Disclaimer: Do I really have to tell everyone that I don't own the X-Men? Doesn't the world already know the truth? I DON'T OWN THEM! I'm sorry. I didn't mean to shout and make a big fuss. Snarf. (You'll be hearing this sacred word a lot in my presence). Anyway, this is the chapter where. FOOLED YOU!!!!!!! You thought I was going to tell you what happened. WELL, YOU WERE WRONG!!! Don't be lazy. Just read. And enjoy. If you don't enjoy, then you're just wasting your time. That doesn't mean don't read it though. I'm just rambling. I'll stop.
Brad Kilburne looked around the Brotherhood's headquarters. It sure didn't look like paradise, but it looked alright. He saw quite a few mutants scattered around the room.
"Pietro!" Magneto called across the room, "Locust!"
A blur shot across the room to halt in front of Brad. He was rather thin and had silvery hair.
"I'm Pietro," he said quickly, "also known as Quicksilver."
Another strange character scuttled up to them. He was crouching on the ground and seemed to have a permanent evil grin on his face.
"Dean Palmer," he said as he held out his hand, "but everyone calls me Locust."
"Show Brad where he will be sleeping," said Magneto.
"Right, follow me," instructed Pietro.
Pietro led him to one side of the huge room he was in. There were many doors lined up on the wall.
"You sleep in room 8K," Locust pointed to one of the doors, "Nate sleeps here too."
"Come on," said Pietro, "We'll introduce you to everyone."
They walked over to a large table where a bunch of people were playing cards.
"Hold it, Remy," said Pietro, "Don't deal yet."
One of the guys looked over at them.
"What do you want?" he asked as he stared at them through red eyes.
"Just giving some introductions," said Pietro, "Now, let me begin. The dealer is Remy LeBeau or Gambit, to his right we have your roommate, Nate Coyler or Pillbug, the tub of lard to his right is Freddy Dukes or Blob, moving along to the other end of the table is our pasty friend Ralph Smith or as you may have guessed, Paste, where was I, oh yeah, to his right you see the disturbing one called Lance Alvers or Avalanche and finally, I believe you already met Todd or Toad."
Brad stared at Pietro, amazed. Pietro hadn't taken a breath throughout the whole set of introductions.
"This is Brad Kilburne or Zombie," finished Pietro with a bow, "You may continue."
"Oh, may I?" asked Gambit sarcastically.
Brad followed Pietro and Locust to another place in the middle of the room. There was an assortment of armchairs. All of them had chunks missing and a few had springs popping out of the sides. The armchairs were in an arc around a TV. Pietro snatched the remote from the armchair closest to him and shut the TV off. Everyone in the armchairs turned to look at Pietro. Most of them gave him dirty looks.
"Excuse me, Hooded Brothers," Pietro began again, "It's time to meet new people."
"Shut up, Pietro," mumbled a guy with light brown hair.
"Don't burn your marshmallows," said Pietro, "how should I begin, ah, yes, the impudent little brat on the left end is John Allerdyce or Pyro, to his right is your good friend Sabretooth, moving to your right the grumpy-looking guy is Dan Rivers or Hammerhead, nasty temper they've got, oh, right, next we have a bad dream, literally, although he's called Steve Lennox or Nightmare, by the way what's with that purple hair?, oh, and at the other end, the winged, needlenose guy with the goggley glasses is Eddie Sullivan or Mosquito, parenthetically this is Brad Kilburne or Zombie."
Pietro tossed the remote to Sabretooth who turned the TV back on.
"I hate this show," said Mosquito in a nasal sounding English accent.
"Don't fret, mate," said Pyro in an Australian accent, "the show's almost over, anyway."
"Sabretooth, Gambit, Mystique, Massacre," Magneto called from the exit to the headquarters.
The four mutants approached Magneto from different sides.
"It is time to watch Charles and his feeble attempt to save the mutant he is looking for,"
"I got a question about that," said Massacre in a gangster voice, "Won't he get there before us and get the mutant so that you can't recruit it?"
"Charles thinks that I want to recruit the mutant that he is looking for," Magneto said with a smirk, "Charles is wasting his time. His target is slightly insane. It would be too difficult to have someone like that in the Brotherhood."
When he was finished explaining, Magneto gestured for his four, highest-ranking mutants to follow him.
The Blackbird landed in a clearing a short way from its destination. Cyclops exited the jet and looked around.
"Looks like the coast is clear," he called to the jet.
Jean Grey followed by Logan and Storm walked down the ramp of the jet.
"Find the mutant and bring him back to the jet," instructed Professor Xavier from the top of the ramp, "Tom will stay with me."
An extremely tall mutant with huge hands stood next to Xavier. He cracked his knuckles as if to scare any spies away. The other four mutants set off towards their destination. Eventually, they came to a large cave with half of a torn banner on the top that said 'Welcome to the Grand Ope'. The banner was ripped at 'Ope'.
"I guess he's in there," suggested Cyclops.
"Good thinking, genius," remarked Logan.
"Don't start with that," said Jean.
"Come on, let's go in," said Storm.
The inside of the cave was full of all sorts of strange things. Cyclops picked up an old toaster while Jean examined a silver statue of a squirrel.
"You think he has enough stuff?" asked Logan as he pulled a string of Christmas lights out from under a hot pink bowling ball and a towel rack.
"Wait," said Storm, "Listen."
The sound of faint footsteps was getting louder from inside the cavern.
"Hello?" called Jean. The footsteps stopped.
"Who could it be?" said a slightly raspy voice to itself, "Never gets visitors,"
They watched as a shadowy figure crawled into view on the wall. It jumped off of the wall and landed in front of Cyclops. The figure was wearing a huge, unbuttoned overcoat with lots of pockets. What little light came from outside the cave showed that the man had shadows under his eyes and shoulder length hair. A long, rat tail protruded from behind him.
"Mine!" he snapped and snatched the toaster from Cyclops' hands.
"Sir, we need to talk to you," Jean started.
"Touching my toast maker," said the strange man, stroking the toaster, "rude snobbies coming to loot Brine's mansion, up to no good."
"He's insane," said Cyclops, astounded.
"Can you tell us your name?" Jean asked slowly. Brine threw the toaster aside and picked up a doorknob.
"Slippy knobbles this is," he said, apparently forgetting they were there.
"What is your name?" Jean repeated. Brine looked at them as if they had just come in.
"What do you want from poor Brine?" he said mournfully, "Brine has stole nothing from nobody."
"We want to know your name," Jean said for the third time.
"Brine," he said, "Brine Crillow."
"Brine?" said Logan, rudely.
"No!" snapped Brine, "BRINE!"
Logan gave him a very strange look.
"Brian?" asked Jean, who had simply read his mind.
"Yes," the creature said smiling, "Brine."
"I think we came after the wrong mutant," said Cyclops.
"He's like a packrat," said Logan, looking around again.
"What?" Brian exclaimed, "What is you calling Brine? Packing Rat? Brine likes it!"
"We've come to help you," said Jean.
"Help what?" asked Packrat as he uncovered an old accordion, "Brine is in no troubles."
"Yes you are," said Jean, "There is a mutant called Magneto coming to take you to his lair."
Packrat smiled again revealing pointed teeth, "That is nonsenseness. Nobody can find Brine's hidden castle."
Cyclops looked around as if to make sure it wasn't a castle. Logan snorted. Packrat began looking at a butterfly net with a long bamboo handle.
"Packrat," said Storm seriously, "You must come back with us or you could get dreadfully hurt."
"Aha!" Packrat shouted, "You are plotting to hurt poor Brine!"
"No, no," said Jean quickly as Packrat armed himself with a boomerang, a broken dart, and a spatula, "We want to save you from the person who wants to hurt you."
Packrat looked at Logan and held the spatula in his tail threateningly. Jean noticed this quickly.
"No, Logan doesn't want to hurt you," she said reassuringly, "He is our friend."
"How about this, Brine," said Logan, "You can bring all your, uh, treasures with you."
"Thinks about this Brine must," Packrat said, "Brine gets to keep all his treasures, you says?"
"Yes," assured Jean.
"Brine accepts your wonderfulous offer!" Packrat said excitedly, "But first you must let Brine go packratting all his treasures!"
"Was that really a good idea?" asked Cyclops as he watched Packrat stuff a hamster wheel and a Cheerios box full of marbles into an old suitcase.
"This was where Professor Xavier sent us," Jean said, "He wouldn't have sent us here if he didn't want to save this mutant."
Everyone helped carry Packrat's piles of "treasures" to the Blackbird. They loaded it all into the cargo area and walked up the ramp.
"We've had a little visit," said Xavier as they entered and Packrat looked around.
"From who?" asked Storm suspiciously.
"Magneto," said Xavier.
Cyclops and Jean exchanged looks while Storm gasped and Logan mumbled something to himself. Packrat just sniffed one of the seats.
"Magneto has informed me that the mutant you have acquired is not one of his targets," Xavier explained.
"I knew it!" raged Logan, "We just gave Magneto a day off."
"Calm down, Logan," warned Xavier, "My feelings tell me that Packrat is not completely useless."
"So what do we do now?" asked Cyclops.
"I believe Magneto will be going after another mutant tomorrow," said Charles, "We must go back to the Institute so that I can search for him with Cerebro."
"The sooner the better," mumbled Logan.
Lance Alvers dealt another hand in the absence of Gambit. Brad had joined their game.
"Agh!" Toad shouted, "I never get good cards! I fold! No! Wait! I quit!"
Toad left the table in a fury to go watch TV.
"I bet five bucks," said Lance as if Toad was never there.
"I'll see your five bucks," Pillbug said in an annoying tour guide voice, "And I'll raise you five more."
"I fold," said Blob through a mouthful of pizza.
"Same here," said Paste, "I don't have that kind of money,"
"Then why do you play?" asked Lance.
"Uh," Paste frowned.
"How about you Zombie?" Lance asked Brad, "Are you in?"
"No," said Brad.
"Well, I'm in," said Lance proudly, "I'm not afraid to put my money at risk."
Pillbug snickered as he showed Lance a straight flush. Everyone else but Lance also had a nice laugh. Pillbug's winning hand had made Lance's previous statement sound rather stupid.
"Unless you want to waste some more of your money," Pillbug said, "I'm going to bed."
No one else wanted to waste anymore money so they all walked to their rooms.
"Don't even think about robbing me," threatened Pillbug in his terribly annoying voice, "or I'll make sure you get permanent brain damage."
Brad was pretty sure Pillbug wasn't kidding. He didn't want to rob Pillbug in the first place. Brad rolled over in bed. It was surprisingly comfortable. He figured the beds were probably stolen. It didn't matter to him, though. He fell asleep.