Disclaimer: I do not own, nor am I making any money from, the X-Men characters. Also thank you to my good friend Corrinth for the use of her creation Ilehana Xavier, aka Vixen.

Scene Six

Barefooted she patrolled the empty corridors that night. From talking to Rogue, Jubilee and Storm, Blaze had built up a mental picture of the movements of the thief. She had no idea who this Cameron was, but it didn't really matter. In this school, even without the exceptional security systems in place, chances were it was a pupil, a child. It wasn't really even a challenge to find out who it was.

Dressed as she was, in jogging pants and strappy cotton vest, barefoot and hair pulled up into a scruffy knot, she might have just been unable to sleep. Unfortunately chances were she wouldn't be getting to bed for hours. She learnt the layout of the building well that night, patrolling it endlessly in the half-light of lamps and computer screens, darting from shadow to shadow lest somebody realise she was about.

The problem was that Xavier's School for Gifted Youngsters never slept, not really. Frequently Blaze had to dive for cover, despite the very late hour. In one girl's dorm, two friends shared whispered gossip and giggles. Creaks coming from Ilehana's room implied at least two people were very much awake. One small boy nearly walked straight into Blaze as she wandered the corridors, fortunately he was almost sleepwalking and he didn't see her dart into a shadowed doorway. She didn't want a fuss that might alert her quarry to her presence. The boy disappeared into a bathroom.

By the time she first heard a suspicious noise everything else had finally gone quiet. Someone was creeping up the stairs. Someone small, quite light, and obviously used to the comings and goings of the dormitory floors of the mansion. Whosoever it was stopped at every floor, every junction and corner, probably hiding in the very arrangements of shadows that Blaze was using. Blaze was surprised, for a child this thief was quite good. But against her, it wouldn't do them any good.

She waited round a corner on the fourth floor, staff quarters. The thief had been building up their nerve, starting with simple snatches from fellow students. Storm was the most recent victim, which meant that a less forgiving, more jumpy member of staff was probably the target tonight. Blaze had already adjusted the lighting, the darker the better, for she had to catch the thief red-handed or they would deny everything.

Pinning herself back against the wall, she quieted her breathing. Shuffle, shuffle, the child was creeping down the corridor. Listening carefully, Blaze heard a door handle click. Nightcrawler's room, it had to be, there hadn't been time for the kid to get any further down the corridor. The door clicked shut again almost silently, but not silently enough.

Five minutes later a small, blond, spectacled boy came back through Nightcrawler's door backwards. Ever so carefully he pulled the door shut, before turning round. Blaze smiled down at him and he winced. Not saying a word, she twitched her head towards the stairs, letting him go first down to the rec. room.

The big screen TV was on, some crummy documentary about mummies in Egypt. Blaze turned to the boy.

"Have you seen the remote, I can't be doing with intellectual stuff at this hour?"

The boy looked from Blaze to the TV, blinked once and the set went dark and silent.

"Cool." Blaze smiled. "Have a seat." The child sat, as did Blaze. "Now, what have you got in your pocket there?"

Reluctantly he dived into his trouser pocket, pulling out a small packet.

"I don't even know what they are, but he didn't have much in there to take..."

Blaze opened the packet and emptied the contents onto her hand.

"They are called rosary beads. Each bead is a prayer. Kurt will miss these a lot." She put them back in the packet carefully, and then put the packet on the table in front of them. "Where is everything else?"

"Oh, I didn't take anything far. I didn't want to sell the stuff or anything. I was just..." The kid shrugged melodramatically, "Just bored I guess." He reached down the side of the sofa and pulled out a bracelet, Rogue's bracelet. "Its all down here, it's a big sofa."

Blaze had to laugh, the boy was fantastic, all that stuff taken in the dead of night from people's rooms and hidden in the sofa they themselves sat on!

"You will have to put it back, all of it." She tried to make her face stern, but it was difficult. "Its wrong to take stuff that isn't yours."

"I know," He was pragmatic, "But there's nothing on TV this season, and I don't sleep."

"Alright, here's the deal." Blaze thought on her feet, "You put all this stuff back by the morning, and promise never to steal again and I not only wont tell on you, but will teach you a game to keep you occupied at night time. How about it?"

Intrigued the kid nodded. Blaze picked up her pack of cards from where it had fallen earlier that day.

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"I just wanted to thank you Blaze, for getting my pendant returned to me." Storm spoke just slightly louder than she needed to, and the point was not lost on Wolverine.

"So, Blaze, um..." He addressed the smug-looking young woman uncertainly.

"Apology accepted, Logan. Don't worry about it." She smiled, and Logan sighed his relief. He could not be doing with apologies.

"You gonna tell us who it was then?" Logan asked. Blaze shook her head.

"There is an honour between most thieves. Just rest assured that it wont happen again."

"Only most thieves, hey?" Logan and Blaze shared a grin. "Just make sure that it doesn't happen again, okay?" She nodded, and then went back to reading a book that Nightcrawler had leant her. The Professor was right; she had started at least to fit in around here. But still at the back of his mind Logan had a sneaking suspicion that Blaze might still find it difficult to cut off her old life just like that. Would they find themselves turning a newly armed criminal mutant out into the world whenever the Professor had finished with Blaze?

"Can somebody please turn on the TV?" Xavier entered the room with Ilehana at his side. Storm obliged, with Bobby, Rogue and Scott also arriving in a hurry. In a poof! of purple smoke, Nightcrawler appeared on the windowsill. Changing the channel to the news, Storm stood back.

"And so the headlines this lunchtime," The female newsreader announced to an intrigued audience and confused Blaze; why was the news so important? "For the second time in three months a mutant criminal has escaped from a specialist high security jail. Remy le Beau, also known as Gambit, escaped last night with the aid of two other unknown mutants" The pictures of a blue haired woman and a colossal man aiding a tall, slim man out of a cell were obviously from the security cameras in the jail. The images were cut short when the woman raised her hand at the camera. "le Beau is to be considered armed and extremely dangerous. Do not approach him. If you have seen these mutants, call the police incident room on..."

"This is bad," Scott pointed out. "Do you think it could be related to Magneto's escape at all Professor?"

"There is no way of telling right now Scott. But I suggest we keep our wits about us. If this is a new stage of Magneto's plan to start a human-mutant war, we can expect this Gambit to be quite dangerous."

Logan liked the sound of this. Finally somethin' to do around here!

"Do we know anything about this guy? What are his powers? Where has he come from?" The Wolverine was positively grinning with anticipation. Storm looked over to Blaze, wondering what the young woman was thinking to all this. Blaze was stood where she had been sitting. She had gone very pale, and her mouth was open like a beached fish gasping for air.

"Blaze, are you alright?" Storm took a hesitant step towards the newcomer. If she was going to faint somebody needed to catch her.

"Remy..." Blaze almost whispered the name, staring at the TV as the channel repeated the showing of the security tape. "I know that man. Its Remy..."

Every person in the room stopped their private discussions and stared at the redhead. Storm had a feeling this girl had some serious explaining to do...