“Man, this TV doesn’t even have cable! This apartment is such a dump!”

     “Toad, will you shut up? Our old house didn’t have cable either!” Lance said, elbowing Toad from his position next to the smelly Mutant on the apartment’s living room couch.

     “Yeah, but Xavier paid for the rent here, yo! I thought he was supposed to be super-rich!”

     “Guys, dinner’s ready!” Pietro called in from the kitchen.

     “Oh joy,” Lance grumbled, turning off the TV before he and Toad walked—veeerrry slowly—into the adjacent kitchen.

     “Your dinner’s on the table, guys—I just have to get the drinks ready,” Pietro said, speeding between the refrigerator.

     “Chef Boyardee AGAIN? Pietro, this is the fourth night in a row we’ve had Beefaroni!” Lance complained. “Don’t you know how to make anything else?”

     “Well, gee, YOU’RE WELCOME,” Pietro retorted. “Next time, just make the darn dinner yourself! I haven’t got all day, y’know—I have lots of stuff to do.”

     “Like what?” Toad said, raising an eyebrow. “Far as I can tell, you just been sittin’ around like the rest of us.”

     “Like I said,” Pietro said, slamming a cupboard for emphasis, “If you don’t LIKE it, then make dinner YOURSELF!”

     “Yeah, but… Aw, I miss Freddy’s cookin’,” Toad pouted as he sat down and sadly slurped up his Beefaroni.

     “And use a spoon, you’re disgusting!” Pietro said, throwing a spoon at Todd. He caught the utensil with his hand before it knocked him in the face and threw it back at Pietro—only to miss and lodge it in the side of a cupboard.

     It had been two weeks since Xavier had visited the Brotherhood members in the hospital and told them about their new living arrangements—given that their house had been destroyed during a recent riot, Xavier had taken pity on them and provided them with an apartment with a month’s rent and food paid for. After that, well… none of them wanted to think about what they would have to do after that. Blob and Wanda were still in the hospital, as they had been the hardest hit by the Powr-8 used in the riot, but they were recovering swiftly—within a few days they were expected to be in good enough condition to leave the hospital.

     “Toad, seriously, you’re splattering the beef sauce everywhere!” Lance said, covering his face from the onslaught of sauce and the occasional bit of beef. “Use a freaking spoon!”

     Toad lifted his face up from the bowl and wiped the sauce from his eyes. “Hey, Beefaroni again or not, I’m hungry, yo! There ain’t nearly enough insects in this place to satisfy my appetite, unlike in the Brothahood house…”

     “Well, your ‘appetite’ is breaking the bank, Toad!” Pietro said, quickly getting out an account sheet from a cupboard and shoving it in front of Toad’s sauce-covered face. “The food money Xavier gave us only has about fifty bucks left in the account! Given how much Blob eats, and now with you pigging out, we’ll be lucky to make it to the end of the month on this even if we eat nothing but Ramen noodles! And do you know how much sodium that stuff has, Toad?!”

     “Alright, alright, don’t burst an artery or nothin’,” Toad said, raising his hands up defense. “I’ll quit eating so much, even if it means I go hungry…”

     “No, I have another idea…” Lance said, smirking as he gestured Pietro over to his side of the table and whispered something into his ear. As he listened to Lance, Pietro also grew a sly grin and they both looked straight at Toad.

     “Uh… Why y’all lookin’ at me like that? W-whatever you thinking, I ain’t doin’ it…”

     *Knock knock knock*

     Wanda looked around at the other Brotherhood members on the other side of the living room, who were all closer to the apartment door than her. Pietro continued to read his magazine, Lance continued to flip through the TV channels, and Fred continued to apply new dressing to his right arm, which was the only part of him that hadn’t completely healed yet.

     “Fine, I’LL get it,” she growled, rolling her eyes before getting up and walking over to the door.

     As she opened the door, an exhausted, tattered Toad collapsed into Wanda, knocking them both to the ground.

     “Toad, GET OFF! What the heck is wrong with you!?”

     “O-oh… You’re back from the hospital, sweetums. Hey.”

     Wanda kicked Toad off of her and stood up as the other Brotherhood members gathered around the open doorway.

     “Toad, what are you doing back here? You weren’t supposed to get off from work until eight tonight! It’s only five-thirty!” Pietro said angrily.

     “Listen, guys… this ‘job’ stuff just ain’t for me… my first day at the Taco King was… well, I actually prefer gettin’ beat up by the X-Men.”

     “Oh, give me a break,” Lance sneered. “Your day couldn’t have been THAT bad.”

     “Okay then, you take my job instead, you think it’s so easy,” Toad said, slowly standing back up.

     “Look, why don’t you just tell us what happened before I punch your face in?!” Lance yelled, his face growing red.

     “Fine, y’ don’t have to throw a fit! It all started when they showed me the frying vat…”

     “…of course, the birdseed only made things worse, so there ya go.”

     No one said anything for a few seconds—the other Brotherhood members just stood wide-eyed staring at Toad, their mouths agape.

     “Oh my GOD!” Lance finally let out.

     “Toad, you are so pathetic…” Pietro muttered.

     “Did they ever find out what happened to the baby, though?” Fred asked.

     Toad shook his head.

     “Well, there goes our hopes of paying next month’s rent,” Lance said angrily, collapsing into a chair behind him and throwing up his hands in frustration.

     “Well, why don’t any of you get a job?” Wanda asked the others, crossing her arms.

     “I am NOT flipping burgers,” Pietro said.

     “Ditto,” Lance seconded.

     “Ditto…ed…. Again…” Blob stumbled. “I mean, being around all that food without being able to eat it? It’s inhuman!”

     “Yeah, but it was cool for poor ol’ Todd to be forced into a job, a’course…”

     “Shut UP, Toad!” Lance interjected.

     “Why don’t YOU get a job, Wanda?” Pietro questioned.

     “Pietro, our father took me out of school after the fourth grade because we were traveling from one country to another so often, don’t you remember?!”

    “Yeah… because of your ‘traveling’…” Toad mumbled.

    “I don’t know the first thing about managing finances like that,” Wanda continued, “And it’d take me too long to learn—we barely have over a week left before our rent is due!”

    “Well, we’ve gotta do something!” Blob said.

    Pietro’s scowl suddenly turned into a smirk. “Hey guys, I think I have an idea on how we can get our rent money and then some…”

    “Well, then tell us already!” Lance demanded.

    “Well, it’s clear that getting a job isn’t up our alley,” Pietro said, pacing around. “So… I think the only realistic option left is…”

    “Steal it!” Toad said happily. “Awright, now you’re talking my language! Why didn’t we just do this in the first place?”

    “Because, you morons, in case you haven’t noticed, the X-Men outnumber us—they can kick our butts any time they want to!” Lance said angrily. “And Xavier paid for this apartment—as soon as they discover it’s us, they’ll have our heads on a platter before the day’s end, and we’ll be right back where we were two and half weeks ago! Maybe even worse off!”

    “IF they discover it’s us,” Pietro said. “Which they won’t.”

    “Oh? And why’s that?” Lance asked. “In case you haven’t noticed, we NEED to use our powers to steal stuff! I mean, we aren’t ugly enough to impersonate Morlocks—well, besides Toad—“

    “Hey!”

    “—and there aren’t any other Mutant groups in Bayville!”

    “Wrong!” Pietro grinned. “There is—or rather, there WAS—one other Mutant group in Bayville. And the best thing is, their identities were never discovered by the public, so we could impersonate them easily! I think you all know where I’m going with this…”

     “This is so, so wrong… Wanda looks really hot, though.”

     “For the last time, shut UP, Toad! Dear God, I can’t believe I’m going along with you morons on this… I can’t even see through these stupid sunglasses…”

     “I’m jus’ sayin’, schnookums… ‘Sides, you ain’t got nothin’ to complain about, you’re the only one that’s the right gender.”

     “This has got to be the lowest we’ve ever sunk, Pietro. Man, I hope Kitty never sees me like this…”

     “First off, Lance, forget Kitty, it’s over between you and her. And secondly, I hate this as much as you do—“

     “Do you?”

     “—YES! And SECONDLY, it’s either this or we’re out on the streets again, so let’s just suck it up and get this done. We’ve almost got these sacks full, anyways! Thanks to Wanda’s hexing the security system, we may just make it through this heist without anyone seeing us—“

     Just then, two bright flashlights flashed on, right into Wanda and Pietro’s faces.

     “Stop right there! What the heck do you people think you’re doing?! You four are under arrest!”

     “You had to open your big mouth,” Lance mumbled to Pietro.

     “As long as they don’t get a good look at you, me, or Toad, it doesn’t matter,” Pietro whispered back. “Wanda…”

     “Fine,” Wanda growled. “But I’m only doing this to get back at the pathetic Normals in this town, you realize that.” Getting up, Wanda stepped out slowly in front of the others, and the two security guards centered their flashlights and their guns on the approaching Brotherhood member.

     “I said, stop ri—wait, you four—“ One of the guards said, then stopped mid-sentence, dumbfounded when he realized what the four people in front of him looked like.

     “That’s right,” Wanda sighed. “We’re the Bayville Sirens, and we’re back. Girl power and all that. So get out now, before there’s any trouble.”

     “N-not a chance!” the guard said, as he and the other guard both readied their guns. “Now stand down NOW, or we’ll open fire! I don’t know how you Sirens went from busting crimes to committing them, but you aren’t getting away with this!”

     “Fine, we’ll do this the hard way,” Wanda said, then hexed the two security guards all the way out through the front windows of the bank. As they flew back, the guards fired their guns at Wanda, but their bullets veered off at an odd angle and hit the ceiling.

     “Alright, that did it!” Pietro said, quickly tying up the sack that he had been filling with money. “Let’s get out of here guys, before the cops arrive in force!”

     “Hey, y’ don’t have to tell me twice!” Toad said, tying up his own sack. “This tight black leather stuff is really chafin’ me, yo! Not to mention this scratchy wig… and the fake cups…”

     “Just zip it and go!” Lance said, taking his and Wanda’s sacks and running out the back door of the bank. Toad, Wanda, and Pietro followed him to the jeep parked back behind the building (though Pietro made it there first, of course).

     Throwing the money sacks in the back seat, the four jumped into the jeep.

     “Alright, Blob, floor it!” Pietro commanded.

     “Heheheh, anything for a bunch of pretty ladies like yourselves!” Blob chuckled. He got a punch in the back of the head by Lance, but that just caused the overweight Mutant to laugh more as the jeep revved up and zoomed down the street.

     “I can’t get this stupid lipstick off!” Lance yelled as he looked at himself in the apartment’s bathroom mirror. He cursed as he rubbed his lips and saw it had no effect. “And all that shaving I had to do earlier… I am NEVER doing this BS again!”

     “Lance, do you have any idea how much money we actually TOOK from that bank?” Pietro said as he entered the bathroom, changed back into his normal clothes. He closed the door behind him.

     “No, and I don’t care! This is the most retarded thing we’ve ever done, by far!”

     “Oh, really?” Pietro smirked. Leaning over to Lance, Pietro mumbled the estimate into his ear.

     “Woah,” Lance said, his eyes getting wide as Pietro repeated the figure to him again. “Wow, that…. That’s a lot…. We didn’t even get that much during the whole ‘fake heroes’ bit…”

     “Now, that’s just between you and me, got it?” Pietro said, turning on the other faucet in the bathroom to wash the makeup off his face. “I’ll tell the others we got about half that. Enough to keep ‘em satisfied while still letting us two get the bulk of the money, but only IF you promise me you’ll keep doing this for at least a few more heists.”

     “What, why?” Lance said, finally managing to scrape some of the lipstick off. “That’s enough to pay the rent for… a long time. You wanna move into a mansion or something?”

     “Maybe in time,” Pietro said, completely serious as he splashed water on his face. “But not now, ol’ Xavier’d get too suspicious if we moved out of here so soon. Maybe in a few years. No, I want to make sure we never have to worry about money again.”

     “Oh, really?” Lance said, turning to face Pietro. “And where exactly would we put all this money, genius? There’s bound to be an investigation into this…”

     “Oh, come ON!” Pietro said, waving Lance’s criticism away. “You honestly think my father doesn’t have connections? We give him a good chunk of it to use for his own ends, and he’ll hide it all away where the cops’ll never find it!”

     “Well… maybe…” Lance considered.

     “C’mon, are you in or out?” Pietro said, drying his face. “About half a dozen more heists like this, and we’ll be set. We’ll never have to dress up as the Sirens again. You can even burn the black leather clothes afterwards if you want to.”

     “I was planning to do that anyway,” Lance said. “But… I guess if it means we never have to worry about money again… I’m in. Though you know the hard part is going to be convincing Wanda to keep doing this… I mean, she’s the reason we can get in these places pretty much undetected…”

     “I got it covered,” Pietro replied with a smirk. “Any mention of her father wanting her to do something and she’s like putty in our hands after Mastermind did that brainwashing thing to her. I’ll just, y’know, tell her tomorrow that I called up dad and that he’s up for us doing this, and bam, she’s in.”

     “Rogue, do you know anything about this!?” Scott said angrily as he walked into the Mansion’s kitchen where she was eating a late breakfast and plopped the Sunday paper on the table, pointing to the front page headline.

     “What?” Rogue said in confusion before she looked at the paper headline—entitled “SIRENS GONE BAD!”—and skimmed over the article. “Wait, Scott—you don’t seriously think that we—“

     “Stole money from a bank?” Scott interrupted, sitting down in the seat opposite Rogue at the table. “No. But that you and some of the other girls were out doing vigilante stuff again and there was some big misunderstanding? Listen, Rogue, you all have got to stop doing this—you’ve got to let the police handle this kind of stuff! We only handle the things that they can’t!”

     “Scott, no, listen—none of us have done the whole Siren thing since we busted that chop shop gang. I mean, yeah, in retrospect, after seeing how everyone treats Mutants now, it was stupid—we get it. Well, except maybe Tabitha, but that’s pretty much a given. We were all here at the Mansion last night when this happened—you have to believe me!”

     Scott looked Rogue square in the eyes and, after a few seconds, sighed. “I’ve known you long enough to know that you wouldn’t lie to any of us, especially over something like this. Alright, I believe you. But then that means—“

     “Someone else out there is framing us!” Rogue said angrily. “But the report here clearly says that the guards that were injured in the fight told the reporters that ‘Mutant-like’ powers were used against them. So I guess that narrows down the framers to Mutants, at least…”

     “Yeah, but I don’t know of any other group of female Mutants in Bayville,” Scott said. “I mean, some of the female Morlocks might do something like this, but there’s no way they could pass themselves off as any of you girls, there’s a reason they’ve condemned themselves to the sewers…”

    “Well, the report does mention the guards only got a good look at one of the fake Sirens…”

    “But who else could it be?”

     “I don’t know, Scott,” Rogue said, massaging her temples. “I guess I’ll see if I can get a hold of Spyke, see if he knows anything about this, just in case.”

     “I’ll go tell Jean and the others about this,” Scott said, standing up. Putting his hand on Rogue’s shoulder, he continued, “Don’t worry about this, Rogue. We’ll find out who’s framing you girls… sooner or later. We just have to keep alert for more news on this—whoever they are, if they’re being so ambitious as to soil the name of a known group of crime fighters for their own benefit, they’re probably planning more than one robbery.”

     “Man, this is the life,” Toad said, sighing happily as he leaned back in the new large massaging chair that he had recently bought for himself. “Oooooh yeeeeahhhh, that feels good… We got enough money to last us almost ‘till we retire now! You sure we still need to keep goin’ with this, Pietro?”

     “One more heist should do it,” Pietro said, quickly punching figures into a number cruncher as he did some calculations. “Then we’ll be set for life. I’ve talked to our father, Wanda—he should be by Saturday to take the money we’ve got stashed here and store it in a safer place. He’s… told me he’s very proud of you for sticking with us on this.”

     “Father’s coming here Saturday?” Wanda said from the other side of the room, looking up from the magazine she was reading as she smiled. “Good! I haven’t seen him since the whole Apocalypse thing…”

     “Putty in the hands,” Pietro murmured to Lance, who was sitting next to him. Lance just smirked in reply. “Though Magneto really is coming here Saturday—we need to get this whole thing wrapped up by then.”

     “’Bout time this whole mess was over with,” Lance replied, itching his chin. “My skin’s having some kind of reaction to the makeup we have to put on.”

     “Not to mention I won’t have to hear you all talk about how bad your costumes are anymore,” Blob said from the ultra-cushiony TV couch they had bought a few days ago. “Hearing you talk about makeup is just weird, Lance. I can barely keep up my appetite with all the weird stuff you guys ‘re doing.”

     “What are you complaining about?!” Lance retorted. “All you have to do is drive the jeep!”

     “Alright, good job, Wanda, there goes the lock to the safe! Alright, Lance, Toad—this is our last job, let’s make it count. Stuff these bags full!”

     “I’m gonna get an Xbox 360, and then buy out all the games for the system they have at the store, yo! We gonna have it made from now on!”

     “No, Toad, we can’t spend too much in one place, or someone might get suspicious,” Pietro answered as the four “Sirens” all entered the bank vault. “Now, I’ll get the back end, you guys take the sides, Wanda, you—“

     Pietro was interrupted as the vault door behind them suddenly swung shut.

     “What the--!?”

     “Hey there, boys. Having fun?” a familiar voice at the back end of the vault said as the lights suddenly came on.

     Toad shrieked.

     Lance cursed.

     Pietro yelped.

     Wanda said nothing.

     Toad shrieked again.

     Lance growled, “Toad, shut up.”

     Toad shrieked a third time.

     Lance smacked Toad across the face so hard the slimy Mutant’s sunglasses and wig fell off.

     Toad promptly stopped shrieking.

     Standing around them inside the vault were Amara, Jean, Kitty, Rogue, and Tabitha, all with smug grins on their faces—and all in their old Siren uniforms. Upon seeing how Lance, Pietro, and Todd looked dressed up as their group, Amara and Kitty broke down into uncontrollable laughter. Lance’s face turned beet red, while at the same time all the blood drained from Todd and Pietro’s own faces.

     “I said, are you having fun playing dress-up?” Tabitha asked again, in her usual amused tone.

     “Uh-um…” Toad stuttered.

     “How… how did you figure out it was us?” Pietro said, his voice noticeably higher in pitch than normal.

     “I called Spyke about the robberies, and he suggested we use Caliban to find out who it was,” Rogue said, cracking her knuckles. “Xavier paid Caliban to go around the half dozen or so banks in town, and sure enough, on the last robbery you guys pulled he sensed that it was you who were impersonating us. Y’know, you really should’ve tried stealing from banks in a larger city, where we would’ve had more trouble tracking you down.”

     “I can’t…. I couldn’t believe you actually…. I didn’t dream you’d go this far…” Kitty gasped, in between her bouts of laughter.

     “Nice way to thank the Professor for the help he gave you losers, huh?” Rogue asked.

     “Yeah, we could’ve just busted you guys at your apartment, but I figured it’d be more fun this way,” Tabitha said. “I mean, I wanted to see you boys all dressed up in person. You look so cuuute!” For emphasis, she pinched Toad’s cheek. Toad was too scared to do anything but shake a little. “So we just had Jeanie pass by your house and scan your minds to see which place you were going to hit next. Pretty smart, huh?”

     Seeing Kitty and Amara finally compose themselves and stand back up, Pietro finally managed to blurt out, “B-but you girls forget, we have our secret weapon with us! Scarlet Witch—get ‘em!”

     Nothing happened.

     “Wanda?”

     “Put her to sleep when you guys first came in here,” Jean said, tapping her forehead. “Blob is asleep in your getaway vehicle, too.”

     Pietro turned around, and sure enough, Wanda was asleep behind them.

     “Oh no.”

     With a final shriek of terror from Toad, the fight commenced.

     “Alvers, phone call for you from your lawyer,” the guard said, opening the door to the cell. “Come with me.”

     “Yeah… sure,” Lance groaned, gathering his crutches and limping out after the guard.

     After Lance passed by the opened door, the prison guard locked up the cell containing most of the other Brotherhood members. Toad and Pietro were covered with welts and bruises, and Wanda had her hands chained behind her in locked metal bonds so she couldn’t move them. Blob was being kept in a separate heavily-reinforced cell so he couldn’t break out.

     The guard led Lance down the hallway and handed him the phone.

     “Hello?” Lance mumbled.

     “I see you boys couldn’t even stay out of trouble for a month—good job.”

     “Myst—“ Lance started, surprised to hear from their leader after she had abandoned them yet again.

     “Do NOT say my name, you imbecile!” Mystique interrupted. “I’m feeding a separate recorded phone call to the guards listening so they don’t suspect anything, the last thing I need is you blurting out who I am!”

     “--er.” Lance stuttered. “Myst--ter. Mr. Jones, what details on the case have you uncovered?”

     “That was unusually fast thinking on your part,” Mystique acknowledged. “Now, listen. I’m currently… occupied with some things. I realize that you are probably trying to figure out how to escape from prison, but DO NOT do so. I will come and get you when I am ready. Until then, stay put and do whatever the prison guards tell you to do, understand?”

     “And how long do I have to wait?” Lance said impatiently. “Listen, this isn’t my idea of—“

     Lance stopped talking as the dial tone suddenly came on over the phone.

     “Great,” Lance said, cursing as he hung up the phone.

     “Your call is over, Alvers?” The guard asked. “Back to your cell, then.”

     “Yeah, whatever,” Lance growled, limping after the guard.

The End
 

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