Author's Note: I love everyone who reviewed!! I learned that getting reviews is like taking drugs—I must have more!! (Not that I know what taking drugs is like) Also, I learned that 5 pages on Microsoft word really isn't that long on so I decided to merge things a little more to try to get the most out of a chapter.

Disclaimer: I wish I owned everything!! Sort of…

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Chapter 2: Rubble

In spite of the preventive measures Wanda and the other boys had set up, Pietro had—yet again—managed to break the air conditioning system, just like he did every summer in his miserable attempts to make it more efficient.

"You guys are so unfair! It's not my fault!" Pietro protested indignantly, as the boys shut him out of Lance's room, the only room that could afford a decent rotating fan. They were afraid he might break that one as well, which wasn't an unfounded concern. Wanda had voluntarily left the room since she had no desire to be in a cramped room with three sweaty boys—but Pietro was so quickly affected by things that the heat usually made him more high strung and jittery, and the cool air really would have helped calm him and his heart rate.

Wanda sat alone in her bedroom with a store-bought handheld fan in her left hand and a National Geographic magazine spread out on her bed. She turned a page about the pandas in the zoo, disinterested.

There was a soft knock at her door.

"Yeah?" she called, glancing at the digital clock on her bedside table. It was a few minutes past midnight.

"Wanda…" Pietro sighed, opening her door. "I am so… so hot. I think I'm dying."

"You shouldn't have broken the AC," she said with a shrug.

His lower lip quivered. "Can I stay here for awhile? I don't feel well, and the boys won't let me in the room."

Wanda took a long look at him. His hair was sweaty and disheveled, his face had little splotches of pink from the heat, and his body looked awfully scrawny, even for him and his lanky build. She felt a teeny, tiny prickle of concern for him.

"Come here," she said, pushing her magazines aside. "Let me check your pulse."

He ambled over, his breathing ragged and laborious. She took his hand and pressed her fingers against his thin, pale wrist. There was a pause while she tried to count the beats. Wanda was the only one at the Brotherhood who knew how to take Pietro's pulse. Normal for Pietro was about five beats per second, but today, his heartbeat was going so fast, it felt like it was vibrating in his skinny body.

"Here." She handed the handheld fan to him. "Breathe a little slower and relax."

He smiled weakly. "Thanks. Man, I hate the summertime."

"I know," Wanda said, trying and failing to sound soothing. "Now shut up. Keep your energy for later." She gestured for him to sit on her bed where she had just been sitting, and she went to her window. He obeyed, and she faced away from him, toward the endlessly dark sky. Pietro had never come to her for help before. She couldn't even remember him doing it in their childhood, but then again, Wanda had very blurry memories of her life before the Brotherhood. She couldn't even remember her mother, and Pietro claimed he could remember her very well. They didn't even have pictures. "How do you feel, Pietro?" she asked, supposing he was almost completely back to normal, if not already.

"A lot better," he said, running his fingers through his hair to comb it back. "It's really hot outside."

"That tends to happen during summer," Wanda said sarcastically, pressing her fingertips to the cool glass of the window, and then turning back to him, feeling awkward with him sitting here in her bedroom, on her bed. He had never been in here, uninjured, for so long before.

He seemed to pick up on her feelings almost instantly. "I like your room," he said, patting the soft bedcovers. "It's very… chaotic."

Wanda laughed, kicking aside a lump of clothes on the floor. It wasn't that she was unclean; she was just messy. It was one of their differences. Pietro was very organized and clean, mostly because he had time to be that way. "You can stay here until you feel a little better," she offered.

"Thanks." Pietro smiled gratefully at her, and predictably began to pick at stray strands of lint on her bed sheets.

"Leave that alone." Wanda tried to keep from snorting at how disturbed he seemed by her mess.

"I can't help it," he said, pursing his lips. "It's just so irritating…"

Wanda sighed, then sat at the foot of her bed, noticing lights flashing outside, complete with a distant crackling sound. Fireworks. Who in their right mind would be shooting off fireworks at midnight?

Pietro turned, seeming more agitated because of his heat exhaustion and the stray piece of string on her bedcovers. "The fourth of July was two weeks ago," he said stubbornly, his face a bit less flushed since he had gotten somewhat cooler. "What kinda lousy fireworks are those? They're not even colorful."

"I know," Wanda said, though she hadn't quite noticed much about them. She took his hand and pressing her fingers to the inside of his wrist. "You're still a little too fast—"

"Well, this thing doesn't go any faster," Pietro roughly shook the handheld fan in frustration.

"Don't shake it," Wanda snatched it from his hand. "I don't want you to break this too. I can make it faster. Just sit."

Pietro sighed exasperatedly, and folded his arms across his chest. She held the fan close to his neck area, and he leaned his head to the side to avoid it. He raised his hand to push it away, just a little, but as he began to reach for it, she warned, "Don't touch it or you'll hurt yourself."

He nodded compliantly, and watched her hand holding it near him, keeping him cool, but also having threatening his very existence if he did wrong. If she wanted to, she could drive the speeding fan into his head and kill him with no reason. But she wouldn't. Right?

"So, Pietro, what did those guys want from you this morning?" she asked. "You didn't do anything wrong, did you?"

"No," he said defensively. "They just popped out of nowhere and started beating me up! I was just trying to get the Windex for my windows, and they came out of the sky, rearing for a fight!"

"Oh, really?" she asked. "You didn't provoke them or anything?"

"I don't know!" Pietro shrugged, seeming totally guilty. "At least I don't think I did."

"Did those men work for father?" Wanda inclined her head, pulling the hand held fan back toward herself to get some air; it felt as if it was getting hotter and hotter in the room the longer she stayed in here.

"Uhh, yeah, I think," he said slowly, trying to sound uncertain. Noticing Wanda's skeptical looks, he hastily confessed, "Yeah, I knew them. They were just trying to get me to talk to them so they could get on good graces with father, but I didn't want to talk to them, and it pissed 'em off, so they tried to beat me up, but then you came and saved the day."

"Good thing I was here," Wanda said, slightly sarcastic. Pietro shrugged again, and didn't say anything. She stared at him knowingly for a long moment. "If you hadn't—"

Suddenly, outside of Wanda's bedroom door, there was a loud thump, and a yelp that sounded like a dog being sat on. There were thumps and scratchy sounds, and someone shouting.

"What is that?" Wanda asked as Pietro strode to the door.

"Yeowch!!!" he howled, yanking his hand away from the knob. "What the hell?!"

"What is it?" Wanda asked anxiously, setting the hand held fan down on her bed.

"It's scalding hot!" Pietro shouted, clutching his hand, staring at the nasty blister that had already began to form.

A bit uneasy, Wanda approached the door, feeling a strange pulse of heat radiate from it. She raised her hands in front of her, conjuring power, expecting the unexpected as she blew the door off of its hinges, into a furnace behind it. The door did not concern her—they had many spare doors in the basement—what was concerning was the huge fire that had taken over the house.

The light was blinding, and the heat was unbearable. Wanda felt Pietro gasped beside her, a cloud of thick black smoke overpowering the two of them. Wanda ducked down, and Pietro began to cough like an asthmatic fifty year old.

"Lance!!" he shouted. "Toad!!!" he coughed. "Freddy!!"

"Pietro!" Wanda hissed, grabbing him by the side of his shorts. He bent down beside her, and without a word, he scooped her up into his arms. She felt a rush of heat combined with a blur of color and sound, and soon she was outside, somehow, in front of their burning, disintegrating house.

She stumbled, shocked at her sudden loneliness.

"Pietro!!!" Wanda cried, searching her surroundings frantically. The night echoed quietly around her with the faint songs of crickets. "Pietro!" Wanda stumbled again, faintly dizzy. "Pietro, come back!! Where are you?!"

There was no response; even the crickets were silent as their house began to collapse. She steadied herself and raised both her hands up to the heavens, using every particle in her body to stop the flames. It was all about control. Control… control…

It took a long moment, one of the longest moments of Wanda's life, for the flames of the house to be put out. It felt as if there was a force resisting her, trying to keep her from setting the flames out, but she knew that it was all in her head. Her brother, her only brother might be trapped in a burning building and dying, and he had saved her, not even caring that he could have a heat stroke or a heart attack.

There was only rubble. The house was gone, and so was the light the flames had produced. It was all darkness and shadows and fear. It was like being in a small room in the middle of the night, with her arms tied around herself, and there was nothing she could ever do to make it okay. All she could do was wait and wait and wait... Wanda shook her head. This was why she couldn't watch scary movies. They got in her head and made her think crazy things that could never happen.

"Pietro…?" Wanda asked, cautiously approaching the door… the door that was no longer a door; it was more of a frame burned black with a pile of ashes and rubble at the floor. There was nothing. The roof was gone… the stairs were virtually non-existent. How long had this fire been raging before she and Pietro had noticed? What if they had never noticed? Would they have fallen through the floor while they were talking, and would they have survived? Had Pietro even survived?—she didn't even know where he was right now…

Turning a corner, she saw a gigantic mound, burned black and red; a human body… dead. Was it really dead? Maybe it was just pretending. It could not be dead. Terribly, horribly dead. Just hours ago, Fred had been alive, naming a spider, watching TV, kicking Pietro out of the only room with a fan, hogging up the carpet…

Beside Fred lay Toad, crumpled into the fetal position. They had fallen through the floor upstairs as it had burned up beneath them. Toad, who called her "Snookums" and other repulsive, disgusting names, but whose only crime was being hideous and smelling like sewage…

A few paces away from Fred and Toad was Lance, whose complete upper half was covered with bits of ceiling and debris. Lance, who was their leader, who had common sense sometimes, who controlled the remote through his rages…

They could not be gone. It just didn't make sense. How could people who had just been existing suddenly be dead? Maybe they were just in a coma. A deep, deep coma, but if they got a doctor, then they would be okay, and they would not be dead at all. They were all gone… how could it be? How could they have not escaped? Even if the fire had started near them, they would have been able to get out, even if the house was destroyed like this. They weren't that stupid. They would have known when to go and forget about their belongings.

Swallowing a thick lump in her throat, Wanda slowly made her way to the dining area, afraid of what she might see. There was a dark shape covering its face in there, his head bowed, his two dirty, dirty hands hiding his eyes. He was leaning against the ashes of what used to be the dining table and he was speaking words so quickly that she could not understand anything of it. He was okay. He was shaky and probably bruised and battered from what he had tried to do when he went back into the house, just like Smokey the Bear said not to. But he was alive. The relief she felt at seeing her brother, injured but alive, was overwhelming. He was pacing back and forth and talking to himself, and covering his eyes so he would not see the destruction around him.

"Pietro…" she whispered, afraid that if she spoke too loudly then something really bad would happen, something worse than all this. She came close to him, praying he was alright and not even feeling the wet in her eyes.

He rushed over to her, and hugged her in the tightest embrace she had ever felt before. Her lungs strained and her ribs were afraid they would break, but they made it through. Thank the lord, thank Buddha, thank every deity known to mankind, thank goodness he was alive and mostly uninjured… She patted him on his back, feeling slightly awkward. His body was very, very hot, radiating from the heat exhaustion, the stress, the trauma…

"I wasn't quick enough…" he sighed, his voice muffled as he bit his bottom lip . "When I got there… the floor collapsed, and… they were already dead… that's all there is to it, I guess… they're really dead, Wanda… they're dead."

He slowly released her, but she didn't scoot miles away. He mumbled to himself, "Oh my god oh my god oh my god oh my god..." but it was very quiet, and she barely heard him. Wanda stood beside Pietro for what seemed like hours or days, and they remained nearly silent together, two people who should have been mourning, but were staring out into nothing, so close, but so far away. It had to have been eternities in silence.

A tiny gust of wind blew past them, and Wanda felt her brother shiver beside her. They had no house. They had no friends with whom they could stay. They had no extra pairs of clothes they could wear. They had no food or drink. They had no money at all. Wanda suddenly realized that they were homeless. They had nothing, nothing but the clothes on their backs.

Wanda lightly touched his elbow, to try to get his attention, feeling guilty because she had been pleased that he was alive. How dare she be happy when the others had not been as fortunate as they?

Suddenly, Pietro jerked, like he had just realized something very, very surprising. "I have to get out of here," he announced, looking at her with wide eyes. She should understand. "I have to; I can't stay here I've gotta go now or else I'm gonna lose it I need to get out of here now—"

Wanda snatched his wrist in an iron grasp. "I don't think so. You're not running away, Pietro."

"I have to!" he shouted frantically against the mild breeze. "Don't you understand? This is my fault!"

She stared at him, and noticed how dirty he looked. If he could have seen himself, he would have died of horror. "Don't be stupid," she said calmly. "You didn't start the fire, did you? No, so just chill out for a minute."

"All right," Pietro said, closing his eyes for a brief moment. "But it is my fault. If I hadn't come to your room, then maybe when the fire started, I would have been able to rush everyone to safety. Or maybe, I could have stopped it before it became too serious. Or maybe, through some crazy twist of fate, it would have never happened, and you could still be reading your boring little magazine in peace!"

"Or maybe you'd be dead," Wanda looked at him intently.

Pietro scowled, and he bit his bottom lip hard, teeth sinking slowly through the skin. Wanda watched, her eyes wide with the very morbid prospect of seeing her brother chew through his own lip.

"You are an idiot," she said, riveted.

Pietro didn't seem to notice her, and just stared out at the charred wreckage that once was the kitchen.

"I cleaned that whole area this morning," he said quietly. "Just this morning. It took me fifteen whole minutes."

Wanda did not release his wrist, because if she did, she might somehow lose him, her only brother in the entire universe, forever.

He closed his eyes again, gathering himself together. "They're never gonna mess up the kitchen again…"

Blood from his lip trickled down his chin. His hand suddenly patted the back of her upper arm, making sure she was still there. Still breathing. Still alive. Wanda held her breath, remembering a foggy remnant of a memory, the park and the bird poo in his hair. It almost didn't seem real.

Pietro slowly looked up at her, his eyes shining. "What time is it?" he asked quietly.

"Umm," Wanda glanced at the cheap plastic watch that Todd had given her for her birthday last month. She hadn't wanted to hurt his feelings, especially since he had used his last five dollars on it. Now it didn't matter anymore, did it? "It's 12:20."

"12:20," Pietro repeated, working his jaw to the side. "It seems like forever. Wanda, we have to find a place to stay."

"I know," Wanda sighed, looking out at the wreckage of the Brotherhood building. "You know I don't know anybody." She inclined her head. "What about that Professor Xavier guy? Isn't he a nice guy? Wouldn't he let us in?"

"No." Pietro shook his head. "Magneto hates him. And so do I, because he told me I 'resemble my father.' Ugh, I can't stand that."

"What about father?" She nudged a pebble on the ground with her toe. "Don't you know where he is?"

Pietro frowned. "I don't think we should go over there…"

"Are you crazy?" she snapped. "Our friends have died and we're homeless, but you don't want to go ask our own father for help or shelter till we can find somewhere else? Hasn't he always been there for us?"

Pietro glared at her. "I suppose," he said, wiping his eyes with the back of his hand. "I just don't really want to be an Acolyte."

"We don't have to."

"Oh, yes we do." He folded his arms across his chest. "Nobody can live at Magneto's secret base unless they are one of his Acolytes and have been put through an initiation test and proven their loyalty. Even if you prove your loyalty, there's no guarantee you're in. You have to be able to do incredible things with your powers. Just being a loyal mutant won't cut it. Regular mutant citizens off the street can't just walk in and be like, 'Hey, I want to be one of your Acolytes', no. Magneto's Acolytes are the best of the best, and you have to be an amazing mutant to be in. If you're not amazing, then you're just an errand boy—or whatever other job you're given. If you're lucky. But you're not allowed to live there if you're not."

"Were you ever an Acolyte?" Wanda asked curiously.

"No," he said through clenched teeth, turning his head away. "I was too good."

"Oh please."

Pietro bit down on his lip again, and stared off into the distance like he wasn't there anymore. Wanda sighed, and tugged at his wrist. "It can't be that bad," she said reasonably.

"You want to go, don't you, Wanda?" he asked, keeping his eyes to the floor, so he wouldn't see the ashes and rubble around him anymore.

"I guess," Wanda said, and she turned to face him. "Are you gonna come too, or what? I have no problem going alone."

"No, I'll go with you," Pietro said quickly. "Even though I was okay with being the errand boy, Ill try again."

"Hmmm?"

"Nothing, nothing…"

There was a little cave about two hours away from Bayville, if you drove. It looked and smelled like crap from the outside, but if you had the audacity to take that foreboding first step in, you would realize that it didn't look on the inside at all like how it appeared on the outside.

After journeying through the dark tunnel, there was a big metal door that could not be moved by human hands. Right beside it was a little flat screen with a tiny speaker in the bottom right-hand corner. This was where the Acolytes who lived here entered a code for entrance. They each got an individual password, had to put their handprint in the screen, and spoke their name to the speaker. It was an amazing security system that could not be fooled by human hands. But if mutant hands even tried to fool it, there would be hell to pay, as Magneto was not a forgiving man. And he had cameras installed in many, many various places.

"This is Magneto's lair," he whispered, trying to make the moment seem spookier than it already was. "All the Acolytes live here."

Wanda watched while he pressed his hand to the screen, traced some letters into it with his index finger, and then he said, "Quicksilver."

The impenetrable metal door scraped open, and Pietro entered, gesturing for Wanda to follow.

The room they were in had a huge screen TV in it, surrounded by three very different chairs, filled with three very different people. In a stiff wooden rocking chair sat a giant of a man, who had a bundle of fabric in his lap, and was knitting and staring at the television screen in wide eyed surprise. He wore a simple T shirt and a pair of Bob the Builder pajama bottoms.

In a green colored recliner lay a man with dark brown hair and black and red eyes. He was the same man who had punched Pietro in the face and had a low, threatening voice. He was grinning at the television screen, and did not seem very threatening in the least bit in his thin white undershirt and plain dark blue pajama bottoms.

In an enormous beanbag was a man with spiky orange hair. He was the same man who had stood by the window while that other man hit her brother. He had a huge bowl of popcorn in his lap, and he was wearing a too small black T shirt, with a pair of navy colored boxer shorts, decorated all over with suns wearing sunglasses. His two socks did not match; one was black, and the other was the brightest neon green Wanda had ever seen in her entire known life, and it almost hurt her retinas to look at it.

Wanda stayed by the door, unsure if she really wanted to enter this place-- this place filled with a bunch of unfamiliar men-- in her sooty pajamas.

"Pietro!" exclaimed the dark haired man with the low voice. "What brings you here?"

"Just dropping by," Pietro said, shrugging. He walked right in front of the television screen and asked, "Is Magneto around?"

"Get out of the way!" whined the red head with the neon sock. "I want to watch what happens!"

"We are watching a scary movie," the giant man explained. "It is entitled, Revenge of the Brainsuckers."

"Where's Magneto?" Pietro repeated, putting his hands on his hips and standing his ground. "We have to talk to him."

"We?" asked the dark haired man. "Who is 'we'?"

"Me and Wanda," Pietro said, and a bloodcurdling scream was heard from the movie behind him, followed by the sounds of suction and terror. Pietro turned around to see the scene. Since he was right in front of the set, he was the only one who could really see it. "What the hell are you guys watching?"

"You ruined the best part!" John declared, hurling his bowl of popcorn at Pietro. Unfortunately, his aim was off by a mile, and it struck Wanda right in the head, knocking her flat on her back and staring at the beautifully painted ceiling above them. It really was a lovely ceiling, and it was the last thing Wanda saw before she slipped into darkness.

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------Just so you all know, I totally made up the movie Revenge of the Brainsuckers. As far as I know, it does not exist.

------Also, I apologize to anyone who loves Toad, Fred, and Lance. It had to be done. :-(

Sorry this update took a whole week when it was already written. I was in a play, and I had no free time. And I got an award for being awesome in that play!! Hoo-hah!! But anyway, REVIEW!!! I PLATONICALLY LOVE YOU ALL!!!!!! Please REVIEW!!!