(An: Sooooo sorry this was so late but my brain skipped. I have the attention span of a gnat so I have problems concentrating on a story for more then a week. And I had to tweak and tweak and tweak this chappy until I was happy with it. Oh yes... and Sinister has an image inducer. I finally found a -good- Sinister bio so now I understand his powers. You may've noticed that I cut the pairings list and changed the genre; well that's because I'm going to make this into a series folks; yes, an infamous Skysong trilogy's in the works.)

"Go fetch the gas," said Mr. Sinister.

The mute did as he was told, and was about to throw it when Sinister stopped him.

"Don't. Not yet. I want to see how they cope."

-

Logan and Sam, the closest to Rahne, helped her shift the rock off her foot. "Ow," Rahne whispered.

Logan inspected it for a second. "Broken," he pronounced.

"This isn't good," said Sam.

"And ye just figured that out?" Rahne snapped, trying to shift her foot.

Kurt, Kitty, and Rogue had been watching this in a stunned silence.

"What are we supposed to do now?" Kurt asked.

"A question for the ages," said Rogue.

"Is anyone else completely confused by this?" Remy asked.

Kurt put a companionable arm around Remy's shoulders. "Get used to it, mein fruend," he said, tone longsuffering. "You're pretty much an X-man now, and for us, confusion is a constant state of being."

"Like, amen to that," said Kitty.

Remy gave Kurt a slow nod while backing out of his hold. He was smiling, but it was the kind of smile you'd give an escaped mental patient.

"I think a better question is 'where are we?'" said Sam.

"Dat's easy," Remy said, looking relieved to have something he could explain. "We're two miles out o' N'Awlins, and maybe... two miles down."

"Ok, so yah're expectin' us to believe we went down just outside there and hit rock?" said Rogue, tapping the side of the hole.

"It's not rock," Remy objected. "It's really, really hardpacked dirt. Dere're crevices like dis all 'round here, but usually dey filled with water. But it hasn't rained in a while..." Remy shrugged.

"Do ya look this all up or somethin'?" asked Rogue, eyebrow raised.

Remy nodded, and held up a finger. "Rule number one, chere, know y'r surroundin's."

"And those would be rules of...?"

"Thievin', o' course," Remy replied, a faint smirk on his face.

Rogue rolled her eyes but shut up.

"So den, what're y'all's powers?" Remy asked, leaning against the side of the hole.

"And ya care... why?" Rogue asked.

"Rule number two: know y'r assets," said Remy.

"What makes you think we're anythin' special, anyway?" Rahne asked.

Remy raised his eyebrows. "Besides all the weird t'ings I've seen y' do? Y'all're runnin' around in spandex, for one t'ing, like cut-rate superheroes."

"Well, that's a new way to refer to us," said Kurt. Kitty nodded fervently.

"Besides, I assume dat if I come with you and become an 'X-man,' wouldn't dat mean I'd find out anyway?"

"You know, he's got a point," said Kurt.

Rogue nudged Logan. "It's so your turn to do the explainin'."

Logan rolled his eyes and rattled off the present members powers. "I ain't goin' into detail about the other New Mutants, or Scooter, Red, or Porcupine."

"All right, den," said Remy, nodding, and once again wearing the escaped-mental-patient smile.

Logan, having dealt with that, returned to the problem of getting out. He let out his claws and stuck his claws into the hard-packed dirt.

"If y're t'inkin' of climbin', don' bother," said Remy. "Up higher, it's so much mud and roots. Dat's why we're down here in de first place."

Logan pulled his claws out of the dirt and retracted them.

"Can't you just bamf us out?" Sam asked Kurt.

He snorted. "Are you kidding me? Two people, one mile up, maybe. But six? I can't teleport six people two feet."

"Well," said Rogue, "if we can't get out ourselves, we'll have to call for backup."

Logan rolled his eyes but pulled out the cell-phone like communicator (a la X-2). He muttered something into it, then closed it with a snap.

"So?" said Rogue.

"Nobody's there," Logan replied. "I left the coordinates, so now we gotta wait."

-

"Now you can throw it," said Mr. Sinister. "They're trying to contact someone."

The mute dropped the little canister down the hole.

Down there, the small group of mutants passed out as the gas spread out.

Mr. Sinister smirked, feeling very pleased. A few more mutants came out of the jet and got the unconscious X-men into it.

"I just love it when everything goes according to plan," Sinister murmured as he stepped aboard the jet himself.

(Another one of those iffy chapters. I can't promise the next chapter will be out tomorrow but if it's not then the next two (and last) chapters will be out on Tuesday. I'm being dragged along for a family Christmas party. If I survive, it will be out. If I don't... none of you are in my will.)