DISCLAIMER: Marvel's, not mine, not to be taken seriously at all. What do you want, it's 1 am and the Muse is on crack tonight.
ARCHIVE: Usual rules apply.
FEEDBACK: Appreciated, as long as it's not flames.
PERMISSIONS: Okay to POP UP FANFIC, but not to MST.

by Indigo

"Ah go away for a week and the world goes to hell."

"Sam!" Tabitha Smith peered over her shades at Sam Guthrie who had been the one to utter the epithet. He customarily was not given to outbursts of such a nature. She turned to see what had caused him to cry out, and her jaw dropped open.

"Uh, hi," said Kitty Pryde sheepishly as X-Force and Generation X stepped out of a magickal teleport circle and arrived in the front foyer of the mansion. "I'm glad to see you guys too. Really glad." She had a pair of small children in her lap -- infants, really, and was struggling to bottle feed them both.

The mansion was, simply put -- a mess. And it reeked -- of sour milk and dirty diapers.

"What happened?" Roberto asked, frowning.

"Long story," said a soft voice behind Kitty. A kid about Kitty Pryde's age, dressed in a rumpled black suit, was jostling a large blonde baby in his arms.

"Reader's Digest version?" asked Danielle, frowning. "And is that you, Pete Wisdom?"

"Bloody right," the teenaged boy replied.

"Ye look like ye're twelve!" Siryn gasped.

"Fourteen, or thereabouts," Kitty chuckled in response to Wisdom's pained expression. "And so am I -- again."

"What the heck happened?" Jubilee demanded.

[~Scarlet Witch,~] Jono piped up thoughtfully. [~Bloody glad we were in Asgard for Eitri's daughter's wedding.~]

"The Scarlet Witch turned Excalibur into babies and teenagers?" asked James Proudstar, looking well and truly perplexed.

"Not just Excalibur," Kitty sighed. "Wolvie's down for his nap -- thank God. Ororo's playing in the garden. Kurt is swinging in the jungle gym. Rogue is watching the Teletubbies with Meggan."

Sam looked pale and not a little sick. "Okay, Kitty, from the beginnin' -- what happened?"

Kitty smiled wryly. "We found out at the last minute from one of the professor's underground that a satellite network was going up with cobbled-together duplicates of the technology Forge used to neutralize Rogue's powers."

The former New Mutants among X-Force winced in sympathetic remembrance.

"So the X-Men naturally tried to go an' stop this from launchin', right?"

"Naturally," Wisdom sighed. "An' because there were launch sites all over the world, Excalibur got into the bleedin' act."

"We called the Avengers," Kitty continued. "Figured they could give us a hand, but most of them were off planet. The Scarlet Witch was around and her brother Quicksilver gave her a lift to our Blackbird."

"We encountered homosapien resistance," added a new voice. Henry P. McCoy, still blue, still furry, but only about seven years old. "While we were engaged in trying to disengage from them with a minimum of casualties, the capsule launched. We could not attempt to disable it without risking explosion and raining debris all over the eastern seaboard."

"Lemme guess," Tabitha added, brushing a hand through her hair. "She hexed up the capsule and instead of neutralizing mutants, it's a de-aging ray, now?"

Hank, Kitty, and Pete all nodded, with long faces. "Those of us closest to the capsule when it released the pulse were de-aged youngest," Hank went on to explain. "If not for Kitty's quick thinking and phasing as many people underground as she could, we would all be infants now."

"Everyone? Humans too?" Paige looked incredulous.

Wisdom smirked. "Yeah, humans too, oddly enough. Only ones spared were in the subways or underground. Anyone on the surface has been given the fountain of youth."

"A second chance, I guess," Dani mused.

"Maybe the X-Men won't be needed this time."

"You're needed," Kitty assured them. "We need help changing the diapers."

Sam just shook his head and resolutely headed for the stairs. "C'mon, Paige. We have the most experience with this."

"Ewww," Jubilee said, but followed as well.

[~Anybody know any good lullabyes?~]

"Shut the bloody hell up, Starsmore."

[~Just tryin' to help...~]

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