"Bishop! Have you seen the little ones?" Scott asked as the tall black man walked into the room. He looked a little harried, Scott noticed.

"No." He picked up the coffee mug that sat on the sink, his hand shaking so hard he could barely bring it to his lips. "And I hope I never see them again." He added under his breath. He had been on kid duty for the last two days, after taking such good care of them that night.

"Could you find them? I haven't seen them for awhile and I'm getting worried." Scott walked out of the room, missing the mug dropping from Bishop's hand and shattering on the tile floor.

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"Do we have it all?" Leech looked over the pile of sandwiches and toys, trying to decide how to wrap them all up. "Artie will take the food. Franklin, you take these toys and Leech will take these ones." He picked up the red shirt they had found in Bishop's drawers, and ripped it into three smaller parts. Everybody knew that if you were going to run away you needed red. Just look at the cartoons!

"Here, do it like this." Franklin laid out the cloth and carefully put the food into the center, then tied all the corners and tied it onto the long stick they'd found. He smiled and slung it over his shoulder, modeling it for them.

"Oh, I knew that." Leech declared, Artie nodding.

"Where are we going to go after we run away?" Franklin asked as he sat back down on the floor of the treehouse.

"To the morlock tunnels. I know how to get there."

"Okay. But I'm not allowed to cross the street by myself." Franklin said solemnly.

"That's all right. I'll hold your hand so no one will get mad."

Pleased with this solution, Franklin started tying the other red cloth strips around the toys, getting ready to leave.

"Now we can have Chocolate Frosted Sugar Bombs any time we want! Won't Mr. Scott be sorry he said no." Franklin nodded decisively. "By the way, did you bring any?"

"Yep. And Leech brought that stuff Mr. Logan likes, and punch. Leech poured it into this bag." He held up a dripping grocery bag, red juice leaking out everywhere. "Are we ready?"

"Let's go!" The three climbed down out of the treehouse, snuck out of the Danger Grotto, and slank through the house until they were back outside.

Marching along the side of the road they made good time, getting far away from the mansion before anybody thought to look in the treehouse.

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"Jean, could you scan for them telepathically? We can't find them anywhere!" Scott was at his wit's end. He'd looked in all the hideouts, rooms, rec. rooms, dinning rooms, family rooms, suits of armor, and he still couldn't find them.

"Maybe, before I do that, you should try asking one of the older kids where they might be."

Now why hadn't that occurred to him? "Jubilee!!!!!! Come down here!"

"I can't! I'm grounded!"

Somehow, she always seemed to remember that only when there was something she didn't want to do. Scott cursed under his breath, something he'd never done before The Teenagers, and started up the long flight of stairs.

"Jubilee, where do the little ones stay most of the time?"

"I dunno." She looked back at Everett's comic book, turned the page, and kept reading.

"What have I told you about those?"

"That they'll rot my brain."

"And why are you reading them?"

She paused, looked up at Everett and smiled. "Because they rotted my brain and I keep forgetting that I'm not supposed to."

"Jubilee, this is no laughing matter! Comic books are like a disease!" He walked to Everett, his back to Jubilation, and started to lecture him. "Do you understand why you shouldn't read them? You shouldn't be giving these to Jubilee. And heaven forbid if the children should see these!" His tirade kept going as Jubilee stood on the bed behind him, mimicking what he said and making faces. Everett tried hard not to laugh. Eventually, his lecture done, Scott took a breath and turned back to Jube.

"Now do you see why you shouldn't read them?"

"Oh, yes. You've changed my life, O Wise One."

He was pretty sure she was being sarcastic . . .but no, nobody was ever sarcastic to him. It must just be his imagination. "Jubilation, do you know where the kids are?"

"I can't say. That would be doing something fun and I'm grounded."

"Telling me where the kids are isn't fun."

"Yes it is. I think it is."

Everett snickered.

"It is not FUN!"

"Uh huh. I just can't tell you Scott. It goes against my morals."

"JUST TELL ME WHERE THE KID'S ARE!!!!"

"Scott, I don't believe you just yelled at me!"

"I'M NOT YELLING!!! IF I WERE YELLING I'D KNOW IT AND I'M NOT!!"

"OKAY, YOU'RE NOT!" Jubilee yelled back.

"DON'T YELL AT ME!"

"Then stop shouting."

"I'M NOT--shouting." He took a deep breath, clamed himself and started again. "Jubilation. The little kid's are missing. Could you please help me find them."

Jubilee thought about it. "I'm sorry Cyc. I can't."

"Can't or won't?"

"Won't. It goes against all my morals. I'm trying to stay grounded and not have any fun, but if I go out on a hunt for the little 'uns that would be fun. I just can't."

"Jubilation, this isn't fun."

"You already said that. It is too fun." She looked back down at her comic book, ignoring him.

Scott's face turned bright red.

"Wow, Mr. Summers, how do you do that?" Everett craned his head around, looking at Cyclops's face.

"NEVER MIND! I DON'T EVEN KNOW WHY I TALK TO YOU! JUST LEAVE ME ALONE!" And with that he stormed out of the room.

"Hey, could you hand me that Superdude ish' right there?" Jubilee asked, pointing.

"Sure. Hey, waitaminute, weren't you listening when Cyc said you shouldn't read comics?"

"Yeah. But my brain's so rotted it just went in one ear and out the other since there's nothing to hold it in there." Both laughed, and went back to reading.

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"Artie! Leech!" the words echoed through the night as the entire x-team turned out to look for the runaways.

"Perhaps a lesson in survival is what they need." Bishop said hopefully.

"I think not. Oh, I hope they're okay. The professor's gonna kill me." Scott whimpered.

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"Can Leech have some more of that good kind?" He asked, turning his noseless green face up at the woman and smiling brightly.

"Sure sweetheart. Take as much as you want, all of you!" She'd picked them up as they had been walking down the street, looking hot, tired and forlorn. They were so cute!

"Can I have some too?" Franklin smiled hopefully.

"Yeah. Okay guys, as much as I'd like to keep you here all day, I'm sure your parents are worried. Why don't you tell me your phone number and I'll call them." She stood and walked to the phone, picked it up and waited for one of them to tell her what to dial.

"We don't have parents," Leech said.

"Oh you poor little things! But you must live with someone." She looked at them, feeling quite sorry for the little dears.

"We live with Mr. Summers." Franklin supplied.

Artie made a picture of a mean monster wearing red sunglasses.

"We don't like him though, so we ran away." Leech added.

"Why don't you like him?" She put the phone back in the cradle and sat down.

"He's mean. He won't let us eat good food, he brought all sorts of mean people with him--"

"Like Bishop!" Leech cried.

"Oh, yes! Bishop is evil! He always yells at us for no reason! Like a few nights ago, he yelled at me because I had to go to the bathroom before bed. And Mr. Summers always yells because we don't eat pancakes! He even made poor Artie go to the hospital part of the house!"

Audrey was appalled. From what these kid's were saying, it sounded like they were being abused!

"And Mr. Summers won't let us sleep with him like Mr. Cassidy did," Franklin finished his list of evils.

"I don't think you should go back there. I think you'd better stay here for a while. Is that okay?"

Three nods went around the table.

"Okay. We'll get you some new clothes tomorrow, those ones are absolutely awful. For now why don't you tell me your phone number, and where you live, and then we'll make you a bed in the living room and have a sleep out tonight, okay?"

"Yeah! This is gonna be fun!"

"Come on Artie, let's go get our stuff!" Leech called as Franklin carefully gave their number and address to Audrey.

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Scott, I think you'd better come back inside. We have news of the kid's whereabouts Jean called telepathically while pouring coffee for the policemen.

He ran into the house, pulling off his coat and rushing to the kitchen.

"You know were they are?" he almost screamed at the cops. They both stood slowly, eyeing his disheveled appearance. This man looked like he could be a jerk.

Scott ran a hand self-consciously through his hair. It was close to eleven P.M. and he hadn't stopped looking for them all day. The five o' clock shadow that stuck to his chin made him look scruffy, and the circles under his eyes were dark. He'd been stung by wasps earlier, and had fallen in poison ivy. He had calamine lotion all over, and red welts all up his arm. To the police, who didn't know all this, he looked like he had needle tracks up his arm, the dark circles only making them surer that he was a junkie.

"Are you Mr. Summers?" One particularly large cop asked.

"Yes, I am. Did you find Artie, Leech and Franklin? Oh please say yes, we've been looking for them all day!"

"I just bet you have." The smaller one snickered.

"Sir, would you come with us please?"

"Absolutely! Are they at the station? Oh, man, I hope they're okay."

The cops exchanged looks.

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"Leech is not tired. Does Leech have to go to bed?" He said, laying down by the other two on the floor.

"Yes, sweetie. We have a long day tomorrow. Time for sleep." She kissed his green forehead, making a mental note to bring up the subject that they hadn't even taken the time to teach the green one to talk properly at the hearing tomorrow. Boy, had it come as a surprise to that awful man when they arrested him. And to think, he'd said all of it was true!

To be continued . . .

Twenty-four days left...

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