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Morgan pushed himself up from his prone position in the pile of glass, removing small shards from his hands. Fortunately, this was the type of glass that tended to make small, annoyingly painful shards rather than large, organ piercing shards. Still they hurt like hell. He shook his head out, and it was then that he noticed the gooey "thing" crawling it's way up his body. "Gah! What the hell is this stuff?!" he shouted in surprise, trying to push it off. This only exacerbated the situation, as it now began clinging to his hand.

"Get off!" he exclaimed, beginning to panic slightly. Whatever this thing was, it certainly wasn't stopping. He had no idea what it was, only that it seemed to be trying to eat him. And yet, as it flowed up his body, he didn't feel pain or burning or anything that might be associated with an amorphous blob trying to eat him. Instead, he felt a pleasantly cool sensation as it slid up his body. However, this did not stop him from doing whatever he could to remove the stuff.

However, all his efforts were in vain, as it creeped up his neck, and slowly began covering his face. So, this is it. Eaten by a giant blob thing, god knows how far from home. Not exactly the way I pictured it would end. He took a deep breath just before his face went under, and waited for it to suffocate him.


Meanwhile, smoke continued to spill from the portal, only now a pair of blood red eyes could be seen through the fog. A silhouette began to form inside the gateway, and slowly came into focus. A bright flash of light shone forth from the gate, illuminating the room, and momentarily blinding anyone nearby. When their eyes would once more adjust, they would see that the portal had calmed down, and that there seemed to be nothing standing in front of it that resembled anything that could be called "Devourer of Souls".

Until they looked down. Once the did that, they would see a small white rabbit sitting in front of the portal. Upon closer inspection, they would see that it had the pair of glowing red eyes that could be seen through the portal.

"Fear me, for I am the Devourer of Souls!!" came the deep, booming voice from this tiny shell.

Rogue was only slightly chagrined when her first target decided to turn around and chat too. She'd been hoping she'd only have to deal with the first guy long enough for someone to distract him enough that she could make a grab at the back of the fire guy's exposed head. His only exposed part. That plan was now ruined as he turned to address her. She was moments from responding to his question, when the new guy she'd met in the kitchen this morning appeared on the roof and became her distraction. Maybe not a very good one, but a distraction none the less, and one that caused flame guy to turn around.

Seeing that she was close enough to grab him, Rogue took instant advantage of the situation. She took two running steps towards her Australian target and lept into the air, hands outstretched and aiming for his neck.

{Oh, don't worry. This bunny's harmless. Actually, I thought one of you guys would do this yourself. I mean, the bunny was kinda askin' for it.}

And then Morgan did the thing that no one, least of all himself, expected him to do. He sat up and looked around. It had taken him a few seconds to realize that he was not dead or dying. In fact, he felt even better than before. By the cool feeling against his skin, he could tell that the liquid-thing was still attached to him, but it hadn't suffocated him in any way. Plus, even though it seemed to be covering his head, he could still see perfectly well.

He raised a hand before his eyes, examining the thin black layer that seemed to be covering it. "Now, that's interesting..." he said, raising an eyebrow, even though he knew that no one would see it.

He hopped down off the little shelf that the glass domes had been sitting on, and walked towards the little rabbit with glowy eyes that had referred to itself as the "Devourer of Souls".

"Cower before my form! Flee from my power!! Swear allegiance to me now, and I may be merci-"

"Oh, shut up, ya B-Movie reject," Morgan said, picking the fluffy little monster up off the ground.

"What are you doing? Unhand me, mortal! I am the Devourer of Souls!!"

"Yeah, yeah," he replied, he dropped the bunny, and with a strong soccer kick, punted it back into the portal.

"That takes care of that," he said, dusting off his hands. "You guys okay?" he asked, looking to Victoria and Sarah. It was at that moment that the crystals crackled back to life once more, with Blink's voice pouring through this time.

"Thank the gods you three are okay. When that thing hijacked the signal, I thought I'd lost you. Anyways, where was I? Oh, right. How to disable the thing. First thing you have to do, is to his the little blue button. On the menu that should come up on the little screen, select "Initiate Shutdown Procedure". The password is "Xylophone". Don't ask why. Whatever you do, though, don't push the red button marked "Shutdown". It's a trap that'll activate a security system that'll punch whoever happens to be standing on that spot full of holes."

"I see," Morgan said. Eager to close down the portal and finally get this over with, he swiftly followed the instructions given to him, making sure that everything was in order. A small hum from the machine could be heard, and slowly but surely, the glowing red thing began to collapes upon itself. Actually, the smaller it got, the faster the collapse went, until it finally disappeared with a small "pop".

Finally, the weirdest adventure that probably any of them had been on was over. Now they just needed to get picked up by Blink, and dropped off back home. And Morgan still needed to figure out what this thing that had attached itself to him was. Without warning, however, dozens of small tendrils extended from the black layer, and the thing reformed itself into a copy of the clothes he had been wearing earlier, only all in black.

"That's double interesting," Morgan said, raising his eyebrow once more.

Zion looked over at Jill and shook her head. She went over and helped Lizz with holding up Jillann. "Lets get this drunkette in her bed before she knocks into somethin' else." Zion said with a laugh.

Rogue's hand closed itself around its target, and instantly the world began to go haywire. This was only normal and she was long used to the disorienting display of mental images that poured themselves into her head when she touched someone's skin with her own. She knew by now exactly how long to hold on to someone in order to insure that they would be knocked out for a few seconds and powerless for an hour or so, but suffer no lasting ill effects.

With a small grunt Rogue released the Australian, whose name she now knew was John, or Pyro as he prefered to be called. As she let go, she could feel the fires around her as if they were somehow connected to her and she to them. And in that instant she knew how to control them. She quickly extinguished the fires below, along with most of the roof. She left some of the fire still lit so she'd be able to fight.

Rogue picked herself up off the floor, and turned towards her teammate and the aero-kenetic, a small maniacle grin, reminiscent of the one worn by the downed Aussie playing across her lips.

"G'day mate!" She said nodding at her rock throwing friend. "Let's have a go at this one shall we?" Her eyes sparkled with glee at her new found fire powers, as she took a step towards her foe, and commanded the fires to reform into a more draconic state.

******

The girl known as X-23 had finally located her prey. He was staying at a place called the Xavier Institiute. A huge place that was home to several mutants, that collectively called themselves the X-men. Whatever Weapon X was doing here, he wouldn't be doing it much longer. X-23 fully intended to challenge him and take him down for all the misery he'd caused her. If it weren't for the one called Logan, she wouldn't be on the run. She wouldn't have to hide from those that had created her, because she wouldn't have been created in the first place. It wasn't all his fault, she knew that, but there was enough blame at his feet to warrant vengance. And it was vengance that she was after. No more, no less.

"Right." Rogue told the fire dragon to hem the aero-kenetic in from behind with its body, on his right side with its massive tail, and from the left with spurts of flame. Now their opponent could only attack from one direction without being burned, and it was blocked by the two of them. Rogue glanced over at her partner and said, "I got 'im pinned in, now you do the honors, mate."

******

X-23 was currently staking out the Institute, watching, waiting, getting to know her target, and his habits. She was also learning the ways of the others as well, but from what she'd seen they would offer little in the way of challenge. It was Logan who would be the challenge. He'd been trained by the same people she had, and knew how to fight. However, now wasn't the time to fight. Now was the time to watch, and learn. The fighting part would come soon enough.

Nearly everyone had left the mansion in one manner or another. Most had gone off to have fun on this first day of summer, but as she'd watched clearly something had come up and caused the others to leave as well. She knew the one they called the Professor was still here along with a new male trainee. She'd done a little evesdropping on their conversation, and had gained a bit of useful information, but not much. Most of what she gathered merely confirmed that there weren't many people at the mansion right now. Which made now a nice time to get inside and begin laying her trap.

As their foe rose into the air Rogue was quick to counter him. "Not so fast there mate! Why'd you think I made it inta a dragon, if not to be able to fly?" With a small laugh she commanded her creature into the air and told it to grow. It swiftly became gigantic and encircled its prey with its firey tail.

******

X-23 quickly made her way inside the mansion. The security system never even once suspected her presence. She was nothing more than a shadow within a shadow, and once inside nothing was going to stop her. The plan was simple, she'd take down the people in the mansion with her neuro-disks and make it so that Logan had to face her one on one.

She made her way through the corridors to the boy's dormatories, where she located the new boy's room. He gave her little trouble, for she'd caught him unawares while he was unpacking. She sniffed the hallway air, and found no other current scents. From there she made a quick round of the rest of the house, finding it as she'd suspected. Empty. Then, she made her way to the area where the Professor's study was. Once there she entered the currently vacant room and sat down at the chess table, where she promptly began to cry. She made no efforts to be silent. In fact, she wanted to be heard.

((My deepest appologies to you Rahzeil. I don't mean to god-mode, but we've all seen the episodes and no one stands a chance against X-23. If any of the mods wish me to edit the post I will.))