Disclaimer: I do not own Marvel.

Day Six – Thursday

"Are you crazy?"

"No."

"Why not?"

"Because?"

"Because why?"

"BECAUSE I SAID SO!"

My eyes opened and I found myself tied up carefully so I couldn't touch anything. Lapin and Jamie were tied up as well, but Lapin appeared to be asleep while Jamie…Jamie had already worn Julien down with his line of questioning. I recognized it. Jamie was born with the need to annoy others when forced to sit still for long periods of time.

I shifted and Jamie looked over at me. Fear flickered in his eyes as he looked at me for guidance. "Jaime…non." I said. Jamie became silent as Julien punched Lapin.

Lapin growled. "Mornin' asshole." He said to Julien, licking his bloody lips. "Whatcha want? Why y'keepin da petite here?"

"Cause he's an asshole, like you said." Jaime interjected. Julien turned around and grabbed Jamie's face.

"Listen, y'little shit. Don' know who y'are, don' care. But y'better watch y'goddamned tongue and I might let ya see y'fucken' parents again." Julien threatened.

"I doubt it." Jamie said coldly. "They're dead and you're stupid. I see two problems there."

"Yeah? What makes me s'damned stupid?" Julien said.

Jamie indignantly rolled his eyes. "It's a secret."

"A secret? What da fuck?" Julien looked over at me and threw a knife down on the table, sticking it into the wood.

"I'll whisper it to you." Jamie said as Julien leaned in. I didn't know what he whispered at the time, and I didn't think it mattered, because while Julien was distracted, a Jamie clone walked in and replaced the knife on the table with a roll of toilet paper, then disappeared. Yes, a roll of toilet paper. Then it occurred to me that Jamie wasn't scared; he was playing with Julien, and enjoying it.

"WHAT?" Julien yelled and reached for the knife. He rolled over from his kneeling position and held up the toilet paper.

Jamie smirked triumphantly. "I guess that's God's way of telling you to deal with your shit and leave us alone."

"What happened?" Julien demanded. "You must have seen it!" He turned to me, unaware that the missing knife was sitting behind me on the floor.

"What petite said." Lapin said. "What, y'don' believe in God? Y'done sent 'nough people t'meet him, y'fucken' assassin!" Julien cursed and looked at me.

"Lapin's right, mon ami, da Big Man hisself come down here t'stop y'from cuttin' up da petite." I said, smiling innocently at my captor.

Julien leaned over and got in my face. "He tell y'he don take muties?"

Click

Julien toppled over onto his side, his hands cuffed in a pair of metal cuffs. I looked up at the Jamie clone and finished cutting my bonds, then I charged the real Jamie and Lapin's ropes. "You guys aren't going to believe this!" Jamie said, leading us down the hall through what appeared to be Julien's apartment into a bedroom. "This guy is sick!"

I covered Julien's eyes quickly, then put my hand down, realizing that he'd gotten the handcuffs from the room and already knew what was in it.

Ah, Julien's room. One of my more disturbing memories. Lapin paled when he saw the porn covering the floor; this wasn't just any porn, it was gay porn. Gay bondage porn. And the handcuffs? A mere accessory in Julien's large collection of metal and leather contraptions. "Mon dieu!" I said, walking out quickly. We went back to the room where we'd been tied up and I leaned on the doorway as Julien attempted to wrestle the cuffs off.

"'Ello, Julien." I said. "Did havin' us good-lookin' men all tied up like dat turn y'on?"

Priceless moment, really. The look on his face when he realized that I, Remy Lebeau, his rival, his enemy, knew about his sexual deviance. I can assure you that every drop of blood left his face; Sinister himself has more coloring than Julien did right at that moment. Lapin stuck his head in. "We may be a couple o'good lookin' hommes, but we like da femmes. And Jamie…he's a petite! Shame on y'Julien!"

"If Remy knew y'hostility 'bout me bein' wit ya bitch souer was jus' cause y'wanted Remy t'yo'self, he'd have killed yo'sick ass." I said as we started to leave.

"Remy." I turned to look at Julien. "Don' tell nobody." He was clearly desperate to keep his secret. Being 'on top' of the situation, I decided to toy with him.

"Why?" I asked.

"Cause Bella'll beat po'Julien. She ain' a nice girl." I chuckled at Julien and then punched him in the face as hard as I could, knocking him out. We'd keep his secret, because he was a pathetic creature. And his sister was scary. I'd know, I almost married her, but was thankfully saved by a duel to the death…yeah, I'd pick the duel over the marriage any day.

It did please me that big tough assassin Julien Bordeaux, the head of our rival Guild, was such a pathetic, twisted man under everything. It did not please me that I'd have to explain all of this to Jamie in as few words as possible. We left the apartment and walked out onto the street, hailing a cab to the restaurant to pick up Lapin's car.

…………………………………………………………………..

"Chile!" Tante grabbed and nearly crushed Jamie to death, taking his temperature with her hand.

Yeah, she slapped the crap out of Lapin and I a few times within in the next hour. But she also baked a pecan pie, which was well worth the pain. "S'Tante, how y'been?" I said, spinning around in the swiveling barstool.

"Worried sick, 'bout the chile!" She replied.

"Not us?" Lapin said, feigning hurt.

"Non, y'been replaced." I turned to see my older brother. "Y'seen da way Tante looks at Jamie. She don' need ya no more." Henri smiled as if enjoying the moment. And then he got his revenge. "Petite's sleepin', had some questions 'bout some of da stuff ya'll saw at Julien's."

Lapin and I looked at each other in totally dread, then pleadingly at Henri, who just smiled wider.

"How is it dat y'managed to expose da petite t'gay porn?"

He barely had it out of his mouth when the back door slammed, Lapin and I making a quick escape into the yard.

Tante wasn't even a little impressed. "REMY y'get yo'sorry ass back in dis house, right now!"

"Non, Tante. Remy want to live!" I said, almost making a clean escape. You know, until my Papa grabbed me and dragged us back into the house.

…………………………………………………………………………

"Julien kidnapped y'?" Papa asked Lapin and I.

"Oui. Jamie busted us out." I smiled at the corruption I'd spread to little Jamie. Papa seemed a little less amused that we'd involved our young guest in Guild tension, or that he'd had a knife to his throat the day before. He eventually sent us upstairs and forbade us to leave the house.

"What? He can't do that! We're leaving tomorrow! I need to have more fun!" Jamie said when we broke the news to him. "Do you know how boring the mansion is going to seem after this week?"

Lapin clearly commiserated with the boy, and went to the closet. "Lapin' ain' gonna be dere wit ya, but he can help y' by teachin' ya." He walked to my closet and took out a box I hadn't seen in years. pouring the box out on my bed, I watched the amazed expression on Jamie's face. "Y'ever picked a lock?"

Jamie shrugged. "Not really."

"Well, today's y'lucky day, petite." Lapin said, picking up one of the locks on the bed and putting it in Jamie's little hands. "Dis an art of da Guild. We gonna teach y' cause ya like da petite frere Remy never had."

Jamie looked at the lock with a look of complete wonder, taking in his lock picking lessons like some sort of religion. His wide little eyes made Lapin and I laugh as he slowly popped open the first lock. "Wow." He said, staring at it.

"It's like makin' love to a woman…" Lapin began, then ended his sentence, Jamie's mouth slightly opened.

"You're so weird." Jamie said, "But not as weird as that Julien guy." He sniffled, reminding us he was still a little sick, then laid back down on the bed. "Hey Remy?"

"Yeah, petite?" I answered him.

"Can we go play in the swamp? Like, camp there?" I laughed and nodded. It had been a long time since I had gone camping. Tante was going to kill us, but we were leaving the next morning, so if we played our cards just right, she wouldn't have the chance.

Three hours later, Lapin, Jamie, and I were sitting on a dry spot of the massive swamp around a fire, roasting marshmallows. "Thanks, Remy." Jamie said to me.

"For what, Petite?" I replied.

"Saving me from Scott, and bringing me along. This week has been so much fun." He said, almost sad.

"Remy don' wanna go back t'New York, but we gotta." Jamie shrugged and started to cry. I was shocked. My little Jamie! "What's da matter, Petite?"

"I miss my family." He said, sniffling. "I should be home with them, helping my dad with the farm or something. All the fun in the world doesn't make them less dead!"

Lapin put the fire out. "C'mon, Petite, we're goin' t'do one more t'ing tonight." He lead us through the dark swamp for almost an hour to the edge, where we saw a barn. "Lapin slept a hangover off in dis barn. He t'inks y'might like it." He flopped down in a big pile of clean hay and put his hands behind his head, watching Jamie with interest. He smiled and jumped on Lapin, hugging him like a real eight-year-old might.

"The smell of hay reminds me of home." He said. "Thanks, Lapin." He said, climbing off the pile to the corner, where a goat and her kid were sleeping somewhat peacefully. "Watch this." Jamie took the cigarettes out of my pocket, dumped them out, then held out the cardboard box to the mama goat, who ate it, much to our surprise. "Goats will eat anything!" The goat stood up and began to follow Jamie around as Lapin and I offered it miscellaneous things to eat (some paper, our marshmallows, a bit of the hay, and some cobwebs). What she really wanted were the buttons off my coat, though. Crazy animal.

Anyway, that night Jamie talked a lot about his family. Lapin and I talked about ours too, and by the time we fell asleep, Jamie was snoring louder than hell.