The door to Scott and Jean's room quietly opened as Leech stepped in, placing his foot so gently on the floor as to not wake Scott up. He carefully made his way over the carpet to where Scott lay on his back. Leech quietly climbed the desk near the window and peered down to where Scott looked so peaceful.

"One . . . two . . ." Leech whispered to himself with a big smile on his face. "THREE!!" Leech yelled aloud, throwing his little body onto Scott's stomach.

"OOF! What the--" Scott was cut off by Leech's exalted cries.

"Mr. Summers, Mr. Summers, guess what guess what, guess, come on, guess!!!"

Scott sat up rubbing his eyes and shaking his head. "What is it Leech? This better be good!" He opened his eyes and looked down at Leech who was smiling like never before.

"Today is Leech's birthday, yippee, come on, let's go!"

Oh great. Scott thought to himself, The Professor planned this, I know it. Scott nodded and signaled to Leech to leave and that he would be right with him.

Leech happily left with a smirk on his face.

Scott laid back down and asked Jean laying beside him, "Why me?"

Jean, lying with her eyes closed, smiled.

Scott made his way downstairs and found Artie, Leech, Jubilee and a long number of other friends gathered around the door and eagerly awaiting an "Okay."

Two dozen eyes fell on Scott Summers as he slowed coming downstairs.

"Come on Mr. Summers!"

"Excuse me?"

"We're goin' ta Chuck E Cheese!"

"You promised!"

"I . . . wha . . .What are you talking about?"

Leech's face drooped and a tear came to his eye. "Mr. Summers . . . you promised Leech . . . remember?"

Scott couldn't help but let them, even though he was sure he would regret it. " . . .well . . . but . . . okay."

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

More limousines pulled up in front of the house and the ecstatic children piled in.

"Move over, comin' through!" Jubilee yelled as she threw herself among the pile of screaming kids in the last limo.

Scott took shotgun in the first seat and gave the reluctant "go ahead" to the driver.

About forty minutes later the three limousines pulled up in front of the evil child infested, burning pizza smelling, sticky floored, "Scott I need more tickets!" building that would imprison Cyclops for the next five hours.

The limo doors opened almost simultaneously and the children piled out and lined up at the entrance. As each child was stamped and Scott got his prison number too, they entered.

Once inside they immediately turned to Scott.

"Me."

"No, me first!"

"Move over!"

Scott found all sorts and sizes of hands reaching toward him. "The professor's gonna love this one!" He thought to himself as he gave each hand a ten dollar bill. It hurt, oh yes it did each and every time a bill was put in their hands but it would be over some hour. (Or year, as it felt)

"That's enough! I'm all out of money!" He shouted as he started making his way to a table.

"Don't worry!" he heard Jubilee shout, "There's an ATM over here!"

He groaned and kept backing away, sighing in relief when the kids finally dispersed to run rampant around the games and rides. He wiped the nervous sweat off his forehead and turned around, running right into a pimply boy carrying a huge tray of greasy pizza. Scott looked in horror as it slammed up by his stomach and chest, then slid off to land in a disgusting pile by his feet.

"Oops. Sorry, Mister." The kid ran off, not bothering to clean up the pizza just yet.

Scott stepped with great disgust and disdain over the pile of cheese and dough, then slowly started to make his way over to an empty table. A three foot troll ran by, knocking his legs out from under him, and Scott hit the floor hard. The troll--kid--started crying, screaming at the top of his lungs. Scott reached up to try and shush him, and the brat kicked his legs.

"Ow! Listen here--"

"OH! My poor Johny!" a three hundred pound woman cried as she rushed over to pick up the child. "You evil monster!" She screamed down at Scott, taking her purse (which was no doubt filled with bowling balls) and hitting him repeatedly alongside his head. "Knocking over poor defenseless little boys! You should be ashamed of yourself!" She gave him one last smack, then turned and huffed away. Scott rubbed his bruised cheek, trying to ignore the glares from the people around him. Slowly he stood, and even slower he made his way to the table. He sat down, groaning and trying to ignore his bruised tailbone.

Leech ran up, a slice of pizza on his head, and held out his hand for more money.

"I'm broke." Cyclops told the hopeful boy.

"But Leech saw an ATM over there. You can get more money." He smiled winningly.

Cyclops shook his head.

Leech's big eyes started to fill with tears. "You mean, you don't want Leech to have a happy birthday?"

"OKAY! I'll go! just stop crying!"

Leech grinned as Scott stood up, then followed close on his heels to be sure he got the first money.

The instant Scott reached the ATM he was crowded by kids again, and with some pain started handing out money. Looking at Paige he narrowed his eyes. "Didn't I just give you some?"

She shook her head. "No, Mr. Summers. You gave that girl there some."

Scott followed the outstretched finger to where a blond girl stood, happily counting cash.

He groaned and had more money snatched out of his hands.

"Hey! Homme! We're starved! Where's the food?" Angelo shouted over the brain splitting din.

Cyclops whimpered and started making his way through the crowd back to his table. Twice he fell over children, once he was run into a table where the biggest man he had ever seen threatened to make a pancake out of him.

"All right," he said once he was there and most of Gen X was assembled, "What kind of pizza do you want?"

"Pepperoni!"

"Sausage!"

"Anchovies!"

"No, you doofus, no anchovies!"

"Brat!"

"Boogerbrain!"

"Green pepper!"

"Bacon! But not the fattening kind!"

"You're such a dork!"

"Tomatoes!"

"Snot-stain!"

"I want more money!"

"I don't want pizza!"

"Ice cream!"

"Fat balloon girl!"

"Hey look! It's Mickey!"

"Chuck, you geek!"

Scott looked up from his frantic writing. "His name is Professor Xaiver, not Chuck. Where do you see him?"

But the kids were already gone, surrounding the big gray mouse.

Cyclops fell into a chair, then glared at the waiter when he came to take his order. The waiter, who was used to it, just took the paper Scott had been writing on and left.

Once in the back he handed one of the cooks the paper, then went out to deal with the crowds.

The chef looked at the paper, trying to make out the scribbled writing. He tapped another man's shoulder, then asked him what he made of it.

The older chef took one look and smiled. "You see, he wants pepperoni, sausage, anchovies, rat," he looked at the younger man and winked, "Probably means meat, bran--he just put an "i" in there. Can't tell what this first word is though, we'll ignore that, green pepper, fattening bacon, sushi is right there, sucha, he probably didn't know how to spell it, tomatoes, money," he frowned, then shook his head and kept going, "more pizza--probably needs three or four--ice cream and balloons! Must be someone's birthday! Come, we'd better start!"

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

As the evening wore on, Scott never got a chance to sit for more then five minutes. First they wanted more money (and every time he went to get money half of it was stolen, and he tripped over that evil little troll while that woman beat him up), then someone screamed in play and he ran to make sure everything was fine (tripping over children who started to bawl and made everyone else look at him like he was an ogre), then they wanted him to watch them try and kill themselves (he whimpered as they climbed the sides of the netting for the balls and jumped in), then they wanted him to play too (he refused, and when they wouldn't let him leave he was thrown out in disgust by a guard), after that he needed more money (tripping over Johny, of course), then he got in a fight with a giant over whether or not Leech had been in line first (Leech decided he didn't want to play that game anyway, and ran off as the first punches were thrown), then he was hauled into the back offices and fined for fighting in the play area (three hundred dollars, to be precise. The other man's son managed the area, so he didn't get in trouble at all), then he found that they'd gotten their pizza, but no one liked it because it didn't have the right stuff ("Too many fish!" "Not enough cheese!" "I wanted ice cream!" "What kind of meat *is* this?" "Pizza is very bad for you." "I *hate* green peppers!") so he ended up buying ten different pizzas just to be sure they got the right kind. Then his card showed up as being stolen and he was interrogated by the police before they decided it was a mistake, at which point he came out starving and found all the food had been eaten already. Scott was ready to kill someone, and when that mouse showed up wearing a "happy birthday" sign, he seemed like a good bet. So Scott attacked him.

Four men tried to pull him off as he bit the thing's nose, growling like Wolverine. He backed off after a minute, then grabbed a chair and ran forward, swinging it at Chuck's head. The adults all cheered and the kids started to bawl. The woman with the purse ran up to him and started smacking him on his back, crying "You evil creature! Hitting a poor rat in front of all these children! You should be ashamed of yourself!"

Jubilee yawned as she watched, saw Skin approach with Leech on his back, almost asleep.

"You about ready to go?" he asked tiredly.

Jubilee nodded.

Skin put his fingers to his lips and whistled, then watched as Scott was beaten up by a 300 pound woman with a mission. The last of the Gen Xers came up, yawning.

"What should we do with all our toys?" Paige asked, looking at the table full of stuffed animals and spider rings.

"Let Scott take 'em home when he's done playing?" Franklin asked as a chair was smashed over Cyc's head.

"Good idea," Monet said, taking Artie's hand and leading him out.

A table broke as a red beam of light sliced through the air, and the crowd jumped on the red eyed man.

"Should we take the limo's back?"

Paige nodded.

"What about Scott?"

Jono turned around to look at the melee behind them. 'es 'aving fun. Leave 'im be.

Paige nodded again and they walked out as one of the windows shattered.

"This was Leech's best birthday ever!" the boy said as police cars surrounded the area and started ordering people out.

Jubilee smiled and rubbed his head. "You got that right, kiddo."

Seven days left . . .

Back to the X-Mansion
Back to the living room