Sorry for the long delay. Life has a way of catching up to you...

Anyway, I hope you enjoy.

P.S. I do not own the men (if I did I would not be on Fanfiction writing about the x-men)

(Two hours later, inside the kitchen of the house)

"Everyone said you weren't going to come back, Anne Marie, but I knew you would. A good girl like you wouldn't leave us all alone." Maddie said as she served the four x-men over the breakfast table. "Known you since was a baby. Never saw a better behaved girl. Always done what was right…"

"Maddie, you're going to end up embarrassing me," Rogue teased with a smile.

"Well, what'd you expect? Being gone so long and then coming home with guests! Not often that I can brag about you!"

"Aw, chère! Where you been hiding this belle fille?" Gambit playfully asked.

"Un-uh young man! Flattery will get you nowhere," Maddie tsked, while swatting his hands away from the pastries she had just sat out.

Hating to break the happy atmosphere but knowing she had to, Rogue broke into the conversation. "Now Maddie, what was Shaw doing here?"

"Well, you know how your daddy never wanted to get rid of the family place, not even when they offered him all that money for it when you were little. Ever since your daddy been dead…"

"Dead?" Questioned Kurt.

There was a brief moment of silence before Maddie turned to Rogue and asked, "You told these men why you're here, honey?"

"No Ma'am." She replied. "But in my defense, it was never my idea to drag them along on this trip. I would've been fine going by myself but the professor insisted that they go to. All part of team exercises and…"

"Now don't you go blaming anything on that nice man young lady. He done more good for you than your father ever did and I will hear nothing said against him. That understood?"

"Yes ma'am."

"Now, I'm going to leave this room for a little awhile and when I get back these boys here better be filled in on the goings on of this little trip y'all are on. I won't go explaining my end of this business until you explain yours!" Saying this Maddie left the room and Rogue was left with three sets of eyes staring at her.

After a brief silence, Wolverine jumped in with his usual two cents. "You heard the lady, Rogue. Ain't no sense sitting there being all silent when she's just going to come back and jump all over you again wince you haven't told us what we're here for."

After a brief hesitation, Rogue began to tell then why they were there.

"Several weeks ago, I was contacted by Maddie. She sent me a letter saying that my father was getting into some trouble. You see, when he found out that I was a mutant, he kicked me out of the house, claiming that I wasn't his daughter, not any more. Maddie sent me letters over the years describing how he began to develop a habit of drinking and gambling. Not a very good combo. He began to accumulate debt and had no way of paying it off. So, he began to sell of little bits of the family possessions. But I guess that's neither here nor there."

There was brief pause before she began again.

"Y'all remember that box I got at the mansion a few days ago? Well, it contained a letter from Maddie and my father's old hat, something he would never willingly part with. Seems he died a few nights ago. Went out to drink at One of Riley's places and was found the next day in the swamp…well, at least pieces of him were found."

The three x-men surrounding her had no clue what to say. Kurt was looking at his sister, wondering if she needed comforting. Gambit was left wondering what the heck he could do now that Rogue had just revealed so much of her past to them. Wolverine was the one who probably had the best perspective on her story. His philosophy: take out the important facts of her story and leave out the emotional involved problems connected to her story.

"So, basically we're here to tie up loose ends your father left behind?" Logan more stated than questioned.

"Bingo."

So saying, Maddie walked in, and immediately asked, "You done telling these boys why they're here?"

"Yes ma'am." Wolverine supplied for Rogue.

"Good. I won't have guests in my house who don't even know why they're here. You should've known better Anne Marie." Maddie lectured to Rogue.

"I know Maddie," Rogue timidly replied.

Upon hearing Rogue's soft reply and seeing her look of exhaustion, Maddie took pity on her. "Aw, honey. I'm sorry. I got all up in a tizzy and I forgot how this topic is affecting you. Must be harder on you than it is on me. I just lose track of these things when I go on a rampage."

"Rogue smiled lightly at this.

"There we go Honey. That's what I want to see. No droopy faces at my table today. Un-uh, not while I have anything to say. Now, darling, what were we talking about before I left?"

"I asked you why Shaw was here earlier." Rogue replied.

"Oh, I remember. (sigh) Well, you could probably guess for yourself why he was here. Ever since your daddy rejected his daddy's offer for the house when you were four, that family has been trying to find a way to get their hands on it. Now, that Mr. Shaw senior is our town's Mayor, things have just gotten worse. That man doesn't know when to stop and his son is a regular ship off the old block. Wants the property for himself. Won't stop until he gets too. That's the whole reason he was here earlier. Since your father was gone and no one expected you to come back, they been threatening me to leave. They've been saying that since there isn't any heir to this property and because of all your daddy's debt they had to confiscate the property."

Maddie took a long breathe after her story in order to catch her breath and so the x-men could take in what she had said. After she deemed it long enough of a break for them to assimilate the information, she said, "But now that Anne Marie is here, the only problem we need to solve is the problem of all that debt."

"Maddie," Rogue began, "it won't be as easy as all that. I think there's more going on here than just the problem of the property."

"Why do you say that, honey?" queried Maddie.

"Well, we already know that the MRD has set up a base close to this area. That alone is a problem. But more important than the base is the implications that go along with the whole involvement of the MRD in the area." Rogue replied.

"Honey, I'm a lot older than you and I don't just think of the significance of one little problem, so you better just spell it out for me."

Rogue began her brief explanation, "(sigh) If the MRD is in an area that the town has possession of that means that the government and the leaders of the MRD had to have been in contact with the leadership of the town, which means…"

She was immediately interrupted by Maddie's shout of, "Mr. Shaw Senior!"

"Right. But that's not it. Given that this area consists of a small population, is seems to me that the MRD is here to do something that needs as few witnesses as possible. I believe that they're conducting some kind of illegal procedures that need to be kept as top secret as possible. That' means that Mr. Shaw senior either has to be in on whatever they're doing or the MRD is taking advantage of him." Rogue finished

"Well, if I had any money to my name, my bet would be on the second possibility." Maddie quickly stated.

"Me too, Maddie."

"How much of the population in the area have ties to or are mutants?" Logan asked.

"Oh, there's not very many. The last few mutants born in town were born around the time that Anne Marie was born. Ever since then, they've been routed out of town. Not many folks around here that will take someone being different. Especially if that person is family." Maddie answered since Rogue had no clue as to the goings on of the community.

"Mon ami, didn't Cerebro say that there had been an influx of mutants in the area lately?" Gambit asked Logan.

"Yeah. But each time Cerebro spotted a mutant signature in this area, it would almost immediately disappear. Chuck said that the blips that Cerebro kept spotting must have just been malfunctions still in the system from when we had to reboot the system a few weeks ago." Logan replied.

"Sounds like we have a few more things we need to take care of before we leave Mississippi." Kurt said as he thought aloud.

"Yeah. I already figured as much" Rogue responded, thinking that maybe it was a good thing these three had tagged along.