Thanks to Luba for correcting my English English when it got too much like my American English, to Carolyn for letting me wing ideas off of her skull, and the fan-fic community in general for recieving these as well as they have.

There, I did it. Now tell Campos to give me cigarettes back.

"He's going to jump you." pointed out Katherine Pryde, Excalibur's Shadowcat, as she surveyed the two players on either side of the checkerboard.

"I don't need any help from a girl." retorted Icarus Scott as he jumped his opponent's piece. The other player responded by jumping all but one of Ic's men.

"Suuuuuuurrrre you don't." grinned Kitty as Lockheed chortled and made two neat piles of the captured red checkers. "I'll bet your remaining piece has a terrific move."

"Whatever." sighed Icarus, admitting defeat. He moved his last checker and let Lockheed jump it. The dragon yawned and hopped from the table to Kitty's shoulder. Kitty scratched her friend between his shoulder blades.

"Yeah, I'd be bored too if I'd just won 13 games straight." she grinned.

"So I'm not good at checkers. Wanna try bungee-jumping? You won't even need a cord with me around." Icarus asked as he demonstrated his power by levitating the checkers and their board back into the game box.

"No thanks." Kitty paused for a second as the small dragon wrapped himself around her neck. "Icarus, is something wrong?"

"Yeah, I just lost to a flying lizard."

"Besides that. I mean, it may be none of my business, but you Morlocks have all seemed awfully down in the dumps lately."

Icarus kicked at the table legs. "It's just... it's not that we don't appreciate you guys letting us crash here and all, but we're kind of worried. It's been almost two months since that mess on Muir and we haven't heard from any of our friends."

Kitty sat down across from Ic. "But we told you that we saw the X-Men alive at the Professor's funeral and..."

The young black boy scowled. "Those are your friends. YOUR team. I'm talking about Erg and Tar Baby and the rest of the Morlocks. There weren't that many of us left after the Reavers tried to tear the place apart and now we don't know who's left. We haven't even heard from Dr. MacTaggart."

"Well, do they know that you're here?"

"Yeah. Sent 'em a letter about a month ago." He looked miserable.

Kitty reached over and patted his hand. "The mail moves slowly to and from Muir." said she, trying to sound sure of herself. "That much I remember from my stay there. Give it time. 'Til then, don't worry about it too much. Believe me, you'll just drive yourselves nuts!" She stood up and uncoiled Lockheed from her throat. "Hey, Rachel and I are going shopping later. You're invited. Ask Keesha and James if they wanna come too. We'll make a day of it. No adult types allowed." She'd hoped that maybe a quick shopping expedition might perk him up, but he just slumped a little more.

"I'll ask." was all he said before scooting his chair back and slouching off. Roughly ten minutes later, Kitty and Rachel wound up heading for the shopping center by themselves.

A few minutes after the two teens had flown off to make life-altering decisions of cash vs. credit, a minor light-show and ripple of sound announced the return of Amanda Sefton to the empty kitchen. As impressive as her display of magic had been, Amanda hardly looked the part. Clad in a T-shirt emblazoned with "Objects Under This Shirt Are Larger Than They Appear" on the front and ripped blue-jeans, the sorceress had her arms so full of letters and packages that she was having trouble keeping her balance.

"These guys have just GOT to start checking their mail more often." she muttered from behind a copy of "Popular Science" magazine. She managed to get her head above the pile, stagger over the table, and drop the stack.

Amanda leaned over to pick up the box of checkers that she'd just knocked to the floor when Widget, tailed by an obviously disgruntled James Terry, flew out of the basement at top speed.

"Come back here ya reject from a pin-ball machine!" yelled the red-haired youth, his freckles almost hidden by his flushed face. He punctuated his mood by swinging at the beeping spheroid with a length of thin pipe.

"What are you doing?" asked Amanda as Widget took refuge behind her. "Better question: What did Widget do?"

"He ATE the doorknob off of the door to my compartment!" shouted Jimmy. "THEN he went inside and ate my BUNK!" The young Morlock waved the pipe under Amanda's nose. "THIS is what's left of it!" Now that she could get a better look at it, Amanda could see that the ends of it did look as if they had been bitten off.

Amanda grinned and stepped aside. "He's all yours, Jimmy." Widget's goggle-eyes went wider for a moment before he zipped away. James sped off after him, determined to change Widget into something between liquid and solid. Amanda shook her head in amusement and began to sort the mail.

"Kitty, Rachel, Rachel, Brian, occupant, occupant, Kurt, Kurt, Kitty, Meggan, Rachel, Kitty,..etc., etc." she sighed. After she finished, she scooped up the three piles of mail for those that were in-house that morning. Brian and Meggan had left some time the night before. Something about needing some time alone together. Kitty and Rachel were nowhere to be found. So that left Tom and Kurt. As Amanda didn't have a single thing that she should have been doing with her time, she decided to just give them their mail.

"Tom? Yoo-hoo? Thomas Corsi? Earth to Thomas Corsi!" Sharon Friedlander called to the pair of legs sticking out from under Excalibur's Blackbird.

"Yes...?" A hollow thud resounded throughout the hanger as Tom's head collided with the plane's undercarriage. "OW!"

"You're supposed to roll out first." pointed out Sharon as Tom's torso and face appeared.

"In the words of Keesha Scott, 'Duh!'. Whatever the news is, it had better be worth the 500 brain cells I just killed." Sharon forked over the thick envelope that Amanda had handed her over to Tom.

"First class from the Weird Happenings Organization." Tom snatched it and held the envelope at arms length. After a minute or so of watching him stare at it, Sharon spoke up again. "Unless you've developed X-Ray vision in the last few minutes, you've got to open it to figure out what this is about."

"I know what it's about. I just don't want to know what it is!"

"That made a lot of sense."

Tom chuckled. "OK, I'm acting like a kid." He tore away the strip of paper gumming the letter closed and scanned the letter on top of a pile of forms. The tall white-turned-Native American froze for a minute as if hypnotized by the black and white lettering. Sharon started to ask if something was wrong. She truly liked Tom and enjoyed his company. Having the common thread of having your entire racial make-up changed by a demon bear made for unique conversation as well.

Tom calmly brushed the metal filings from the surface of a nearby work table, replaced the letter, and set down the envelope. Then he whooped loudly enough to send Sharon jumping several feet back. When Tom turned to look at her, his grin had his eyes squeezed to mere slits. That didn't keep some obvious pride from shining through, though.

"You feel up to finally unveiling the big mystery now?" she asked, putting a hand on her hip, but smiling as well.

"Not unless you feel like coming under here and beating it out of me." he replied, going on his back again and rolling back under the plane. "I kind of want to wait until everything is official."

"Tom!" sighed Sharon in exasperation. Common history or not, Tom was still under no obligation to spill his guts to her. She had more than a slight inkling that he was enjoying teasing her as well. Sharon kicked playfully at the plane, barely touching the surface with the toes sticking out of her sandals. The was the ringing sound of a small metal object hitting the ground and indistinct noises from Tom. "Want me to call you out for lunch or just slide a club sandwich and a soda under there around noon?" No reply. "OK, fine. If you need me, I'll be... somewhere, I guess." Sharon exited the hanger.

A second later, Tom Corsi rolled back out from under the plane and groped around for a rag to clean the sudden shower of oil that Sharon's kick had brought down on his face.

Kitty stopped browsing through the Babbage's latest display of software and gave Rachel a pointed look.

"Can't you talk about something else?!"

"Sure, but that wouldn't be half as fun. Look, why don't you just ask him out?"

Kitty dropped an updated version of DOOM back onto it's pile. "Because!" she sputtered, walking towards the accessories and staring doggedly at a make of modem inferior to the one already hooked up to her PC.

"Because?" prodded Rachel, walking behind her at a leisurely pace. She knew that badgering Kitty like this was just plain evil, but it was also because she cared about her. Her best friend in the world had been thinking about Pete Wisdom constantly since their infiltration of the Hellfire Club. Kitty was attracted to him, but simply couldn't work up the nerve to talk to him as more than an friend. Instead, she'd been trying to paint over her attraction to Wisdom by bringing thoughts of Pete's short-comings and Alistaire's good points to the fore whenever he crossed her mind. 'I'm just trying to help.' Ray told herself again. She could tell that Wisdom just had a crusty exterior, but was a basically decent person and probably more suited for Kitty than the quiet Alistaire ever would be. If she'd thought otherwise, she would have steered Kitty away from him. 'And besides, Kitty needs a little stirring up.'

"Because," Kitty hissed, "he's a nasty, uncouth, loud-mouthed, jerk! If you think he's so cute, why don't you go chase after him?" snapped the younger girl.

"Not my type." grinned Rachel. "I don't go after guys that can show me up."

Kitty gave Rachel an odd look and picked up a memory upgrade and (after a moment's thought) a copy of 'Space Dragon'. It was marked down to 65% off, but that wasn't why she picked it up. It was a silly-looking game, with horrible graphics that were hardly more than different colored blobs on the screen, but hard to beat. It was also a game that she had played all the time with Doug Ramsey back when the New Mutants and the X-Men had all been under one roof. When it had first gone from being an arcade game to floppy disk, she hadn't bothered to pick it up. It was more fun to run down to the mall and play it with Doug (until they had been banned from the arcade for popping a microchip by scoring more than the machine could handle). Soon after, everything had gotten so insane so fast that running out to check out the latest new computer games had been knocked completely off of Kitty Pryde's list of 'Things To Do'. And then Doug had died, ensuring that she'd never get to do anything, be it play computer games or even just discuss the weather, with her friend again. Seeing that box with the little dragon logo on it had brought back a flood of memories, most of them good, and Kitty suddenly felt a strong urge to see if she could still shoot an Orgoid mothership out of orbit.

Rachel noticed Kitty's sudden silence. "You OK?" she asked.

"Huh? Yeah, Ray. I'm fine. I just haven't played this game in a while, you know?" Kitty's voice became thick with a mockery overdone refinement. "And it just brought back a wave of nostalgia. I'm positively LONGING for my carefree days as a youngster! My inner child is just SCREAMING for release! I simply MUST play this trashy little game!" Smiling, Kitty walked towards the checkout counter, where there was quite a line.

Rachel grinned and rolled her eyes and waited for Kitty back at the game's display, which was really more her speed as far as computers went. She didn't know a kilobyte from a RAM (whatever that was!) but some of the games were pretty interesting. She set down her bags, picked one game up at random, and flipped it over to look at the front. A apocalyptic, post-war landscape jumped out at her, and for a second Rachel remembered her past. Her true past. Death traumas... losses...loneliness... PAIN! Then it was gone. And Rachel passed out, taking a header into the games.

Mitch Culley was not happy. His mistress had just kicked him out, wife was on the brink of filing for a divorce that would leave him lucky to still have both of his balls, he was hung-over, it started raining wherever he went, and now Pete wanted to meet with him. Not that he minded Pete all that much. He was OK (for an insufferable, smart-assed, snot-nosed, twerp) and far from being stupid. But thier taste in drinking establishments differed considerably.

Culley was 6' 5", 234 pounds, with sandy brown hair left at a reasonable length up top, but shaved down to the skin at the sides to hide his premature gray. His nose and lips were broad and his brow low, shading his one truly memorable feature: different colored eyes. One was a rich amber, the other a vibrant green. Car-door ears and a shabby brown suit completed his appearance.

He opened the door to "The Stallion's Rest" (which he always thought of as "The Donkey's Dungheap") and looked around. The place was the total opposite of any establishment he'd like to be seen in: well-lit, fairly clean, and smelling of well-oiled wood and drinks that probably hadn't been watered down. Seated at the bar, was a dark-haired git in a battered black trenchcoat with one arm in a sling who was belting down shots of scotch with his left hand.

"Ain't you a bit young to be in here, son?" he asked, taking a seat on the bar-stool next to the teen.

"Stow it up yer ass, ya near-sighted bugger." Pete growled, tossing his friend a dirty look.

"My lord, but if you young 'uns ain't got no respect for your elders nowadays." Culley chuckled, giving Pete an up and down look. "Well, mate, you dragged me out of my wallow for some reason. It better be a damned good one." No reply from Pete, except to signal another drink from the barmaid. "I'll be damned. Pete Wisdom ain't got a single wise-crack to spit. I just may have a heart-attack me." Culley ordered a beer and waited.

Pete ran a hand through his hair, which was already sticking up every which way, and sighed deeply. "I must've lost me last bit o' worldly sense to be asking you, of all people, about this, but I'm desperate. And I'm telling you now, Culley, you so much as snigger and you'll find yer ugly mug in another time-zone."

Culley raised his right hand. "On the grave of me dearly departed Uncle Trever."

"Bullshit. You're glad the old arse is dead."

"He's croaked, isn't he? So its good 'nuff. Now what're you grumbling about?"

"How the hell do you go about asking a girl out on a date?"

Culley spewed his brewski across the countertop. "WOT?!"

"You gone deaf as well? Thought not. Those blasted hubcaps on your head can pick up radar." Pete finally just asked the plump brunette behind the bar to leave the bottle of scotch on the bar and poured himself another shot.

"Pete, 're you shittn' me? You've bedded down more women, ladies, tarts, and the random bit of fluff in the time I've known you than I have in me whole lovely life! Why the bloody frig're you asking me for advice?"

"Because," Pete said bluntly, "yer an A-class loser, Culley. Yer one hell of a nice bloke and I ain't shamed to say yer a chum of mine, but yer still a loser when it comes to gettin' women. It ain't that you don't know what to do, but yer a total fumblefuck when it comes to talkin' to 'em..."

"Christ, talk a little louder why don't you? I think there's a few in the back what didn't hear you!" Culley snapped.

"But the five or six times in yer life that you have gotten it right," Pete went on, "you've gotten 'em and gotten 'em for a good long while. 'Sides, Romey's not speaking to me, so I can't ask her 'bout this. So how do I go about it?"

"First off," Culley sighed, wondering why the hell he wasn't back at his flat, groveling in front of his wife, "Who is she and why's this one so special?"

"What's it to you?" Culley waited. "A'right, 'er name's Pryde..."

"Hell, the name alone oughta tell you to back off."

"Go play with yerself, wanker." Pete retorted. "She's smart and she's pretty and she don't seem to think much of herself now. But in a year, maybe two, that girl's going to be able to hold her own anywhere." Wisdom's eyes started to get a little unfocused. "She's got these great big brown eyes, Mitch. You can see right into her soul..."

Culley grabbed the scotch and shoved it out of Pete's reach. Having Pete call him something besides Culley or an insult meant that things were serious. "Riiiiiight. No more for you, mate."

"Bugger off." Pete snapped, getting back into his usual mind-frame.

"OK, so she's cute. OK, so you want first dibs before anyone else can see her for what she'll be in a bit. When's the last time you saw her?"

"She popped by the W.H.O to check on how I was doing in between puttering about in the lab just before I got out."

"Right. She at least knows you're alive. So go up and pull the usual lines and sweep her offa her feet."

Pete's head snapped up. "Jesus, I can't do that! She's 16 at the very most! She's just a kid!"

"So're you." Culley pointed out, pouring a generous amount of scotch into what was left of his beer.

Pete paused and grinned lop-sidedly. "Yeah. Kinda forgot for a second there. But I still can't just go in and treat her like a woman."

Culley snorted. "Oh, if she's as smart as you say she is, I'm sure she'll appreciate that."

"No matter how smart she is, she's still just a girl. I'm not even sure she's legal yet. I've got to bring it down to some harmless dating until she's ready and I don't know how. OK? That's what I need yer help with. Clear 'nuff for you?"

"Yeah, I got it. And guess what?"

Pete saw the look on Culley's face and started to get nervous. "What?"

"I'm givin' ya one piece of advice. Ain't no bloke that ever managed to do this without steppin' on his own tongue. You've got to make a fool out of yourself for her benefit. 'Nother words, yer on yer own. Let me know how it turns out."

Pete's surprised curse was music to Culley's ears as he paid for his beer and walked out of the door. It had stopped raining, and he had a pretty good idea of what to say to keep both women in his life.

Rachel opened her eyes and sat up quickly, surprised to find that she was on the floor. Two voices vied for her attention.

"Ray? What happened?"

"Are you all right, miss?"

Ray answered both of them. "I guess I just got a little woozy there. I'm fine." Rachel noticed that the second speaker was a tall, thin boy, with dark-brown hair wearing a button down shirt, gray slacks, glasses and a Babbage's ID tag. Kitty helped the tall red-head to her feet.

"A little woozy? You passed out." Shadowcat insisted.

"Just a little flashback." Rachel insisted. "We can talk about it later. You go finish checking out before that line backs up clear out to the states." Kitty moved off reluctantly.

"OK, I'll just be a minute."

Rachel's attention turned to the young man as he asked again if she was OK. The sharp answer on her tongue quelled itself as she took a quick glance at his thoughts. He wasn't trying to get in on her good graces as a starting point for a date or something. He was truly concerned about her. It brought to mind someone else... but she couldn't recall quite who at the moment. The secondary thing in his thoughts was the display that he'd have to prop back up.

"Really. I'm OK." Rachel said, offering him a smile. "Thanks for asking." Without knowing why she did, she stuck out her hand. "Rachel Summers."

He'd obviously been expecting a brush off. "Um... Tom. Tom Jones." he stammered, shaking her hand awkwardly. He managed a thin smile. "And if you ask me 'What's new, pussycat?', I'll be forced to report you to mall security."

Rachel laughed slightly, but she was in actuality busy studying Tom's thin face. He was soft-spoken and had a nice look about him, if slightly nervous. He also wasn't busy trying to impress her, which was a pleasant change.

"I'm really sorry about the mess. I'll help you clean in up." she offered.

Tom offered her that same, shy smile. "No need. I'll just have to earn my paycheck for a change." He gestered with one hand, indicating the store in general. "There's not an awful lot of back-breaking labor going on around here."

"Are you sure. Things look kind of busy."

"Positive."

"Ray!" Kitty waved from the store's entrance. "C'mon!"

"Nice to meet you." Rachel smiled again, picked up her bag and walked after Kitty. Tom stared after her until both girls left the store, and began to straighten up the display. Needless to say, his mind wasn't really on his work.

"Nice guy." Rachel said as they left.

"Think so? Aside from the superficial, see any difference between him and Alistaire?" Kitty asked, looking slighty hopeful. If Rachel went for this Tom guy, then maybe Kitty'd have a chance with Alistaire.

"Yes. Fashion sense."

"We should be heading back." Kitty said, looking at her watch. "I should've stayed and finished cracking those codes to the Hellfire Club's mainframe."

Rachel playfully waved off Kitty's suggestion. "All work and no play make Katherine Pryde an on-line live-in." Rachel pretended to mull something over in her mind. "You know, you're right, kiddo."

"About what?" Kitty asked, seeming to have forgotten about heading home as she made a bee-line for the bookstore.

"About Wisdom. He's all wrong for you."

"Glad you agree." said Kitty, though she didn't sound it.

"He's low class." continued Rachel. "A total bum. You've seen him often enough to know that, though."

"Yeah. Sure." Kitty replied slowly, looking through the sci-fi section.

"I mean, he doesn't have a single decent bone in his body."

"That's a little harsh, Ray." Kitty replied, looking up sharply. "I mean, he DID talk Alysande out of that alley."

"And failed miserably."

"Well, he tried!" Kitty retorted, thinking that Ray was being totally unfair. "And the only reason he didn't succeed was because I made a wrong move and he took the blame for that, even though he didn't have to..."

"True, but..."

"But, nothing." Kitty went on. "He's not all bad and I can make my own decisions about who's a bad influence on me and who's not, so don't you judge people until you know them a little better!" She paused for breath and noticed that she had attracted the attention of roughly have the store. Kitty blushed and was suddenly very deeply absorbed in a shelf of role-playing books. Rachel mentally patted herself on the back. Reverse psychology was older than dirt, but it worked.

Amanda poked her head into the doorway of the gym and stepped out onto the platform at the top of the stairs. Kurt was flipping around the room like a man possessed, but that was fine with her. There were definitely worse sights in the world than a prime example of the male body in skin-tight clothing.

She recalled a time when her older brother, Stefan, had caught her staring at Kurt in much the same way back in their circus days. Amanda had been furious about being spied upon herself, and her brother had teased her about it unmercifully, but had shown some sense of decorum in keeping it just between the two of them. She'd always got the impression that Stefan had been more amused by it than anything else. Sometimes, she really missed him...

Amanda shook herself out of that before she could get all misty-eyed and called over to Kurt.

"Hey, Blue!"

Nightcrawler looked up and paused in the middle of his pommel horse routine, paused long enough to shift his balance, launched himself into the air, and did a tripple somersault before executing a perfect landing. Smiling broadly, he waved her down. Amanda came down the stairs and gave him a quick kiss.

"Guten morgen, liebchen. What brings you down here?" he asked, slipping an arm around her waist.

"I just wanted to see you get all sweaty." she quipped in reply.

"I'm flattered." Then he noticed the two envelopes in her hand. "Are those for me?"

Amanda was in too good a mood just to hand them over. "Maybe." she evaded, slipping out of his grasp.

"Are they from Westchester?"

"Could be." Amanda retreated a few more steps towards the stairs, holding the letters behind her back.

"Amanda, you know that I'm totally enthralled by your presence, but if you don't give me those letters, I will have to take them by force." Kurt threatened with a huge grin on his face. Amanda took him about as seriously as an attack-poodle.

"Strong words from an elf with an over-active pituitary gland!" she tossed over her shoulder as she ran back up the stairs. Kurt had teleported to the landing before she was halfway up.

"How easily we forget." he chuckled, pouncing on her as her momentum carried her almost into his arms. "Hand them over before I bring out the heavy artillery."

"Never!" she giggled. "Do your worst!" Then she recalled what Kurt's 'worst' was. "OH NO!" she shrieked, laughing hysterically as Kurt began tickling her. "ACK! STOP IT!" You just didn't know how bad tickling could get until the fingertips teasing your belly and neck were covered with velvet fur and a pointed tail covered with the same was flitting across your ribcage. Still unable to stop laughing, Amanda picked up her legs and rolled into a protective ball, letting Nightcrawler hold her entire weight. "You hear me...HAH! Oh lord...hee-hee...uncle! Mercy! You stop it right now!" She dropped her legs again, turned to face her tormentor, and struggled, upsetting Kurt's balance... and pulling both of them to the floor, with him on top.

Kurt reflected on how quickly the mood of a situation could change by a simple switch of position. Underneath him, Amanda wasn't moving, except for the heaving of her chest as she struggled to get her breath again. He leaned over and kissed her lips gently. She responded with no small measure of eagerness.

"Amanda..." he murmured, leaning down to breathe the name into her ear when they came up for air.

"Yes?" she asked, her voice equally hushed, equally strained.

"I've got my mail! Auf Wiedersein!" Kurt teleported off with his letters, leaving his laughter to echo against the gym walls. Amanda sat up, looking a little dazed, and leaned back against the guardrail. Still sitting, she sighed deeply and gave a long, rueful chuckle.

Nathan Essex Sinister was deep in thought. Hard as it was to believe, things had been almost... pleasant in the month since he had disposed of the Marauders. There was a soft chittering sound as his latest experiment in recombiant genetic engineering swarmed up his arm to crouch on the back of his chair. It looked to be a cat's head mounted on the body of a small monkey... save for the fact that it had downy wings spouting from between it's shoulder blades. Sinister swept it to the floor once it started waving it's tail in his face. Improving animal genes were no more than a passing challenge for him, far less complex than those of mutants or humans, almost like a rocket scientist working on a crossword puzzle while more important break-throughs took place. A diverting way to pass time.

Unfortunately, his ultimate master-piece was going to be delayed, thanks to the bungling of his former lackeys. There was a bit of Summers DNA that he still required that he did not have. Sinister refused to allow less than perfection in his work. He'd seen the folly of that. Therefore there was that matter of how to acquire the DNA of Rachel Summers without the aid (such as it were) from errand boys.

Sinister was distracted from his brooding by a ball of warm, vibrating fur on his lap. Purring? He hadn't realized that was possible in this particular creature. In fact, it shouldn't have been. Sinister thought that he had eradicate that ability, as he found the noise irritating. How interesting. Sinister picked up the creature and put it back in it's cage. He'd dissect it later and find the flaw then.

Back to the task at hand. Not only did he not have the DNA he wanted, some of McCoy's (not the real McCoy, of course, some sort of alternate version, which was safely locked away in one Sinister's few cryo-cells) Morlocks were still within the realm of the living. It was annoying, to say the least. But Sinister had the patience of the damned. He could wait for an opportunity. Until then, he'd have to amuse himself with other matters. He began to look around for dissection tray.

Kurt, having gone to his room first for a shower and a change of clothes, seated himself in the kitchen and propped his feet up on the table, trying to put the feeling of Amanda's body and lips against his out of his mind. He'd teased her horribly, but turnabout was fair play, after all. The first letter was addressed to K. Wagner from Mr. Warren Worthington in neatly typed letters and carried the emblem of Xavier's School for Gifted Youngsters. The second was considerably less formal, being addressed simply to 'Elf' from 'Logan'. Under the theory that saving the best for last would make the words from his dearest friend even more welcome, Kurt opened the letter from Scott first... and nearly dropped it. It was a form letter, informing him that the school had become aware that he had 'exceptional abilities' and inviting him to take advantage of the 'higher standard of education' available at Xavier's. With a barely controlled anger born of deep hurt, Kurt stuffed the letter back in the envelope and dropped it on the table. After a second's consideration, he added insult to the outright rejection by using it as a coaster for his coffee mug.

'How dare he!' Kurt fumed inwardly, crossing his arms over his chest and scowling as his tail began to lash furiously. True, the Angel (Archangel now) had not known the new X-Men very well, but this was too much! First off, to make such a gesture when Kurt and Kitty had informed the X-Men that they intended to stay with Excalibur, and secondly, to make it in such a detached fashion! Kurt thoughts roiled angrily. 'I'm fully aware that I am no longer a member of the X-Men and it hurts to know that even if I wished to return, things would not be the same as before. There has been too much change and far too many bruised feelings. But to treat me as if I'm ignorant of what the school truly is...' He sighed deeply.

Amanda chose this moment to walk into the kitchen, carrying a mop, bucket, and a container of liquid soap. She noted her former lover's agitation at once. It was easy to see, for he was very rarely so upset that he allowed it to show as anger. She set down her materials, went up behind him, and wrapped her arms around him, a gesture from before that she slipped back into without thinking.

"What's wrong?" she asked softly.

"A slight. Nothing I wish to drag out in the open right now." he admitted, putting a hand on top of hers.

"Not from Wolverine, I hope!" Amanda exclaimed.

"Nein, nein." he reassured her. "I suppose it's foolish of me to get so upset over it." Amanda gave him a slight squeeze.

"Puh-leeze! They left you, Kitty, and Rachel in the dark about everything. If I were you, I'd have sent some pretty heated messages down Graymalkin way by now."

Kurt chuckled and craned his neck to get a look at her face. "You never did believe in turning the other cheek did you?"

"Why? You'll just get smacked on both sides of your face." she smiled in return. "You certain you're OK?"

"Positive." All the same he looked slightly disappointed when she gave his shoulder a reassuring pat and moved away towards the living room. "Where are you off to?"

"I'm going to suggest to the kids that we give Bertha a good scrubbing. They've been moping around and besides, I think the dragon would enjoy the attention."

"Oh. Well, have fun."

"I'll try. Can't possibly be any harder than washing a car, can it?"

As Amanda exited stage right, Kurt opened the other envelope and scanned Logan's slashing print.

How've you been, misfit? I got your letter, in case you're wondering and I'm going to make a few belated remarks that I couldn't get to you while you were comatose and just didn't seem right at the funeral.

You were hooked on stupid pills right before that mess with the Beyonder, weren't you? 'Cuz that's the only explanation that I can come up with for what went down between you and 'Manda and the reason that you ignored all of those phone messages she left just before the massacre. Don't get me wrong, I'm glad that she's there now. I think you two are good for each other. But you're twenty different kinds of idiot for giving her the brush off the way you did before. After hearing you go on and on about how lucky you were to find each other and how much she meant to you just because she didn't go screaming into the night when she found out what you really looked like, I'm starting to wonder how serious you were before. I'm guessing that finding out that she was really your kid sweetheart changed her from a rare gem among women to just a familiar friend. And you know that saying about familiarity and contempt. Be sure to watch yourself with her this time around. You burn her again and she's liable to forget that she knows you're alive.

All right, lecture's over. Guess I ought to give you the skinny about what's gone down since Chuck's funeral. Moira's staying with us. After what happened on Muir, she doesn't want to set foot on that chunk of rock again. She's leaving it in the care of some doc by the name of Rory Campbell. X-Factor's moved into the mansion and Scott's taking the point for the X-Men. Storm wasn't happy about stepping down from top dog spot, especially since she won leadership from Cyke fair and square the first time around. But ol' poppa Xavier expressed an interest in having Scott lead the X-Men in his will. And you know Cyclops. He'd rather cut his own throat than go against the Prof's wishes. First thing I thought when I saw the five of them on the front stoop was "Great. We're gonna be packed in like flamin' sardines." Sorry t'say, I was wrong.

Rogue was the first to literally fly the coop. She went to Forge for help in controlling her power, and he'd cobbled together this implant in less than three days. Works like a charm. Rogue can kiss and hug 'til her little heart's content and not have to ditch her flight or anything else. Kinda makes you wonder why no one thought of it before, doesn't it? Not more'n a week after that, she explained to Scott that she wanted to try and have a 'normal' life, packed up, said her good-byes, and took off.

Polaris was the next one, and I can't say that I'm surprised. Lorna never much wanted to be part of this super-hero gig to begin with and she didn't have much of a reason to stick around. After all she'd been through with having Malice in her head and everything else, I can understand that.

Iceman went after that, back to the glorious life of a number-crunching paper pusher. I think all this time, he felt intimidated enough by Chuck to try and stick with the hero biz, but now that the Prof's gone, so's the Iceman.

Petey finally chose between being an X-Man and going back to his life as Peter Nicholas. He left claiming that he was gonna pick up what was left of his old life while he still could and find Callisto.

'Nother reason that the mansion ain't gonna be very crowded is that by the time you get this, odds are that the X-Men will have cleared out of here.

Long story, but it boils down to the fact that Xavier and MacTaggert had been thinking about the next generation of New Mutants for a long while. Chuck probably would have put it into action inside a year, but Summers wanted to step it up. So the mansion's going to be housing 'gifted youngsters' again and the X-Men are going to be switching bases to X-Factor's 'ship'. And Elf, you ain't gonna believe who they want to wet-nurse these kids. Scott cut Sean, Moira, and me out of the crowd to stay behind and baby-sit. Personally, I think that Cyke just wanted to make sure the Canuckle Head wasn't going to be around to challenge his leadership.

Can't really complain, though. The kids aren't a bad bunch and li'l Miss Lee is just thrilled that I ain't going anywhere. She near 'bout blew the roof off of the house when she heard about being bumped down to the 'New Mutant' level, though. We've got four others in the fold right now, one of 'em being Sam Guthrie's little sister, Paige. She husks off her skin and lord only knows what you'll find underneath it. There's Everett Thomas, whose power... near as I can explain it... is to be able to duplicate anyone else's if he can get 'in synch' with 'em. We've got a kid from your side of the pond by the name of Jonathan Starsmore. All Cerebro can tell us so far is that he's a mutant whose power ain't manifested yet. I fought Cyke on this one. If the kid ain't even discovered his power yet, I don't see any reason for us to haul him off when could be all his power is is to change the color of his eyes. But Irish and his lady seem to think that it's a better idea to have him here for when his power does show, so that's that. Democracy's a real pain sometimes. Finally, there's this young lady by the name of Clarice Ferguson. Kid's power is to move objects from one place to another via some separate dimension in the blink of an eye, just not necessarily in one piece. When her power reared up, the poor kid wound up 'blinking' parts of her cousin into different spots around the room. She wasn't mad or anything. Said she just felt this enormous rush of energy and then passed out. Woke up covered in blood and now she'd rather tackle the devil himself bare-handed rather than use her powers again. She's also as shy as they come, like she's locking herself away as punishment for what she did and trying to protect everyone else from the same thing.

I guess that's about it for now. Don't worry much about us losing touch again. Now that our cover's pretty much blown, no reason why we can't keep communications going, 'cuz I have missed your company, Kurt. And you still owe me 12 cases of beer.

I almost forgot to tell ya, Moira got the letter that those Morlocks sent. She's been out of her mind wondering about them and Corsi and Friedlander too. None of the other Morlocks survived, but at least we found their bodies and managed to bury them. Tell them that they've got an open invitation to the school if they want. You never much liked the idea about putting kids in battle situations, so I figured you wouldn't want them staying with Excalibur.

'Amazing.' thought Kurt with a grin. 'Anyone else could have written a tome about what has happened in the last few weeks, and still left much unsaid. Logan is as terse as always, but yet manages to convey all that is important. Not to mention the fact that he has just given me the answer to a nagging question.' He reached for his coffee and scowled again. Scott certainly had the art of subtle insult down to an art. Being invited to join a group of children perhaps 3/4 his own age was at the very least ego threatening. Before he could sink too deeply into his self-righteous thoughts, he 'ported up to his room and placed both letters underneath his bible, and decided to go see if Amanda and the Morlocks were going to need any help with that dragon.

"I'm gonna get you." If you had told anyone under the command of Brigadier Alysdane Stuart that at two o' clock in the afternoon, she would be in shorts and a sleeveless T-shirt and crawling around after a dog on her living-room floor, they would have made sure that you had a warm, safe place to stay and then called the nut-house on you. But there she was, using a few days of long-accumulating leave, chasing her godchild all over the house on her hands and knees. Alysande, who had been rescued from the Hellfire Club a little more than a fortnight ago, gave a soft yip and crouched down, rump in the air in the classic 'let's play!' invitation. A second later, someone knocked on the door to Alysdane's home, and Alysande's playful demeanor vanished along with Alysande as she took refuge under the sofa. It was a tight squeeze for a big dog, but fear can do marvelous things.

"Sis?" came Alistaire's voice through the door. "It's me!"

Alysdane scrambled over to the couch and began trying to coax her godchild out from underneath. "Come in! It's open!"

Alistaire opened the door and peered around the frame. "Not again."

"Yes, again." She put her cheek to the floor and looked under the couch. "It's OK. It's just Alistaire, you silly girl." The tip of Alysande's black nose poked out first, followed by the broad head with it's tan and black markings, then shoulders, forelegs and slender torso, and finally powerful hind legs and a bush tail. "Was that so bad?" Alysdane asked, giving the Alsatian a hug. The dog wiggled free and dashed into another room, hoping to pick up the game where it had left off. But the Brigadier's playful mood was drained. She plunked herself down on the sofa and sighed.

"She's a beautiful dog." Alistaire put in, trying to be helpful.

"But she's supposed to be a girl!" his sister almost snarled her frustration. "She's stopped hiding from me at least, she's started eating when I'm in the room, and the vet says she's in perfect health... and yes, Wisdom was right about her having had at least one litter. But she hasn't changed back into a girl once, Alistaire." Worry showed quite plainly on her face. "What if she's forgotten how? Oh, God... what if she's trapped like that?"

"Don't fall apart." Alistaire said, trying to remain cool-headed. "Just give her some time."

"Time with who? She hasn't responded to anyone else and I can't stay away from Happenings indefinitely!" Alysdane sighed deeply. "Truth be told, little brother, I haven't the faintest idea what I'm going to do."

Brian Braddock and Meggan got home roughly ten minutes before Kitty and Rachel and noticed most of the light-house's residents lolling outside on the beach. Once the two lovers went inside and got their first whiff of wet dragon, they understood why.

Meggan simply covered her nose and retreated to higher ground, namely, her room. Brian, being head of the house and all had to know what was going on.

"Is someone boiling soap in the basement? Is there a sewage leak?" he asked Keesha, the only other person besides Meggan inside, as she opened all of the windows and doors on the level. She took the clothes pin off of her nose long enough to reply.

"Naw. We gave Bertha-"

"Bertha?"

"That big dragon in the basement. We gave her a bath outside and let her back in before she had dried out all the way." The red-skinned girl's eyes began to tear and she quickly popped the pin back on her nose. Brian was having to blink hard to keep his own eyes clear, but he had to know one more thing before he ran after Meggan.

"How in blazes did you get a seven foot wide dragon through a three-foot door?"

"We asked nicely." choked Keesha before giving up the battle and joining everyone else outside. They didn't suffer long. Rachel quickly dried things out once she and Kitty caught a whiff of odure de Bertha.

"Liebchen," Kurt advised Amanda once they were sure that it was safe to enter, "next time..."

"You think I'm dumb enough for there to BE a next time, Fuzzy?" asked Amanda, wondering how much of that stench had found it's way into the train compartment she was living in.

Later that evening, Kurt called everyone into the living room for a discussion. Tom and Brian both had hunches about the nature of this meeting, but didn't speak up at once, waiting to hear what Nightcrawler had to say first. Slightly on edge, he finally stood and spoke his mind.

"I hope no one takes this as a sign that they are unwelcome here, but this is something that I feel cannot be put off any longer. Sharon, Tom, Amanda, and you Morlocks... have you given any thought to where you are going to go from this point?"

"He's right." broke in Brian. "Do you people have anywhere you can go? We're not running a hotel, you know."

Kurt managed to keep himself from flinching. "Not the way I would have put it, herr Braddock," he sighed "but accurate enough."

"I might." said Thomas, slowly. "I have some relatives over on the outskirts of London." Everyone's face seemed to ask the same question: 'What's been keeping you here then?' "It's kind of hard to explain away a change of race, you know? Anyway, if I can't stay with them, I'll be out of your hair fairly soon anyway. I managed to wrangle a job at W.H.O." He smiled faintly at Sharon's surprised expression.

"Is that what you've been grinning about all day?" she demanded, grinning in spite of herself. "That's great!"

"Ten years as a cop gave me enough experience for a slot near the bottom of the ladder. So if you want me gone that badly..."

"I didn't mean it like that!" Brian snapped, irritated again. Things were silent for a minute or two longer, then Amanda raised her voice slightly.

"I-I think I'd like to join. Excalibur, I mean."

Rachel grinned slightly. "Think our team could really use a stewardess?" she asked. Meggan smiled at that remark.

Amanda didn't seem to find it very funny. "OK, so I'm not a mutant. I didn't just wake up one morning and find out that I could fly or something. I had to earn my powers, go out into the real world, and get a job. I'm sorry if that makes me unsuited to the super-hero trade."

Kurt tried to soothe over Amanda's anger. "That wasn't what Rachel was implying."

"Yeah," agreed Kitty. "I mean, we've all trained for this kind of thing. We're used to it."

"And I can't learn?" No answer. Finally, Brian shrugged.

"I don't see why not. Welcome aboard."

"Hell, if it's that easy, I'm joining too." Keesha retorted from where she was sitting with Icarus.

"Hold on, a second!" objected Rachel. "You're still a kid, Keesha."

"So's Kitty."

Kurt broke into the argument before Kitty could jump in and escalate it. "Um... I actually had an idea about you and your friends, fraulein. Xavier's School for Gifted Youngsters is still accepting students and I was thinking that perhaps you, Icarus, and James would care to attend." The two Morlock boys grinned.

"Cool!"

"Why not?"

"Hell, no!" Keesha snarled. "No way am I heading off to become an X-Man in training. Or heading back to the U.S." She glared around at everyone. "What are my options if I go back there, huh? Don't tell me you guys don't remember all that crap about 'the mutant menace' that was going on before the M-marauders took out the Morlocks. You couldn't go a day without hearing about it, even down in the tunnels." She touched her bright red skin. "I haven't seen any of that since we got here. The only choice I'd really have is to join one of the X-Teams, and I don't intend to spend the rest of my life running around fighting for something that just ain't going to happen. At least here I've got a fair chance for a decent life."

"The school's not like that!" Kitty snapped, still stung from being called a kid. "It's there to teach young mutants how to master their powers, not create an army or anything."

"Coulda fooled me." returned Keesha.

"Aside from that," began Brian. "I think that you need more than to simply be trained in the use of your powers. Having a conventional education couldn't hurt."

Meggan nodded, quick to support her lover. "That's right, and after you finished at Xavier's would there be any reason you couldn't come back to England if you wanted to?"

"I'M NOT GOING BACK AND YOU CAN'T MAKE ME!" Keesha yelled, opting for volume if she couldn't get by on reason. She stormed out of the room and down the basement (which still smelled like rotting leather, despite Rachel's efforts to air it out). Icarus didn't go after his sister. In fact, he seemed embarrassed. Kurt had told them that they were, as far as anyone knew, the last of the Morlocks and he was taking that seriously. He felt that Keesha was acting like a baby, throwing a fit because she couldn't get her own way.

"That could have gone better." sighed Rachel. She turned her gaze to Orlin, the Morlock known as Healer. "I guess you'd like to go with the kids, right?" The old man smiled.

"Was there any doubt?" he asked softly. "I think they'll need someone to look after them for a while yet." He ignored the dirty looks that both of the boys threw him.

"I guess that leaves me." sighed Sharon, feeling as if they were playing a game of 'Elimination'. "I'd kind of like to stay, but there doesn't seem to be much of an infirmary to work in."

"That doesn't mean that we can't use a nurse." Nightcrawler said in a thoughtful tone. "I have some medical training, but I'm not exactly qualified to treat all of the injuries that can happen in this line of work." Sharon grinned at him.

"Unless you plan to haul me out into the field while Excalibur slugs it out with the villain of the week, I'm not going to be a lot of help. But there usually seems to be a demand for qualified nurses, no matter where you go. It shouldn't be too hard to find a job on the mainland. I'll find something."

"Look for one in London." suggested Thomas jokingly. "We can be roomies or something." He dodged the couch pillow that Sharon lobbed at him.

"Dream on, Corsi." That broke up the last of the hostility that was lingering in the air.

"I suppose I'd best go talk to Keesha." Kurt said, feeling that her agitated state was his fault for bringing up the subject.

"Let me." Kitty volunteered, dropping through the floor before anyone could say a word.

It wasn't hard for her to find Keesha. The red-skinned Morlock girl was sitting at the top of the stairs with her ear pressed up against the door.

"Hey." Kitty greeted her. Keesha jumped slightly, but didn't return the greeting. "You know, Xavier's really isn't all that bad. I mean, you'll be around kids your own age and..."

"Drop the song and dance, Kitty." Keesha snarled. "The only way you're shipping me off is if you hog-tie me and drop kick me onto the plane."

Kitty frowned. "Why are you being so stubborn about this? Jimmy and Ic are thrilled about it."

"Jimmy and Ic aren't me. It's not like we Morlocks have a hive mind or anything. And as to why I'm being so stubborn, why don't you ask the rest of your team to relocate the lighthouse to a Nazi concentration camp? That mansion is built over part of the old Morlock tunnels. I couldn't stay there..." Keesha made a quick swipe at her eyes as they threatened to overflow for the second time that day. "You were there when the Marauders hit us, Pryde. I saw you just before I caught a piece of the tunnel in the neck. We were less than nothing to them! You think you could go back to the X-Men and live in that house if all you could think about was that you were walking over the place where your family had died? There's no god-damned way!" Keesha tried to hold back a sob and couldn't quite succeed. She felt like an ungrateful little rat, to be acting like this after all that MacTaggert and the others had done for her, but there was just no way that she was going to live anywhere around the tunnels again.

Kitty finally sat down next to the girl. She knew that they weren't more than a couple of months apart, but for some reason, Kitty felt several years Keesha's junior. "Maybe," she said hesitantly, "we can work something out."

"There they go." It was several days later and Rachel was watching the Blackbird vanish into the sky. "Why didn't you go with them?" she asked the girl at her side.

Keesha sighed. "I could say bye just as easily here as at the school. Besides, long good-byes are just good for runny noses and sob-fests... and Ic might have tried to talk me into staying with him."

"Think you would have?"

"No, but it would have been hard to let him down." She turned around and walked back into the lighthouse. Rachel followed. The place seemed spookily quiet. Tom was already settled in London and Sharon was on the Blackbird with Kurt, Kitty, and the Morlocks. She'd surprised herself by suggesting that maybe she could be the school nurse at Xavier's again. Sharon had enjoyed working with the first New Mutants and thought that working with the newest batch of students might not be much different.

Rachel tried to make conversation. "So... Kitty's going to be helping you with your school-work, huh?"

"Yeah." Keesha mounted the stairs to the next level of the lighthouse.

"And you're an unofficial member of Excalibur."

"Why are you quizzing me on this?" Keesha finally asked. "You know the deal! I do my studies with Kitty, I tag along on the routine-type missions, and I keep things ship-shape around the lighthouse. What more do you want?"

"Because," Rachel said, "You two are trying to keep something between the two of you, not on the official deal. And I'm a telepath just bursting at the seams with curiosity."

"Uhhhhh...well, there is a little something." Keesha admitted, focusing on the toes of her shoes.

"I'm waiting."

"Since Kitty's going to be giving up a large chunk of her personal time to tutor me, we figured that it'd be only fair that something out of all of this benefit her directly." Keesha stopped in front of the door to Rachel and Kitty's room and took a deep breath. "I promised to clean her room at least twice a week."

Rachel's eyes sparkled with amusement. "You've never SEEN Kitty's side of the room, have you?"

"Hey, I used to live in a tunnel. It can't be that bad." Keesha opened the door to the room. Rachel's side of the room was pretty neat, but Kitty's looked as if a nuclear explosion had rearranged the molecules of everything at random. Clothes hung from the desk, bed, computer, and nightstand. A week's worth of dirty laundry lurked underneath the bed. Hand written notes on everything from web addresses to check out to the codes Kitty was trying to crack littered the surface of the desk and the floor around it. Small lumps underneath various articles of clothing dared the Morlock to uncover them. Keesha slammed to the door and leaned against it. "Maybe I can catch up with the plane if I get a running start..."

Next Issue: Happy Birthday Dear Kitty! It's Shadowkitten's Sweet Sixteen! Let's make sure she never forgets it! Shouldn't be TOO hard considering what happens.