"All Creatures Great and Small"
"Alpha"
"Babes in Smallville"
"Babysat"
"The Ballad of Trish and Henry"
"Blues"
"Bobby and Hank say 'Farewell, New York' and Other Things"
"Bobby and the Beast"
"Bobby's Casserole"
"Bobby vs. Pat Sajak"
"A Certain Face"
"Confounded Computer!"
"A Day at the Races"
"A Day in the Life"
"Dialogue"
"Dispensing the Shopping"
"The Early X-Men in Studio 54"
"Event"
"First, Do No Harm"
"For Remembrance"
"From the Dais with the Closed Coffin"
"The Good of the Many"
"Gunslinger Dreams"
"Heard No More"
"Hiccups"
"Homecoming"
"A Homely Touch"
"I Do Not Love Thee, Mr. Twinkie"
"Lamentation"
"Leadership"
"The Lecture"
"Longest Night"
"Love Is Just Another 4-Letter Word"
"Magic Breakfast"
"Making the Call"
"Midnight Twinkie Run"
"Miss April's Stars & Garters"
"The Morning Paper"
"Movies"
"Naomi"
"Neon Hearts"
"The No Story"
"Not a Creature Was Stirring"
"The Oath"
"Personal Delivery"
"Point Blank"
"The Power-Whup Girls"
"The Price of Coffee"
"Pygmalion's Silence"
"Rumble in Kitchen Stadium"
"The Shadow Inside"
"The Shi'ar Coffee Story"
"Shoot Me"
"Waiting"
"A Friend, Sleeping"
"A Small Addiction"
"Some Assembly Required"
"Something Old, Something New, Something Borrowed, Someone Blue"
"Start Spreading the News"
"Such Sweet Sorrow"
"Tale of the Last Twinkie"
"Never Mess with a Furry Blue Genius"
"The TD2001"
"Tear Sheets"
"A Test of Power"
"Tripping into the Light Fantastic"
"Twenty First Century Guy"
"When in Rome"
"When Tomorrow Comes"
"Written from Purgatory"
"The Wyoming Pie"
"X-Men #75"
"Yummy Yellow White Surprise"
"Zero Degree Celsius"

Notes: I read the 350 word challenge, just after I'd been looking at a recent gift, wondering how I could fit it into a story, and this happened. Sorry ;-)


A Small Addiction

A mouse.

A vibrating mouse.

Hank pulled the string in the toy's tail again, and cupped it in his hands as it jiggered its way back to stillness and silence.

A vibrating mouse?

He pulled the string once again as he cautiously held it up to his face, furry nose to furry nose.

"What a bizarre gift." He murmured aloud as it stopped again.

Who would give him a vibrating mouse? And why?

Then again, maybe it hadn't been meant for him...? He picked up the wrapping paper, and looked it over. No, look, there. HANK, it said. Capital letters, scrawled on the paper. No card.

It was probably from Robert.

He pulled the string again, absently.

It was the sort of present Robert would give someone, and he was the sort of person to give someone a bizarre and useless present for no particular reason. In fact, until Bastion had cleared out the mansion, Hank had had an entire drawer devoted to the bizarre and useless presents Bobby had given him over the years.

He rather missed them, actually.

The mouse stopped. He pulled the string again.

Then again, Robert didn't often bother to wrap his gifts. And, further, the fact that he hadn't personally presented it to Hank, and wasn't currently bouncing up and down in front of him, waiting to see his reaction, also suggested someone else.

So. A little deduction was in order.

It couldn't be Ororo. It just wasn't... her. Rogue or Kitty would have wrapped it better. Logan wouldn't have wrapped it at all. Kurt?

Hank scratched his head and pulled the string again. Well. Kurt might. He frowned dubiously. But - no, Kurt was visiting Amanda. And Remy had vanished again. Peter? Doubtful.

Charles? . . . No. Just - no.

He pulled the string again.

"Hank. What is that?"

"Bobby?"

"Hey, it vibrates. That's cute. Can I -"

"No."

"Oookay. Possessive much?" Hank ignored him, petted the mouse reassuringly. And pulled the string.

And sighed. Definitely not Robert then. Who else was there?


Sarah stood outside Medlab, and smiled a little as the sound of a toy mouse vibrating started over again.

"There." She muttered. "See? I can do nice."

~end


Oh, look, I never said it would make sense. I said it was 350 words long, and actually, I lied about that too. It's 371 ;-).
(And yes, I do have a vibrating mouse, and it is addictive.)