There were many ways to get into the mansion if one really wanted to. Pietro and Toad were perfectly capable of hopping over the gates and, if mass entrance was needed, Lance'n'Freddy'n'Boom-Boom always had a knack for sheer brute destruction. Toad's current Daddy occupant claimed proficiency at disabling mechanical systems. But, oddly enough, there was an X-Man already waiting at the gates.

It was only Pietro's luck the Man would be Evan.

Despite the probable situation at the X-Mansion, Pietro expected Evan to give him an antagonistic look and snarl "What are you doing here?" but he didn't. He looked at them with something approaching relief. Pietro knew right off that things were, indeedy, very bad and it hadn't been some kind of imaginative hoax at all.

"We're here for Kurt," Lance said with a strange tentiveness.

"He's in the infirmary. I can open the gates if you want . . . but you really shouldn't go in," Evan said dully.

"Why?" Tabitha asked, but, of course, they all knew the answer.

Or, Pietro amended, think we know.

"The Professor used mind control on me," Evan answered, his voice miserable. "He made me come out the back door and skirt around the gates to meet you here. Rogue's dead."

That . . . was news. Pietro did a quick lap around the Brotherhood before he got control of himself.

"Dead? Dead-dead?"

"I was trying to tell the Professor and he wouldn't let me talk. Sent me out here. Said he wanted me to bring you in."

"Iknewit!" Pietro shrilled. "Iknewit! It'sallpartofsomeplan. We'replannedtobe here!"

"What plan?" Evan grated, sounding like his old self for a moment.

"Youneedtogetout of here," Pietro said, pulling Evan up by his shoulders and pushing him toward the street. "Farfarfar away."

"I can't leave the X-Men!" But Evan didn't seem to be struggling. Only, once Pietro had shoved him into the gutter, he stopped, as if rooted, and all Pietro's efforts (of a level that wouldn't end up turning Evan into a grease stain, anyway) were futile.

Evan seemed as dumfounded as he was by it. "I think I'm still being controlled!"

Pietro swore. "Evan,hewantsyoudead! Orwhatever!"

"Who?"

"Magneto! Kurt's gottadiseaseandwe'reimmunetoit, but you're not and it could killyou."

"Then the X-Men!" Evan panicked, stomping past Pietro and back toward the gate. "They've been in there --"

"Long enough." Toad put a restraining hand on Evan's shoulder. "Long enough, Evan. If Xavier can make the students contract the disease, force them to, he's already done it."

Evan stared at him, then shrugged off Toad's hand in disgust. "It doesn't matter! You said Magneto wanted to kill us, not Xavier! Why would Xavier . . . that doesn't make any sense. And I can't leave them."

"Well,apparentlyyoucan't. Hewon'tletyou. But maybe . . . " Pietro exchanged a glance with Lance, who, for once, seemed to be lighting up with recognition of a possibility at the same time Pietro did.

"Mesmero," they blurted out as one.

"Who?"

"He'sthisnut."

"Came to the House a couple of times to show off. Accompanied by Magneto."

"Whowasallpleased with his new toy."

"Made Toad sing the entire soundtrack of Annie."

"Reallyembarressing."

"And he looks kinda like Xavier."

"MakethatalotlikeXavier."

Lance smiled. "Score. We got it."

Evan looked somewhat less enthusiastic. "Do you know how to fight him, then?"

"Um. Notaclue. But it's better than it being Xavier, right?"

"Yeah. Rogue's dead," he repeated, Pietro thought, unnecessarily.

"Are you sure?" Tabitha pressed, standing on her toes. "Maybe she just appeared . . . "

"Look, there's dead and there's dead," Evan snapped. "Jean didn't even have to check for a pulse, all right? She did anyway, but she didn't have to. It was like one moment she was fine, and the next, it was like something chewed her up and spat her out so fast we couldn't see it. Just what was left, and that was her, all right?"

Evan's complexion went to a sort of copper sickly as he talked and Pietro could feel his own wan blood draining from his face. No one had anything to say. Yes, that sounded quite real and quite dead, kinda hard to mistake that for a faint, yes, yes, yes.

"We have to go in now," Evan droned, his pallor oozing away suddenly. He turned and palmed the gates open, motioning the Brotherhood to follow.

Pietro swallowed hard.

But follow they did.