Disclaimer: If X-Men were mine, then the world would have ended already from kids being brainwashed by the program. Not really, but the thought is cool.
Rogue and Ali didn't talk for the next few days. Ali just went to training sessions, went to school, and slept. That was all that she did, because to her, nothing else mattered. Kitty and Kurt left Ali alone. They knew that she needed space so that she could get over the murder of her parents, and so gladly let her have it. It wasn't that they hated her, but they knew how badly it had affected her, just by what Rogue told them about Ali's behavior.
The next day left everyone bored to death after school, including Kurt, who for once, didn't want to splurge on Gutbombs or do anything else.
"This is, like, so boring," Kitty complained as she sat on the couch, glaring at the TV. Nothing was on, except for stupid infomercials. Rogue sat slumped in her own chair, thinking of anything and everything that she could do to rid them all of boredom.
"Still nothing on TV?" Scott asked as he walked into the room.
"No," Kurt groaned, tossing the remote over the couch from his position on the floor.
Scott sighed and turned on his heel, leaving the three to their own thoughts.
Suddenly, Bobby, Jubilee, Ray, and Amara ran into the room, laughing and yelling.
"That was such a sweet trick you pulled on Logan, Bobby!" Amara yelled through her giggles.
"Yeah, I didn't think you could pull it off," Jubilee added.
Bobby grinned. "Well, I had some help, thanks to Ray," he replied.
"ICE CUBE!" screamed a voice filled with rage.
Rogue, Kitty, and Kurt immediately bolted out of the room, knowing that they did not want to see the others get busted. It was going to be ugly.
Outside, they found Ali, who was charging and un-charging her fists and staring off into space. A breeze suddenly started up, kicking her brown-red hair back.
"Ali?" asked Kurt unsurely.
Ali looked back, a bit surprised to see him there. "Hey Kurt," she called, smiling a bit. "You scared me. I didn't hear you guys come out."
Kurt breathed a sigh of relief. At least now they could talk to her. He had, personally, thought that she would yell at him for disturbing her peace and quiet. He was thankful that she hadn't.
The other three mutants quickly joined Ali over by the stone bench that she was sitting on. They talked as if they had all week, laughing about antics at school, joking around with each other, and just plain having fun.
Rogue sighed closed her eyes. She leaned her head back to bask in the last few rays of the sun before it passed beyond the horizon.
"It's so warm out here," Kitty cooed, leaning back in the soft grass.
Ali nodded, a smile gracing her face.
"You girls are so boring," Kurt said. "All you vant to do is talk about how nice it is outside. Don't you vant to do anything else?"
The three girls shook their heads innocently, still smiling.
"I'm out of here, zen," Kurt replied, shaking his head disappointedly. With that, he ported away, leaving a stench of brimstone behind.
Kitty coughed. "I hate that smell," she commented.
Rogue and Ali nodded in agreement. Far past sundown, they sat outside in the warmth talking about this and that. They went inside for dinner around seven o' clock, where they found out that for his prank, Bobby had earned himself and Ray a week of Logan Sessions and they had to scrub down the Blackbird (with Logan's supervision, of course).
Everyone (with the exception of Bobby and Ray, understandably) went to bed a lot happier than they had in a long time.
**
Saturday that week started out boring. Everyone slept in late, until twelve, in Kurt's case. Then Rogue, Kitty, Jean, and Ali left for the mall around noon to do some shopping.
"Look at this cute top!" squealed Kitty in one of the stores. She held in her hand a bright pink halter-top.
Jean nodded her approval. "That is cute," she commented.
"It would, like, totally look good on Ali, don't you think?" Kitty pressed.
Jean grinned. "Yeah, it would."
Ali began to back up. Her standard gray color t-shirt this time held a Linkin Park symbol. "No way. I do NOT wear pink. That's is one of my rules," she stated firmly.
"Oh, come on!" begged Kitty. "You'd totally attract all the guys!"
"What if I don't want to attract any guys?" Ali retorted.
Kitty groaned. "How could you not want to get a boyfriend!" she cried.
Ali shrugged. "Pretty easily," she replied. "But the point is, I'm not wearing that or buying it. You can get it, Kitty, but I won't."
Kitty stuck her lip out in a pout and turned around to talk with Jean.
Rogue grabbed Ali's arm and pulled her from the store. Kitty and Jean wouldn't mind. Rogue and Ali had different styles than the other girls, and the two would understand.
Rogue pulled Ali into another shop, where Ali found exactly what she wanted: gray t-shirts, red, blue, with prints of music groups, movies, everything. Rogue looked through the racks, not really into any of the clothes. She didn't like to go shopping a lot. Most of the clothes out these days showed too much skin, and with her, that could be deadly. So instead, she stuck with the clothes that she had picked out previously, deciding that they were safe enough and perfect to wear.
The two left the store later, deeming all the clothes 'too expensive for my budget'.
That was when they ran into trouble.
"Well, chere, we meet again," said a Cajun voice from behind them.
"Sheila! Who knew we'd meet again so soon!"
Rogue's eyes widened. She and Ali whirled around only to see Gambit and John Alderdyce standing behind them with another tall, broad man.
"You know the other femme, John?" asked the Cajun.
John nodded. "She and I ran into each other the other day. 'Bout a week ago, if I'm correct."
Rogue turned to Ali. "You know Pyro?" she asked, shocked.
Ali nodded slowly. "If you mean John, then yeah," she replied.
"Chere, feel like doin' Remy a favor?" interrupted the Cajun with a grin.
Rogue glared at him. "Nevah. Not after what happened in New Orleans. Kidnappin' me and all," she said, her voice edged with anger.
"Chere--"
"Don't call me 'chere'!" Rogue yelled angrily. "Now get away, Swamp Rat."
But the man, Remy, didn't move. Ali stood off to the side, and was quickly joined by John.
"So how you doin', sheila?" he asked.
Ali shrugged. "I'm doing alright, I suppose," she replied.
John nodded. "Sounds good."
"Yeah."
The two lapsed into silence as they watched Rogue and Remy fight. Actually, it was more like Rogue yelling at Remy, who was enjoying seeing her angry.
"Does Remy always like getting Rogue mad like this?" Ali asked suddenly.
John grinned. "He only does it cause he thinks she's cute when she's mad—especially at him."
Ali shook her head. "Unbelievable," she muttered.
John's grin widened.
"Ali, that's it! We're goin' back to the Institute!" Rogue shrieked.
Ali nodded, knowing that it was not wise to argue with Rogue when she was angry like this. Just as she was leaving, John grabbed her arm.
"You live at the Xavier Institute?" he asked.
Ali nodded. "Yeah. Why?"
John lowered his voice. "Then that must mean that you're a mutant," he whispered.
Ali jerked her arm back, too shocked to speak. How did this guy know what she was? This was not good. Who knew what was going to happen now.
"No, no, it's just that," John explained, "I'm one, too."
Ali calmed down. "You are?" she asked.
John nodded. "I'm a pyrokinetic. That means I like fire," he explained with a grin.
Ali smiled weakly. She was just about to ask him why he wasn't at the institute when Rogue yelled at her.
"Jean and Kitty are headin' this way! If they see you talking to him, they'll kill ya!" she warned Ali.
Ali nodded. "Alright," she called back. She turned to John and smiled. "I'll see ya around, Alderdyce," she said, then turned to around and hurried away.
Suddenly, something occurred to him: Magneto would be interested in knowing about Xavier's newest recruit.
**
Rogue groaned. "Ah hate that Swamp Rat," she growled.
Ali turned to Rogue. "Why do you hate him so much?" she asked curiously.
Rogue groaned. "Long story short, he kidnapped meh and lied to meh to fulfill his own wishes," she grumbled.
Ali nodded.
Suddenly, Rogue slammed her hand onto the back of Ali's head.
"OW! What was that for?" Ali complained, rubbing the back of her head gingerly.
"For not telling meh about John. Tell meh next time, got it?" she ordered.
Ali glared at her friend. "Got it," she muttered.
Jean and Kitty came up to them, each holding a shopping bag in each hand.
"Hey, why didn't you two buy anything?" Kitty asked.
Ali and Rogue shrugged. "Everything was too expensive," Ali supplied for them both.
Rogue nodded quickly to affirm the truth to their friends. If they found out about them meeting the two Acolyte boys, neither would be pleased. And if Logan found out…
That wouldn't be pretty at all.
They drove back to the institute, where the girls dropped off their shopping bags and decided to take a break. Everything was going relatively well—until the professor came in.
"The Brotherhood are tearing up a restaurant," he announced. "We need to stop them before they hurt anyone."
There were a few nods around the rec room. Then the professor turned to Ali. "You should probably come too, Ali," he added.
Ali pulled on her trainee uniform and raced to the X-Van with Rogue and Kitty. The van tore down the backstreets towards the restaurant. Rogue reassured Ali that everything would be all right, but Ali worried that she might create a repeat of what happened to Pietro once. Or cause something even worse.
The X-Men burst into the now-evacuated building, only to find Blob gorging on the food in the kitchen, Lance creating deep cracks and ridges in the floor, and Pietro raced around the room, giving it what he called "a makeover".
Jean lifted Pietro up with her telekinesis, allowing Scott to quickly shoot him with his optic blasts, sending him sailing into the wall.
Rogue quickly took out Lance by sneaking up behind him (with Kitty's help) and touching his face with her hand. He was out cold in an instant.
Kurt, after wrestling intensely with Toad, caught hold of Toad's tongue and slammed it in a door, causing the mutant to scream and yelp for help. Ali touched his head lightly with a charged finger, sending jolts through his nimble body. He stopped struggling right after she removed her finger.
Suddenly, Blob lifted Ali up from behind, holding her as far away as he could. "That was a bad move," he commented slowly with an evil grin. Ali struggled in his iron grip, twisting and squirming to try and escape. But her attempts were vain, for in the end, she was still stuck in his enormous hands.
"You better let go of her now, bub," commented Logan's voice, which was deathly calm. Not a good sign. When he was that calm, he was actually pissed. When he was pissed, he was more dangerous than usual.
Blob grinned. "I'd like to see you make me," he replied.
Logan suddenly leapt forward, his claws outstretched towards the giant. Suddenly, Blob moved Ali in front of him, using her as a human shield. She scrunched her eyes shut quickly, afraid to see death rushing towards her.
Logan quickly retracted his claws, finding that he could do nothing. Blob then swung out his fist, knocking the much smaller man backwards. Scott suddenly shot one of his optic blasts at Blob.
The large teenager spotted the blasts out of the corner of his eyes and turned towards Cyclops, Ali in front of him. The energy beams slammed into Ali's stomach, sending sharp needles of pain throughout her body. She gave a cry of pain, her eyes shut tight.
Suddenly, her eyes shot open, and her body charged with energy. The electricity quickly traveled from her body to Blob's, shocking him only slightly. That was, until the voltage increased. Then he was wishing dearly that he could drop her, but because of the connection of electricity between the two, he was incapable of letting go, much less budging his hands an inch.
Kitty realized immediately that she had to do something, so she jumped forward, grabbing Ali's arms and pulling her through Blob, cutting of the flow of electricity and saving the two from further injury.
Blob fell backwards onto the ground, out cold. Ali and Kitty appeared through the ground a moment later, Kitty carrying a panting Ali.
"You okay, Spark?" Logan asked.
Ali nodded.
"C'mon, we've gotta get out of here before people start coming back," Scott said.
Everyone nodded and hurried out. Kurt ported Ali to the van and buckled her into the seat. "Thanks, Kurt," she said.
Kurt nodded. "No problem," he replied. "I vish I could have helped save you," he added disappointedly.
Ali smiled weakly. "It's ok, Kurt," she replied. "If we're both lucky, this kind of thing will never happen again."
Kurt smiled and nodded his agreement.
The rest of the X-Men suddenly joined them, scrambling into the van, which promptly shot off towards the institute. The fight had been hard, but had also reminded them that there were some mutants out in the world that wanted humans scared and frightened of them. That only made Professor Xavier's cause more important.
***
hey everyone!! If you're still reading this, then you're a faithful reader indeed, and I thank you so much!! Odd chapter, if I do say so myself. Will try to update within next five days. No school tomorrow, so I'll try to upload another chapter. But I'm having a hard time coming up with things to put in the chapters, so it may take a bit longer. But past tomorrow, I'll have trouble posting, cause I have basketball after school most days, I think. Thursday, at the latest, would be my next posting. Until then, R&R!! I love you all for your reviews!!
~Jojo~