Author's Notes: I do not own characters of the X-Men: Evolution or G.I. Joe for they are the respective properties of Marvel Comics and Hasbro/Sunbow Entertainment. The characters of the Misfit-verse, including Althea, Xi, Lina, Blind Master, Trinity, and Malerie Surprise are property of authoress Red Witch, who has graciously lent her fantastic fanon universe for me to write about (thanks Red Witch, you rock!) Also, the Misfit characters, Paul Starr, Jenni Starr, Craig Starr, and Kyle Wildfire are property of author L1701E who've I promised for a cameo with his Starr brothers and friends and who is a wonderful e-mail buddy (thanks again, L1701E!). I also wish to thank Aaron for lending me his Starr character, Jenni Starr for this story! I own the OC Justin Moore/Whitelighter, and I am in no way here to make money off this piece of work, so please for the love of God, don't sue me! I credited everyone! That said, enjoy this one-shot called…
Box Lunch Bruisings
"Remind me again why we're doing this?" Lance groaned as he nicked his thumb for the third time while chopping garlic and carrot, fighting the urge to bemoan and complain.
Althea fought to sigh in irritation as she explained for the umpteenth time while taking the chicken out of the deep fryer, "Because Hawk and Xavier both agreed that this box-lunch charity event will help smooth things over between both the X-Men and Misfits and hopefully lessen the bad feelings between us after what happened with the Phoenix Force and Apokolips. And also, by a totally unrelated coincidence, the adults said that doing this fundraiser is part of our punishment, and they're still to rebuild the Pit's obstacles courses from the last time we went through it and the Joes just ran out of alcohol, so this was the next best thing they could think of to get us out of their hair and give 'em some peace and quiet."
"Punishment! For what?" echoed Lance incredulously.
"For dragging the police officers from both Gotham City and Metropolis and the members of the Justice League in our fight we all went full out in the middle of Main Street in Gotham City?" Wanda pointed out rhetorically in a deadpanned tone as she grated the cheese for the macaroni.
"I thought Low Light liked that one, yo, considering it gave Cover Girl the chance to knee the Flash in the family jewels," Todd piped up while munching on a chocolate-covered grasshopper.
"For causing noticeable destruction in said Main Street when you started using your powers and fractured the main sewage pipe of the city?" Fred added as he drained the pasta.
"To be fair, that one was worth it," chuckled Lance, "Jamie told me that after he got doused, Peter needed to take ten showers with bleach and soap and the Ruskie still couldn't get the smell off him!"
"Because General Hawk is still pretty miffed at the fact that Pietro somehow stupidly handed the photographers of the National Enquirer magazine a picture of Duke, Flint, Lady Jaye, and Blind Master singing karaoke while drunk and wearing nothing but their underwear and lampshades at last year's New Years Eve party?" Brittany added as she, Quinn, and Daria got into a minor food fight with some mashed potatoes.
"Oh yeah, I remember how loudly we heard Duke and Flint screaming from the Pit when they saw themselves on the front page of yesterday's issue!" Lina recalled immediately.
"Ah, so that explains why you're suddenly spending extra time with me as my personal tutor recently as well as doing additional babysitting duties for Barney and Claudius," Justin remarked to Pietro, one eyebrow raised and smiling.
"Oh shut up, you Ned Flanders knock-off," muttered Pietro as he stirred the cookie dough with his super-speed.
Xi then asked, "So how exactly does this box-lunch fundraiser work? And what exactly do we do?"
Quinn piped up while licking the frosting off her fingers, "Well, the box-lunch auction is being held over at Brown University to help raise funds for the new college hall that's being built there! And we're participating in making some of the box-lunches because Hawk and Xavier both thought that the teams could use all the good PR we could get. Especially since funds have been kind of slow recently for Brown due to that huge scandal with the university heads embezzling money from the budget."
"In other words, they're strapped for cash, and they figured having mutants help out with the fundraiser wouldn't make much of a difference since they're close to rock-bottom anyway. Plus, the fact that the X-Men and Misfits are going to be there was enough to make sure they'd get a lot of publicity over it," Althea quipped.
"And there's no such thing as bad publicity," Pietro smiled.
"Of course, you'd be the expert on that one, wouldn't you?" smirked Fred.
"I was wondering why they were so willing," murmured Lina as she pulled an apple pie from the over, "Normally, you'd think that the last thing people would do would be to invite mutants to a fundraiser…unless if they don't mind losing sponsors and donations and public approval."
"And how does the auction work?" Xi asked again as he managed to stuff several food items into a small cardboard box before wrapping it in colorful paper.
Daria then answered while making a huge sandwich, "Well, the whole point of the auction is that people will bid on a wrapped box-lunch without knowing who made it, and whoever has the highest bid gets the box-lunch, but as an added romantic bonus, the person gets to share the lunch with whoever made it as a date! In other words, buy a box-lunch and you get to go on a date with the person who fixed it! And there'll be two separate sub-auctions, one for the box-lunches made by the boys and one for the box-lunches made by the girls! So if we get the box lunch Jamie made, he'll have to eat with us as a date!"
"You drugged the food, didn't you?" quipped Todd as he placed a handful of chocolate-covered grasshoppers in a bag for his box-lunch.
"Maybe…" Daria, Quinn, and Brittany intoned in innocent and playful voices, complete with Bambi eyes, before Quinn and Brittany grinned before taking out dart guns from behind their backs.
"And if he tries to make a run for it, the low-grade horse-tranquilizers we're packing will make sure he can't go far!" Brittany giggled. Althea then hushed her triplet sisters as she brought her voice to a whisper, motioning the other Misfits to come closer.
She said a bit excitedly, "But there's another reason we're going to this little shindig, you guys! We're also going to check up on some new mutants for the G.I. Joe team, the Superstars! They're going to be playing at the fundraiser today over at Brown!"
Lance gasped, "What? The Superstars! The rock-band led by the Starr brothers that went platinum four times over? The ones that are big fans of KISS? The band who's lead guitarist and singer, Paul Starr, is the number one heartthrob for young female teenagers? They're mutants?"
"No way!" gasped Wanda as everyone else huddled for the details.
"Way," affirmed Althea with a fierce nod of her head, "As it turns out, several of the Joes, Recondo, Airtight and Barbeque, were doing a recon mission in Los Angeles looking for possible Cobra links to the local branch of H.A.T.E. when they stumbled on a raid made by some members of the Friends of Humanity, and the Superstars happened to be passing by. Long story short, the Superstars used some of the mutant powers to save Recondo and the other Joes from being killed, and as a result, they revealed themselves to the Joes."
"But they didn't get outed? You'd think that by using their mutant powers in front of everyone would have been a real celebrity scandal, especially if the Friends of Humanity are willing to do anything to ruin a mutant's life," remarked Lina. Althea shook her head.
"That's the beauty of their powers. It turns out Paul Starr has telepathic powers that includes a hypnotic effect along with firing lasers from one of his eyes. He used it to gently wipe out the short-term memory of the soldiers from the Friends of Humanity and any nearby witnesses; as a result, everyone thought the damage was done by the firearms and explosives the minutemen brought with them, so no one else knew they were mutants. His brother Craig Starr has the same thing along with his cousin, Jenni. Jenni, however, additionally can summon pulses of light from her hands, like Jubilee in a way except with lasers instead of fireworks. And add their keyboardist Lila Cheney who can teleport across far distances, and their drummer, Kyle Wildfire, who's got super-strength, can fly and can manipulate electricity throughout his entire body like Live Wire could, and you've got a pretty impressive team!"
"Cool!" whistled Fred, "So are they going to join us Misfits?"
"Actually, no. Recondo, Airtight, Barbeque and General Hawk offered it to them, but they said that they would like to remain discreet and incognito for a while along with just spending time as a band. But, they did offer interest that perhaps someday in the future, they could start a new, splinter group of Misfits on the West Coast of the United States! And they felt that if needed, they'd help us out if we should ever get into a battle that's too intense for us and our friends alone."
"Interesting, a West Coast version of the Misfits. Sort of like how Titans East is the East Coast version of the original Teen Titans from Jump City," said Xi.
Althea then whispered warningly, "But remember you guys: not one word about this to anyone! We can't even talk it amongst each other without the X-Men eavesdropping and finding out! So as far as we know, what I just told you never happened! I mean, we can't let the X-Men discover about this unless we wanna give Professor X a chance to steal new recruits from us! So remember, this is a secret! No blabbing!"
Everyone else turned to Toad with deadpanned looks. Toad looked around before he realized that all his teammates were staring at him, and he protested in defense, "Hey, I ain't that bad, yo! I know when to keep a secret!"
"Since when?" Pietro smirked as he took out a pan of gingerbread men cookies from the oven, "You couldn't keep a secret even if we paid you!"
"Hey, watch it Quickie!" Todd growled. Meanwhile, Fred and Lina were gently conversing with each other in the sidelines.
"So, what's going to be in your box-lunch, Fred?" Lina asked shyly, but innocently enough. Fred blushed before he hid the box behind his back, which was appropriate enough considering his size and belly.
"Ah, ah, ah, Lina!" he teased, wagging his forefinger, "No peeking! You're gonna have to bid on it just like everyone else, fair as fair! But…I'll give you a hint: there's going to be some sort of clue that will let people know it's my box! I'm gonna decorate the outside in wrapping paper and ribbon that will definitely let people clue in to it being cooked by me!"
"A definite clue in the wrapping, huh? Sounds like a challenge," smiled Lina. Todd then looked over Pietro's shoulder at the tray of gingerbread men the speedster baked for the box-lunches.
"Pietro, yo…why'd you bake your gingerbread men like…whoa boy!" Todd blurted out in surprise.
"Uh…are those gingerbread men doing what it looks like they're doing?" Quinn asked, her face crinkled in slight disgust. Pietro smiled even wider.
"Yep."
Xi remarked, one eyebrow raised in shock, "I have to admit, I've never seen anatomically correct gingerbread men…and women before."
Wanda rolled her eyes at Pietro, saying, "Well congratulations, my dear insane brother, you've just given new meaning to the term 'baker's dozen'."
---
At the same time, over at the X-Mansion…
"But can't I like - ?" began Kitty.
"NO!" yelled all her teammates heatedly, both the younger X-Men and the New Mutants, as they busily hustled and cooked in the large kitchen.
"But just like a little bit of - !" Kitty tried again.
"NO!"
"I'll just like whip up something from - !"
"NO!"
"Can't I at least help someone? I'm totally good at - !"
"NO!"
"Can I at least flip the cookbook pages?"
There was a pause as the X-Men teenagers considered it.
"Hmmmmm…NO!" they all bellowed in unison.
"Like, that's not fair!" the valley girl whined as she kicked at the linoleum, "You're letting Jean stay in the kitchen!"
"For several good reasons, Kitty!" Jean said as calmly as a voice she could muster, despite her temper threatening to get the best of her, "One: I'm not cooking; I'm supervising! Two: unlike you, I've actually improved my cooking skills thanks to Roadblock's guidance! Three: you're the only person here in the Institute who can still burn Jell-O and water! Four: this is a fundraising event so we actually want people to bid on the food we cook! Five: we have enough lawsuits everyday without needing to add another one for attempted mass murder via food poisoning and botulism! Six: we actually want to get a good public image from doing this box-lunch auction! And the seventh and most important reason why we're not letting you cook: because we said so! So, NO!"
"You guys are so mean!" griped Kitty before she left in a huff. Jake Clawson looked a little sympathetic as he passed by Kitty and limped his way into the kitchen.
"Don't you kittens think you were being a little too hard on her?" he chastised gently as he rested against the counter, "Kitty may not have the best skills, but her heart's in the right place and she just wishes to help and not feel left out. This is one of the few rare instances where the X-Men can come out to the public and actually do something to help along with make some friends."
Scott muttered as he brushed some ribs with molasses before putting the rack back into the oven, "Try telling that to us last week when she secretly tried to spice up and improve the vegetable chowder Storm cooked up for dinner behind our backs before it got served! I can still remember the pain in my stomach during the hours of spending it in the infirmary!"
"At least you can remember, mon ami," groaned Remy as he took the lid of a steaming pot of crawfish gumbo, "The only thing Remy can recollect is flying angels beckoning Remy to heaven before crashing into a passing airplane. Mon dieu! Remy must have been hallucinating and in bad shape if Kitty's cooking can do that!"
"Uh, that wasn't a hallucination, Remy," Ray commented as he took out a freshly baked loaf of banana-nut bread, "That was when Rogue hurled you into the infirmary's ceiling when you threw up on her while you were sick with fever. We have the videotape if you want to see it."
"Aw, Remy didn't know Cherie cared," grinned the Cajun mutant as he ambled seductively towards Rogue who was making a huge submarine sandwich, "Shall we follow the old saying and kiss the cook?"
Rogue growled warningly, "Just try it, Cajun, and the Mansion's kitchen will have a new, swamp-rat-shaped hole in the ceiling."
"Remy will go check on his gumbo," Gambit said hurriedly, doing an absolute face.
Kurt noticed that Jake's leg was causing him some slight discomfort and that on a closer look, the brown-furred kat had a wrapping of gauze tightly woven across his thigh.
"Rina, again?" Kurt smiled. Jake wearily gave Kurt an irritated look.
"I'm so happy that my pain is your pleasure, you little scamp," the kat muttered, "I swear, every time I try to talk to Rina, she goes completely feral and jumps me! And now that she and Logan are training together, she's been picking up some new moves and using me as her practice dummy! That is, if she isn't trying to catch me off guard and pounce on me!"
"You know, Razor, most guys would be grateful to have a girl jumping on them every second," Tabitha teased as she mixed the fruit salad.
"Wasn't it because of your scent?" Piotr asked as he took out a tray of French fries from the oven, "Forge explained it to us that your body odor causes a chemical reaction to her brain, sort of like pheromones animals use as biological signals towards each other. Unfortunately, the aroma of your cat hair somehow gives the signal to Logan and Rina to dislike you and treat you like an enemy."
"Yeah…but if I didn't know any better, I would have sworn the Badger's planning this. I wouldn't be surprised if he was encouraging Rina to give me a hard time," complained Jake as he limped back out of the kitchen.
"Razor, man, I think you're being a little too paranoid," Roberto commented over his shoulder, but that sentence was immediately followed by a series of snarling before the crashing sound of a heavy body hitting the floor along with Jake hollering in pain and Logan guffawing in the background.
"Rina, get off of me! Logan, don't just stand there! Help me out!" Jake howled as the sounds of the brawl intensified outside the kitchen and through the door.
"C'mon, girl! Let the hairball get up! You were supposed to pounce on him in his bedroom and knock him out so that we could dunk him into the pool for a flea bath, remember?" Logan chuckled.
"I couldn't wait any longer! You were right! He is fun to torture!" Rina said excitedly as she kept trying to wrestle Jake to the ground, and the kat was amazed at how strong and strapping the girl was, even though she was slender and agile and weighed much less than he did.
"Logan, when I get out of here, I'm gonna kill you!" Jake bellowed with vengeance, "Yeow! Rina, quit biting me! You took a chunk off my shoulder!"
All the X-Men turned to look back at Roberto who rolled his eyes, exasperated and slightly red with embarrassment.
"Okay, okay, I take it back," the Brazilian adolescent conceded.
Meanwhile, Sam stepped out into the dining room to add several completed box-lunches along with the pile on the dining table in the wide, spacious dining room before he saw that Bobby was gleefully chuckling to himself while placing a hot, piping cherry pie into a cardboard box on top of a coiled, metal spring. Gently and methodically, Bobby pushed down on the pie so that the metal pie-tin pressed against the spring and caused it to contract and bunch up before he hurriedly closed the box before the pie could come flying out. Satisfied, Bobby began wrapping up the box before letting out a round of "mua-ha-ha-ha" like a typical movie villain. Sam looked on, slightly bothered; knowing Bobby, this wasn't going to be a good thing.
"Ok, I'll bite, greenhorn. What are you doing, Bobby?" Sam sighed tiredly, knowing he was going to be sorry he even asked. Bobby looked up with a very disturbing smile plastered on his face.
"I placed a cherry pie on top of a very large and powerful spring inside this box! I did it just right so that whoever opens this sucker's going to release the spring and cause the pie to go flying out only to smack the victim right in the face! And now, I'm wrapping it so that it looks like Blob made it himself! See?" Cannonball looked at the newly wrapped box-lunch. It was quite an odd sight, to say the least. The wrapping paper was the color of red with the Dallas Cowboys football team's logo plastered on it along with pictures of a caricature-style drawing Fred's face, down to the large chins and blond Mohawk. And the bundle was all nicely tied with a white ribbon with big, bold letters saying "BLOB" all over.
Sam had to admit, had he not seen the box beforehand, he too would have easily surmised that Fred from the Misfits made it.
"Uh…Bobby, why?" Sam asked, one eye narrowed in confusion.
"Well, you know how Lina has a thing for Freddy, but she's too shy to tell him? And how both she and Fred have been making eyes at each other but nothing really has gotten off the ground?" Bobby asked.
Sam nodded. It was quite a shock to the rest of the X-Men as well as he when Bobby blabbed to his friends that Lina had feelings for Fred (and Jean nearly choked with laughter, thinking it was some sort of ludicrous joke). And when it turned out that it was quite real and serious, Jean commented none too nicely that Lina must have very low standards. Though some such as Jamie, Kurt, and Tabitha and Jake were truly happy and hoped that Fred would eventually be able to tell Dragonfly how he felt about her, the rest of the X-Men made bets in the pool on whether or not Lina and Fred would even get together (with the amount of the pool being more than two thousand dollars and the most common bet was that Lina and Fred would never become an item).
"Well, I'm disguising this box so that people will think it's Fred's when it goes off to the box-lunch auction!" Bobby bragged proudly.
"And…why would you do such a thing?" Sam asked, still incredibly lost.
"So that Lina will be sure to think that it's Fred's and tries to bid for it! And because it's been made to look like Blob's box, no one else from the X-Men and Misfits will buy it! And when she buys it, thinking it's from Blob, she'll open it right in front of ol' Fat-Boy right before she gets a face-full of cherry pie right in the kisser! She'll think this was a cruel hoax played by Freddy and be so mad at him! And the best part is, Fred'll never be able to prove that he didn't do it!"
"And why are you wanting to do this?"
Bobby flashed his teeth in a very wicked grin as he said, "So that Lina will totally hate Fred for it, Fred'll be crushed, Lina will be available, and that'll leave her free for me to make my move to sweep her off her feet with my box-lunch as a date! It's absolutely foolproof for 'Operation: Breakup'!"
Sam rolled his eyes, sighing before he turned away and commented over his shoulder, "Well, I'm not gonna say anything Bobby, cause I'm not a snitch and I do care about your well-being, however shocking and revolting that is to admit, but ya' do know you're going to hell in a handbasket, right?"
Bobby smirked as he replied merrily, "At least I'll have Lina with me."
---
"Welcome to Brown!" Cover Girl announced, her eyes slightly sparkling and definitely more alive than normal. Thanks to the Mass Device, the X-Men were able to hop along with the Joes and the Misfits and teleport to the grounds of Brown University in Rhode Island. Thanks to Jean and Xavier telekinetically and telepathically shielding their arrival, not a single onlooker noticed the mutants and the soldiers appearing out of thin air. Fred was carrying a large bag full of the boy's box-lunches and Rogue was carrying a large sack full of the girls' box-lunches. Since they wanted to make the auction interesting and fair, none of the boys and the girls from both teams were allowed to view the other genders' box lunches, and when the auction would start, they would have to guess which box-lunches came from whom just like everyone else.
"Now, you'll bet on my box-lunch, right, Scott?" Jean smiled encouragingly at her boyfriend.
"Of course, I will," Scott nodded automatically, trying his best not to imagine what would happen if Jean's food wasn't up to par and that he would need to go to the infirmary a second time. Thankfully, Jean didn't pick it up with her telepathy as she sauntered off, causing the X-Men leader to breathe out with a sigh of relief.
"So Stormy, what does your box-lunch look like? Think you'll be able to have room for me as a main course after we sample some of your gourmet cooking? Or do you want to get cooking with me later in one of the dorm suites?" grinned Shipwreck as he leaned close to the resident weather-witch. It was pretty clear that the G.I. Joe sailor wanted to try to bid for Ororo's box so that he could have that lunch date with her.
Ororo glared at him as she rumbled in a angered voice, "Nice try, you sailor reject, but I was wise enough to foresee such a disaster, and as such, I have taken precautions to make sure I do not spend any more time with you unless absolutely necessary. I didn't make a box-lunch, so as a result, there is absolutely no way in God's green Earth that I will ever spend time with you for a lunch date!"
"Well, how about a little dessert, then, Stormy?" Shipwreck begged in a teasing voice with puppy-dog eyes as he wrapped his arms around her in a very groping bear-hug, "Now, do you like chocolate syrup or whipped cream?"
"You seem happy," Low Light commented, touched, as they walked off and dropped off the box-lunches along at the auction podium while Shipwreck yelped in pain in the background.
"Of course, Cooper! It's great to be back to my old alma mater!" Cover Girl declared.
"Wait, hold on a sec! YOU were a graduate from Brown?" gaped Forge, his jaw dropping in shock. That was certainly an oxymoron.
Cover Girl rolled her eyes at the blue furred mutant as she continued, "Yes, Forge, contrary to what you believe, I'm a model who has both looks and brains! What, you think I'm stupid?"
"N-no, I never said that. I'm just surprised, that's all," Forge stammered.
"Well, contrary to believe, I was a pretty bright student before I got into modeling and car mechanics. I didn't graduate with highest honors, but I did well enough, especially since I had to work to help pay for my tuition to cover what the scholarships and loans couldn't."
Forge asked, "So you pretty much scrimped and saved and worked your way through four years of an Ivy League university? That's pretty groovy of you," whistled Forge, hoping it could soften what he said earlier.
"Yeah, but too bad I don't remember much of it anymore, especially ever since I took the glamorous life of being a G.I. Joe and a parental figure to the Misfits," murmured Cover Girl sadly to herself as Low Light rubbed her shoulders affectionately.
"Really, you don't remember much about your college days, Port Peach? How about lying on your back for a while? That's certainly bound to spark a few memories," a Southern voice drawled behind them, sneering with scorn and contempt. Cover Girl stiffened at the familiar voice as she and the X-Men and Joes whirled around to see a middle-aged Southern woman with a trim, lanky figure, and dressed sharply in a bright red blouse and black slacks with a few simple items of gold jewelry, her red lips brought together into a sneer.
It was Malerie Surprise.
"Malerie…" growled Cover Girl, baring her teeth.
"Krieger…" growled Malerie, the words coming out as a hiss.
"Malerie Surprise?" blinked Beast, "Isn't she the famous and distinctive upper-crust model who Cover Girl fought at the tsunami relief-aid acts in Indonesia?"
"Pretty much," winced Spirit.
"Oh dear…" winced Beast, now realizing what a problem this was going to be.
Roadblock murmured, "As far as I can tell, Cover Girl's gonna be raising some hell."
"So you're back here in Brown, huh, Port Peach? Oh, but I must say that I love your hair! So which wig-store did you buy it from?" Malerie sniped sadistically.
Cover Girl pursued her lips, but she managed to give a confident smile as she returned, "I bought it off of some whore. I believe it was your mother."
"And she's got you there," commented Low Light as he licked a finger and made a tally mark in the air.
Xavier (bless him) tried to ease the tension as he wheeled forward and said in a polite voice, "Come now, let's not fight when the whole point is to attend this auction to help raise money for the new college dorm being built and -"
"Oh do keep your mouth shut, Xavier!" snapped Malerie in a bitter, sickened timbre, "I know who you and your entire school of rejected dregs of human society really are! It's simply disgraceful that the Brown administrators would go along with such a revolting display, especially since you and the abominations you try to pass off as children don't belong with the respectable folk! It is simply miraculous that I am here to ensure that the dedication of the new hall in my name goes well!"
"The new hall on the campus? It's being named after you?" Spirit asked incredulously.
"Yes, as a testament to how Brown has me, a successful business woman with her own multimillion-dollar corporation, as an alumnus who can use her donations to ensure that this prestigious university can further breed and cultivate girls of bright minds and dignity and high standards. Something I am sure you and your animals have none of! The only thing that makes this event tolerable is the thought that none of your freakish children will ever be able to defile such a prestigious institution with their presence! I'm making sure that no decent college in this nation will ever accept a mutant as a student! Or stupid, flea-ridden barn animals as teachers!"
Jake and Hank didn't miss the look Malerie threw at them when she said this, and both of the instructors of the X-Men bristled at the insult. With that and a final sneer, Malerie Surprise left with an arrogant gait.
"Hmph, how charming," Ororo murmured flatly.
"How frank," Spirit commented.
"How humble," Hank supplied sarcastically.
"Confident," Jake drawled.
"Self-assured" Blind Master pointed out.
"Speaks what's on her mind," finished Logan.
"What a bitch," all six of them said in deadpanned unison and slightly disgusted voices.
"Oh, if I only had a dollar for every time I've said that about her, that witch," growled Cover Girl.
Professor Xavier scolded all of them in a slightly stern voice, "Really, all of you, that is enough. Even with Malerie Surprise being here, you cannot condemn her for having her own thoughts and beliefs, and it is not our place to correct her if she is so adamant. Granted, we can disagree and try to show her the truth, but I don't want you X-Men doing anything to cause her grievance."
"Hate to tell you this, Xavier, but we aren't part of your X-Men so don't be surprised if Malerie gets a little comeuppance via the Misfit way," Low Light grinned mischievously, his eyes twinkling behind his sniper goggles.
"Want me to give General Hawk a heads-up for the eventual, incoming and costly damage that's just bound to happen?" Spirit sighed rhetorically as he punched in a cell-phone number.
"This happens often?" Jake asked, raising an eyebrow.
"Jake, it's a fact of life in the Misfit way! We'd get suspicious if we haven't gotten an explosion every day!" Roadblock quipped.
Meanwhile, not too far off from the adults…
"Rina?" Xi asked as he noticed the clone of Wolverine was slightly trembling. Throughout the entire time they were here, the mutant teenagers were getting disdainful glares of hate and disgust if not stares of disbelief, but thankfully, no one was stupid or foolish enough to say anything to instigate a fight with the Misfits and X-Men.
"I…I'm just not comfortable around all these people," she whispered, fighting the urge, "I just…I just want to kill each and every one of them. I just want to go somewhere where I can be by myself." In understanding, Rogue took Rina's hand and held it firmly in hers while Xi took Rina's other hand.
Xi whispered, "No, Rina. You have no real reason to run, and if you run now, how are you ever going to try to mingle with a group or with society? Besides, like Storm Shadow once told me, the times you feel you need to run are the times you need to be around people the most."
"Don't let these creeps get to ya', Rina. You don't have anything to fear about them, especially from narrow-minded, bigoted twits like these jerks," Rogue said in fierce defensive concern for Rina.
Rina smiled as Rogue and Xi walked with linked hands. It wasn't much of a surprise that Rina was actually bonding with Rogue and Xi a bit more than most of the members from the Misfits and the X-Men. Though she could tell that the X-Men, the Misfits, and the Joes were good people, she wasn't ready to trust them entirely, especially after being around only the sort of people who experimented on her and used her as an object rather than a human being. To be honest, a small part of her was expecting the X-Men and the Misfits to turn on her, to hate her, to harm her. Yet when she learned about Rogue and Xi's pasts and how they themselves were results of experimentations, Rina felt more at ease. To tell the truth, X23 was extremely shocked and grateful that there were some mutants who understood and could emphasize what it felt like to be used as living weapons…and it gave her hope that she could overcome that, especially when she saw that Rogue and Xi had families and happy lives with the Misfits and X-Men. The Joes she had reservations about since they were soldiers, so similar to Hydra, but her father, Wolverine, patiently explained that G.I. Joe was everything Hydra wasn't, a few rare instances of soldiers who believed for the good and peace of the whole world, regardless of being different. And Xi was proof of that along with the rest of the members of the Brotherhood.
As the Misfits and X-Men came close to the stage where the Superstars band would be playing as well as where the auction was being held at…
"Hey dudes and dudettes!" yelled a voice behind them, "Wow, Althea! Totally stellar to see you and your team!"
"Hey Paul!" Althea smiled with warmth as she and her friends turned around, "Guys, meet Paul and the Superstars! Paul, my team, the Misfits…our friends or lack of a better term for it, the X-Men…our parents, the Joes and the X-adults are over there next to the groves…and that sailor who's getting whaled on by the X-Man in the distance, Storm, is my flesh-and-blood father, who I'm ashamed to say I share his genes."
"Yeow! Ow! Stormy, I was just joking! YEOW!" Shipwreck hollered in the background as they could spot telltale flashes of lightning.
"Nice to meet all of you," chorused Lila Cheney and Jenni Starr together, smiling kindly.
The X-Men and Misfits looked in slight awe at the five teenagers who were in front of them; though they were just ordinary adolescents and young adults who were no different from them, the X-Men and Misfits couldn't help but ponder on the fact that they were meeting actual, famous celebrities, music icons that were rising quickly on the ladder of stardom to the same cult status as KISS and U2. Paul was a lanky yet handsome teenager with a wild mane of black hair with a perfectly-shaped, purple star over his right eye, wearing a black KISS T-shirt with the sleeves ripped out and faded jeans and silver bracelets. His twin brother, Craig, had a haunted yet dangerous and caged look in his eyes as he just glowered at the X-Men, obviously showing discomfort and slight animosity. Craig had a black star-birthmark over his right eye and was wearing a black leather jacket and jeans, and Scott and Remy could discern the black nightstick that was conveniently attached to his hip. Lila was smiling with sincere openness as she clasped her hands behind her back. She was a tall and skinny waif of a girl with raven-sleeked, straight, black hair that cascaded down her shoulders and halfway down her back and her face and skin were tanned slightly. She was wearing fashionably-ripped jeans and a white, long-sleeved shirt with a black T-shirt worn on top of it, and around her wrists and neck were black bands studded with silver. Jenni Starr, who was next to Lila, giggled serenely while fingering the gold necklace chain around her neck. She was a truly stunning give with rosy-skin, long blond hair and had a red, four-pointed star over her right eye to match the color of her nail polish, and she was wearing a short-sleeved jean-jacket and dark jeans. Kyle, meanwhile, was the youngest, barely even thirteen, with collar-length brown hair and hard, blue eyes while wearing black jeans and a black tank-top along with a thick, metal chain looped around one wrist. Though young and slender, Kyle had some muscle definition in his arms that gave him a menacingly intimidating look. And Scott didn't miss the sneer Kyle threw at him, almost disdainful about Cyclops for some odd reason.
"Nice to meet you too," chorused some of the X-Men and the Misfits.
"Wow, like Paul Starr!" gasped Kitty excitedly, her eyes shining like miniature suns, "This is like so totally cool! I have all of your CDs and albums!"
"Thanks! It's cool to finally meet you too, Kitty," Paul humbly and kindly smiled.
"You know who we are?" Remy asked, raising his eyebrows in surprise.
"Course we do!" Jenni said, "The X-Men have been plastered in every periodical and magazine across the world! But…we know better than to believe some of the media sensationalism."
"Wait…you guys aren't against mutants?" Jamie asked.
Craig answered darkly, "As much as you twits like to believe we're just musicians with no brains and no opinions of our own, we can think for ourselves, thank you very much. And yes, we support mutant rights, especially since idiot assholes like Graydon Creed and Stryker are far worse than any mutant gene can produce, and stuff like anti-mutant rallies, war crimes against children with the X-Gene, and public humiliation and outings and pardoned slayings are enough to make us sick! So trust me when I say that we'd rather be mutant-supporters."
The X-Men weren't sure if they were to feel flattered or insulted. Kyle smirked as he commented aloud.
"Of course, it's hard to believe that the X-Men are enough to fight Magneto, especially since they're led by a couple of useless jabroni!"
Lila then stepped forward and slapped Kyle upside the head, scolding, "Kyle, don't be such a jerk!"
She then turned to the X-Men, apologizing gently, "I'm sorry, but Kyle 'Thunderbolt' Wildfire is a little bit antisocial and not to mention that he's got a pretty big chip on his shoulder. Don't take anything what he says personally; he's all right and supports mutants."
"Trust me, we've been called a lot worse, Lila," Ray said. Meanwhile, most of the girls were starting to crowd around Paul Starr, excitedly talking to him.
"So like are you entered in the box-lunch auction too, Paul?" Kitty asked excitedly.
"Yep, me and my cousin, Jenni. We wanted to help out for the fundraising, especially since a lot of the Starr family knows what it's like to not have money and without families. Both Craig and me are orphans," Paul said with the ease of time, his eyes twinkling with kindness.
"Wow, I'm sorry about that. None of the interviews you gave with magazines ever mentioned that. You must be so lonely," Amara commented with pity.
"I get over it, and I have my brother and my cousin, along with my band," Paul smiled.
To the X-Boys' amazements, Paul was surrounded by a growing number of both the mutant girls and the college girls of Brown who somehow spotted Paul and wanted a chance to talk with the superstar. And like flies to honey, the throng of giggling and adoring girls was starting to grow exponentially. In fact, the only girls who were not adoring Paul were Tabitha, Althea, Wanda, Lina, and Rina.
"Wow, this is exactly like the incident when Longshot from Mojo's dimension came over to visit you guys at the X-Mansion, yo," Toad commented.
"Don't remind me, Toad," groaned Scott, rubbing his forehead with one hand, "I still have the migraines to this day about that one!"
Piotr seethed, before turning to Lance, growling, "I don't believe this! As if you weren't bad enough horning in on Kitty, Alvers!"
"Hey, wait a minute! What do you mean by 'horning in', Muscle-Head?" growled Lance as he made a fist with one hand. Tabitha just smoothly interrupted the tense accusations before they could erupt into another full-fledged fight.
"See, this is why people should be glad to have a stable girl like me!" crowed Tabitha smugly, "I mean, I didn't fall for Longshot's charm when he last came, and though Paul is kinda cute, I know I'll always be happy with Sam as my boyfriend! And I know Sammy is just as dedicated to me as I am to him, right, Sam?"
No response.
"Sam?" There was still no answer, so Tabitha turned around to see a galling sight. Sam, along with Jamie, Ray, Roberto, Pietro, Kurt, and a crowd of other love-struck boys from the college dorms, were busy ogling and hanging around Jenni Starr as she politely and kindly signed autographs along with talked with as many of the fans as she could. And Kurt, Jamie, Sam, Ray, Roberto, and Pietro all had glazed looks in their eyes as they dreamily gazed upon her with blank, mindless expressions and smiles that could have put the Cheshire Cat in "Alice in Wonderland" to shame. In fact, the only ones who weren't adoring Jenni Star were Todd, Xi, Justin, Fred, Bobby, Scott, Lance, Piotr, and Remy. Tabitha felt her blood boil over as her eye twitched ever so slightly.
"Oh yes, Sam's really dedicated to only you, Boom-Boom," smirked Xi in an equally smug tone.
"Shut it, Xi," growled Tabitha. Scott then turned to Todd, Xi, Fred, and Justin.
"Hey, how come you guys aren't infatuated with Jenni Starr?" he asked.
"Althea'll kill me if I even try it," Toad replied, "and she'll use Trinity to get back at me for my oversight. Besides, I'm loyal to my one and only girl."
"Awwww, that's my Toddles!" Althea giggled with fondness as she wrapped her arms around the frog-like mutant's neck, "I have trained you well, I see!"
Xi shrugged at the X-Men leader, "I'm asexual, remember? I don't have the same biological urges and attractions other humans and mutants do, so it would make sense that I'm not drawn to Jenni…or Paul for that matter."
Piotr winced as the words registered into his brain and shattered whatever decency he had in his consciousness as he moaned, "I did not need that mental picture, Xi!"
Both Fred and Justin answered, blushing slightly and a bit hurriedly, "Not my type."
Remy and Scott were glaring however at Paul Starr, surrounded by the giggling and adoring chatter of most of the female X-Men.
"Remy can honestly say that Remy do not like this Paul Starr one fricking bit…" growled the Cajun X-Man.
As much as Scott wanted to give in to the irritation, he took most of his willpower in order to suppress the jealous and irked feelings, letting them subside into a smoldering pile in his gut as he said in as calm of a tone as he could muster, "Look, I don't like it anymore than you do, Remy, but let's just let this one slide. It's just a harmless crush, and as long as the girls are talking with Paul, they aren't going to really be doing anything wrong or distracting. And besides, Paul Starr is a famous musician! I mean, you really think he's going to try anything with one of the X-Girls? That'll be career-suicide right then and there if the public ever finds out he's trying to date a mutant! Besides, he seems really nice enough, and the fact that he supports mutant-human peace shows he's not all bad. So let's just let this one go. Like the time when Longshot visited us, this isn't going to go anywhere. We shouldn't be so short-sighted."
"Remy hope you're right about this…" muttered Gambit as he crossed his arms, sulking, and glared at Rogue giggling with the Superstar guitarist and singer.
"This is what you would call a disaster, correct?" Rina asked as she turned to Xi.
Xi sighed, rolling his eyes as he clarified, "Yes…or at the very least, it will be very soon"
---
"And do I have a bid for this box-lunch?" the head of Brown's administration, Renee Dietz, commented in a microphone, holding up the box Bobby disguised to look like Fred's, and every girl in the audience could see the pictures of Fred's face plastered on the wrapping paper along with the words "BLOB" printed on the ribbon.
"Gee, I wonder who made that one," Rogue snorted sarcastically. Lina shrieked with excitement.
"That's Fred's! That's got to be Fred's! Oh, oh! That's a clue if I've ever saw one!" the insect-girl said excitedly as she raised her hand and yelled "Ten dollars!"
"Kind of an obvious clue, don't you think? I mean, Fred's a little slow, but I don't think he'd do something that blatant," Amara commented suspiciously.
"Amara, this is the Blob we're talking about. Odds are, he would do something like this," Tabitha emphasized as Lina eagerly claimed her prize. She was the only one who bid on the box-lunch. Dietz then took out a box littered with purple stars on white wrapping paper and a zebra-striped ribbon. One girl clambered excitedly.
"That's got to be Paul Starr's lunch! It's just got to! Twenty dollars!" the girl cried elatedly.
"Paul Starr?" the rest of the female crowd gasped in exhilaration before the war began.
"Thirty dollars!" yelled Rogue.
"Fifty dollars! I'm not losing a date with Paul Starr to a mutant freak!" snarled a nearby sorority sister.
"Sixty dollars, and one more word out of you, and you're going to find my foot lodged up your butt!" growled Jean.
"Seventy dollars!" yelled another girl.
"One hundred!" Amara yelled.
"Oh no, you don't, Amara! That date with Paul Starr is like so totally mine! One hundred fifty dollars!" Kitty yelled, and from that point, the bidding got quite ugly as the price and the girls' collective tempers and competitive edges rose higher and higher before the lunch-box was settled for two-thousand. (the X-Girls pooled their money together to get that one, much to the grumbling of the other females in the crowd). Yet the grumbling was soon forgotten as Paul and the Superstars then gave a fine performance on the stage, playing hits like "Black Diamond" and "Detroit Rock City", and the party atmosphere was a bit contagious as the familiar rock music eased the tensions as the girls and boys ambled and merged with each other, enjoying the peace and not really caring if their neighbor was a human or a mutant.
Professor Xavier could honestly say this was actually a nice example of his dream for peace between mutants and humans, and he couldn't have been happier.
Unfortunately…
KKAAAAA-BOOOOOOOOOOOOOOMMMMMMM!
"What on Earth?" gasped Blind Master as he and the rest of the terrified crowd saw in the distance the new college hall that was being built by the proceeds of the box-lunch auction was now in flames and starting to crumble into a useless pile of wood, mortar, stone, and metal.
"Wow, I've never seen an entire college hall catch on fire before…and that quickly," Justin murmured, blinking.
Several of the students then pointed fingers at the X-Men and Misfits, screaming, "It's the mutants! They must have done this! It's the muties' fault!"
"Oh, like get real!" snapped Kitty, "We were right here! How else could we possibly set an explosion?"
"Oh yeah, well then if you didn't do this, who did?" snapped a male undergrad. As if on cue, the campus' television widescreen that was perched high on the Student Center crackled to life, immediately displaying a live video feed showing…Malerie Surprise talking furiously to another man. And the Misfits, the Joes, the X-Men, Dietz and the students could see and hear everything.
"What the hell did you do, Surprise?" growled the man, "You weren't supposed to set off the bomb until the mutant freaks and the Joes took the stage when that fat Dietz lady was going to give them a special commendation in front of the crowds for their participation in today's event! Why the hell did you set off the bomb now?"
"I don't know!" hissed Malerie, "Someone moved the bomb! And I must have accidentally jostled the button of the detonator! I don't know, and I sure as hell don't care! The only reason I agreed to bombing the university was to take out that bitch, Cover Girl!"
The man jabbed a finger into Malerie's chest, snarling, "Don't take that tone of voice with me, you stuck-up tramp! The only reason the Friends of Humanity supported your company and donated that nice chunk of cash was because you promised us to deliver the extermination of those freaks, the X-Men and the Misfits! Now our entire plans with blowing them to kingdom come is absolutely worthless and – hey, what are you three doing with that video camera?"
"Smile, you're on Misfit TV!" chimed the eager three voices of Daria, Brittany, and Quinn in unison off-screen, "and we just got your confession on this videotape!"
"And FYI, we were the ones who moved the bomb you set underneath the stage! Figured it would go with the décor of the hall being named after you a lot better!" Daria laughed.
"Appropriate since, like your integrity and fashion-sense and bank accounts, after today, the Malerie Surprise Hall has gone up in flames!" Brittany leered off-camera.
"Now deep down, can we honestly say the fact that it was due to Trinity isn't surprising?" Piotr commented wearily.
"That is so not stellar, man," Paul Starr commented, shaking his head at Malerie.
"And thanks to our handy, dandy little live-feed technology in our scanners, we were able to hack into Brown's main video-transmitter for the entire campus! Smile, you two! You just confessed to the bombing to everyone watching this right now on the campus grounds!" Quinn giggled.
"Everyone?" screeched Malerie, her face growing white.
"Damn it to hell!" swore the man in the picture before he took out a white walkie-talkie and screamed, "Friends of Humanity, move to Plan B! Repeat, Plan B! Troops, wipe out all the mutants and freak-lovers!"
"Charge! Destroy them all!" yelled soldiers and members of the anti-mutant organization as they came running out, brandishing clubs and firearms. The crowd of students and teachers scattered, screaming and in a panic as the fundraising event crumbled to an absolute, chaotic, hellhole. Xi turned to Rina.
"Rina?"
"Yes?"
"These people, we can hurt," the lizard Misfits said simply in affirmation, and nodding, both X23 and Xi pounced upon the attackers, followed quickly by Toad, Jake, Logan, and Blind Master.
"Now deep down, could we honestly have said we could all see this one coming?" Althea sighed before she strafed out of the path of a Friends of Humanity zealot trying to club her with a wooden two-by-four before delivering a swift sweep kick and tripping the soldier to go flying to the ground, face first.
"You have a point, Althea," groaned Jean as she used her telekinesis to create a shield to block hurling rocks and Molotov cocktails from raining down on the crowd, "I knew I should have just stayed in bed today…"
"Kill all freak-lovers!" roared one man as he aimed a bazooka at the Superstars who were still holding their instruments on the stage.
"Oh geez!" Paul blanched, his face white as Jenni gasped, putting her hands to her mouth. Lila and Kyle knew that if they didn't use their mutant powers, they would be in serious danger, and yet if they did, they would be outed as mutants to the public and to the X-Men.
"Everyone, duck and cover!" Craig yelled as they tried to scramble off the stage before the FOH member could fire, but luckily, someone else came to their rescue before the minuteman could fire with his weapon.
"Back off, creep!" yelled Scarlet Witch as she let loose a hex-bolt at the bazooka, and immediately, the weapons short-circuited and jammed, unable to fire its destructive missile upon the flaming stage. This allowed the Superstars to safely escape the stage before Paul and Jenni Starr managed to find several fire extinguishers and tried to contain the blaze before it even got more out of control. Roaring, the man tossed aside the smoking and sparking piece of machinery before he whipped out a Saturday Night Special from his pocket and pointed the black gun directly at Wanda's head. Yet Wanda didn't need to do anything. At the last second, a black nightstick flew and tore across the air, twirling madly, before it painfully struck against the soldier's hand and knocked the firearm out of his grip.
"Agh!" yelped the man as he cradled his injured hand and now weaponless, which allowed Kyle Wildfire to intervene.
"Here's a gutwrench supplex, courtesy of the Thunderbolt, you jabroni!" yelled Kyle before he knocked out the Friend of Humanity bigot with a single punch. Scarlet Witch whirled angrily on Craig Starr as he picked up the nightstick he threw to save Wanda's life.
"What the hell were you doing?" she hissed in irritation, "I thought you guys wanted to keep a low profile!"
"We told General Hawk that we wouldn't join in on the war with mutants using our powers," Craig shot back coldly, "We never said anything about not helping out with the war on mutants without our powers. As long as there's a fight, we don't run away from it, Maximoff, and as far as the public will see, we're just mutant-supporters who will help protect the students from getting hurt in the hustle."
"At a big risk to yourself and your life?" Wanda said in annoyance as she, Craig, and Kyle rushed out to the other parts of the campus where the Friends of Humanity were causing havoc and mindless destruction with the Joes, the Misfits, and the X-Men trying their best to stop them.
"I appreciate the concern, Wanda, but it's hardly needed," drawled Craig.
"Don't flatter yourself," Wanda heatedly denied, though there was a slight tinge of red in her cheeks as she hexed a switchblade knife out of one woman's hand before she could use it to stab Spirit. Spirit gratefully nodded to Wanda before he did a sweep kick and tripped the female supporter of the Friends of Humanity off her feet, sending her flying on her back. Craig then tackled two other men, using his nightstick to send them sprawling, jamming the wooden weapon into the soft areas of their guts before delivering several roundhouse kicks and two uppercuts to keep them down for a while.
Meanwhile, several of the anti-mutant combatants threw several grenades, and though Jean was able to deflect it with her telekinesis, they all landed upon the pile of box-lunches and with a mighty explosion, the lunches and bits of food were sent flying and rained down upon the crowd.
"Oh no! The box lunch I got from Fred!" wailed Lina as she inadvertently let go and saw the box get trampled by the panicked crowd. Bobby then suddenly had a package land into his arms from the explosion and upon closer look, it was a box-lunch wrapped with pink wrapping paper and red stars along with the number "27".
"Huh?" Bobby looked at the lunch he was holding in his hands, "Number 27?"
"Number 27! Hey, that X-Man's got Jenni Starr's box-lunch!" yelled a college student from one of Brown's fraternity, pointing at Bobby with outrage and shock, "I remember when Dietz held it up for bid! 27 is Jenni Starr's number!"
"Jenni Starr! GET IT!" a roar rang out and Bobby suddenly looked up to see a stampeding mass of boys blitzing towards him.
"Oh no…" whimpered Bobby before he was trampled and dog-piled en masse by a horde of wild males who were eager to claim their rights to the lunch date with the female guitarist of the Superstars. Most noticeable was the fact that Forge, Roberto, Sam, Ray, and Pietro were among the mob, trying to snatch the box-lunch (which was starting to go through some massive damage from all the furious and frantic man-handling) from each other.
"I got it!" yelled Forge triumphantly as he stupidly raised the box over his head in a glowing, bragging manner.
"No, I got it, freak!" spat out a teenage boy as he tackled Forge to the mass below before snatching the box-lunch of Jenni Starr out of the inventor's hands.
"Not anymore, you don't!" Roberto yelled as he snatched the box out of the student's hands before he delivered his foot into the boy's back, pitching the competitor forward.
"Get real, mutie! That date with Jenni Star is as good as mine!" roared a powerful college football jock as he let loose and caught Roberto with a good right-hook, sending him sprawling before he made a grab for the box. But Quicksilver was faster.
"In your dreams!" yelled Pietro as he painfully elbowed the opponent in the stomach, leaving the college boy winded and short of breath, before Pietro managed to make a grab for the box and tried to dash off with it, only to have several boys latch on to his ankles and painfully trip the silver-haired Misfit on his face.
"It's MINE!" a large faction of boys yelled in unison before they all dove for it. And underneath the entire pile, Bobby was twitching in pain from being crushed by so many heavy bodies crushing him to the ground, barely even able to breathe.
"Owwwwww…" he moaned.
Meanwhile, Roadblock, Jamie, and Jean were trying their best to prevent the other mobs from damaging the neighboring buildings in their senseless violence, with Roadblock using his martial skills and Jamie using his glovatrix to shoot bola missiles when all of a sudden, the men and women had blank expressions on their faces for several seconds before they all toppled to the ground, unconscious but serenely dozing. Roadblock rushed over and took a nearby soldier's pulse to make sure they were alive as Multiple and Jean stared in shock.
"What the - ?" gasped Jamie in surprise, "Are they…are they sleeping?"
The Joe solider nodded in relief, knowing that this was one problem that was quickly and cleanly settled, "They're all right as far as I can see…but Jean, did you use you telepathy?"
The red-haired telekinetic shook her head in growing puzzlement as she exclaimed, "No, I didn't do anything! It wasn't due to using my powers at all! Someone else did this to help us!"
"But who?" Jamie gaped. Roadblock glanced out of the corner of his eyes towards the stage to see Paul Starr giving him a thumbs-up sign quickly and clandestinely, without drawing any attention to himself.
"Paul!" hissed Jenni surreptitiously in a scolding tone as she helped a couple escape from the flames of the Molotov cocktails, "You weren't supposed to do that! If the Friends of Humanity or the X-Men found out, we'll all be targeted!"
Paul gave his cousin a dry look before he pointed out while using the fire extinguisher on the stage, "So you'd rather let all these nutjobs from the Friends of Humanity burn everyone and everything to the ground? Besides, what are we supposed to do? Just stay here and watch? As long as there are so many people wildly panicking and gathered around here, Professor Xavier and Jean wouldn't have been able to specifically sense who put them to sleep! And you know we have to help!"
"He's got a point, Jenni! Hey!" yelped Lila as she wildly ducked to avoid being clubbed in the head by a Friends of Humanity solider, wildly swinging a baseball bat.
"Death to all mutie supporters!" he roared as he charged, but Lila was starting to lose her patience as she wildly dodged before she neatly tripped the passing-by bigot with her foot, sending him flying to the ground.
"Honestly, the jerks we have to deal with on our tours!" griped Lila as she heel-stomped on the man's hand before he could wildly grab his baseball bat from the ground, crushing two of his fingers before she let out a fast kick to the man's chin. The soldier toppled backwards as his head cracked back and he fell to the grassy ground, unconscious.
"The fire! It's spreading!" yelled Scott and he, Remy, and Lance did their best to try to contain it.
"Oh for crying out loud," muttered Althea in exasperation as she used all the available water she could summon from the duck-pond and the neighboring fountains to form a formidable waterspout and have it come crashing down upon the flaming building, extinguishing the fire. Paul and Jenni took out what was left of the flames with the fire extinguishers.
Meanwhile, near the Student Center…
"Yikes!" gasped Justin as he and Amara were suddenly surrounded by Friends of Humanity soldiers, all of them holding bats and strange laser pistols, no doubt taken from the supplies when the Friend of Humanity once were untied with H.A.T.E. Amara was not the least bit intimidated as she turned into her fire-form, her body encased with molten rock and flames as she formed several fireballs in her hands.
"Back off, you pigs!" she snarled before she managed to fling several fireballs at her opponents, causing some to scatter and succeeding in causing one woman to drop her gun in pain, the metal of the pistol now turning red-hot before it melted into useless junk. However, Magma couldn't deal with all of them at once, and acting on impulse, she sprang towards a three brawny men, her gymnastic skills rushing forth to her mind with urgency. With a battle cry, the Nova Roman princess managed to deliver several acrobatic kicks and leaps which sent two of the three laid out sprawling on the ground. The third one tried to shoot her, but a quick ball of lava rendered it useless. Undaunted, the man tried to punch Magma, and she dodged and ducked wildly while returning several punches back of her own. At the same time, Justin was helpless as he saw he was still surrounded by five armed and dangerous humans, their guns pointed at him and ready to fire, but before he could orb out, Kyle intervened and came to Misfit's rescue.
"Piledriver! Front chanercy! Frankensteiner! Frog splash! And finally just cause I don't like you, a front-face lock followed by a nutcracker, jabroni!" Kyle yelled as he executed a fast and furious blur of wrestling moves in a matter of seconds, much to Justin's amazement, and in no time at all, the rest of the anti-mutant group were all lying on the ground, sporting multiple bruises and groaning in pain, teetering between consciousness and unconsciousness. But then Justin looked up at the young adolescent to spot something a bit alarming.
"Kyle!" gasped Justin.
"What, you Ned-Flanders knock-off? Can't you see I'm busy trying to save your chicken-feathered butt?" snapped the brown-haired adolescent. But Justin was still persistent, his voice awed with warning.
"Your eyes! They're glowing yellow!" he hissed. Kyle's face blanched with slight panic.
"Shit!" he whispered, covering his eyes with his hands.
He couldn't risk letting people know that he had mutant powers, especially when in the midst of fighting members of the Friends of Humanity. And with him trying to conceal it, it made Kyle look incredibly awkward not to mention he couldn't fight with his vision blinded. Amara rushed up to them as she finished dealing with the remaining soldier with a swift kick to the groin area.
"What happened? What's wrong with Kyle?" she gasped as she hurried over to their sides.
"None of your damn business, Aquilla!" snapped Kyle offensively, still using one hand to cover his eyes from sight, but Justin, knowing that Althea requested them to keep the Superstars' mutations a secret, covered lamely for the boy.
"He got hurt when he was fighting the guys from the Friends of Humanity! One of them squirted some pepper spray on him! He's hurt!"
"And you freaks are going to join him!" snarled one of the FOH participants as he raised his shotgun directly at Amara, Justin, and Thunderbolt. Before he could fire however, Justin instinctively grabbed Kyle's shoulder and Amara's hand before he willfully orbed, and thanks to the emotions of fear, all three of them teleported out of harm's way.
General Hawk, who managed to use a teleportation watch to transport himself into the campus ground, found himself face to face with an angry Dietz.
Dietz irritably said, "General Hawk, this was not what I envisioned when you said the Misfits and X-Men would be on their best behavior! Now granted, the damage from the bomb is solely the fault of the Friends of Humanity, but the other instances of damage…"
"Ooops, sorry!" Scott called out as one of his optic blasts destroyed the roof of the nearby library.
"…must be compensated by G.I. Joe," she finished in a hard tone.
"How much?" groaned Hawk, deadpanned.
"Let's just say enough to get Brown several new halls, a library, and its own national airport, sir," replied back Dietz, frowning as she crossed her arms over her chest, "And while we're on the subject of warnings, you should know that there is now a lifetime ban on both your soldiers from G.I. Joe and mutants from the X-Men and Misfits."
"When you say a 'lifetime ban', you mean our lifetimes or yours?" asked Logan rhetorically, fighting the urge to groan as another blast from the cannon rang out followed by Malerie Surprise screaming hysterically as she was being chased by Cover Girl who was riding on the back of an angry bull and cheering "Toro, toro!". And since Malerie was wearing a red blouse, she made herself into a very attractive target for a rampaging bull…
"Either way, someone's life is about to get cut short," sighed Dietz as Malerie let out another round of screaming…
---
"Well, on the upside, General Hawk wasn't that angry, and we only have to do this for a week," Jamie supplied helpfully as he and the rest of the X-Men, the Misfits, the Misfit handlers, and Kyle Wildfire were in one of the large sections of the basement, peeling a gigantic pile of potatoes as part of their KP duty.
"Oh shut up, you little squirt," grumbled Kyle as he placed his umpteenth, cleanly peeled vegetable in the bucket before grabbing another spud.
"Hey, only we get to call him that, jerkface!" Pietro snapped.
"And what are you gonna do about it, Quickie? Shampoo the Thunderbolt's hair? Give the Thunderbolt a manicure? Oooh, I'm shaking! If you really wanted to scare someone, Weenie-Boy, go send your psychotic nut of a sister to beat 'em up!" drawled Kyle sarcastically.
"How'd you like me to have to hex this potato peeler and shove it up where the sun doesn't shine?" Wanda growled.
"And how'd you like me to give you a good smack on the mouth, witch-girl? Normally, the Thunderbolt doesn't hit women, but in your case, you sure as hell ain't a lady!"
"Keep talking, Wildfire, and I'll use this potato peeler to make sure you become a lady, you - !"
"C'mon, you two, fighting's not going to help us, and since we'll be doing this together for three weeks, we might as well try to make it as smooth as possible and not bicker," Justin said gently and he picked a piece of potato skin on his hands. Jean raised an eyebrow at Justin before she turned to Rogue.
"Rogue, I take it back. You were right: that sort of optimistic pep-talk is annoying," she said, deadpanned.
"Told you," muttered Rogue.
"Hey!" protested Justin hotly.
"Rogue, Jean, Justin, Pietro, Wanda, and Kyle, knock it off, all six of you!" snapped Cover Girl, "Stop fighting and keep peeling! Like it or not, we're all stuck here with KP duty together!"
"Even though a good portion of it happens to be your fault, Cover Girl," grumbled Ororo under her breath as she grimaced while peeling a small potato. Cover Girl, however, heard that and whirled on Storm angrily.
"You know, peeling spuds may not be bad thing for you, your majesty," she spat with mocking disgust, "Unless if you think that doing KP duty is beneath you, which comes of to no surprise since you barely get off your high horse!"
"I just don't see why we have to do KP duty along with the rest of the Joes and the Misfits! Especially since you were the ones responsible for the college hall in Brown exploding! And Hawk has no jurisdiction to punish the X-Men, especially when most of the blame lies on you and the other Joes!" Ororo heatedly retorted back.
"Funny, I don't recall you showing that much self-control when you kept sending lightning on Shipwreck and accidentally set one of Brown's sororities on fire!" Cover Girl snapped.
Wanda remarked, "I thought you were actually glad about that one since you realized that the Delta-Delta-Delta sorority had Malerie Surprise as an alumnus."
"Not now, Wanda!" Cover Girl moaned, "That's beside the point!"
"By the way, there's some good news. I got a call from the ER ward at Brown General and the surgeon said that despite what you did to her, Malerie Surprise should be up and be able to eat full solids again after a week or two," Spirit commented, frowning at Cover Girl.
Cover Girl sniffed, "Oh, like it's my fault her perfume stimulated the bull into thinking that she was a heifer in heat…"
"Ouch, that's gonna leave a mental scar," winced Jake as he finished peeling a potato.
"And Beast and Lifeline called to let us know that his injury is only a mild concussion, and that Xavier will wake up tomorrow over at the Pit's medical bay with a slight headache," Low Light added as he picked up another potato.
Kyle griped, "What really stinks is that I'm the only one doing KP duty with you! Paul, Jenni, and Craig got off scot-free!"
"I think it was because of the fact you accidentally injured the chief of campus security when you did that body-slam on him and the nearby Friends of Humanity soldiers," pointed out Forge as he started peeling, grumbling all the meanwhile.
"Well, on the upside, at least you're doing a very nice bonding session of quality time with the X-Men and the Misfits, Kyle" Justin provided gently.
"Oh shut up, and pass the Thunderbolt another bucket," grumbled Kyle.
The End
Author's Notes: Well, I hope you guys enjoyed this one shot because I'll be taking a little break and skip an update for the next Friday, primarily because I'll be reading "Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince" tonight as soon as I get it from the bookstore, so since I wish to spend time reading, I won't update with the next one-shot until two weeks from now!
X-Men and Misfits: THANK YOU, GOD! He's giving us time to recover!
Anyway, something tells me the Misfits and the X-Men don't want me writing about them anytime soon, so I'll just be gracious enough to give them and the Justice League time to rest before I drag then back up with my trusty keyboard!
Flash: Hey, don't bring us into this! You're crazy enough to write about these twisted kids without needing us!
Batgirl and Supergirl: Oh no, you don't! If WE had to suffer through his last crossover, then it's only fair the rest of you have to suffer as well!
Justice League: Nuts…
Anyway, check back on the Friday two weeks from now for the spectacular one shot with the Misfits and X-Men spending some quality time with at the Watchtower! Until then, happy reading!