Okay, I couldn't help myself. This chapter has Lancitty in it. Lancitty rules!

For any non-Lancitty fans, don't worry. It's not exactly very long. So don't worry.

Review! I haven't gotten any so far! Review!

Oh yeah - and i don't own anything. Not Maximum Ride or X-Men Evolution.

Chapter Four

"Wow. We're all still alive." Star said the next morning. "I was sure we'd all get murdered in our sleep."

"This is Bayville park, not central park." Ratchet said as they sat up from underneath the tree. Kate, Ratchet, Star and Hoyden had all spent the night lying under a huge oak in Bayville park, into the little nooks and staying safe from the weather.

Fang and Maya had spent the night asleep on the tree above them. None of the non-bird hybrids could understand how they were so comfortable, but apparently they felt extremely safe.

Ratchet had asked if they were going to make a nest. Fang had replied that it might be comfier but it would attract more attention to see two teenagers in two nests then two teenagers sleeping in a tree.

It took five minutes for them to realise he'd been joking.

"You reckon if we scared them they'd fall out?" Hoyden pointed up at the sleeping forms of Fang and Maya. The land-dwelling hybrids had woken up because a squirrel had raced across Kate, who had yelped and woken up Star, who'd automatically kicked Ratchet, who flipped his hand out and slapped Hoyden. All in the space of one second.

"Well, if we have to be awake, they do." Star grinned.

"Oh, wow!" Ratchet pointed and gasped. "The ice-queen – she's smiling! That boyfriend of yours has really-"

Even Ratchet's senses didn't tip him off to the fact that Star was a little bit angry with that comparison until he was lying on the ground with Star sitting on him, her fingers around his neck but not squeezing.

"Pietro is not my boyfriend." Star hissed. "Understood?"

"Okay, okay. Just a friend. Sheesh." Star climbed off Ratchet who pulled himself to his feet. "So, we going to wake them or not?"

Kate shrugged. "Sure. Want a boost up?"

"That would be nice."

Kate extended her hand and Star stood on it. Then Kate pushed up, holding her hand above her head. It was a weird sight for any passer-byer – Star was rail thin, but Kate was holding her up with one hand high above her head.

Then again, this was Bayville. Odd things happened.

Star climbed up onto the tree and Ratchet followed. Hoyden and Kate stayed behind. "What exactly are we going to do?" Star whispered.

"Didn't you read Fang's Blog before we joined?"

"Of course – that's how I joined, but what…"

"Watch and learn."

Ratchet snuck up close to Fang, deciding that Maya seemed to enjoy fighting much more then Fang. He got up close, and leaned in.

"ERASERS!" He shouted.

Fang awoke with a jolt.

Down below, Kate and Hoyden watched as the boy fell from tree and slammed into the ground. "Ow." He muttered.

"Well, it was kinda your own fault." Kate told Ratchet as she helped the super-sense guy stand up.

Ratchet shot her a dirty look and then rubbed his stomach where Fang had kicked out. Star scampered down the tree, and then Maya leaped down gracefully. "What was that about?" She asked.

"Ratchet wanted to see if you'd fall out of the tree." Hoyden shrugged. Ratchet glared at him.

"Thanks a lot, pipsqueak."

Hoyden shrugged.

"Well, obviously we don't." Maya shrugged.

"Whatever." Star shook her head. "I've gotta run to meet Pietro."

"Do you even know what time it is?" Fang asked her.

"Nope." She raced off to a jogger jogging along the path. She spoke for a second, and then zoomed back to the other hybrids. "It's quarter past nine. Said I'd meet him at nine-thirty, and I don't want to be late."

"Okay." Fang nodded and tried to speak again, but Star had already left. He looked at Maya in confusion. "Why would she think she's going to be late?"

"Probably wants to outshine him." Maya shrugged. "So what's for breakfast?"

Despite the fact she was fifteen minutes early, Pietro was already waiting for her. "About time. I've been waiting forever." Pietro rolled his eyes at her.

"Well, it's your own fault for coming early, isn't it?" Star smirked at him. "If you'd come when it was time, you wouldn't have this problem."

"I did come on time. You were late."

"And what time was that?"

"Nine-thirty." Pietro knew this was absolute sh… garbage, but Star didn't have a watch.

"So how come it's twenty past nine now?"

"What makes you think it's twenty past?"

"I can read time by the sun." Star lied. Hey, it was twenty past (she'd stopped for some breakfast along the way and that jogger hadn't been specific).

Pietro didn't have an answer.

"You wanna start?" Star asked.

"Sure. Round the town and back?"

"Duh."

Zoom!

Ai-yah!

"Beat you this time!"

"Not likely."

"I don't care how likely it is, I beat you this time."

"No, you didn't."

"What, you blind?"

"No, I can see perfectly that I won and you're trying to get credit."

"Race again?"

"I'll wave to you from the finish line."

"Bring it on."

And they were gone.

"Oi Pietro!" Lance yelled, walking through the park. "Where is he… Pietro! Maximoff! Where are you?"

"Lance?"

Lance spun around to see a brunette smiling at him. "What's up?"

"Oh, hey Kitty. Just trying to find Pietro. You haven't seen him, have you?" Lance said to his girlfriend, his eyes directly meeting her big brown eyes.

"You mean the blonde blur that's racing around Bayville?"

"One of them."

Kitty's eyes widened. "What?"

"Long story short, there's two blonde super-speeds in Bayville now. Naturally they met and well, they've been racing since yesterday morning."

"Huh. That would explain it." Kitty nodded. "We thought that he'd gotten hyper on coffee or something."

"Nah. When that happens, Wanda ties him up with his own feet until he calms down. So do you know where Pietro went?"

"Sorry, not a clue. What do you need him for anyway?"

"Don't need him but he'd run himself into the ground before admitting to her that he's exhausted. And as annoying as the hyper brat is, he's still our friend."

"Okay then." Kitty nodded. "I'll let you know if he turns up. But wouldn't she – this girl who he's running with – let him know when she's about to faint?"

Lance shook his head. "Nah. They're so alike it's freaky. I'm not sure if they're related or if they're soulmates, but, Stella or whatever her name was probably wouldn't complain either. Besides, I think part of her powers is that she can run all day."

Kitty nodded, and then glanced behind the trees. "I'd better go before the park blows up. The senior X-Men are doing a training session with the juniors." She added. "How to control powers no matter what. Someone is going to fail if all five of us aren't there."

"Five? What about that new kid who replaced Daniels?"

"Bobby? He's good at fighting and all, but despite what Scott and Jean say, we're kinda watching over him as well. Bye!" She raced off.

Lance looked after her and then shook his head. "Well, if the park's crawling with X-Geeks, I really don't think that they're around here."

"Those freaks are – well, freaks." Someone muttered behind him. Lance turned around to see five teenagers (all of them around seventeen – two cheerleaders, two jocks and one girl wearing regular clothes).

"I know, right?" A cheerleader nodded. Lance gripped his hand and tried not to make an earthquake out of anger – park was filled with X-Men, and he so didn't want a fight.

"Definitely." The regular girl nodded. "I mean, Matt just called me, said that there was an insane mutant with super-speed running around Bayville. Keep stopping at that old oak tree near the swimming pools."

"Think we should teach 'em a lesson?" A jock grunted.

Lance left the park, heading for the oak tree. He was half hoping that the jocks did decide to go and teach Star and Pietro a lesson – or any of the other mutants, for that matter.

Considering how alike Star and Pietro were, that jock would probably end up tied to a lamp-post by his own clothes in his underwear.

"Now that time I beat you."

"In your dreams, Pietro."

"Obviously I'm psychic and can dream the future than."

"If you win in a race against me in the future, have I got a broken leg? Or maybe am I in a coma? Cause I see no reason you'd win otherwise."

Lance raised an eyebrow as he reached the oak tree.

"Rematch, then."

"Duh. That's what we've been doing all day."

"Then let's not break with tradition."

Then there was a flash of wind and both of them were gone. Lance frowned and stepped where they'd see him. It took about three seconds.

"See, I won!" Star grinned.

"Nope. I did."

"Suuure you did."

"See? You agree, I won."

"No, you lost. I won."

"Race again?"

"I'm there."

A rush of wind and Lance blinked. They hadn't even noticed him.

"Haha! I accept the honour of winning this race."

"Taking all my credit. I knew it."

"Have you two been doing this all day?" Lance asked. Star and Pietro both looked at him. "Yep." Star replied.

"Got a problem with it?" Pietro asked.

"Actually, you're both going to run yourself into the ground. You need a break." Lance rolled his eyes. "Not that I really care, but Wanda thinks you've been a good brother, so she'd flip out if we let you die."

"Thinks?" Star asked Pietro.

"It's a long story involving an insane asylum, a shape-shifter, a snowboarding Pyromaniac, a Toad with a hologram and a mind-altering mutant."

"You'll have to tell me later then."

"Whatever." Lance shook his head. "Anyway, you need to rest."

Pietro thought about that. "Nah, I'd rather race." He shot off, Star behind him.

"Now that time I won. You can't deny it. I won by a margin."

"Because you cheated! You had a head-start!"

"Still won."

"Really? Then let's rematch and actually do it without cheating!"

"Done."

Then they were gone.

"Seriously, Pietro, Star!" Lance shouted as they came back. "You've got to take a rest for a bit-"

"I won!"

"No, I did!"

"Me!"

"Me!"

"Me!"

"Oh, like you could win without cheating."

"Bite me."

"Fine."

"Take a step near me and I'll rip your tongue out. I wasn't kidding when I said I had five years of all Catholic Boarding school."

Lance could barely tell who was who. Everything was something that Pietro could say – you know, assuming he spent five years at Catholic Boarding school.

Then they were gone.

Lance waited for two seconds. "Seriously, I'm gonna go get Wanda. She'll stop you – okay, I'll just go get her now." Lance rolled his eyes as they shot off again.

"Hey Lance." Fred said, walking up. Behind him Toad was hopping next to Wanda. "What's up?"

"I can't stop them." Lance shrugged.

"Stop who?" Wanda asked.

Zoom!

Ai-yah!

"I won!"

"As if!"

"Oh, come on. You couldn't outrace me if someone strapped rockets to your feet."

"Yeah – hey, would that even make us go faster or slower?"

"We'd crash into something. So rematch?"

"Done."

They vanished.

"Oh. Stop them." Todd nodded.

The two blondes arrived again. "That time, I totally – EEW!" Star shrieked, grabbing her hair. She wasn't being particularly girly – even Max would go 'gross!' if Toad slimed her hair.

Assuming they weren't fighting or anything mildly important like that.

"What is this stuff?" Star scraped some goo out of her hair.

"Slime." Todd said.

"Gross out! Where'd you get it?"

"You don't want to know the answer to that." Pietro advised her, looking at his team-mate who was smirking. "Let's just say there's a reason we call Toad slimy."

"GROSS! So this is basically spit?"

"Yeah." Toad nodded. "Does wonders for the hair. Like what I did with mine?" He touched his straggly locks.

Star screamed in disgust, anger, and hostility.

"You want me to help you get it out?" Pietro asked.

"Sure. Once I murder the warty Toad over there!"

"Hey, I haven't got any warts, yo!"

"Huh. You two really are a lot alike." Wanda observed. "Pietro would react in pretty much the same way – then again, you're a girl and girls are perfectly allowed to freak out if they get that slime in their hair Okay, to be fair, anyone's allowed to freak out like that."

"Look, Star, sorry about the sliming, but both of you would probably kill yourselves before you stop running." Lance rolled his eyes.

"And this is your concern because?"

"Another race?" Pietro asked Star.

"Naturally."

They both spun around but didn't move.

"Hey!" Star yelped, grabbing her feet. "I'm stuck. And my foot's turned blue. Why has my foot turned blue? That is not normal. Help!"

"Wanda!" Pietro snapped, grabbing at his own feet.

"What?" Wanda smiled at him.

"So your power is to stop people from running." Star rolled her eyes. "I can see how it would be useful living with Pietro, but in actual fights how useful is it?"

"It's not stopping people from running, although that's part of it." Wanda shrugged. "I can control matter, and change mutant powers around. Anyone's powers. I got the X-Men arrested because they 'attacked' the city zoo." She smirked.

"How would that affect me?" Star protested. "Hello, I'm a human/hummingbird hybrid. Evolution has nothing to do with me – unless of course you count the zombies going 'you are the future.' Which is creepy."

"Whatever." Toad shook his head. "Come on, let's get them away from here. Freddy, could you tie 'em up, we'll drop Star at her friends and lock Pietro in his room for an hour or so, yo."

"That I can live with." Fred smirked.

Then Star proved she wasn't bluffing about cutting people down at the knees because of her school.

Her fingers curled around Fred's Mohawk and she pulled him forwards. Then she pushed out as hard as she could, crashing him into Wanda.

The hex broke and Star kicked her foot out at Lance, sending him sprawling. Toad spat out at her and shot his tongue out. Star dodged the slime and caught his tongue. Then she raced around Toad, tying him up with his own tongue.

"Wow." Pietro said. He was astounded. This girl had just taken out all of the brotherhood. Granted they weren't really ready to fight, but… Hey, was that proving super-speed rocked, or that Star herself rocked? Or both? "Just… wow. You really are something, aren't you?

"Let's change our running spot, shall we?" Star grinned at him.

Lance pushed himself of the ground. "Okay, if that's how you want to do it." He grimaced, and slammed his foot onto the ground.

Rock shards splintered up from the ground, pushing into the air. Star raced to the side and completely avoided it, stepping far in front of the huge chasm that had oppened up right behind her.

Then Pietro raced around Lance fast, causing him to lose balance. He tripped and slammed into the ground. "Ouch." He pushed himself up.

"Seriously yo, we're trying to help!" Toad jumped into the air and landed in front of Pietro. "We don't wanna see you get dead of exhaustion or whatever."

Freddy crawled up. "Yeah Pietro, we're your friends." He grunted.

A blue flash shot out and curled around the two super-speeds. "Okay then." Wanda grimaced. "Let's try this again, shall we?"

That's when Star realised something very weird had occurred.

"Hold up, wait. What the heck just happened? How did you do that?" She gestured around to the brotherhood members, including Pietro.

"Do what?" Toad asked.

"Well, those costumes. When did you get changed into them?" Instead of Lance, Wanda, Todd, Fred and Pietro, there was Avalanche, The Scarlet Witch, Toad, Blob and Quicksilver – not that Star knew their codenames, but did figure out something was up.

"What about our costumes?" Lance asked her.

"You're kidding, right?"

The brotherhood members stared at her. They seemed to have no idea what she was on about.

"Lance's wearing a fishbowl on his head; Wanda looks like a clichéd super-villainess; Toad's wearing something that's giving him a hunch and makes him look so stupid; Freddy – that's your name, right? – well, Freddy's not wearing anything that stupid but he still changed into it for no apparent reason and Pietro's dressed in spandex! What's up with that?"

The brotherhood blinked. "I guess… I dunno. We always wear this when we're doing stuff like this." Blob said, thinking. "Don't you have a costume?"

"A costume? Like in spandex and a cape? No thank you. We're lucky to have clean clothes half the time, let alone be able to change in an instant! What, do your rivals the X-Men or whatever they call themselves dress in costume or do they laugh at you?"

"Uh, they have costumes." Toad said. "You know, I never really thought about this before. Why do we do this? I mean, Boom Boom never had a costume – not counting her X-Geek one, and she didn't stay with them very long. What's up with this?"

The brotherhood members stopped for long enough for Wanda to forget her hex. Pietro was thinking about it too. Star, on the other hand, kicked out hard.

Pietro understood in an instant and they both shot off, faster and faster, only looking ahead, not behind.

In hindsight, they probably should have been looking at the huge gaping chasm in front of them.

"Aaaaaaah!... Ow."

"Great move Lance." Wanda rolled her eyes. "Now they're stuck down there. How do we get them out again?"

"Hey, it's not my fault." Lance protested. "Okay, it kinda is, but the gap's been there for ages."

"Are they okay?" Toad asked, and he hopped to the edge. "Yo! You guys alright down there?"

"Thanks for your concern." Pietro's voice wafted out. "We're both fine, thank you very much. Get us outta here!"

Lance sighed. "Do we have to? I mean, they'd get out sooner or later."

"Would you rather the X-Geeks finding them and having to get them out of there?" Wanda replied. "I mean, a brotherhood member and… well, I guess an ally of the brotherhood, having to get saved by the X-Men?"

The brotherhood sighed. "Alright." Lance grimaced. "We'll go get a rope – look out!"

Fred had moved too close to the edge and fallen straight over. There was a shriek from below and then a sickening thud. "Hey! Don't throw rocks at us!" Star yelled.

"Excuse me, I take offence at that!" Fred snapped, pushing himself up down below in the crevice. "I am not a rock."

"Oh, sorry – I just saw a big shape falling down. You need to lose some weight." Star patted him on the head.

"Oh, that's okay then – wait a minute…" Fred blinked. "That was an insult, wasn't it?"

"No, it was a fact. Freddy, I don't mean to be offensive but if you're literally big enough to squash someone flat then you really need to lose weight." Star pointed out.

"Well… well… well…" Fred shut up.

"So now what?" Toad asked back on the surface.

"Let's get a rope. A really strong rope. And maybe a crane." Lance said, looking down onto the three stuck mutants.

"That's a good idea." Toad nodded. "Lance, you stay here and guard them. Me and mah crimson cutie will go and grab some rope together."

Wanda grimaced. "Not likely."

"Come on, Sweetums, can't you give me a chance?" Toad touched her arm gently. "I'm sorry if-"

"Don't. Touch. Me." Wanda growled, pushing him hard in the stomach. He fell backwards and just as he was falling into the crevice, his tongue curled around Wanda's arm.

She shrieked and grabbed Lance. And then all three of them slammed into the ground.

"Everyone okay?" Lance asked groggily, sitting up.

"I'm fine. You okay sweetie?" Toad asked Wanda. She didn't answer, her eyes tightly closed.

"Sweetums? Wanda? You okay?" Toad touched her head. He moved her lock of hair back to show a huge purple bruise.

"Wanda!"

"Well," Star said with a groan. "Now things can't get any better."

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