Notes: Welp, this is it, folks. We've reached the end of the line. (Yay!, cry the masses) Pretend like you're sad. Just humor me. Anyway, once again, I wanna thank everyone who's reviewed. As Edge would say (What, you don't know who Edge is? He's only probably the hottest Canadian south of the border! No, the OTHER border.), "you guys so totally rule all!" And now, on with the story.

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"She's gonna kill me!"

Bobby heard the distress call as he was walking past the medlab. It was without a doubt Justin's voice, and for a moment he pondered letting him deal with it. If he did, great. If he didn't ... well, at least Britney would be a bachelorette again.

When he peeked through the window in the door and saw him flat against the wall and staring in wide-eyed horror as Cecilia aimed a needle at his head from several feet away, he figured he might do well to play the diplomat.

He pushed the door open and walked inside, watching the doctor uneasily as she balanced the syringe in her right hand.

"I never was very good at darts, so you might want to be very, very still for a minute."

"Um . . ."

"Get out, Drake."

"You know, homicide is generally frowned upon in most places."

"I'm a doctor. By the time I'm done, it won't look like homicide." She hefted the syringe up to eye level, sizing her target up. "Now, just don't move and you'll be fine."

"Okay, call me curious, but, um . . . what're you doin'?"

Cecilia glanced at Bobby. "I've had it. It's bad enough you stick me watching some smart-mouthed, spoiled brat, but this? This is too much. I can't handle it."

"Can't handle what?"

"This!" She shrieked, gesturing wildly to Justin and making Bobby take a step back when she narrowly missed plunging the syringe into his arm. "The boy is white! White as snow! He needs to accept it and get on with his life and stop insisting I call him 'my brother.'"

Bobby's expression softened somewhat. "He just wants to make friends, Cece."

"Don't call me that. And Drake, I hate to tell you this, but I'm black and I don't even call people 'brothers.' I tried telling him that, but no. He won't listen." She glared accusingly at him. "And my name is not Chris. It is Cecilia, and I'm going to drill it into his skull, one needle point at a time!"

Bobby backed up another step. Diplomacy really was overrated.

"Oh." He headed for the door when Justin screamed again. It was a very loud, ear-splitting, Banshee-level scream. Bobby was frozen in terror at the mere sound, and for a moment he recalled a college reading of The Odyssey, specifically the part when the sirens would lure someone to his death with their enchanting song.

"You can't leave me here! She's gonna kill me!"

"And?"

Justin blinked. Well, that hadn't been anticipated. "I have a girlfriend!"

"I know." Bobby reached for the doorknob.

"I have pictures! Good ones!"

There was a hidden language between young males that, while most women didn't understand it, it was universal to their opposite gender. Bobby stopped in his tracks, looking cautiously over his shoulder. "How good?"

Justin was beginning to sweat. Bobby considered letting him squirm a little more. This was fun. "Real good."

That universal language promising dirty pictures, all for the cost of sedating one irate doctor, was beginning to lure him. If only he had a board to strap himself to to keep from getting pulled in . . .

"All those fake nudes on the 'net and stuff? They're nothin', man." Justin was hysterical now, almost bursting into tears when a syringe flew at him and landed no more than half a foot from his left ear.

Bobby could hear the sirens laughing at his gullible nature. But those pictures . . .

"Cecilia?"

"What?"

She looked up to see a very haggard-looking Jean standing in the doorway, narrowed green eyes fixed on the young man across the room.

"I want to have a talk with our guest."

Cecilia was a brave woman in her own right. She was not, however, suicidal, and so she stepped out of the way when a very angry Jean Grey-Summers stalked into the room, stopping when she was barely a foot away from Justin.

"Goodbye, my friend."

A light pink aura developed around Jean's head, and a split-second later, Justin fell to the floor like a sack of potatoes.

Bobby raised his eyebrows. "Did you deep-six his mind or what?"

"He'll be out for a while. I think I'm going to go sit him out on a street corner somewhere. I'm sure someone will pick him up."

"I don't think that's very fair."

"Oh, Bobby, I wouldn't just do that. I'd at least have the heart to put a sign around his neck. 'Free to good home.' Or maybe just 'free.'"



And so it came to be that, more or less, the departure of Justin Timberlake was witnessed by the entirety of the Xavier household, with more than a few mixed emotions. Most of the mansion's inhabitants were indifferent. Bobby was bitter that he'd saved the young man's life and gained no pictures in return. Scott was impossibly confused, which was categorized as Scott's third emotion in Bobby's ever-popular Summers EQ Game. It had been going on under Scott's nose for quite some time now, all between Bobby, Jubilee, Gambit, Rogue on occasion, Warren, Logan, Hank, and even Jean now and then. The way it worked was that every Sunday morning, the participants would get together to bet on how many times Scott's three emotions - anger, bravery, and confusion - would surface and which would be predominant throughout the week. So far, Bobby was happy. He was already ahead of the competition, which was good since he really wanted that collection of taped The New Red Green Show episodes Gambit had thrown into the pot this week.

The thought of winning those almost canceled out the disappointment of no authentic Britney Spears nude pictures.

Justin was just happy to be leaving. He vaguely recalled someone holding him hostage with a syringe, but it seemed like more of a bad dream than anything. The last thing he remembered was waking up to see some redhead staring at him expectantly. Aside from a splitting headache and several unanswered questions, he couldn't say his experience in his odd place was entirely a loss. He'd seen more beautiful women than he thought possible, not one person mocked him or his music to his face, and he didn't have to listen to Britney complain that her feet hurt. He loved her dearly, but for the life of him, he wished she'd buy some shoe cushioning pads and quit whining.

He walked out the front door without looking back, watching the woman in front of him with a curious expression. She was black with long, flowing white hair and expressive blue eyes. An odd combination to say the least, but not at all a bad one. He'd have to see if she was dating anyone.

Sam watched from the doorway with a mixture of pride - that having been attained by living through the weekend with only minor psychological damage - and fear - it was only a matter of time before his X-Force teammates put two and two together and tracked him down. His mind really was starting to kick into overdrive. Then something struck him. Really struck him. Right between the shoulder blades, in fact, and it hurt like hell. So as he lay on the ground gasping for air, four-letter words forming on his tongue that would still get him smacked in the mouth by his mother, one coherent thought came to him. That thought was, unfortunately, induced by Cable's voice behind him.

"Tag."

He rolled over onto his back, squinting up at the huge man and grinning cautiously. "Hi, sir."

Scott sniffed. "Nate? You smell like . . ." He frowned, brow creasing above his visor. "Like spoiled milk."

Sam unconsciously crabwalked backwards a little bit until he was halfway out the front door.

"I'm well aware of that." He extended a hand to Sam, and for a moment the young man thought he was about to be slapped into oblivion. When he peeled an eye open and saw the hand was still there, he breathed a sigh of relief and accepted it, hefting himself to his feet and brushing himself off. "I saw that kid in the driveway when I was coming in. Did you do that?"

Sam covered all his options in under ten seconds. Say yes and be yelled at. Say no and be called a liar and be yelled at some more. Don't answer and return to the milk incident debate.

He nodded wordlessly.

To his surprise, the corners of Cable's mouth lifted slightly. "Thought so. You have a good aim. You'll make a great leader one of these days."

Sam brightened considerably. "Really?"

Cable shrugged slightly. "Well, you would." He pulled his gun out from its place strapped to his back, resting the barrel against Sam's forehead. "It took me two days to get the milk out, but it works fine now."

"Ya could be bluffin'," Sam pointed out, attempting a joke. Cable never made a move to return the smile.

"Could be."

Sam flinched. He was a good poker player - great, even. But you just don't bluff with a big man with a gun aimed at your head.

Cable smiled malevolently. "Run."

See Sam run. See Sam forget every bit of extensive training he's had over the years and almost stumble over the bottom step outside the building. See Cable taking aim. See Sam's blasting field kick in. See Bobby laugh. See Scott scratch his head in hopeless bewilderment.

Such was the life of the X-Men.