Nothing else of interest really happened until the end of the school day, when Rogue and the boys were heading out to the front of the school to get in the Jeep and drive home. Rogue strode along towards the back of the little delinquent clump, mulling over what she was going to do with all the money she now had. Rogue, who had never had a job, did not usually have much in the way of cash, except for around birthday-time. She wondered if Bayville had any good clothes stores...

Still. Grey and Pryde supposedly shop in only the best places. If what they wear's the best this pitiful town has, might mean Ah'll have to take a day trip up to New York. Ah could slip some sleepers into Mystique's coffee so she wouldn't know Ah'd gone. God knows that woman'd bust a gut if Ah ever skipped school on her watch.

Someone shouting her name brought Rogue out of her pleasant retail-therapeutic reverie. She looked sharply at the boys- they had so little finesse they often yelled right in each other's ears. Yet none were looking at her. They were squaring themselves up, looking determined and Fred was breathing sharply through his nose, which could mean only one thing. The Brotherhood boys were preparing for a fight... or they'd seen an ice cream truck. Whatever.

No, it was a fight, and it was presumably with whoever was yelling for Rogue. Out of the throng a person materialised. He looked quite happy to see Rogue.

"X-Man," she heard Lance mutter to Todd. Rogue didn't have to be told. Half of her wanted to run for her life, another quarter wanted to beat the crap out of Evan and the final quarter wanted to die from embarrassment.

"Hey, Rogue!" Rogue looked at the boy aghast as he made his way over to her. "How've you been? I'm good. Haven't been going into any more girls' bathrooms." He grinned like everything was OK... which everything was not.

Rogue couldn't speak. Evan was one of the X-Men. Even though he hadn't been part of their team when the X-Men had attacked her she still had a cold and panicky feeling like the walls were closing in on her.

"You know this geek?" asked Fred, cracking his knuckles. Ooh, tough guy, she thought reproachfully. The boys, despite their seeming readiness to fight, had moved backward out of harm's way.

"No!" said Rogue, rather shrilly. She took a step backward.

The Brotherhood boys looked at her expectantly. Evan looked at her expectantly.

Evan looked slightly hurt, but she felt nothing for that. He was an X-Man. What was she meant to do?

... She knew. She knew what she had to do, as a good Brotherhood girl. And she wasn't sorry. She wanted to do it. She needed to show this new X-Man never to mess with her like his teammates had done in the past. He needed to learn young not to ever come near a Brotherhood member and expect kindness, forgiveness or compassion. No such things dwelled in Rogue.

Glowering at him, she hissed in a low, dangerous voice, "Get AWAY from me, X-Man!" Storming past him to join her team, she bumped into his shoulder, hard.

"What'd I do?" asked Evan in shock.

Rogue turned back and snarled, "You're no friend of mine. You come near me again; Ah'll beat the holy shit outta you!"

Evan watched, looking extremely taken aback as Rogue stamped over to the Brotherhood boys, who all leered rather evilly at Evan before the group turned on their collective heel and made for the car park. It felt good, to stride along as part of a group... to fit in among the boys. She didn't feel in tune with them often, but when she did it was cool. She'd never belonged with anyone before, and it felt like... like...

Unable to think of the words, Rogue abandoned that train of thought. At any rate, mah birthday is definitely lookin' up, thought Rogue in vicious satisfaction.

In the car (sitting in her usual seat), Rogue looked over her birthday card from Irene for about the eleventh time since the Brotherhood meeting in Darkholme's office. It was a standard mass-produced girly birthday card, with Irene's message inside typewritten.

Dear Rogue, it said.

Happy birthday! I still can't believe you're sixteen years old. I wish so much that I could see you right now. It hurt me to have to send you away when your life is only just beginning. I miss you a lot. We are going to see each other again, honey. Probably very soon...?

Remember, Rogue, listen to Raven and keep up with your studies. I know you're going to make me very proud.

Best wishes from Irene.

Rogue looked over the card again and again. Soon, huh? she thought, trying to suppress a thrill of excitement. Maybe she would be sent home for a visit soon, or Irene could come to Bayville...?

But that was impossible, she realised somewhat dully. There was no way Mystique would let her go home, not this soon anyway. And she missed Irene. She missed the way she'd hum as she ran her hands over a Braille novel, making up half-tunes and smiling cryptically. People were often nervous of Irene, as though blindness was contagious and Rogue didn't understand that.

Maybe Ah just play dumb somehow. People act as if whatever's goin' on with me is contagious too. She smiled wryly. If only they knew.

"Whatcha got, Rogue?" asked Todd, and she was suddenly aware of the boys looking at her. They were waiting at the traffic lights.

Rogue glared. "Nothin.'" She hastily tried to shove the birthday card out of sight.

"You haven't been looking at anything or anyone else since we started driving," said Lance, turning around to smirk at her.

"What am Ah meant to look at? You?" asked Rogue witheringly.

"It's gotta be interesting if it keeps you from looking at me," Lance deadpanned, giving a slightly wolfish grin. "Blob, you know what to do."

Fred went mock-menacingly for Rogue's arm- she shoved his hand away and decided she might as well. "Ah'll only let ya see if ya can guess what it is. Which means Ah'll never have to show ya 'cause you guys are so dumb."

"Is that a challenge, yo?" asked Todd, grinning. Somewhere along the line the boys had stopped taking Rogue seriously about these things, even if she actually meant it.

Grimly, Rogue said, "You know it."

"Bank statement," Lance guessed. The Jeep pulled away.

"Not even close."

"Death threat?" Fred asked.

"Nuh-uh."

"Loooove note?" sneered Todd, with the intention of embarrassing Rogue into revealing something.

"Fat chance," Rogue scoffed, without so much as a trace of bitterness. This wrong-footed the boys, who exchanged glances. Rogue saw this and said comfortably, "Keep the guesses comin', Ah like this game."

"Birthday card?" guessed Fred.

Hands firmly pinning the card to her lap, Rogue looked away and (biting her lip to try and conceal her smirk) muttered, "Oh, you are so wrong..."

A pause.

"I knew it!" yelled Lance jubilantly from the driver's seat. "Grab it, Toad!"

The Jeep swerved as a minor scuffle took place in the backseat and Rogue somehow managed to kick Lance in the back of the head. "Ow!" he yelled reproachfully as Fred yelled, "Got it!" and waved a rather scrunched-up birthday card in his massive fist.

Todd grabbed it and began reading it aloud in a sickly voice. Curiously, Rogue did not feel like taking each of them out, but rather as if she were included in a joke. Which she supposed she was.

"Ah'll ask ya to give that back now," she stated in a chilly voice. "And thank you kindly; Blob, for pulverisin' the one birthday card Ah'll get this year. 'Preciate it."

It was then that the meaning of birthday card seemed to dawn on the boys- well, Todd and Fred at least. Lance had fallen silent a little while ago and looked slightly guilty.

"Give it to her, Toad," he mumbled, avoiding Rogue's green eyes in the rear view mirror.

"It's your birthday?" he asked foolishly.

"No," said Rogue sarcastically, and then hastily said, "No. 'Course not. And if it were Ah wouldn't tell ya."

"You should've told us." This was Fred.

"Uh-huh." Sarcasm practically bogged down the cars heading along the road. Rogue folded her arms and looked out of the nearest window, scowling. With a smirk, she turned back to Todd. "Gross, Tolensky, ya probably got slime on it."

The boys hooted and started making many different delightfully immature slime-related jokes. Rogue's birthday seemed to have been forgotten for the moment.

"Ya'll are such idiots," said Rogue, but she was... laughing. They're really not so bad sometimes, she thought. Not that she'd ever tell them that. Didn't want them to get too big for their boots or anything. "Ya'll are such idiots," she repeated, shaking her head, and snatched the birthday card back from Todd. She just felt glad the money was in her pocket.

...

"Who's Irene?" asked Lance that night as Rogue strolled into the kitchen with her hair wrapped in a towel because she'd just had a shower. She was wearing her gloves with her pyjamas.

"Pardon?" asked Rogue absently, tucking an escaped curl behind her ear as she poured herself some milk.

"The woman who sent you the card. Who's she?"

"Piss off, Avalanche," Rogue said automatically. She had humoured the Brotherhood boys earlier, now she was in the mood to be alone. Nothing got between Rogue Adler and her alone time, dammit.

Lance appeared not to have heard. "She sounds like a mom. Is she your mom?"

"Ah don't have a mom. Where's Mystique?"

"She left when you were in the shower. Said she had something important to do."

"Hmm."

"Is she your mom?"

Rogue looked at him with something like revulsion. "Who, Mystique?"

Lance looked equally revolted. "No! Irene."

Rogue gave him a commiserating look. "Ugh, fine. She's mah foster mom. Or ex-foster mom, Ah suppose, now that technically Ah'm livin' on mah own."

There was a loud crash and riotous laughter from upstairs.

"Technically," said Lance thoughtfully. "She seems to like you."

"Who, Mystique?" said Rogue sarcastically.

"No," Lance said witheringly. "Irene."

Rogue slurped some milk and sneered at Lance. Wiping her upper lip she said thoughtfully, "Seems sometimes like Ah'm a tad bit obsessed with Mystique, huh?"

"More like she's obsessed with you. I'm startin' to feel like I have a little sister, the way Mystique goes on. 'Look after Rogue, don't piss Rogue off, make sure Rogue knows friends from enemies...' I'm gonna start a petition that'll bar Mystique from putting any more girls in the Brotherhood, period."

"Come off it, Lance," Rogue said sharply. "Surely Ah'm not the worst example ya could ever come across? Ah'm sure there's prospective Brotherhood girls loads more scary an' psycho than me."

"Doubt it." Lance sneered. He left the room, and Rogue absent-mindedly gave his retreating back a flip of the bird.

Her birthday, which had started out rather crappily, had ended on an OK note. Rogue sat up in her room and made herself some birthday notes in her notebook.

Got one birthday card- from Irene, duh, she wrote. Todd keeps humming 'Happy Birthday'. I swear if he does it again I'll grab his slimy tongue and choke him with it. Yeah.

Maybe not. The boys aren't pissing me off nearly so much as usual today. Guess it's the whole birthday thing. I'll be back to normal tomorrow.

Wonder what that dick Summers gets for his birthday. Socks, most likely. Or a book on how to be dull and totally goody-goody. No, what am I thinking? He probably wrote that book himself, didn't he? I must find out when his birthday is, I have the best idea for a birthday present for him. I can scratch a message into the side of that precious car of his! But what?

MUTANT BITCHES RULE? Or HAPPY BIRTHDAY, LOSER? Or how about ALL HAIL SCOTT SUMMERS AND THE GEEK SQUAD?

She snickered and shoved her notebook under her pillow.

As usual, her dreams were odd... disjointed, even. That night they were not so much memories as a garbled version of events... she was in the back of the Jeep, fighting with Fred and Todd over Irene's birthday card to her, and the Jeep flipped right over onto the road...

"Up!" yelled a voice. Someone was banging on her bedroom door.

Rogue sleepily went up on her elbows. "Whuh?" she said, very eloquently.

"Get up!"

It was Fred. For a literal vampire Rogue was not crazy about being woken up in the dead of night, and she threw a textbook at the door. It glanced off and landed with a thump on the wood floor.

"Mystique called. She says we've gotta get up and get dressed 'cause we're goin' to meet someone."

Rogue glanced at her bedside clock and choked on indignation. "It's four-thirty in the freakin' morning," she moaned. "She should get someone who particularly cares to come with her on her little rescue mission."

"Get up, Rogue!" The door swung open. Fred hauled Rogue bodily out of bed. "Todd and Lance are already dressed," he said accusingly, setting her on her feet.

Yeah, only 'cause they probably fell asleep watchin' TV again. "Can you not?" she asked icily, wrenching her forearm out of his grip.

"And it's not a rescue mission. She said we had to go meet someone."

"Is too. Ah know Mystique. Whenever she says she's goin' to go meet someone, 'specially when it's in the middle of the night, it's either to spring them from jail or get some weapons off them."

Fred looked confused, opened and closed his mouth a couple of times, shook his head and left the room.

Rogue looked equally confused as she had a fleeting vision of a kitchen table littered with guns and grenades. As she pulled on some exercise clothes, she mumbled, "Don't be stupid, girl, Mystique doesn't use guns. She... supplies them."

She blinked. She hadn't meant to say that last bit.

Todd, Fred and Lance were already in the Jeep when she left the boarding house, and the engine was running.

"Took your sweet time, didn't you?" cracked Todd.

"Shut it, Toad. And genius-men, ya forgot to lock the front door. Ya'd better be grateful Ah had mah key on me."

"Didn't bother me, I don't have any valuables," said Lance, who was driving as usual.

"Speak for yourself, mah guitar's in there. Now, why've you guys been so quick to jump out of bed and follow Mystique's orders? Not scared of her, are ya?" Rogue sneered.

"No!" yelled Lance and Todd, at the same time Fred said, "We'd have to be stupid not to be scared of her."

The sky was vast and blue-black above them as they roared along deserted night streets, with Lance doing the occasional burnout just because he could. He was a teenage boy, after all.

They had arrived in the centre of Bayville, which would have been silent if not for the Jeep. Rogue rolled her eyes as she jumped out. "Holy crap, that engine. Mystique oughta fork out for a stealth vehicle, Ah reckon."

"Yeah, it ain't like she's spendin' her dough on clothes," said Toad, and he snickered shrilly until Lance kicked him, which Rogue appreciated.

"This the place?" asked Fred in hushed tones.

"Yeah," said Rogue before Lance could, snatching the piece of paper he'd written down Mystique's message on and squinting to make out his writing.

"We're waiting for someone," said Lance unnecessarily.

They stood, very tensely, for about two minutes before Lance, Todd and Fred all sat down on the pavement.

"Wouldn't put it past Mystique to get us out of bed just because she can," said Fred grumpily, propping his chin in his hand.

"You guys oughta be on the lookout," said Rogue disapprovingly.

"Sure we are, mini-Mystique,"Todd sneered.

Scowling, Rogue stared around. "Mystique ain't the joker type. Ah know someone's comin', just..."

"What?" Lance asked, drumming his hands on his knees.

"Wait."

"We are waitin'. Just 'cause we ain't standing at attention-" began Fred.

"No, wait as in wait, Ah think Ah hear somethin'." Rogue rolled her eyes and squinted at the movement she had glimpsed at the other end of the street.

"Seriously?" asked Lance, frowning.

"'Bout time, I'm missin' out on my beauty sleep," whined Todd.

Rogue had about a million different wisecracks for a statement like that, but was too busy staring at the source of the movement. "Ah'm positive Ah saw somethin'..."

In the next moment, several different things happened. Lance stood up to join Rogue, only to be bowled over by a greenish blur. The street began to shake and several store windows cracked as Lance automatically let out some shockwaves. Rogue tripped over, hitting the pavement hard.

"Lance, stop it!" she shrieked. After a few moments the pavement quit vibrating.

Dimly, she could see some white-haired person wearing green cracking up laughing, so hard that the duffel bag he was carrying fell to the ground. "What the hell do ya think you're playin' at, ya geriatric- ya stupid-" Rogue faltered.

The boy- because she could see it was a boy now- smirked and said, "Do I look that old to you?"

"That kooky white hair makes ya look about a million years old," Lance said angrily.

"Let's get 'em," said Fred menacingly. He made a swipe for the boy, who ducked in a white and green blur and wagged a finger.

"Uh-uh, wouldn't do that if I were you, I'm too fast for any of you bozos," he said, without taking a breath. He then yelped as Rogue kicked him hard from behind.

"Hi," she said nastily as he turned around in disbelief.

He grinned. "I'll let you have that one. Only 'cause you're a girl, though."

It was the Brotherhood's turn to yelp as the deep voice of Mystique emanated from the shadows. "Thank you, Rogue, for putting our newest member in his place. God knows he needed that."

"OK, how long were you standing there?" demanded Lance.

"Long enough. However, now is not the time for an all-out riot, do you understand me? I want all of you in the Jeep, now and I want you heading home five minutes ago."

"How does that work out?" hissed Todd mutinously as they climbed into the Jeep. "Woman can't even tell the time."

"How are you gettin' home?" asked Rogue to Mystique, both of them ignoring Todd.

"Flying." Mystique promptly turned into a raven and winged away into the night sky.

The drive home was permeated by many yawns and mutinous looks toward the white-haired boy, who smirked and put his feet up on the back of Lance's seat. Rogue had to sit in the front because he'd taken her usual seat. She turned around to glower at him every so often.

The downstairs lights in the Brotherhood of Bayville Boarding House were all on. "You could've picked a better time to arrive," said Lance sourly to the boy as they headed for the house.

"I escaped from jail, I couldn't adjust that to fit in with your sleeping time." It seemed this new boy had smirked more in fifteen minutes than Rogue had in a few weeks. This made her hostile. Nobody was allowed to smirk better or more frequently than she.

They trooped through the door to find Mystique standing by the stairs. "Did we make OK time?" asked Rogue conversationally.

"No, not really. Lance, you should drive more aggressively."

Man, she shouldn't say that. If Lance drives any more aggressively than he does now we'll all be dead in a week.

Lance growled.

Less than a week, thought Rogue, slightly perturbed.

"Mystique, don't do that to us again," groaned Todd.

She rounded on him and he gulped. "Do you have something to say, Toad?"

"Nope."

"Excellent. Brotherhood of Mutants, this is your newest member. Introduce yourselves, please," said Mystique.

It felt rather like an etiquette lesson. "Lance Alvers- Avalanche," said Lance.

"Fred. Uh, Blob."

"Todd Tolensky, the Toad."

"Name's Pietro D. Maximoff," said the white-haired boy shortly. He shot the words out rapid-fire and extended a hand for Rogue to shake in greeting. When Rogue grudgingly went to take his hand he whipped it out of her reach.

Huh. Amateur. Rogue decided to put the boy in his place. Looking slowly up from the place his hand had been right up into his pale eyes, she spoke. "Nice name. What does the D stand for?" Her voice was innocent, but there was a don't-try-me-new-boy look on her face that served quite well in intimidating Pietro.

"Doesn't matter."

"Why?" she asked loftily, looking over her shoulder at the boys. They smirked, clued in as to what she was doing. Mystique watched silently.

"Just don't worry your pretty little brain about it, OK?" Pietro said, obviously thinking she was going to swoon or something.

Nothing doing. "If Ah've such a pretty brain as you say, why shouldn't Ah use it?" asked Rogue.

The boy smiled. "Call me Quicksilver."

"Ah go only by Rogue. See ya later, speed demon. Ah'm goin' to bed." Rogue walked upstairs.

She was aware that if any of the boys had walked out on a Brotherhood meeting like that, Mystique would probably have barked at them, at the very least. She wondered what it was about her that made Mystique favour her. The rides to school, the remembrance of her birthday- they couldn't just have been because she was a girl, or because she was the foster daughter of Mystique's friend.

- - -

DISCLAIMER: X-Men: Evolution does not belong to me. It belongs to Stan Lee, Marvel Comics, the WB, whoever you like. If it belonged to me, I would have had Gambit in the Ascension glimpse of the future.

NOTES: I am SO sorry about not getting this chapter up sooner. My home Internet got all screwed and I couldn't use it at all. I just checked my e-mail and felt very honoured by the nice reviews you people have been sending me. I thought I'd better get another chapter up before everyone lost interest in my little story.

I WENT TO AN OFFSPRING CONCERT! Oh my God, it was the coolest thing I've EVER seen- excepting, of course, the Evanescence concert I went to at the start of the year. It was like living a dream, because I've loved The Offspring since I was twelve years old. I went with my friend Helen- she co-wrote a story called The Ragin' Ouch with me, I believe Star-of-Chaos reviewed that one? Yeah. Helen's so cool; she's my best friend. :)

... Do you know how bloody hard it is to try and write while your little sister is watching Beauty and the Beast at top volume in the other room? Bloody friggin' hell...

Sorry if the timeline is a little screwed up. I think Pietro arrived at Bayville High for that basketball game on the same day as the B-hood's meeting with Darkholme, no? Well, in this fic he did. Smirk.

Note: I love Mystique. She's so fun to write.

... Heh, heh. I'm listening to my sister's video, and well- "There must be more than this provincial life!" "Just watch, I'm going to make Belle my wiiiife!" I'm terrible, I find the corniest things funny. I don't know if anyone remembers, but in an episode of X-Men: The Animated Series Sabretooth threatened Logan and Logan taunted, "Oooh, whaddya gonna do? Eat your spinach?" I swear, I was laughing my arse off at that. Ditto that one time TAS!Cyke was like to TAS!Rogue (via a communicator), "Can you see Bishop?" and she replied, watching him enter the building where I think Congress is in the States, "Ah could spit on 'em- if Ah wasn't a lady. Looks like he's runnin' for Congress." Oh, good Lord, that was another one I cracked up at. Also the other night I was at a sleepover of my friend's (happy birthday, Kelly, even though I know you're not going to read this your party was awesome!) and we watched Scary Movie 3, and I was fully dying with laughter at the President saying (about some rappers who just died), "They died for their country, send flowers to their bitches and hoes!" I am such a dork.

To the person who asked, Fields of Innocence is in fact the song that begins I still remember the world from the eyes of a child. Sorry I can't mention you by name, but I'm offline as I write this.

I am a happy girl at the moment, what with regaining my Internet and getting Ultimate X-Men: New Mutants Issue #44 today. God, that issue is good. The end was a real shock though. Also, I'm finally getting a move on with my novel. I love my novel good, I do. Trouble is, I haven't even finished the second chapter and I'm starting to worry it'll never get published because the characters (they're teenage girls) are too obnoxious. Sigh. Laters, all.

SONGS:

Beauty Queen by Lash. (I have this new appreciation for Lash. What with Rogue's birthday and all I am putting in lots of songs that have a sullen teenager air to them.)