What Happened When They Babysat the X-Babies
Chapter 4
Everybody’s got a kid!

With both sets of authors and muses out of the Danger Room looking for the wayward X-Baby, that only left Yezra, Nick, and Trevor to deal with all the rest of them, plus a few lil’ Avengers, not to mention some little girl that nobody, not even Yez could place. She kept on trying to hold Lil’ Wolvie’s hand.

“Hey kid, who are ya?” Nick asked, hunkering down to her level. The little girl looked at him with huge blue eyes and tugged at one of her black pigtails. Yez thought she looked like a dark haired Elsie Dee.

“I’m not supposed ta talk to stwangers,” she told him, looking up at him again. “’Specially big, mean, ugly stwangers.” Nick blinked. Wolvie pulled his hand away from her grasp again.

“Her name’s Copycat. An’ she’s right. Ya are bleepin’ ugly!” Nick’s eye narrowed and he instinctively reached to his side where he usually kept his gun.

“Why you little shi…” Yez pressed her lips together, trying to remember where she’d heard that name before.

“I wonder if Ice knows one of her creations is running amok in Marville.” Her attention was taken by a little kid sobbing in the corner of the room, something that looked like a cigarette stuck in his mouth. By the brooding stance and the little trenchcoat, she pegged him for the mini Remy. Even though she hated kids, she had to admit that this one looked cute.

“What’s the matter?” she asked, going down on one knee to look at him. The ‘cigarette’ turned out to be a lollypop, and the kid was crying pretty hard. He turned to her, his cute little red and black eyes brimming with tears.

“Shh…sh…Sugah don’ like Gumbo no more!” he sniffed, wiping his nose with the sleeve of his coat. If Ice had been there, Yez was certain that she would have gone “Awww!” and then reached over to comfort the little tyke. Yez was not Ice. She just sat back on her haunches before the little Cajun got any ideas to rub his snot covered face on her t-shirt. Reaching out, she patted his shaking shoulder lightly.

“There, there. Now I’m sure if you and Sugah act anything like Remy and Rogue, then everything will be right as rain next week. Feel better?” Gumbo looked at her, confused, but he had stopped wailing. He blinked, then nodded. “Good. Now go an’ talk to some of the other girls. That is, if you’re not afraid of getting cooties.” Gumbo straightened up.

“Non! Gumbo not afraid of de cooties! Dat’s why all de femmes like Gumbo!” With that, he went and marched off, heading towards the group of girls that was headed by the miniature Storm and Jubilee. Charming smile back in place, he easily got a few pecks on the cheeks from each girl. Once a charmer, always a charmer, huh Remy? Yez shook her head and went back over to where Nicky was having problems of his own.

“Look, I don’t have to take that kinda language from you! I’ve got a mind ta go an’ wash yer mouth out with soap!” Nick bellowed. Wolvie reared back and held his hands over his sensitive ears. Copycat glared at the giant man.

“Look mister General! I don’t like it when you yell at Wolvie!” She kicked him in the shins.

“Yeah! Go after him Darlin’!” She would, but Trevor came in and gathered up the little girl before she got in another kick.

“Lemme go you meanie!”

“Let her go!” SNIKT Yez sighed and picked up Wolvie, keeping her hands out of his tiny claw’s reach. “Hey ya stoopid skirt! Lemme go!” The other X-Babies and Lil’ Avengers stared on.

“Humph. That’s why we don’t asso..assoc..” one of the Avenger girls in red said, trying to think of a big word. “Why we don’t mess with them.” The little boy beside her frowned.

“Witchie, that wasn’t nice. Apologize now.” Yez took one look at him and actually did do the silent ‘Awww…’.

“Nicky! It’s a mini-Steeeevvve! Innit he cute?” Nick sighed, knowing this was going to be a long day.

***

“Come out, come out, wherever you are!” Griffin sing-songed, looking in every abandoned room for the wayward CreepyCrawler. She stopped, listening for any tell tale -BAMF- or any sound that a hiding little kid would make. She and Remy had split up to cover more territory, and neither of them could find the kid. Her eyes adjusted to the dark room and she grinned when she saw a small tail stick out from underneath the kitchen table.

Bingo. Now how do I sneak up on him? Carefully circling around the kitchen workstation, she purposely avoided coming too close to the table.

“Now if I were a kid, where would I hide? Hmmm, how about…here?” she asked loudly, opening up the refrigerator. She heard his muffled giggles come out from under the table.

“Hmm, not here, but there’s some ice cream pops that look so yummy! And there’s even two of them! Who am I going to share them with?” It was all she needed to say, all of a sudden there was a little magenta puff of smoke beside her and Creepy was sitting on the island tabletop, hands outstretched to receive his treat.

“Not so fast. I’ll give this to you if you decide to behave and stop playing tag. Deal?” Creepy looked at her, then at the ice cream, then back at her.

“Okay.” Griffin smiled and gave him the treat and they both ate peacefully together.

***

“Sparkler, what do you think about the big people?” Shower whispered from their little circle. They were watching as the man named Trevor put down Copycat and Miss Yezra put Wolvie down. She noticed that Jeannie was frowning at Copycat.

“Why do you not like Copycat?” she asked. Jeannie huffed.

“She’s stupid, an’ ugly, an’ mean, an’ most a’ all, Wolvie likes her!” Sparkler rolled her eyes.

“I like her. Wolvie don’t like you anyways Jeannie. Cyke likes you!” the girls giggled and looked over where Cyke was talking to Captain Amerikid and Hawkey. Sparkler looked at Hawkey and sighed, batting her eyes. Shower blushed and turned away when Amerikid smiled at her.

“But Wolvie used to like me bestest!” Jeannie protested. Shadowkitty scoffed.

“Me an’ Wolvie are better friends than you an’ Wolvie! He likes me bestest!” Sparkler turned back to the conversation.

“No way! Wolvie so likes me the bestest!”

“Oh yeah?”

“Yeah!” Gumbo and Shower saw that the conversation was starting to get heated, and backed away.

“Shower, you de lock pick, neh?” he asked her, still wiping his slightly runny nose on the sleeve of his coat.

“Uh huh. Why do you ask?” She didn’t like that look he had.

“Let’s go wit Copycat. She de ot’er t’ief in here,” he said with a smirk, holding out a little lock picking device. Shower caught on to what he wanted to do and grabbed his hand, running towards where she had last seen Wolvie and Copycat.

***

“Stho, I was telling Misth Ice to sthop driving stho fasth an’ she just told me to shut up!” Cyke said, retelling his little outing to Captain Amerikid.

“I don’t think she said shut up, grown-ups are supposed to be polite,” he said in the absent author’s defense. Both Cyke and Amerikid looked around the Danger Room where random pandemonium was ensuing. The group of girls were arguing about something, Icebaby and lil’ Beast were sliding around on ice slides, Hawkey was using Sugah as target practice with his little set of suction cup tipped arrows, and out of the corner of their eye, they could see Wolvie, Copycat, Shower, and Gumbo up to no good, fiddling with a device on the door. Then there were the other lil’ Avengers. Witchie was sitting and watching her brother run around faster than anyone else could. He was chasing the two members of the Bullies around, Snaggletooth getting mad and growling a whole bunch, Mistie Q morphing into different shapes. Even though they were enemies, Cyke thought that she would be a good person to play hide an’ go seek with. Nobody would be able to find her. Then there was that other little boy that nobody had gotten a good look at yet…

***

“God, they’re gonna tear up this place, I just know it!” Yez said, feeling the beginnings of a massive headache start right between her eyes. Trevor looked in shock at the chaos, he was an only child himself and had never even been around kids for a prolonged period of time.

“Geez, when Logan said I could go into Marville, I wasn’t expecting this!” That made Yez ask him to explain how he exactly got there in the first place, and he had to recap the whole kicked-in-door-claws-at-throat episode. Of course she laughed at him. Nick was leaning against a wall and trying to control the twitch that had developed in his good eye. Another person not used to being around kids, he was starting to see why his Queen hated them so much. All of a sudden, one of the kids ran by him and pulled out a large squirt gun.

“Bang, bang! Yer dead!” he yelled, firing at Nick with careful precision. Nick looked down at his once white t-shirt and noticed that there were now two bright red spots in the middle of his chest. He reached up where something was dripping down his forehead and put his fingers there. He looked at the sticky red liquid, then sniffed.

“Kid, who the hell do ya think ya are puttin’ Kool-Aid in a firearm?” he bellowed. To the kid’s credit, he didn’t get scared or let his lip quiver or anything. He just stood there and straightened his shoulders, putting his gun to his right shoulder.

“Colonel Meatball, that’s who I am!” he bellowed back, his eye glinting with attitude.

God, he even has an eyepatch… Nick looked at Yez, who was trying to contain her mirth, but just had to let a laugh get past sealed lips.

“Not a word Yezra. Not one single flamin’ word.”

***

“Do ya got it?”

“Almost. Stop moving so much!” Copycat grunted and teetered on her knees again. Their group had formed a kiddie pyramid of sorts, and Gumbo was trying to wire the door controls open. Shower had tried first, but she only knew how to pry the casing off. Gumbo climbed down and frowned.

“Gumbo can’t get it! You try chère!” he said, handing Copycat the lock pick tool. She got a leg up from Wolvie onto Gumbo’s shoulders, and they stood there.

“Gumbo see England, Gumbo see France, Gumbo see Copycat’s underpants!” Of course Gumbo had to look up her dress. It wouldn’t be him if he didn’t. Wolvie growled at him.

“Ya’d better stop lookin’ at her underpants Gumbo…” he warned, letting his threat trail off. They were stopped from fighting when the door opened.

“I gots it!” Copycat whispered, her face set in a beaming smile that showed off the missing front tooth as the door opened. They looked towards the adults who were busy with the miniature SHIELD agent, then towards the more mature babies, who were busy talking and playing together. They looked at each other, then ran through the open doorway.

***

“Logan, this is very nice, but you forgot one thing,” Ice said from her spot on the rec room couch. Logan leaned back so he could look at her and frowned in confusion.

“What, darlin’?”

“Well, you’ve shown me the mansion, but you’ve neglected to show me the most important part of it.”

“I already showed ya everything. What did I miss?” He shifted so his weight wouldn’t be that heavy on her from where they were sprawled on the sofa. He grinned down at her when she ran her hands down his back.

“You fergot to show me your room, that’s what, you Canucklehead.” He chuckled and was about to kiss her when they heard several small gasps come from in front of the sofa. Craning their heads, they saw Shower with her hands over her mouth, Copycat giggling, and the boys looking at Logan like he had lost his mind. She was a girl, she had cooties! What was he doing all over her like that?

“Miss Ice, ya gonna tell him yer gonna break his hands too?” Logan looked down and removed one hand from her boob.

“Looks to Gumbo dat Mister Wolvie not afraid of de cooties eit’er.” The four kids saw the snarl forming at the bigger Wolvie’s lip and gasped again, making a break for the nearest exit. Logan swore and Ice rolled her eyes.

“Guess that means we have to go after them.”

“How did they get out?”

“Cripes! The door! That means that everybody can get out now!” Ice looked at Logan, and they scrambled off the sofa and towards the direction the kids had run off to.

back | next | story index