On the Other Side of Town

On the opposite side of town, where not many people dared to venture, sat the decaying building of The Brotherhood Boarding House. A man walked in with his nose held high. What he saw did not please him very much. One large guy was sleeping on the couch, one was sitting near the trashcan, stick out his tongue inhumanly far to catch flies, and the two others were playing cards. "Pay attention, y' worthless fleas! Out of the kin'ness of Magneto's heart, he has decided to give y' another chance to regain y'r dignity and prove y'rselves worthy to be on his team. I didn't say anything to him, but I honestly don't see why he would give y' clowns such an important task, but whatever." He handed a sealed letter to Pietro before leaving. Before he shut the door, he said, "And I suggest y' do not mess this one up!"When he shut the door, he started muttering to himself, "It's just a girl. I could have handled it myself." Pietro tore open the envelope and began reading quickly. When he finally reached the end, he told the others about their new assignment.

As he spoke, he sounded like a captain about to go to war. "Gentlemen, our objective is to recruit a new girl. She has already been swayed to the X-Men" Todd Tolansky quietly asked Lance Alvers "So, what's the point of recruiting this chick, yo?"

Lance didn't say anything, and Pietro continued like there wasn't an interruption, "she is quite an asset that we can not lose to them. She was enrolled at Bayville for tomorrow's classes. She's a sophomore, which means you," he pointed to Fred Dukes, "and you" he pointed to Todd, "Will most likely be seeing her. Do not scare her away!" With that said, he walked up the stairs and into his room. The next day would be difficult for all of them.

When he woke up, he showered and changed out into a plain white shirt and dark blue pants. He ran down the stairs, but didn't see anyone. He ran up the stairs to find the others. There weren't many rooms in the house. All of the bedrooms consisted of his room, Lance's room, Wanda's room, and the room Fred and Todd shared. Wanda left to look for her father, so it was just the four of them. Pietro sped to Lance's room and started banging on the door, and then he sped toward Todd and Fred's room, and started banging at their door. "Get up you lazy halfwits! She will be at the school by now, and probably surrounded by those X-Geeks."

Lance sent a trimmer through the whole house, which was his way of saying, 'Give me five more minutes.'

Pietro knew him to well, that 'five minutes' would turn into 'half an hour' so he began shouting, "No, Get up now, Lance!" The door slowly opened to reveal a sleepy eyed Lance.

"Get downstairs and have something that will wake you up!" Pietro shouted at him, before banging hard on Todd and Fred's door. The first to answer the door was Fred. He tried to punch Pietro, but of coarse, he was too slow. "Come on! Hurry up! We'll be too late!" Pietro kept shouting as he ducked each swing. Fred was dressed and barely awake when he walked downstairs. Pietro looked after him, but didn't see Todd. "Where's Toad, Blob?" he half shouted.

"I don't know. I think he was getting dressed when I left". Pietro sped in and started banging on the bathroom door. "Toad, Hurry up!"

It didn't take to long to get everyone into the car, and down to the school. Lance and Fred were almost fully awake now, but Todd was using the side of Lance's jeep as a cushion, and every time they hit a bump, he would smash his head. He would simply grumble about Lance's poor driving, then return to sleep.

Finally, Lance's jeep pulled up into the school's parking lot. Pietro jumped out and began looking around frantically. He spotted Scott's small, red sports car and saw the group near it. Pietro pointed them out to the others, and then dragged them along to see if she was among them. He didn't want to get close enough to get attention, yet he wanted to be able to see. Pietro whispered the name of each person as he say them, "There is that perfect Scott Summers talking with his beloved Jean Grey. There is Bobby, Even, Kurt, pretty Kitty" That got Lance's attention. "And Rogue. There she is!" The girl he was looking for was awkwardly standing between Scott and Jean. Pietro and his friends didn't seem to hear the bell ring, and no one realized what was going on until the X-Men were feet away from them. Lance, Pietro, Fred and Todd's eyes never left Daniela's. As she passed, they heard her ask Kitty, "Why were all those freaky guys just staring at me."

"Who knows why those losers were staring at you." Pietro heard Kitty whisper back, glancing at them with a nasty look on her face.

"Do they live around us?"

"No way. If they did, we'd all die from the lack of oxygen." This made Daniela smile a bit. Kitty continues, "They live in, like, a boarding house."

"Where is it?"

"It's on the other side of town. It's a pretty big house called 'The Brotherhood Boarding House.' Though I don't get why. Mystique lived there at one time, and so did Wanda." Daniela drowned out the ending of her sentence; she was busy repeating the name of the house in her head.

She whispered more to herself, then anyone, "'The Brotherhood House?'" Something in Daniela's memories were surfacing.

"Yeah…. Oh no! Like, I'm totally going to be late for class!" She ran off, but stopped and turned around, "Oh, don't forget. Your last class before lunch will be nearby the cafeteria, so you'll get there before the rest of us. Save us a table in the middle." Then she saw the Brotherhood still watching, so she ran back, grabbed Daniela's arm and started to run in the direction of their classes. (Kitty's class was only a few doors away from Daniela's). As she ran, she still spoke, "And if any of the Brotherhood Boys try to talk to you, don't let them influence you. They might try it while we aren't there."

They ran in silence before Kitty shouted, "I almost forgot to give you this!" Kitty yelled, as she handed her a watch.

"What am I supposed to do with this?"

"You wear it. It's a special projection watch. You've seen Kurt's watch before, I'm sure. This will change you eyes. They'll look normal, so you won't get quite as many stares. Of course your vision will be slightly lowered, so it's best to turn it off when we get home."

When they reached Daniela's class first, Kitty pushed her inside, and then ran off for her own. Daniela silently made her way to an empty desk near a window. It was toward the back, but that didn't stop all the looks she got. She quietly sat down, dropping here eyes to the top of her desk.

She only sat alone for a moment or two, when she heard a voice, "Yo, what are you all lookin' at? What, you've never seen a girl before?"

Someone sat next to her, and another person sat behind her. The three of them sat there in silence, before she spoke up. "Thank you for-" Daniela said as she looked up, but stopped when she met the boy's face.

"You!"

"Me."

"I've seen you before, you were one of those guys who were staring at me when I got here."

"Yep."

"What do you want?"

"Nothin'. I just wanna talk, yo."

Daniela turned around to see another one of the guys. She turned to the one beside her. "About what?"

"You shouldn't hide, you know."

"I'm not hiding. I'm right here." This wasn't a good time for her to turn invisible, but, thankfully, he wasn't talking about that.

"Oh really, well then, you won't mind if I take this, yo." He stuck out his tongue, latched it around her watch, and yanked it off.

Immediately, Daniela's hands flew up over her eyes to cover them.

"Why won't you look at me? I just took your watch." The boy asked.

"Because… Because…" she couldn't think of a suitable reason.

"Because you're hiding something." He offered.

"Give it back!" Daniela didn't mean to shout, but she was getting hysterical. She didn't want anyone to see her.

"Calm down, yo! I wasn't gonna keep 'em, or nothin'." He gave it back to her, and she put it on. She took a mirror out of her bag to check her eyes, and when she saw they were fine, she turned back around.

"What do you want?"

But before he could say anything, Daniela let out a gasp and then an "Ew." She looked down at her hand. There was slim oozing down her fingers now. She looked back at the boy.

"Sorry 'bout that…. My name is Todd Tolansky. But my friends call me Toad." He stuck his hand out, which she hesitantly took.

He continued to speak. "And that, back there, is Fred Dukes. But we call him Blob." Daniela turned around to look at him. She wasn't expecting anything really, but he smiled and waved to her. Daniela smiled and waved back. She turned back to Toad.

It was her turn to speak. "I'm Daniela McKenzie."