The Brotherhood boys stared at their blue-skinned boss with looks of uncertainty.
"So you're saying you want us to go after some mutant…" Toad started.
"… Just so we can get to her before Xavier does…" Fred put his two cents in.
"… And you don't even know what her power is…" Lance added.
"… And we could face potential death if she turns out to be a dangerous mutant with lethal powers." Pietro finished.
"Yes," Mystique answered bluntly. "Now get to it!"
"How come Wanda can't come?" Toad whined.
"Because she would scare the girl away," Mystique admitted. Pointing her finger at the door, she screamed, "Now go!"
With that, the four boys were off to the forest area of Bayville that the town hadn't bothered to chop down and industrialize yet, wondering out loud why Mystique hadn't gone after the girl herself. She had gone to the members of the Brotherhood personally, after all. Why would she send four intimidating teenage boys to try to recruit a girl no older than fifteen when she could get the job done herself correctly?
"Maybe she's too scared," Todd decided as he hopped over some foliage.
"Yeah, right. She's probably some sort of assassin. Why would she be afraid of some kid who can't even control their powers?" Pietro said, pushing a branch back so it would get out of his way. "It's most likely because she failed and couldn't get to her, so we're the last resort."
"I'm with Toad," Fred said, grunting as Pietro let go of the branch and it hit him in the face. "I mean, what if the girl turns out to be some kind of mutant pig with 30 tentacles and has spider-eyes and fangs like a viper?"
Lance rolled his eyes as he took a large step to avoid falling into a small stream of water. "You've been watching too many sci-fi horror movies."
"I agree. I mean, the likeliness of that happening, is like, one out of a billion." Pietro added as he too stepped over the stream.
"There are seven billion people on planet Earth…" Toad said, hopping over the stream with no problem.
"Fine, one out of a trillion. Happy now?" Pietro snapped, accidentally slipping on some rocks but managing to regain his balance before he fell.
"Yup," Fred cheered. Not caring about getting his shoes wet, he stepped into the stream and made sure to avoid the rocks that Pietro had slipped on.
"I'm good," Todd agreed with his fat friend as he hopped onto his shoulder.
"You guys, shut up. I think I see her…" Lance interrupted the boys' conversation.
All of a sudden, a girl climbed out of a nearby tree. Her facial and body features verified that she was a young teenager, but everything else about her said otherwise.
Her red hair was tied in two short ponytails with green bows. She was wearing a blue jeans jumper and a plain, green t-shirt with dark green tennis shoe. She was licking a green lollipop she held in her hand.
"Do you want to play with me?" she asked in an innocent, child-like manner as she took a lick of her sucker.
"Sure, let's play Follow-the-Leader." Pietro said, quickly forming a plan in his head. "We're the leaders and you're the follower."
The girl shook her head as she licked her lollipop once again. "I don't like that game. I want to play Hide-and-Go-Seek."
"Well, we don't like that game." Pietro argued.
The girl grew crocodile tears in her eyes. "You mean… you mean you don't like me?"
Before Pietro could make things worse by confirming her words to be true, Lance stepped in. "Listen, we need you to come with us." He hoped she wouldn't ask why and just be her naïve self and just go.
"Sorry, but my mommy said not to follow strangers home."
"Isn't she supposed to be at her rebellious stage by now?" Toad whispered to Fred as Lance continued to try to convince the girl to follow them home.
"Forget that," Pietro, who had overheard, said quietly, not bothering to whisper. "Isn't she supposed to be using bigger words and not saying, "Mommy," anymore?"
"I think this girl's a nutcase," Fred whispered back.
"You're telling me," Todd muttered.
"I say we go back home and tell Mystique we couldn't find her," Pietro declared.
"Couldn't find who?" the girl left her conversation to question the white-haired boy's statement.
"None of your business," Toad said as he hopped off of Fred's shoulder to the ground.
"Bye, Kid." Fred said as he turned to leave.
"See ya, wouldn't wanna be ya." Pietro zoomed to catch up with his friends.
Lance sighed. "I guess that's my cue to leave too."
As soon as they all turned around and started walking, the girl was in front of them.
"Whoa, how'd you do that?" Fred asked, slightly startled.
"Maybe she has teleportation," Toad suggested weakly.
The girl glared as she bit into her sucker, making her look less intimidating (as if she were to begin with). "All I wanted was somebody to play with, but you guys were mean to me. I bet it's 'cause you're grown-ups."
"Teenagers," Fred immediately corrected.
"Like you," Toad added.
"I'm not a teenager, I'm a kid." She said, glaring even harder as she took another bite of her candy on a stick. "And maybe if you were my age, you'd want to play too."
They just stared at the girl curiously, wondering what she was going to do next. She stared back.
After thirty seconds of staring, Pietro couldn't take it any longer. "Listen kid, I'd really love to play with you, but I have places to be and things to do."
Crazy-nut-girl finished off her lollipop and threw the stick at Pietro's direction, which he easily dodged. "That all you got?"
Unexpectedly, the girl smirked and said, "That's only the beginning." She walked up the Fred until he was only inches away and reached out to him.
Blob closed his eyes and winced, waiting for some horrible fate to happen to him. When none came, he opened his eyes again, only to be embarrassed to see the girl waiting for him to grab the green lollipop she was handing him.
He quickly snatched it from her, took off the wrapper and stuck it in his mouth.
"Tastes like a weird mixture of apple and watermelon flavor," he commented as he continued to suck.
"Ooh, I want one!" Toad hopped up and down like a five year old. "Can I have one?"
The girl giggled. "Sure you can."
Soon, all the Brotherhood had green suckers in their mouth besides Lance.
"I don't like apple flavor," he argued.
"I have watermelon!" she convinced.
"I don't like watermelon either," he snapped.
"Then what do you like?" she asked.
"I don't like any candy," he said stubbornly.
The girl huffed, then proceeded to say, "Plllllllllleeeeeeeeeeeeeeeaa aasssee!" over and over until he finally caved in and took the lollipop she was offering him.
As soon as Lance had the sucker in his mouth, he instantly felt a strange, child-like bliss he hadn't encountered for years.
"I feel kind of weird," Toad admitted as he finished the last of his candy.
"Me too," Fred said.
"Me three," Pietro added.
Lance's only response was a grunt in what they assumed was agreement.
Two hours later, four unconscious Brotherhood members lay in the thick forest engulfed by a bright, neon green light as something supernatural started to happen.
Upon wakening, the first thing the members of the Brotherhood realized was that night had come and was nearly gone. It had been near sunset when the Brotherhood had started searching; the fact that it was almost sunrise meant they had probably been out for four or five hours.
"Ugh, my aching head." Pietro moaned in a voice that sounded like it belonged to a child, his eyes slammed shut in pain.
Everyone grunted or groaned in agreement; they too, were in a similar position to Pietro. Then, Toad commented, "Your voice sounds funny."
Once realizing his voice sounded the same way as the speedster's, he immediately cleared his throat, thinking it had happened because of puberty. "Testing, one, two, three." He muttered. Toad was surprised to find no change in his voice.
Fred, who was now sitting up and staring at the other members of the Brotherhood in a mixture of awe and fright, said, "You guys, I don't think we're sixteen anymore."
I'm searching for the kind of story people like to read the most and sticking to that writing style. I'm going to try to keep this story serious (as in, not making characters do stuff you could never do in the show) and keep everyone in character for the most part. Did I add in enough detail? Was there too much telling and not enough showing? Please review and tell me so.
RANDOM QUESTION: Have you guys read that litter-ature on this site called My Immortal? The story is in the Harry Potter category (which I've never read the books or seen the movies) but anyway apparently the story was so bad it got taken off. TheJadedDolphin posted it back on here so people could have a good laugh at the original author's expense. If you want to know how not to write, search the story. And the story is not a joke; the girl sincerely thinks she is a good writer. She's still on this site unfortunately and her penname is XXXbloodyrists666XXX.