Author's Note: I lied. Well, this chapter was kind of forced, but hey... I was bored, I was tired, and I was sick of waiting for three more reviews. So I kicked back, and wrote.
SHOUT OUTS:
Guin: Thanks a million! But hey...wait a minute. YOU SHOULDN'T BE REVIEWING MY STORY! You should be updating on "Toad Comes Home" #duct tapes Guin to a computer# Heh. WRITE!! NOW!! The cliffy is killing me, here! I see that you have made a guess on the girl in the elevator. Good job, and triple A batteries for your Mort clone. #pat pat pat#
Carmilla: #Sigh# I had a feeling that word didn't go there, but the sentence felt far too empty without a little 'blip' at the end. So I just...had to! Thanks a bunch for the review!
Author's Extended Note: Guin is correct, my little elevator cameo was Tabitha...but I see no one made a guess on Toad's assailant....hmmm.... we'll just have to find out in time, won't we? maniacal laughter
Hmm. I'm still debating whether Tabitha should remain a cameo or not....hmm....we shall see. We shall see....
Chapter Three- Unwelcome Visitors
Xavier took a deep breath, and decided it would be best to get as much sleep as he could. In the morning he would dispatch a team to meet Toynbee, and if necessary, bring him back to the mansion. He was more than a little worried for the man's health.
His choices for the trip were very few. Logan wasn't one likely to negotiate with the former criminal, and with Mortimer's nerves already on edge; he decided it wasn't a good idea to send him.
Scott, he presumed, was going to be out of commission for awhile. It would be cruel to ask him to leave the mansion so soon. Kurt wasn't the type for a reconnaissance mission in the first place, and that left...
"You can't be serious, professor!" the white-haired woman hissed in rage. "He'd be a danger to us, the students...!"
"We have ways of subduing someone such as Toad, Ms. Munroe. You don't have to worry about that. I'm more worried on what he'll do on seeing you."
"Then why don't you send Logan? Or Kurt?"
"Do you think of Logan as the negotiating sort? You may bring Kurt with you if you wish; but he has never been on a mission alone before. Let alone one of this magnitude." Ororo didn't even bother bringing up Scott. What was the point? The professor hadn't let anyone bother him for weeks. The only one to establish some kind of human contact with him was the Wolverine.
She sighed. "I'll take Kurt with me." She said. "Do you have a lock on him, professor?" Charles nodded, and handed her a slip of paper with the Queens address neatly printed on it.
"Don't lose it." He said. "and Godspeed." She nodded, trying to subdue her feelings of rage and hatred. She thought that she had blotted the wretched thing out on Liberty Island.
Apparently not. She swung by the kitchen for something to eat. There was no doubt she was going to have to leave within the hour- and she didn't fancy making the trip on an empty stomach.
She met Kurt there, engaged in an unofficial staring contest with one of the students over the last remaining pint of ice cream. "Kurt...?" she said uncertainly.
"Vat frauline?" he said, looking up at her for a split second. As quick as lightning, the boy's hand darted out and snatched the pint, grinning contentedly. The blue man sighed, and got up, his dark coat rustling.
"Professor Xavier has a mission for us."
"A mission?" he asked smiling, looking in the fridge. "Vat is it zis time?" Ororo smiled. Kurt had definitely loosened up in the weeks of arriving at the mansion.
"We're...on pick up."
"Ah..." he said, biting in to an apple. "Ven are we leaving?"
"As soon as possible." She said. "We should be back today if all goes well."
"May I ask vat we are 'picking up'?" his mouth full of the red fruit.
"Just someone for the professor. Meet me in the hangar in about fifteen minutes. I need to get a few things." She said. Her friend nodded uncertainly, reading the chilly look on her face.
She walked down several flights of stairs, and entered the arsenal. It was the sort of place that made you feel like you were in the center of an action movie- there were row upon row of weapons, knives, swords, pistols, rifles...and her personal favorite. Dart guns.
When meeting Kurt, she didn't have to worry about manipulating the weather- because they were in a very large, open area.
Her instructions were to break in to Toynbee's flat, and 'talk' to him there. She couldn't imagine what a full blown wind storm or a bolt of lightning would do to the other residents; not to mention their property.
She loaded the gun with a mix of tranquilizers and paralyzing darts, and fixed the gun in to her belt, making sure the safety was locked. The last thing she wanted to do was to be shot in the foot, and leave Nightcrawler waiting for six to seven hours. Not a good way to start out a mission.
Toad plopped himself on to his moth-eaten couch, making a silent vow never to leave the bloody flat again. He grabbed his CD player, clamping the headphones over his ears. In the last few moments before falling asleep, he could have sworn he heard someone jimmying his lock, but he quickly put the thought out of his head. It was probably nothing.
Ororo strapped herself in to the Blackbird, her slender fingers striking each switch with practiced ease and knowledge. Kurt sat in the co-pilot's seat, although planned on doing everything but touching the wide array of controls in front of him.
"The person we are being sent to retrieve is possibly armed, and incredibly dangerous. He was formerly in league with Magneto's 'Brotherhood', and has most certainly been in the shadier part of society before that."
"Most certainly?" asked Kurt, looking up from his book momentarily.
"It's been hard to trace him before he reached Magneto. He's very discreet." She said. "His name is Mortimer Toynbee, alias, 'Toad'. He's possibly armed, and most certainly dangerous." And it was because of this statement that when they found Mortimer sleeping serenely on the couch, Kurt could barely stifle his laughter.
Sorry for the short chapter....hehehehe.