Disclaimer: X-men Evolution is owned by other companies and individuals. This piece is a fan-fiction meaning I do not own the copyrights to the characters, nor do I make any profit from this work.

"Um lets see. I have $3.28, how much you got?"

          Jamie began digging through his pockets. He managed to fish out two pieces of gum Jubes had given him, his pocket knife Logan had given him for his birthday, a piece of string he was planning to use in a prank against Roberto, three dimes, one nickel and eight pennies. He pulled his little canvas wallet out of his back pocket and found a shiny brand new one-dollar bill. All total they managed to scrape together $7.71, that is until Blob found a penny on the ground, making the total $7.72. Now Freddy might not be the smartest guy on the planet, but he did know the value of food and he also knew that their money wasn't going to go very far. They were sitting in a parking lot behind a 7-11 on the outskirts of town. Fred was trying not to panic, but he didn't have any idea what to do.

          He looked down at Jamie and realized that he was responsible for the little guy. Jamie was counting on him to figure out what to do and frankly Freddy was scared. Trying to keep calm and find out more about what was going on, he picked Jamie up, set him on his shoulders and started walking toward downtown Bayville.

"Um, Jamie why don't you tell me what happened tonight. 'Cause I'm a little confused myself and mebbe it would help if you told me what's going on at the mansion."

          As Fred walked, Jamie Talked. "Well I was outside riding my bike around on the sidewalk. Kurt had said he would play a game of basketball with me later so I was kind of waiting around for him to show up. It was getting sort of late and I hadn't heard from him so I thought he must have forgotten again. The big kids always forget about me anyway so I thought I would go do something else. I sort of wanted to find Bobby 'cause I had an idea for a prank to pull on Roberto and I wanted his help, but he told me to go find something else to do, I think he was busy flirting with Jubilee… Well so then I decided to go down to the beach maybe and see if anyone was down there but no one was. It started getting dark so I tried to go back to the house but when I got closer I saw all the big kids trying to run away from a bunch of people with guns and I got really scared so I hid and they put everyone into vans. And I didn't know what to do so I ran away and I tried to hide and then I tried to find someone I knew but it was only a bunch of people dressed funny searching the house and the lawn and I was scared and so I ran away again and then I climbed over the fence and hid in the woods and then I found you and…"

          Freddy was trying to keep up with the kid who seemed to be talking faster than Pietro ever could when he realized Jamie had stopped and was crying. He didn't really know what to tell him really, so he just nodded and started telling him what happened earlier at the boarding house. He didn't know what to think, but if the X-geeks were in trouble with the police then it must have been serious. Maybe it had something to do with those Sentinel people, even though he thought all that was over.

"Freddy?"

"Yeah?"

"I'm scared."

          He didn't really know what to say, he was scared to. More scared than he had been in a long long time, but he didn't want to let Jamie know that. The kid was looking to him to make it better and he really didn't know how. But he didn't want the kid to lose hope so he just said, "Don't worry Jamie, we gonna figure this out together." Freddy hadn't realized how much he relied on Pietro and the others to tell him what to do, and now that they weren't here he was so confused. He thought that must be sort of what Jamie was feeling too, except the Fred was the Blob, a big strong guy with invulnerable skin, while Jamie was just a little tiny confused mutant with a power he couldn't control and which wasn't all that useful most of the time anyway. Freddy realized that the only thing keeping Jamie safe was him, and while he was scared half to death about the situation, he knew that if he could do anything to stop it he wouldn't let anything hurt the little guy. He'd think of a plan, it might take him a couple days but eventually he would figure out what they should do.

"Freddy?"

"Huh?" he realized he had drifted off in thought a little and wasn't really paying attention.

"You passed the store."

"Oh."

            Turning around, he started walking through the parking lot. Right now he knew they needed food and sleep. He didn't know what was gonna happen after that, but for he'd take care of that when it got there. With those thoughts he entered the 24/7 shopping center, trying to think of what he could get for $7.72 to feed two people until he could come up with a plan.