…Wanda, we thought you were dead."

"Dead?" Wanda echoed in disbelief. "You…you just tried to bring me back from the dead?! Why?"

"That's what I'm trying to explain," Jean told her. "We're desperate, Wanda. We need you." Wanda scoffed.

"For what?"

"A lot has changed since you…left." Jean flicked her eyes up and down Zuko, who crossed his arms over his bare chest and stared down at her. She blushed, but continued. "We stood a fighting chance for a while but then… Mystique murdered the professor." Wanda could tell that this was recently, because Jean's eyes still watered and she had to look away. Toad picked up where she left off.

"Even though Mystique did it for him, Magneto still killed her for retribution. I guess he 'n the prof' were still close, despite the war." At the sound of her father's name Wanda's blood boiled. Zuko slipped a hand into hers, and she looked up at him. He stared into her eyes, letting her know that he was there and that it would be ok, Magneto or not. Wanda growled and let the anger fade for the moment in order to focus on the other part of that statement.

"War? What war?"

"Magneto has been raging an all-out war on normal, non-mutant humans and all mutants who would fight on their side." Jean had regained composure and had continued speaking. "What you knew before, the Morlocks, the Brotherhood, the X-men, the Acolytes, all of it; it doesn't exist anymore. There are no more branches, just a line down the middle. Those who fight with Magneto and his ideals to have the world taken over by mutants and slaughter every human in his way, and those who oppose him." Wanda's eyes flashed dangerously.

"And what does all of this have to do with me?" she demanded coldly.

"With both Mystique and the professor gone…there's no one to oppose him. There are people, but they have no hope, nothing to rally behind. The professor was the last man to stand between Magneto and his twisted idea of a utopia. No there's no one that can take him on with a fighting chance of winning…except you. You were the only one to have ever bested him. We need you Wanda, not just us, but everyone."

"If you were trying to bring me back from the dead, why didn't you try the professor first?" Wanda spat, trying to ignore the previous comment.

"It was Toad's idea…" Jean said. Wanda looked at Toad, who shrugged.

"I figured, if you went out with magic, maybe enough magic could bring you back. So I went to Agatha. She said she needed a psychic boost to find your plane of existence, so we got Jean. And me…well they used me to call you." Toad shrugged and looked away. Wanda was about to ask that the hell he meant by that, but Zuko interrupted.

"So if Wanda helps you, you'll send her, us, back?" he asked. Silence.

"You weren't going to send me back?!" Wanda hissed.

"Wanda…we thought that you were dead," Jean said slowly. "The magic we used… we weren't planning of killing you when, if, you helped us. We didn't know that you had gone somewhere else. What we did… It was a one-way doorway."

"You mean you can't!" Red flashes of lightning lit up the room as Wanda's panic fused with her anger. "How dare you, how dare any of you…." She ran out of words to use to express her emotions at that point. Zuko could tell that she was slipping from him. If he didn't act now, she would do something that he wouldn't be able to stop. He put one of his hands on her shoulder and turned her to face him.

"Wanda," he said gently as he stared her down. Her fists were clenched and there was murder in her eyes, but she still held back to listen to him. "It's going to be ok. You got to my world once before, didn't you? That was a long time ago, when you hadn't grown or learned as much control over your power. If it happened on accident, we can do it again. It will just take time to figure out how, but we'll figure it out. I promise." Wanda still felt a violent rage ripping through her at the situation she had been thrown into, but allowed some of it to ebb away at his words.

"How can you be so calm? It's your world too. What will they do, without a Fire Lord? What if they need you? You can't just disappear on your people like this." Zuko nodded, but then put his remaining hand on her other shoulder, holding her directly in front of him so as to block everyone else out while he talked her down.

"Yes, that's true but they will have Uncle, and my mother, as well as Aang and everyone else to help out while I'm gone." He moved one of his hands up to cup her face. "I'm here with you, Wanda. We'll figure this out, together." She closed her eyes and pushed her face into his palm, holding there for a moment or two before releasing a breath and with it her hex sphere. As she turned around she tried to ignore the hurt in Toad's eyes.

"Fine. But I'm not promising anything; my number one priority is to get back home where I belong."