A/N: Hello! So, much to the horror of just myself really, school has started for me here and while things are still pretty slow, I can foresee that changing soon. :( Anyway, this is the chapter for this week! :) On a more important note, please know that I DO NOT read the comics but I have watched all five of the X-Men movies. Unfortunately for me, there are slight inconsistencies between them. In X-Men Origins: Wolverine, the Professor was bald and standing when he recruited the group from the island but from X-Men: First Class, he was not bald when he got paralysed so I'm just going to ignore the whole thing and go with the classic bald and wheelchair-bound. I have taken a couple of people from X-Men: First Class since I don't really think they will desert the Prof but while I'm going to assume most would have watched the movie, it's not really that important to know who they are :)

Thank you to Batgirl619 who followed this story :)

Thanks also to anyone who has been reading/following this story. The support means a lot :D

Disclaimer: I do not own the X-Men or any of the characters. All copyright and ownership goes to Marvel and the creators. I make no profit from this little adventure of mine and this is purely for entertainment purposes.


Chapter 8: Mission

Wade Wilson may be snarky, sarcastic, sometimes a bit arrogant and an extremely highly skilled swordsman (in his own opinion), but he has been in the Hire-to-Kill business for a long time and survival in an industry where you could wake up to your roommate holding a knife to your throat involved much more than skills and wit; it needed brains, and Wade was one smart mercenary. The timeline he had been given involved pickup two days after the drop-off date which would mean two full days before the day and if he did not act on his base instinct to find the cheapest motel and crash, he had two days to scout, one day to act and subdue the target and one last day which would have a hopefully early pickup. After spending about an hour circling the area around the mansion's territory at a reasonably safe distance, Wade had a pretty good mental map of the place and had also found various hiding places where he could watch the day-to-day activities without drawing attention to himself. After all, a mercenary's job was very much similar to that of a spy; you have to know more about your enemy than he did about you and you had to kill him before he killed you. It was a dog-bite-dog world out there and Wade was not planning on getting bitten. After the initial hour of surveying the grounds, Wade took his position at his chosen hiding place and watched the mansion with the intensity of a hawk. The spot he had chosen had good cover from the trees which both gave him shade and provided a good cover from any prying eyes that may be looking for him. He changed his position often, teleporting to various places of varying distances from the mansion but he still favoured the spot in the tree cover and tended to stay there longer. It did after all have the best view of the mansion. By the end of the day, he had come to a reasonable conclusion as to the mansion's workings and the schedule of most of its inhabitants. Since it was a school, a good part of all the residents were students and spent most of their time in one room or another presumably having lessons. The other inhabitants – the teachers Wade suspected – were with the students most of the time but they disappeared for about two hours sometime in the night after Wade watched them ride what looked to be an elevator which prompted him to start to consider exactly how big the mansion really was. After he was sure that the inhabitants of the mansion had more or less all went to sleep, Wade left the place with all his newfound data and went to search for the cheapest motel, cursing Stryker all the way.


He had known the moment the man had entered the grounds. To the typical bystander, he would not appear out of place, just a normal passerby whose curiosity had been aroused by the extravagant building that was so out of place in the city. But when his presence did not leave for the rest of the day, the Professor's guard had been raised. After his lessons with the new additions to his family, he had retreated down to the basement where he had recently, with the help of the now faraway Hank McCoy, built a replica of the original Cerebro. He had then proceeded to attempt to track the intruder but had discovered something very odd – he could not track him. The man was rapidly appearing and disappearing in and out of different places around the grounds and though he did stay still at certain points, it was never long enough for the Professor to get a good read on him. It was then that he had realized that they were dealing with someone very different from what he had expected. When the various 'senior' members of the X-Men had come down to the basement for Danger Room practice, he had called them to discuss the new intruder on their grounds.

"It appears that there has been a strange presence that has been circling the mansion for the whole day, but I can't get a read on him. He keeps… … jumping."

Alex Summers, Havok, along with Sean Cassidy, Banshee, watched the Professor, frowns forming on their foreheads as they looked between them. After their confrontation with Shaw and Magneto, they had left Charles but had later returned to offer their assistance to the Professor's cause until their services were no longer required. After all, the man had taken them in and had treated them not unlike his own family. It was the least they could do, especially after the accident had left him paralysed waist down.

"But what do you mean by 'jumping'?" Summers piped up. The Professor had never had any trouble tracking mutants or humans alike.

"His position keeps changing, rapidly." The Professor offered, ever the picture of calm and nonchalance.

"So you mean like teleporting?" Sean suggested. After all, if the man was a mutant and there were mutants that could quite literally 'eat' a bomb, how odd would teleporting be? It was a fairly widespread idea.

"That may be correct but nevertheless, until I can get a read on this man, I would advise both of you to keep a look out. He was been around the area for the whole day and I don't think he is sight-seeing."

The two other men looked at each other before looking back at their mentor, the man that had taught them so much over the years. They nodded in unison before Alex stood up.

"Don't worry, we'll keep a lookout. Is there anything else though?"

"There is something about this one. He's different but I don't know how. I would suggest that neither of you attempt to confront him. I have a feeling he's not like the rest of us."

Alex nodded as Sean rose as well before both of them left the room to start their practice sessions in the Danger Room. The Professor slowly moved his wheelchair and headed back upstairs to the ground level. He could feel all of the student's minds, the dreams of those who were sleeping and the thoughts of those who were not. He searched the grounds with his mind to find their new friend to be missing but he was sure that today would not be the last they would be seeing him. As he wheeled himself to a nearby window, he watched the sky as rain began to fall, the splatters on the roof and windows forming a rhythmic tune. The Professor frowned as questions began to fill his mind. Who are you… Wade Wilson?


The motel that Wade had found was indeed cheap and there was only so much he could expect from something like that. In the past, before the whole Weapon X team and all, Wade thrived as a mercenary, earning more from one hit than what most could get in a year. So, naturally, he got himself much more comfortable accommodation during his travels around the world to find expensive people to kill. But Stryker very obviously was not going to grant him such a luxury. Throwing himself on one of the two beds in the petite room he had rented, he wondered more about what he was doing. These two days had passed in a flash, and the time before felt like it had come from a different lifetime where he was not him and yet was more himself than he ever was. Grumbling and burying his head in the scruffy pillow, Wade attempted to coax himself to sleep. But sleep tended to evade one with a heavy heart and that night, it evaded him for a long time.


Wade had arrived back in his spot near the mansion before the sun was even up. He had woken after just three hours of a restless sleep and could not coax himself back into it. After that, he had dragged himself up and gotten himself some breakfast from a 24/7 convenience store and plopped back on his spot, chewing his sandwich with a vengeance. He had resigned to his sleepless fate and had decided to simply spend his entire day attempting to find out as much as he could about the mansion before he attacked it the next day. He had not even spotted Grey the day before and he was determined to change that. Repeating his style from the day before, he teleported often, never settling long in one spot. He watched the world go by through the lenses of his binoculars and attempted to deduce the abilities of his new adversaries. They would be collateral damage if they attempted to get in his way and Wade was going to try to minimise unnecessary deaths. By the time it was noon, he was dead on his feet and the only thing that was keeping him from crashing was an adrenaline surge that he was riding on and sheer willpower and stubbornness. The day had been boring with the same old schedule but before Wade made a quick bolt to get some lunch, something caught his attention. The students, as well as their teachers were coming out of the mansion in unison, heading to the backyard. It was only then that Wade finally got a good gauge on the number of mutants in the residence and to be honest, the odds were not in his favour. The only thing that was advantageous to him was the fact that he has been in this business longer and most of everybody living in the mansion were just kids that had little to no control over their powers or had powers that were not directly dangerous to him. He watched them practice, some stronger than others and made a mental note of those who he should look out for, just in case. There was still no sign of Jean Grey though. It was only until later when Wade had made a quick trip to grab some lunch and returned with all the enthusiasm of a dog on vet day that he spotted her. Like the others before, she emerged to have practice in the backyard. She was accompanied by a bald man who was wheelchair bound and the boy from the picture. Wade watched on as the oldest of their group carefully manoeuvred himself here and there as he set up objects for the girl to manipulate. Sometimes, she would launch them and the boy would hit them with what looked to be optic blasts from his eyes. His accuracy was sometimes off and it appeared to fluctuate quite a lot but Wade added all three of them to his list of people-to-look-out-for.

Once he had spotted her, it was easy to follow the girl through her path in the school. By the end of the day, Wade had discovered which room was hers and marked it out in his mental map of what he had gathered about the mansion. He doubted that he would be completely correct but at least he had a brief idea. After the girl had slept and Wade watched to check the time in which the other residents of the soon-to-be-not peaceful mansion tucked in, Wade left to grab himself a long delayed dinner.


He had felt him watching them when he was having his private training session with Scott and Jean earlier in the day and while his presence disappeared and reappeared often, he had been around for the rest of the day. The Professor was becoming increasingly worried about the man. There was such a strong feeling of pain in him, covered under layers of will, determination, hatred and the occasional annoyance. The Professor had tried again in the night to get a read on the man but had once again failed. He could never lock onto his position and he could not focus too hard or he would risk hurting or even killing other mutants that his mind was connected to. Perhaps Sean was right and the man was indeed a teleporter. But something told the Professor that there was more to Wade Wilson than met the eye and what he might find would not be pretty.


Wade had thankfully gotten himself about 9 hours of a good and proper sleep thanks to the accumulated fatigue of the days before. It was finally mission day. He would attack the mansion straight up, head to the second floor where he knew the girl's room was, tranquilize her, take her and get the hell out of the place, all the while defeating anyone who might stand up against him. That should be simple enough. Wade figured that he already had a good idea of the schedule there and his best bet to find the girl as quickly as possible was to attack when the students were expected to be in their rooms. That would mean dusk to dawn. So, Wade spent the day making preparations, checking his weapons, sharpening his swords, packing everything into the harness and making sure that he knew the location of each weapon he was carrying well and that they were in easy reach whenever he would need them. He doubted that he would need more than his swords and his teleportation but one could never be too careful. After that, he had taken yet another nap, this one lasting three hours before taking a shower, changing into a spandex that was totally his style (it was attention-catching as hell) and grabbing all his things before leaving.

He arrived at the mansion just a few moments later, just as the last of its residents were getting ready for bed. Grinning, he stalked over to the huge building, walking at a comfortable pace and swiftly pulling out the bullet-loaded gun to bust the lock over the main gate.

"Wake up children! I'm here!"

Wade announced with the excitement of a kid on Christmas morning before kicking the door of the Xavier mansion wide open.


Tell me what you think :)