Disclaimer: I do not own anything except for the idea of the plot

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I aint one to lie and say that life is perfect. Hell, my life is far from it. I got a mother who manipulated me into staying with her and fight her battles for her. I never had a thing against Professor Xavier. So when my mamma finally pushed me over the edge, I really didn't have to think all that hard about where my loyalties lie and who I was gonna stand next to.

Now don't get me wrong here, I did not turn my back on the Brotherhood. You see, the way I figure it, Mamma- I mean Mystique tricked the bunch of them the same way she did me. Through lies and deceit. With that in mind, I felt sympathy for them. If they weren't so dead set in causing trouble after I joined Xavier's happy lot of wanna-be superheroes, I wouldn't have had to knock them down a peg or two.

So naturally, when Good ole Xavier announced that we were going up against Magnet Brain, it felt kinda like a reunion of old friends. Granted we were never joined at the arms and skipping on our way to our missions, but still that vibe of camaraderie was present.

And good ole Scotty boy just had to pitch a fit.

Well, we win some we loose some.

And boy was I about to loose it.

~)(~

"Okay guys, Magneto is up to something here. I'm not sure what but I have the feeling that it will be monumental to everything."

As Jeannie started the pep talk I had to hand it to her. She was stepping' up to the plate where Scotty Boy lacked the guts. Good for her. Not that her authority is gonna fly so well with all of us. Especially the Brotherhood. But low and behold, they kept their traps shut. Even Lance. You would think that Lance would have a bit of a hard time taking orders when he's usually the one giving them… Maybe that's why Scotty and him were frequently at odds.

Well, as I was off in my own thoughts, I 'accidentally' tuned out the pep speech that Grey was giving us. I can probably tell you the gist of it. Something about teamwork being important and a key factor and that this was a prime example of professor Xavier's goal: mutants working together for the common good of the people. I'm pretty sure I head Todd snort once or twice during Jeannie's speech. Not that I can condemn him. At least he was paying attention.

So our happy band of vigilante heroes made our way down to the docks. And badda bing, badda boom. The action begins. It was almost kinda comical now that I think about it. Here we are a bunch of trained mutant teenagers hell bent on not doing permanent damage going up against the men that Magnet Brain- a man insufferably set on having mutants superior to humans- had selected to do something "monumental", as Jeannie put it. And we all knew that that type of monumental was not gonna be in our "equal rights for all" favor.

And so, when those four spheres touched ground, we- Xavier's and company- waited with abated breath to see what monstrosity was within those orbs.

Imagine my disappointment when I see a big furry rabid man, a dude with a pack of cards, the tin man from Oz, and a freaking orange teletubbie step out of the contraptions.

This is what Magneto was gonna use to help his "homo-superior" view?

I wasn't impressed.

But you know us superheroes we have some sort of complex that just programs right into our head, making us go head to head with these four-

Holy Crap! Who the hell gave the teletubbie fire?!

And suddenly, Magnet Brain's guys didn't seem so unimpressive.

No. Scratch that. They just became friggin terrifying.

But what do you do when you are trained for this situation? You follow what's been batted into your cerebral cortex by a man not much taller than you but has one mean ass punch, especially if bones are coated with metal.

It was just another battle. Another fight we had to throw ourselves in. And we did just that too. We used Grey's preached method teamwork against most of Magneto's lackeys.

Except for one.

At the time, I hadn't noticed the absence of the card thrower. I was too busy helping out Evan or Wanda. But as soon as I was able to step back, I looked over the mutant playground and only saw three of Magnet Brains goons. So naturally I had to let the damn curious cat out of its bag, and went searching for the missing puzzle piece. I mean, I had the means to take him out. One little swipe of my finger and bam- the guy would be out cold. No big deal. So when I think that I've got the element of surprise on the guy, I remove one of my gloves. Piece of cake.

I stepped out from around the corner

And come face to extremely close face with the other guy.

Did I mention extremely close? I half wanted to warn the guy to stay back, but that wouldn't be proper battlefield etiquette, would it?

But even if I wanted to warn the man, I wouldn't have been able to. The guy just held me there, rooted to the spot with nothing more than his eyes. It was unnerving and calming at once. Oddly familiar, if you ask me.

And then, he got closer.

My inner self was cringing at the close proximity of the guy. But still, he held me fast with his gaze. I saw something glowing faintly out of the corner of my eye, but his intense stare down at me wouldn't allow me to look anywhere else but at him.

And I couldn't bring myself to want to, either.

But then, the cocky bastard had the audacity to put the damn object that I couldn't bring myself to acknowledge in my damn hand as he ran off with nothing more than a mock salute to bring me out of my confused state.

And when I looked down, what did I see?

One of those damn playing cards, glowing pink, faintly crackling with explosive energy. If I hadn't seen the pink glow before, I might have stared at it a bit longer, curious. But, thankfully, I had enough of my wits left in me to quickly toss the card away from me before I became one limb short.

Didn't think much about it then.

To tell the truth, I didn't think much about it at all. I went back to the rest of my teammates, having lost sight of the rude card thrower. We fought Magneto and his goons till these huge robots came and started attacking us. And well, I was one of the few to get attacked and caught.

What can I say? It just wasn't my day.

I was captive for a bit before the rest of the gang showed up and helped us escape. Logan was obviously pissed. He kept muttering the name Sabertooth with such hatred and venom that I was actually starting to pity the overgrown rabid animal that Logan had the pleasure of fighting last.

It was only back at the mansion, in the comfort of my own room that I actually got the chance to think about things.

And, well, it did help that I find one slightly familiar playing card onto of my pillow was enough to jump start the thought process.

When I saw the dreadful card laid out on my bed, my eyes narrowed with an unforgiving glint as I stomped my way towards the offending object. I snatching the thing from my pillow case and was about t o crumple it and throw it away, aware that the person who placed it there was probably watching my every movement.

Key word, though? About.

I didn't throw the damn thing away. Why? Because right before I clenched my fist to ruin the life of the card for good, I noticed that the white part of the card, had words on them.

For the life of me, I couldn't remember what the card was, weather it was a number or face card, club or spade. All I know is that the words written on it were familiar.

See you around, Chere.

Granted, I believe the exact phrase had my real name in place on the endearment, but you know what I mean by it being familiar.

And the events of the fight with the card thrower came crashing to the front of my mind. The way he looked at me was probably him recognizing me. Again my white stripes are hard to dismiss, especially if you seen them before a few years ago. But what I distinctly recall was the unexplainable calm and relation I felt when I held his gaze. Exactly the same reaction I had to a red and black gaze down in Louisiana one muggy summer night.

And I realize I was still as much of an idiot as I was back when I was thirteen. I still ran ahead, thinking I was some one-woman army. At least this time there were no gunshots fired at my head. Just a gigantic metal machine shooting green goo at me.

And as I stood there, card half crinkled in my grasp, I knew that my swamp rat encounters were far from over.

To prove my point, not long after, when we returned to Bayville High after being outed as Mutants, I saw the stupid Cajun smirking as the two bullies I was going to confront were running away in terror.

One plus one equals two. Not that hard to put what happened together.

"What are ya doing here?!" Despite the fact that I knew him, however briefly, before, I still held a grudge against him. I mean, come on-this was one of guys that were responsible for me being stuck in a green goo bubble and held captive at some military experimental base. I wasn't about to just ignore that fact.

"Jus' passin t'rough, Chere."

And again with the two finger salute. His dismissal of me.

I was more than pissed off.

So when Kitty caught up to me, I did what any person would naturally proceed to do. I dragged Kitty with me as I followed him.

To the Brotherhood of all places, too. I mean, lets think about this. Theses boys fought Magneto with us. Magneto was the reason why Fred was missing from their merry band of delinquents. Cajun- known now as Gambit- works under Magneto. You see anybody else would have had the sense to outright refuse to comply with Magnet Brain's demands. But no. A card trick and a swish of the curtain and these boys are back at playing Magnetos pawns.

Maybe I'm being a little harsh here. He did threaten to blow up Todd. But still. These boys are known for sticking it to authority figures, but they can't even manage an argument against one of Magneto's lackey's?

After Gambit leaves, Lance with group in tow, jump in his jeep and speed away.

And I get Kitty to faze us through various moving objects going at fast paces in the hope of foiling one of Magneto's plans.

Imagine my disappointment when it was just Pietro in a box.

And lance has to be the over dramatic villain hero and send the police vehicles transporting Pietro into a frenzy, nearly throwing Pietro into a ditch. And it ends like it always does. With me and Kitty saving their asses. At least this time around, we get a pleasant surprise. It's good to know that not every human out there hates us.

Still, no good deed goes unpunished. Kitty and I still wound up with detention.

And as we were sent back to our rooms, fuming (Kitty at me, and me just because) I see another damn card on my pillow. I snatch at it before Kitty has even the chance to see anything and when she's safely away, out of sight, I look over the card and make out the faint scrawl of "Merci, Cher" written over the three of clubs.

And I was certain then, if not before, that my encounters with the red-eyed Cajun were far from over.

It hadn't crossed my mind that they never would.