Author's Notes - Thanks for all the reviews guys! I have to say that this is probably the best ammount of feedback I've ever gotten. I hate to say that updates aren't going to be four chapters at a time as I had just uploaded four previously written chapters. But I'll try to be as quick as possible. I have a lot of plans for this fic and hope it lives up to your expectations.
Just a few things: Forking (as in what the Brotherhood did on Halloween) is when you take plastic forks and stick them in someone's lawn before a frost. They are frozen into the ground and have a nasty tendency to break when people try to pull them out. Wicked fun! And to the annonymous poster who said that I misspelled 'football,' amigo, I lived in England for two years and know for a fact that it is spelled 'football' and not 'futball.'
"SNOW NINJAS!"
Jean and Rogue didn't even have time to duck behind a telekinetic shield before they were beseiged by a flury of snowballs. The two girls shook the snow out of their hair and looked around for the people responsible. Two figures in white jumped off into the distance, both laughing evily.
"I suppose I was right to be worried when you bought winter camouflage for the two of you?" Mystique asked as she sat on the kitchen counter sipping from a cup of coffee. Mortimer and Todd quickly were shedding the white garments that were soaking wet from the snow outside, hanging them up on a rack that had been set up for drying. "Didn't do any perminant damage, did you?"
"Now that depends on what your definition of 'perminant damage' is, luv." Mortimer grinned.
Todd was busy sniffing the air. "Hey, it smells good in here, yo!"
"It should." Mystique took a sip of her coffee. "Freddy's been hard at work all day. Dinner's really going to be something tonight."
Pietro looked at the dining room table with an appraising eye. This was really the first time that the room would actually be used for it's indended purpose. Since it was used mainly as a storage room when the Brotherhood first got together, there had been a lot of dust and grime built up and Pietro started to regret offering to get it ready for Thanksgiving dinner. The speedster sighed, at least it wouldn't take as long as if the other memebers of the Brotherhood were doing it. Getting the boxes that had been left in the room to another, still unused part of the boarding house was easy. The boxes were light and with most of the others in the kitchen there wasn't anyone to slow him down as he made the numerous trips up and downs stairs at top speed. After about fifteen minutes, he was left with a rather spacious room that held a good sized table and more than enough chairs for the Brotherhood.
Now, about all that dust.
Pietro considered just seeing if he could work up enough air turbulance to just get the dust moving, but when he saw that just walking on the hardwood floors left footprints, he decided that perhaps the 'normal' way of cleaning might be the better one. Slower, more agrivating, but probably better in the long run.
Besides, maybe it would do him some good to do things at a 'normal' speed for a change. Wanda seemed to think that it would. When you do things at super-speed you don't think about them, Pietro. That's probably why you act like such a jerk sometimes. Take some time to slow down.
He hated slowing down.
It did cause him to think more.
He never thought particuarly pleasent thoughts when he did.
The broom's bristles scratched lightly on the floor, sounding rediculously loud to his mind.
The cell phone that his father had given him was still up in his room in it's normal spot on his dresser. For the past few months he had been feeding Magneto a steady stream of misinformation supplied by Mystique. For the most part it was just saying that the Brotherhood still wasn't ready for any sort of consideration by Magneto. That Wanda was still traveling around searching for something and that the X-Men were keeping so much pressure on them that they hadn't been able to do anything. Pietro didn't mind it actually. The separation from his father had been a good thing. Over the past months Pietro's relationship with Wanda had improved by leaps and bounds. True, they still fought a lot and one glare from her was enough to make him flinch, but they had actually been able to begin to talk. Wanda finally was able to accept that Pietro had never agreed with Magneto's decision to place her in the mental institution, and Pietro had done his best to make amends for siding with Magneto in the whole Sentinel incident.
Dustpan, he'd forgotten it upstairs.
Gone.
Back.
Damn, there was a lot of dust. He hadn't even gotten through half the room. Apparently Mystique hadn't liked housecleaning either. The rest of the house wasn't as dirty and it had been home to five, unsupervised mutant teenagers. Six if you included the short stay of Tabitha 'Boom Boom' Smith. Hell, she'd probably been responsible for most of the damage in the bording house's west wing.
Back to sweeping.
Damn. His hair was going to be grey by the time he was finished.
Misinformation.
It was the only way he knew, outside of just confronting Magneto - and that was just suicidal, even for a blood relative - to make amends to the Brotherhood.
"ACHOOOO!"
Stupid dust.
Magneto.
Father.
Self-proclaimed savior of mutant kind.
And he was betraying him.
Why?
Anger. Pietro was angry. He wasn't supposed to have been an errend boy. That's what the Acolytes had relegated him to. Pyro, Colossus, Sabertooth, even Mastermind had more say in the goings on of the Acolytes. Pietro had just been the barely tolerated one, let in on things just because he was Magneto's son. Apparently super-speed wasn't useful enough for them.
And he had even saved Magneto's life.
Ungrateful jerk.
Magneto.
No longer Father.
Just Magneto.
It would be easier that way.
Mystique was right anyway. Magneto was out for power, not mutant rights. True, things still sounded a little... Xavier-ish, but they made more sense when he thought about them.
What's that? Oh, the arm weights. Barely realize they're there now. Might want to mention that to Mortimer.
He'll put heavier ones on.
That's a good thing, idiot. Means you're getting stronger.
Who you calling an idiot?
The idiot who forgot the obvious.
Why I outta...
Crap... Arguing with myself.
Lots of dust. Almost done.
Still have a lot to do to make things up to the Brotherhood. No excuse for acting like a jerk.
*sigh*
He needed to talk to Wanda. She was good for helping to get thoughts straight.
The room was clean. All that was left was to set the table.
Lance set the last bag into the back of his Jeep and then swung himself into the driver's seat. Freddy had sent him out for some last minute shopping for Thanksgiving dinner. Just a few things, most of them were just little things that were more or less finishing touches. Lance mused over the list that he had shoved into his pocket. He smiled when he remembered one of the items. A Thanksgiving-themed cookie cutter. It really didn't matter exactly of what, but Freddy had insisted that it had to be Thanksgiving-themed. Freddy had told Lance that he was going to use leftover crust dough and the cookie cutter to decorate the center of the pumpkin pie. After searching the supermarket, Lance had found a pumkin and a turkey cookie cutter. He decided to go with the turkey.
The snow had come just in time for a white Thanksgiving. Lance stood against his jeep as he waited for the windshield to defrost. He supposed he could have sat inside. It probably would have been warmer. Mortimer had helped him rig a hard top that kept the wind from getting to him during the long drives in the cold, but all the same, Lance enjoyed standing outside and watching the people come and go from the supermarket. Most of them were rushing, Lance bet they were like he was. Just running in for last minute things that were needed for the yearly dinner to end all dinners.
Out of the corner of his eye, Lance spotted a familiar red convertable. The soft top was pulled up, but it was still obviously Scott Summers' car. Lance lazily watched his breath rise in a white cloud as Kitty Pryde and Scott piled out of the car and started towards the supermarket. Would have thought Kitty was the type to go home for Thanksgiving. Lance mused idly. The two X-Men were just about to enter the store when Kitty spotted him. She tugged on Scott's sleeve and the older teen cast a frown in Lance's direction. Abruptly changing directions, Scott headed in Lance's direction.
"What do you know about 'snow ninjas?'"
Lance gave Scott an unbelieving look. "Snow ninjas? Summers, you've been watching too many bad '80's movies." Scott snorted, but turned and walked into the store. Lance just laughed and shook his head. "What you still doing here, Kitty Kat?" he asked when he saw that Kitty was still standing in front of him with a slightly sad look on her face.
"You could still come over to our side, you know." Kitty said, avoiding Lance's eyes.
Lance stiffened. "I thought we'd been over that." he said shortly. "I belong with the Brotherhood, Kitty. I'm not X-Men material."
"But I know you can be!" Kitty grabbed Lance's arm, "I know you could."
"Kitty!" Lance jerked his arm away, "Stop it! Look, I know we had something for a while. I know that at one time I might have jumped at the chance to be an X-Man, but that is all in the past. I've seen a lot more of the world than you have Kitty, and I know what it's really like." Lance's eyes narrowed and Kitty shifted uncomfortably under his gaze. "The world isn't milk and cookies, Kitty. There are a whole lot of people out there who just don't give a damn about a kid on the street and a world that hates us because we were born. That's why I stick with the Brotherhood, Kitty. We all know what the world is like and we watch out for each other."
"Like Pietro?" Kitty laughed, "He really looked out for you guys."
Lance tightened his grip on Kitty's arm. "Pietro's got a lot of shit in his life that you'd never understand. That's what makes him one of the Brotherhood."
"We've all had hard lives..."
"Bullshit." Lance countered, "You don't know the first thing about a hard life. Parents that looked after you, never going hungry or wondering if you were ever going to have a place to sleep - when you've lived like that, then talk to me. You want to know why Tabitha and Rogue never made it in the Brotherhood? Because they never really knew what it was like to be totally alone. Even with all her bitching, Tabby was never really alone, and Rogue's the same way." Lance looked like he was going to keep going, but the sudden appearance of Scott at the door of the supermarket caused him to stop abruptly. He let go of Kitty's arm and jumped into his Jeep. "Get inside, Kitty. Boy Scout is waiting for you."
Lance waited until he was sure Kitty wasn't near his Jeep. She might be able to phase, but all the same the apparance that he would even consider backing over her was callous, even for him.
Blaze of Glory played on the radio as Lance headed back to the bording house. His face was set in the overly-familiar 'fuck-the-world' expression as he pulled into the front drive. He had been in a good mood. He hissed a little as the Jeep skidded a bit as it hit an ice patch, but quickly pulled the Jeep out of a skid and to a stop.
"Sucessful?" Lance looked up and saw Mystique standing on the porch, a mug in hand.
"Yeah." Lance grumbled.
Mystique cocked her head slightly. "Something happen?" she asked as she walked over to the Jeep, grabbing one of the bags in her free arm.
"Ran into Summers and Kitty at the store." Lance grumbled. Mystique nodded. She had been told by several of the Brotherhood about the short and fairly turbulant relationship that Lance had been in with the X-Man.
"Well, don't let that get you in a bad mood today." Mystique smiled at him. "Freddy's almost done in the kitchen and everything's coming together."
Lance sighed and followed the shape-shifter into the kitchen. The scents of Thanksgiving hit him as soon as he walked through the door. The counters were covered with the signs of Freddy's days work. Taking in a deep breath, Lance let the smells fill his lungs and his shoulders loosened a bit as he placed the bags on the counter next to the ones Mystique had brought in. Leaving the kitchen, Lance poked his head into the dining room and was surprised at how clean it actually was. He knew that Pietro had volunteered to take care of it, but it had been so filthy when he had left for the store that he had been positive that even the speedster would have had a longer task ahead of him. A gust of wind blew past him and suddenly Pietro was a dirvish of activity setting the places at the table and arranging a little paper turkey centerpiece that Wanda had spent a good deal of the morning working on.
Shaking his head, Lance headed towards the living room. A few months ago he would have never been able to picture this sort of life for anyone in the Brotherhood. They had honestly been a rag-tag bunch of second-tier Acolyte wanna-bees who had been actually turned into something that was eerily reminicant of a family unit.
Fuck, Lance grinned and dropped down onto the sofa and flipped on the TV to watch the rest of the Macy's Thanksgiving parade, if it weren't for the fact that we're still planning to make life hell for just about everyone, I'd be worried we were turning into the X-Men with all this warm fuzziness.
There were times that Wanda hated having the room right above the kitchen. Before all the changes around the bording house, the smell of spoiled food had drifted up through the floorboards on hot days. But on this particualar day, Wanda snuggled down into her pillows and enjoyed the smells from the dinner that she would be sharing in the next few hours.
This was going to be Wanda's first Thanksgiving since she'd left the institution. As she pulled her feet up beneath her to sit cross-legged and leaned back against her headboard. Wanda looked across her bed at the empty scrapbook and plethora of pictures and momentos. There were a lot of pictures, most having been taking in the last few months from the window of her bedroom. She hadn't wanted the boys or Mystique to know what she was doing; scrapbooking probably would have struck them all as a little... well, odd as Wanda's hobby of choice. But the one-time use cameras weren't that expensive, and Wanda liked the idea of having something tangible about the only real family she'd ever felt like she'd belonged to.
There was the brief sound of feet falling on stairs as Pietro made a run upstairs for something. Wanda hoped that he was taking her advice and was taking some time to actually slow down today. She had been pleasently surprised to find that when Pietro actually made an effort, he was actually somewhat nice to be around. Just goes to show what you can find out about your siblings when you're not constantly plotting against each other. Wanda mused idly.
Wanda picked up one of the pictures, one that had been taken during one of Todd and Pietro's training sessions with Mortimer. Pietro was more or less a blur in the picture, as usual, and Todd was rather humorously positioned in mid-air as he jumped to avoid being tagged by the speedster. Wanda couldn't help but smile a little bit. No matter how much she hated to admit it, Todd was good for cheering-up if nothing else. True, he was a persistant little annoyance sometimes, but still he was a nice change to the usual angst that sometimes settled over the residents of the boarding house. Setting the picture back amoung its brothers, Wanda picked up the scrapbook and opened it to it's first blank page.
Frowning, Wanda flipped the colored sheets of paper that she had picked up from the scrapbook store. Frankly she had been amazed that there was an entire store at the mall dedicated to scrapbooking, but there was and the ladies there had given her some good advice about making her book.
God, the others are never going to let me live this down if they ever actually find out about this.
There was a pile of comics and newspapers by the side of her bed. It was a little odd, but she felt like the costumed super-chracters would somehow fit well in the scrapbook dedicated to a house of super-powered teenagers.
Maybe she should have just stuck with her first idea of a diary.
And old newspaper caught her eye. The front page had a huge Sentinel surrounded by almost unrecognizable figures that Wanda knew were the X-Men and the Brotherhood. Wanda wasn't exactly sure why she had kept that particular paper; it certainly wasn't the best part of her life. She had been angry and just about everything, was lashing out at just about everyone and not giving a fuck about it.
Wanda frowned a little. She hoped she was remembering everything. Shortly after Mystique and Mortimer had arrived Pietro had come clean about what Magneto had Mastermind do to her memories. After Hex Bolting him into the wall, and Todd for good measure - he'd known what had happened - she'd just cried. She rembered having been surprised when Pietro had actually not run away and come back and given her the first brotherly hug she'd ever remembered getting from him. He had been shaking like a chiuaua to be sure, but he had come back. Wanda had surprised herself even more by not Hex Bolting him across the room again. It was amazing how much she had actually felt like she had needed it from him.
Then there was Magneto. After hearing what he had done to her, Wanda had decided that there was no way in hell that she was ever going to call that man 'father' again. She knew that the break from Magneto had been hard on Pietro, but he actually seemed to be becoming a better person these days.
After a few more minutes Wanda shoved the scrapbooking materials into a box and slid it under her bed. The smells from downstairs were getting to be just too good to ignore now. Who would have thought that Freddy would actually wind up being as good at cooking food as he was at eating it?
Actually, ol' Freddy seems to have cut back on the snacks lately. Wanda mused as she closed the door to her room and jogged down the stairs. It wasn't so much that Freddy had looked like he was loosing weight... His mutation probably made that impossible, but it looked like all that extra 'blob-ness' was actally starting to work its way into more muscle than fat. Guess it's true that when you spend all your time in the kitchen it just puts you off food. He's gonna have to watch it or else we'll have to come up with a new nick-name for him. Wanda almost grinned as she turned into the kitchen and inhaled the heavenly smells of Thanksgiving.
The snow crunched lightly under Todd's feet as he bounded around the backyard. It might be Thanksgiving, but Mortimer still wanted him to run through his training routine. It wasn't as bad as Todd had thought it was going to be. He was alone in the backyard for a change, so he goofed off a little as he ran through his drills. A little backflip here and another one there helped to break up the routine a little. The weights on his arms and legs weren't really an issue for Todd anymore; something which had actually surprised the young mutant when he had realized it earlier in the day. He knew Mortimer had another set set up for him and probably the same for Pietro. After all, if he had been doing this well with his extra forty pounds, then Pietro couldn't possibly be having that much trouble with his.
Looking up at the second floor of the bording house, Todd saw Wanda's shadow against the shade. For a moment Todd wondered what she might be doing up there. She'd finished the decorations for the table before he and Mortimer had gotten back from their little... ninja mission and had shut herself in her room since then. Hopping on the now rusted washing machine, Todd paused a moment and sighed.
It wasn't much of a secret that Todd had harbored a crush on Wanda since the day the old Mystique had brought her into the Brotherhood. Well, at least since Todd realized that Wanda was much more likely to send Pietro into a wall with Hex Bolt than him. Todd let out a soft sigh and rested his chin on his palm. Bad, beautiful and so fucking untouchable. A scowl crossed Todd's face. Wanda was somewhat close to Mystique, but that probably had something more to do with the fact that they were the only two females in the bording house. She was getting close with Pietro, but then again, they were siblings and siblings were supposed to be close like that, weren't they? Todd supposed so. After all, Nightcrawler and Rogue were pretty close and they weren't even blood relatives.
Then there was Mathews...
Well, at least she was even more untouchable for him than she was for Todd. That thought brought him some small sense of satisfaction, at least.
That and the fact that he and Pietro had been planning various ways of shaking down the quarterback without getting themselves kicked out of school. Pietro had been quick to point out that they could get away with just about anything as long as it wasn't on school grounds and it didn't result in any outright threats or harm to Duncan. Just enough to... get the point across.
Ooooooh boy, but was that ever tempting.
And the fact that Pietro was more than willing to include Todd in the plan just made it that much more delicious.
A sudden shiver down his spine jolted Todd back into hyperkenetic activity. He wasn't really amphibious... he didn't think so anyway... but he sure could get pretty damn cold in a hurry. Probably had something to do with lack of body hair and body fat. After a quick moment of thought, Todd decided to head into the kitchen. At the moment that was the warmest room in the house, outside of the basement where the boiler was. He sprang into the kitchen just as Wanda slid in. Todd grinned.
"Hey, Sweety!"
*ZAPP!*
A split second later and Todd found himself upside down against the door to the outside. He looked up to see Freddy standing over him with a exasperated look on his face. Grabbind Todd's belt, he hoisted his smaller friend up and set him on the counter as Wanda slipped back out of the room, a stolen cookie in her hand.
"You still after her, Todd?" Freddy asked.
"Heh... Sure!"
Freddy just shook his head. "Man, you're a glutton for punishment or something."
Todd used his tongue quickly to snag a cookie off the same plate that Wanda's had been on. "Yeah, well, I figure I'm makin' progress. She hasn't knocked me down the stairs in over two months." Todd pointed out thoughtfully.
"Not that having a ton of homework and daily drills would have had anything to do with that?"
"Totally unrelated, yo!"
Freddy just rolled his eyes again in a 'whatever-you-say' kinda way. Todd shot him another grin and hopped out into the living room.
Freddy had been in the kitchen for the better part of the day. While he would normally take any opportunity to sleep in, today was different. Thanksgiving - and this was going to be the best Thanksgiving that any of them would have ever had. Well, at least for Lance, Todd and himself. Wanda and Pietro never really talked about their past and the same went for Mystique and Mort.
Mystique had fully embraced the idea of a big Thanksgiving for the Brotherhood. Mystique actually seemed to like anything that would promote a sense of family. She had spent a good couple of hours the previous day at the store getting everything that they would need. Of course, Lance had needed to go get a few things that they had forgotten, but most everything had been ready. And everyone was more than happy to let Freddy take care of the meal. For some reason it had surprised them all when they learned that he had a flair for the culinary arts. Apparently the idea that Freddy could cook as well as eat hadn't ever crossed their minds.
'Course I don't see what's so weird about it, Freddy thought to himself, When you rely on yourself for just about everything, you have to be able to take care of yourself.
Of course Freddy supposed that the fact that he had worked in a traveling show before coming to Bayville had something to do with that. While it was true that the show tended to leave him a little tired afterwords, he had actually kept his fast food consumption to a minimum. Stuff like that used up his small paycheck from the show far too quickly. In the long run it was much easier and cheaper to make his own meals.
The others had been coming into check up on the dinner's progress all day. Todd and Mystique had been the most frequent visitors. Mystique liked to make sure things were always going to plans, Todd was just eager to see his first full-fledged Thanksgiving dinner come together. Todd had never outright mentioned it to anyone, but Freddy got the idea that this was probably going to be a first for the younger teen.
Of course, Todd could just be trying to sneak food ahead of dinner time.
When he thought about it, the whole situation seemed a little surreal to Freddy. His life was nearly normal, really for the first time in his life. There hadn't been any fights with the X-Men and Gambit hadn't been snooping around for Magneto, and Princpal Kelly had even been off the Brotherhood's collective back for the first time since they'd been exposed as mutants. That probably had something to do with Mystique. She usually seemed to take care of that sort of thing for them. On the whole, it was hard to resist the urge to brace for an inevitable catastrophy to ruin the day. Somewhere in the back of his mind, Freddy wondered if this was what being an X-Man was like. Well, being an X-Man but minus all the goody-two-shoes crap.
Freddy checked the turkey one more time before deciding that it was finally done. Taking it out of the oven, he carefully arranged it on the serving plate and dressed it. When he was finally satisfied with the final product, Freddy left the kitchen to check out Pietro's progress in the dining room. To his slight surprise, the whole job wasn't finished. It looked like Pietro had actually decided to do something at normal speed. Somewhat surprising, but Freddy shrugged it off. Probably Wanda's idea. "Hey, Pietro," Freddy made his presence known to the other teen, "you about ready? I can serve as soon as the table's set."
Pietro's face split into a grin. "I think I can hurry up for that! Give me a minute and it's all yours, big guy." Freddy barely had time to step out of the doorway before he felt the stiff breeze that showed that Pietro was back moving at full speed to finish up the table. He didn't stick around to see the end results of Pietro's work, after all, he'd be back in a few minutes with the food.
"Hey, Freddy! Hey, Freddy!" Todd hopped up behind him and jumped up on the larger mutant's shoulder. "Just saw Pietro zippin' around. Does that mean dinner's almost ready?"
"Yeah, just got to get the food on the table."
"Alright! I'm gonna eat until I throw up!"
"Is anyone at this table particuarly religious?" Mystique asked from her position at the head of the table. When she was greated with a host of blank stares, she smiled a 'thought-so' smile. "In that case, we'll forgo any sort of grace before dinner. But before ravishing this wonderful meal, let's all give Freddy a round of applause for all his hard work and for everyone else for helping."
A chorus of cheers and whoots went up around the table.
"But I'm afraid I wouldn't be a very good den mother if I didn't insist that we each say something profound or sappy before we dig in." Mystique waved her hand in a careless gesture. "Anyone want to volunteer to start?"
"Sure, I'm just glad to be out of that friggin' nut house." Wanda said, crossing her arms over her chest. "I am not.. repeat not going to set foot in another mental facility as long as I live."
"Short, sweet, too the point." Mystique smiled. "Who's next?"
"Having a real home for the past year's been one of the best things I've ever had happen to me." Freddy said. "I haven't actually had a single place to call home for real since I was about eleven."
"Man, I'm thankful for the food, yo!" Todd's face was as bright as a Christmas tree. "I ain't ever seen a spread like this! And I mean ever!"
"Wonderfully insightful, Todd." Wanda gave him a sarcastic smile.
"Now, now," Mortimer gave a mock-stern warning from his end of the table, "you can't expect the lad to come up with something like that right now. After all, we're celebrating a day when the whole bloody point seems to gorge yourself on a ruddy bird. God bless America!"
"I'm just happy to be at a Thanksgiving meal with something that is actually like a family." Lance cut in. "I relate better to everyone here than I ever did with anyone who was actually related to me. Not to mention that this is a hell of a lot better than anything I had at home as far as food. Freddy, you'd better be careful or else you'll wind up as the offical cook of the Brotherhood."
Freddy looked a bit embarassed at the flood of complements. "It's nothin', guys. I like cooking and actually keeps me from eating a lot of it."
Todd's jaw dropped. "Woah, Freddy not eating? Kinda freaky... Like... like..."
"Like Todd bathing." Pietro said with a sarcastic grin.
"Or Pietro not being a git." Todd shot back.
"Bless! He said his first word!" Mortimer shot up in his seat. The others looked like him like he had grown another head.
"Um, Mortimer, dear, Todd has been speaking for quite a while now." Mystique pointed out.
"But this was his first proper British word!" Mortimer protested. "Did you hear that? Just like a born limey. Where's my CD with Hail Britannia?"
"Man-child." Mystique shook her head with an amused smile spread across her face. "Now how about you, Pietro?"
Pietro blushed a little and shifted akwardly in his seat. While he usually had no problem with the spotlight being on him, it was really... unfamiliar in the family-like atmosphere that had been created in the dining room. "Um... I just wanted to say that I'm thankful for second chances. This year I've been lucky enough to get two of them. I threw away my first chance with the Brotherhood without thinking about what would happen to the rest of you. I stood by when I was little and didn't say anything when Magneto put Wanda into that institution. But now I wouldn't trade any of you guys for another shot at the Acolytes or anything else, and getting another shot at being a brother to my sister has been more than I could have hoped for."
A silence fell over the entire room and Pietro continued to fidget slightly. Finally, Lance broke the quiet. "Man, I almost feel guilty about the hazing now..."
Pietro's head snapped up. "Hazing?! What hazing?"
Lance's managed a somewhat sheepish grin. "Well, after you kinda... Um..."
"Screwed us royaly?" Todd offered.
"Yeah, screwed us royaly, we decided that it might be just a little way to even things out again."
Wanda arched her eyebrow. "Please tell me that's not what those robes that arrived the other day were for."
"Robes?" Pietro was starting to look confused.
"Yeah, robes. Ever see Animal House?" Lance laughed.
Pietro gritted his teeth. "If it wasn't for the fact that I know that on some base level I really deserve it..." he managed to get out.
"They're monogramed and everything, Pietro!" Todd laughed. "This is gonna be fun!"
"Yeah, yeah, eat now, haze later. Let's eat that bloody bird before it gets cold." Mortimer growled. It was enough of a growl to get the teens' attention, but still warm enough to help everyone settle back into a more holiday spirit. And then they followed Mortimer's instructions to the letter. In less than an hour, there was little to nothing left of the fatastic feast that was the Brotherhood's first real Thanksgiving.
A new kind of quiet had decended over the bording house as its residents slowly went their separate ways after the meal. Todd and Lance had offered to clean the kitchen since Freddy had done all of the day's cooking, but Freddy had insisted on at least keeping them company. Wanda and Pietro had gone off to talk some more, leaving Mystique and Mortimer on the porch. Mystique was sitting on the railing, enjoying the cool air of the night. Mortimer was wrapped up in several layers and obviously not enjoying the weather nearly as much.
"Today was good for them." Mystique said quietly after a few minutes of silence. Mortimer nodded in agreement, then looked over at her with his large yellow eyes.
"But you're thinking 'what's next year going to be like?', aren't you?"
Nodding slightly, Mystique sighed. "They're still young. They've done so much, but they're still young."
"So were we."
"But we had Eric."
"And they have you."
Mystique looked down from her perch. "I'm hardly Erik, Mortimer." A smile played at her lips.
Mortimer caught it. "Got that, luv. I love the man like me father, but I've no desire to see him prancing around in the buff."
"Ahhhh.... So you do realize that I run around naked!"
"Oh bloody... You're impossible, woman!"
"As if you'd have me any other way.
"Haven't had you any way."
"Not for my lack of trying."
"..."
Mortimer suddenly got quiet. The light was dim, and Mortimer's complexion made a blush hard to see in the best of conditions. Mystique slipped off the railing and lay a hand on Mortimer's shoulder, who stiffened under it.
Stiffened, but didn't flinch.
Mystique smiled. She had things she was thankful for too. The strong body that stood next to her in the frosty night air was just one of the most precious.