++++++ Yet again we have another time skip. This is the last one I promise.

From here on out its all the same time.

I hope you enjoy.

I do not own ++++++

Seven

Home.

The word stuck on the edge of her tongue, like taffy or a chewy caramel. It was an enjoyable feeling to know that she would be home soon.

The day Gaia turned eighteen and graduated high school she left. Hooking up with a mercenary team called the Bloody Geese she learnt the tricks of the mercenary trade-well tricks she hadn't learnt from her parents. She had spent most of her year away in places like Laos, Mozambique and the Sudan as a soldier for hire. Her newly acquired mates found it so odd that in amongst the tattooed rough nuts of their squad, here was this porcelain mutant beauty with the grace and fines of a dancer slumming it with the rest of them.

And that's where her name came from.

Gun Dancer they called her. Seeing her fight was like seeing a dancer on stage doing the ballet. At least that's what they said.

Gaia loved her mottly little crew-there was a mixture of mutants and none mutants that embraced each other without the fighting humans and mutants participated in. In the Bloody Geese was what humanity should really be.

In the past five years since Gaia's first kill, she'd added at least twenty kills to that, even more since she'd been killing as a part of the Bloody Geese. But in the past year that she'd been away she'd missed her parents, she'd missed her brother Jason and she'd missed the birth of her baby sister Monique. Her mother was becoming strangely domesticated in the role of wife even if she wasn't one-yet.

She couldn't imagine her father ever asking.

Tomorrow Jason was starting kindergarten which is why Gaia was coming home. When the cargo plane landed, Gaia came out into the foggy morning of New York weather. As the fog dissipated, Gaia realised that she had a welcoming committee…and not the good kind.

There was Professor Charles Xavier on the tarmac flanked by Jean and another guy who looked like a Geese and not an X-Men. "Good morning Miss Blake."

"Oh great, it's wheels," Gaia grumbled.

His face remained the same but his eyes expressed their disappointment. "I was delighted when I found out that you were coming back to New York. You've had an adventurous year, I understand."

Gaia rolled her eyes. "Right…tracking me?" she asked him. "What's the game, Xavier?"

"I came to extend you an invitation," Charlies smiled. "To the school for breakfast?"

She shrugged. "A free meal is a free meal. Whose sideburns?"

"You're sarcastic rude," he chuckled, smoking a cigar. "I like it. Names Logan."

"Gaia," she answered, following the group back to a waiting car where Scott sat looking utterly bored. "Oh hey four-eyes. Long-time no see." Gaia threw her bags at Jean's feet, "thanks, red," she winked.

Gaia got in the front passenger seat. "I like a free breakfast as much as the next person but I'd like to know what the ulterior motive is. I like my current job."

"Killing people for money?" Scott asked her.

She huffed. "Well it was either kill people for money or work for you losers. I like killing for money." Gaia sat back and put her sunnies on despite the current level of light. "Someone awesome fill me in on what's been happening in the states," she yawned, "and by awesome I mean Logan."

In the back of the car Logan laughed. "You get more excitement from seeing tits on a bull than from this place. I just came along for a break from the kids and some fresh air."

Gaia laughed. "Go on…stick your head out the window."

"Do I look like a Golden Retriever, kid?" he asked.

Gaia shrugged. "You look like something," she laughed. "Woof." She sat back and enjoyed the drive. It was a bit of a long one but it's not like she had to go anywhere. Her parents weren't even expecting her back from the Sudan yet for a while.

She must have fallen asleep because Scott poked her awake when the car stopped.

Gaia punched him in the face.

"Damnit!" Scott shouted. "I think you broke my nose."

"Oops," she shrugged. Gaia climbed out and found herself looking up at a huge English mansion surrounded by fields of the greenest grass she had ever seen. "Holy crap," she laughed. "I've just come from the Sudan and here you are sitting like kings and queens…that really pisses me off. Much more than it should."

"This is my home, Miss Blake," Charles smiled, "Welcome to the Xavier School for Gifted Youngsters."

"You know my team and I raided a place like this a week ago?" Gaia asked him.

"Oh," Charles frowned. "I am sorry about that."

"Don't be," she shrugged, "it was a sex den. Kids, drugs, money." Gaia looked around, "hey where did the awesome one go?" Gaia asked them, searching for Logan.

"I believe Logan has a nine am appointment in the Danger Room," Jean told her.

Gaia's eyes flashed. "What's the Danger Room?"

"Stick around long enough and you can find out," Charles told her.

She sniffed herself and wrinkled her nose. "Got some place I can change and shower? I smell like a cargo plane full of guns."

"Newby?" someone asked. The speaker was hiding somewhat in the shadows. She came out of the darkness, Gaia loved her white bangs down the side of her face. "Lookin' a little old for mutant high."

Gaia snorted. "Mutant high? No, I'm not a newby. I'm here for the free breakfast. I'm Gaia." She extended her hand but the girl didn't touch it.

"I wouldn't touch her if I were you," Jean warned. "That's Rogue. She absorbs the powers of mutants."

"So I'd probably kill you," Gaia chuckled. "Nice to meet you Rogue."

"Likewise," she grinned. "Once you've had your breaky come join us outside."

Gaia nodded but inside she was not joining them outside. When she turned around she found a woman with white hair leading a bunch of young kids across the hall. She had a funny feeling that this was all for her benefit. But she bit the bullet anyway. "So where do you get these kids anyway? Charity auction? Craig's List? Dad likes to put shrunken heads on Craig's List for fun. Don't ask me why, it's a hobby…one of many."

"These children come to us from either horrible homes, the streets or loving homes," Charles explained. "Some of them have similar situations such as yours."

Gaia turned around. "See I don't think this is funny asshole!" she snapped. "Parading a bunch of piss ass kids in front of me to pull on my heartstrings?"

"These children need someone like you," Jean objected.

"These children need to be turned into weapons?" Gaia laughed. "And here I thought you were the good guys."

"You already are a weapon," Scott argued. "Shelby and Wade molded you into a different kind of weapon. An indiscriminate sociopath who murders for money. Put any anger you have towards your life and do something good."

Gaia grabbed the air around him and slammed him into the wall. "Before you cast judgment on my life, I only kill bad people. Warlords. Rapists. Murderers. Drug runners. Slave owners. People who touch kids."

Charles cleared his throat. "I assure you, Miss Blake, this is not a show."

"Certainly feels like one to me," Gaia snapped. She dropped Scott like a sack of potatoes and walked over him. "Where are your showers again?"

++++++ So shall we have Gaia have a little fun in a Danger Room simulation? ++++++