It's a fact; I don't own any X-Men Evolution characters, GI Joe characters or Homer Simpson. I'm only doing this because I'm deranged. I just thought I'd try something different this time. This story is written from the adult Jamie's point of view. Here's a little glimpse into the future from yours truly.

The Great Paper Clip War

By James 'Multiple Man' Maddrox

From his best selling autobiography "I'm Only More Than a Hundred Men."

Looking back at my days as a New Mutant at the Xavier Institute, I have to admit than in more than one occasion I have mixed emotions. I feel a sad sweet nostalgia for my childhood coupled with the memory of the reality of my situation. When I think of my schooldays I believe one phrase sums up my feelings perfectly. What the hell were my parents smoking when they sent me there?

Yeah the world was a harsh place, especially the early years when mutants were first introduced to the world. Much like it is today only a lot more explosives and no outreach programs. There were a lot of things mutants had to fear in those days. Angry mobs, FOH and Purity, Mutant experimentation and exploitation by governments and/or secret agencies run by governments, Sentinels and Cobra. Not to mention legislation against us including the Mutant Registration Act. (Keep in mind that this was long before President Oprah Winfrey added on free health care, tax breaks, car insurance and Social Security perks for mutants to the bill in her second term. As we all know, not only did nearly every mutant in the country register immediately, more than five million non mutants tried to get in on the action too.) For more on this see Chapter 78: Register Everyone and Let the Credit Card Companies Sort It Out.

However, nothing will toughen a little mutant kid up faster than living with a group of teenage mutant maniacs with rampaging hormones running amok. I witnessed some of the most bizarre and frightening experiences the world has ever known. And this was before I lost my virginity to Trinity. But I'm getting ahead of myself. (For those perverts reading this that have no patience, you might want to skip ahead to Chapter 13: Why I Am Afraid Of Whipped Cream.)

Anyway, as I was saying I saw a lot of crazy wild things during my time at the Xavier Institute For The Gifted. (It should have read The Xavier Institute For The Gifted At Blowing Things Up and Driving People Insane.) You've already read quite a few of the adventures (or complete disasters) of the X-Men and the Brotherhood-turned-Misfits. And I am sure everyone is aware of some of the more infamous chapters in Mutant History. Events such as the Tater Tot Incident, Beast mooning Senator Kelly on National Television, The FYI Brawl and Professor Xavier losing his temper and calling Paris Hilton the Queen of Sluts during her brief stint as an anchor for Nightline.

But there has been one incident that has been shrouded in mystery. An occurrence that has had more cover-ups and denials than any of the Weapon X programs. Even today the X-Men deny it ever happened. But I'm here to tell you it did. I was there and I saw the whole thing.

I am referring of course to The Great Paper Clip War.

The whole mess started that Winter in 2006. The year wasn't even a full month old and it was filled with fires, floods, blizzards, earthquakes, landslides and the release of Kevin Federlines' CD. Needless to say things were already pretty tense around the world.

And it wasn't any easier at home. Due to the increasing number of mutant bans and protestors in Bayville, once again we were all trapped inside the Institute with nowhere to go.

Okay that's not entirely true. Yeah we had the X-Jet and the Velocity but since there were huge blizzards so big that not even Storm could dissipate them we couldn't get out. And I suppose if it occurred to someone to ask the Misfits for assistance they would have taken us with the help of their Mass Device Teleportation watches. But of course that wouldn't happen for two reasons: the first being that every time we took a trip with the Misfits anywhere it ended in disaster. I don't mean your run of the mill disasters. I am talking about your 500 drunken Hell's Angels Motorcyclists heading straight for a nuclear power plant disaster. (Those of you who have read my books Misfits In The Mists and Never Marry a Misfit know what I am talking about.)

Secondly no X-Man in his right mind would ask a Misfit's help for anything. Especially since they delighted in coming over every day to drive the majority of us insane. See reason number one.

Not that the X-Men were ever models of sanity and restraint. To continue my analogy, the X-Men were akin to a drunken Homer Simpson and the entire town of Springfield. (See my other book: What the Hell is Wrong With the X-Men Anyway?)

So picture it…

Drunken Hell's Angels on motorcycles. Bad.

Drunken Simpsons in a nuclear power plant. Bad.

Putting both Drunken Hell's Angels and Simpsons together…

Kaboom.

In other words putting the two groups together was bound to cause some kind of explosion even under the best possible terms.

So there we were, the outside world hating us. Big blizzards. Stuck inside the mansion for weeks on end with only four main forms of recreation: Chores, schoolwork, Danger Room Practice and placing bets on everyone's love lives. I made a lot of money that year.

To say we were all getting a little stir crazy is an understatement. Even the instructors were starting to climb the walls. Actually Logan literally did climb the walls using his claws for a few days until everyone complained about the holes he was making. To be fair, the guy was trying to get away from Kitty's whining about her love life and Jubilee's constant constant complaining about needing a new wardrobe. Little wonder that after nearly 35 years of teaching at the Institute he finally snapped and ran off to Broadway where he performed in several musicals for a while. He was quite good too. Even earned a Tony.

I'm amazed that man lasted that long without killing us all.

As I was saying it was a particularly long dull morning. It was a Sunday so as a rule there were no classes or Danger Room sessions. This was due to the fact that both the teachers and the students demanded at least one day off to sleep in. By this time I had perfected the technique of using my multiples to read and do my homework at the same time. I could literally read three or four books at a time and remember them all when I reabsorbed my duplicates. This was a skill that was particularly useful during my adult years in my many careers as a government agent, private detective, author, bodyguard/love interest for several female rock stars and Wolverine's agent. Not to mention my brief career as an actor in that cult classic TV show: Multiplicity The Series.

(Again to those perverts who don't want to wait, skip ahead to Chapters 25 to 38 for more details on these affairs. Particularly Chapter 27, How I Got Over My Fear Of Whipped Cream.)

So there I was, a fourteen-year-old kid with no homework, no classes or morning cartoons to occupy my time. Professor X had taken off with Warren Worthington the Third and Ororo Monroe to Washington to debate yet again on some kind of committee dealing with mutants.

It was years later we discovered that more than half of these 'committees' took place in bar in the Watergate Hotel.

But I'm getting off track. All the other remaining adults were asleep or so I thought. To my surprise I saw Jean Grey sitting calmly in the living room with a huge box of paper clips. Hovering before her was a long paper clip chain and she was adding on to it using her powers.

"What'cha doin'?" I asked sleepily.

"I'm trying something new with my powers," Jean explained. "I'm using my telekinesis to link together paper clips."

"Making a chain? Cool," It was to me at the time. I mean what's cooler to a fourteen-year-old than using your powers in stupid and meaningless ways?

"It's to help me focus my concentration," She gave me a look to imply she knew what I was thinking. (Not that hard for a telepath.) "It's actually quite challenging."

"Oh," I said again, not really knowing what else to say. "Why are you up so early?"

"I needed some time to concentrate and early in the morning it's a lot…" She began.

BOOOM!

"Quieter…" Jean sighed as she watched the paper clip chain fall to the floor.

The sound of Tabitha's fury at whoever and whatever she wanted rumbled through the mansion. The shrill scream of Bobby's cry like a little frightened girl followed afterwards. Then the angry rumble of a half dozen female students getting ready to lynch someone (Probably Bobby) echoed through the hallway. Not to mention the angry grumbles of a lot of male students more than willing to assist the girls.

I saw Scott stagger downstairs. His hair was a mess and he was wearing his shorts, T-shirt and robe with slippers. "Scott?" Jean saw him as well. "What's going on?"

"Iceman…" Scott moaned half asleep. "Shaving cream…Razzle Frazzle…(at least that's what I thought he said.) Snow on the floor…Grunt, Grumble…Bathroom door frozen shut…Grunt…"

"Oh dear," Jean sighed as she used her powers to pick up the paper clip chain and start on it again.

Scott then stopped to look at her for a moment. "Are you doing what I think you're doing?"

"Using my powers to make a paper clip chain, yes Scott," Jean said matter of factly.

"Why?" He was stunned.

"To practice her powers, duh," I rolled my eyes at him.

"Shouldn't you be upstairs beating up Bobby?" Scott gave me a look.

"Let him stay," Jean told him. "He's not bothering me."

ZOOOM!

"PIETRO!" Someone screamed upstairs.

RUMBLE!

"LANCE YOU JERK WHAT ARE YOU DOING?" Kitty shouted.

"HE STARTED IT!" Lance could be heard screaming. More voices chimed in to a large argument.

The Drunken Hell's Angels…I mean the Misfits had arrived.

Normally this would send me into a panic and look for a place to hide, since the Trinity Triplets usually accompanied them. Those girls including my future wife would always try and kiss me for hours on end. (And we all know which one I ended up marrying so I won't go into that until you get to Chapter 50: The Ball And Chain) But I knew since it was a Sunday they wouldn't show up until much later.

Sundays they always slept in until noon. That's when the sleeping potion their sister drugged them with usually wore off.

Pietro had zoomed downstairs snickering over some prank he had pulled when he saw what Jean was doing. "What are you doing?"

"Flying to Zimbabwe, Quicksilver," Jean was starting to get very annoyed. "What does it look like I'm doing?"

"It looks like you're just stringing paper clips together," Pietro said.

"Well that is what she's doing," Althea said as she walked in.

"Why would she do something as pointless as that?" Pietro asked.

"This from the guy who ran around just to see how many Starbucks stores there were in the state of Maine?" Althea gave him a look.

"It's not pointless," Scott huffed. "It's an important exercise in concentration and focusing her powers. Any idiot can see that."

"You didn't know," I pointed out.

"Go to your room," Scott looked at me with a scowl.

Normally that would send me running, but since most of the adults were absent or hiding in the lab I decided to stay put. I retorted in the most polite and mature way possible, by sticking my tongue out.

Soon nearly half the mansion had come downstairs and saw what Jean was doing with her powers. Many were impressed. But Pietro was not one of them. Hating the spotlight being off him for more than a nanosecond, he decided to try and steal Jean's thunder. He did it by stealing some of her paperclips and using his super speed to make a chain of his own.

"See," He proudly showed off his paperclip chain. "Mine's better and longer."

"Pietro as fast as you are," Althea gave him a look. "What Jean is doing takes a lot more skill."

"No way!" Lance stuck up for Pietro, which was unusual for him lately. Perhaps he was still miffed over whatever fight he had with Kitty that time and simply was looking for an argument so he could fight someone.

"I hate to say it but for once my brother's right," Wanda piped up. "His powers are better suited for making paper clip chains faster. Actually that's pretty much it."

"HEY!" Pietro snapped. "Thanks a lot, Sis. I think…"

"That would be a first," Rogue scoffed.

Eventually nearly all the girls minus Wanda were on Jean's side and all the boys except for Scott were on Pietro's side. I won't bore you with the details of the exact specifics of the lengthy debate. Basically the next three hours sounded like this with a few explosions:

"Is not!"

"Is too!"

"Jean's right!"

"Pietro's right!"

"Jean's way takes more skill!"

"Pietro is faster! He can make a longer chain!"

"Can not!"

"Wanna bet?"

And so on and so forth. Finally it was decided on a contest to see who could make the longest and most complete paper clip chain. Eventually everyone was sent throughout the entire mansion to hunt down every paper clip they could find. Althea and Arcade teleported back to their home and soon brought back several boxes of paper clips. I'm pretty sure they must have stolen them from every office in the Pit.

Fueled by both sides neither Pietro nor Jean were willing to back down. True Pietro was faster but Jean was slowly catching up. Perhaps somehow she was tapping into the dormant Phoenix Force inside her. I could swear I saw a flash of red fire in her eyes as she furiously made her chain. Soon they were both neck and neck.

Finally we had exhausted our paper chain supply and to our astonishment we all discovered that both of them had made a chain consisting of exactly 1,234,786,330 paper clips.

Do you have any idea what the odds of that are? Neither do I but I know it's a lot.

But that didn't satisfy anyone. Oh no, in fact this encouraged Pietro even more. "If only I had more paper clips I could show you who's boss!" He yelled.

"Bring it on!" Jean shouted back.

We all knew there was only one way to solve this and what we had to do next. And damn all rationality and sanity we were going to do it.

For the next three days the newscasters and authorities were baffled at the mysterious disappearance of paper clips throughout the entire state. It never fails to amaze me how much we owe our lives to those tiny bits of metal that hold papers together. Bills and checks were lost and forgotten. Payments were not made and credit card companies saw an increase in debt.

Lawmakers who had learned the art of attaching addendums and articles to bills being debated were stymied. True they could use staples, but they were just too noisy and noticeable. In fact they misplaced a few papers. It's rumored that a few proposed mutant bans were robbed of their paper clips and shoved behind a drawer somewhere. Some say Xi did it but personally I wouldn't put it past Rogue.

Offices became even more of a mess than usual since there was nothing to attach random pieces of paper together. True staples could be used again but this led to an overflow of staples breaking down or malfunctioning, people tearing papers apart or to shreds and getting paper cuts. But still many presentations couldn't be put together in time and nothing was getting done.

Prices for any remaining paper clips as well as Band-Aids went through the roof. A five-dollar package of paper clips rose to a whopping fourteen dollars and ninety-five cents. Paper clips were brought in from other states in order to help but even that proved futile. Especially since many of the trucks that were supposed to bring them turned up empty. (Trinity was getting very good with their skill at the Mass Device.) There were even some fistfights over paper clips at stores.

In other words the entire economy was thrown into chaos because neither Jean nor Pietro could keep their egos in check.

Oh yeah at the time there were a few people that blamed mutants for the whole disaster. But amazingly no one believed them the one time they were actually right. Everybody blamed either George Bush or Donald Trump. There were a few fistfights over that one too.

Of course Jean and Pietro had agreed to rest periods so they could sleep and the rest of us could get paper clips. I myself was sent to watch over the chains so that neither side would cheat. More likely Pietro would try and steal some of Jean's and add onto his.

It was on the fourth day that Logan had come back from whatever trip he had been on at the time. He had returned to a shocking sight. Paper clip chains were everywhere. They were strung all throughout the halls, down banisters, on the floor, walls and ceiling and even out the window.

Logan saw this sight and responded in a rational way. "WHAT THE HELL IS GOING ON HERE?"

Hank walked in with a clipboard. "Logan welcome back! You are just in time to witness the fruition of a fascinating experiment."

"Jean and Pietro are competing to see who can make the best paper clip chain with their powers," I explained. "They've been at it for three whole days."

"You're kidding?" He looked at me. Then he looked at Hank. "And you just let them do this?"

"Well admittedly I was ensconced in my laboratory when the contest first began," He coughed. "Doing a very important research on the effects of certain substances on mutant physiology and…"

"You got high on beer and Twinkies again didn't you?" Logan interrupted him.

"I was not inebriated!" Hank snorted. "I may have had an extra Ding Dong or two but…"

"Never mind!" Logan waved. "This explains all those news reports."

"What news reports?" Hank blinked.

"The ones on people going nuts over a paper clip shortage!" Logan told him.

"Oh…" Hank blinked. "That explains those Staples trucks Trinity teleported to the backyard yesterday."

"WHAT?" Logan roared. "WHEN CHARLES FINDS OUT ABOUT WHAT YOU DID…"

"ME?" Hank snapped back. "YOU WERE SUPPOSED TO BE IN CHARGE NOT GALAVANTING OFF TO…"

"Will you guys keep it down?" Scott poked his head out. "You're ruining Jean's concentration!"

"Of all the nuts living here…" Logan stormed into the room where the contest began. "Cyclops how could you…?"

He stopped in his tracks. The very sight of those two working simply stunned him. Pietro's fevered pitch of paper clip clipping speed was faster than light, and it looked like a blur of colors was before him. Jean was working just as fast. Sometimes linking together twenty clips at a time. All floating through the air with great precision.

And there the rest of us were. Cheering them on. Waving banners and flags. Giving the combatants sips of water and coaching them. Not to mention several others running in and out with boxes of paper clips.

"Got another shipment courtesy of Bayville High!" Trinity laughed as they skipped in with some boxes. "Those idiots never knew what hit 'em!"

"WHAT?" Logan roared. That stopped us all in our tracks.

But only Pietro for a nanosecond. Using the brief distraction he grabbed his paper clip chain and clipped his to Jean's hovering in the air. "I WIN!" He crowed.

"WHAT?" Jean shouted. The full fury of rage was in her eyes as she used her powers to shove him against the wall. "YOU CHEATING LITTLE…"

"KNOCK IT OFF!" Logan's roar was the only thing stopping the room from erupting into pandemonium. He then proceeded to give us a huge dressing down and lecture on how stupid we had all been acting.

Then Hank took that opportunity to remind Logan that he wasn't supposed to leave the school grounds in the first place and asked exactly what he was doing at that hotel with Jinx down the road that kept him away for so long. This quieted Logan down immensely.

In the end all parties agreed never to mention the Great Paper Clip War ever again to anyone. It was agreed to send the completed paper clip chain intact to Blob's Uncle Bubba Jane. (Yeah you read it right.) Uncle Bubba Jane ran a curiosity museum featuring the Biggest Ball of Twine in Minnesota. The Ultimate Paper Clip Chain resides there in all its glory to this very day. Well, there and through two other small towns.

So why am I telling you this now?

Simple, to get back at both groups for some of the psychological scarring they did. (See Chapter 3: The Danger Room is Really Dangerous! And Chapter 13 as well, Why I Am Afraid of Whipped Cream.)

That and a ton of money my publisher promised me.