X-Men: New Wave

After convincing Pilar that we should take to the next Poker game available, we made our way to the car park. It was a dark night, the sun was just giving off the last specks of light, this caused an eerie glow over Pilar - she looked more illuminating than normal. The gravel crunched slightly under our feet and I made my way to the first car I saw.

"What are we going to do? I can't drive?" Pilar questioned, slowly making her way closer towards me, the gravel seemed to get louder as the darkness crept over us.

"Don't worry I've got this covered." I smiled and unlocked the car, the mechanisms were quite basic in terms of controlling and the hot wiring was easy - I had plenty of practise from my time in London.

"So what now?" Pilar asked, looking around cautiously, she seemed more scared than excited - I saw this as my opotunity to show her I wasn't an enemy.

I leaned in closer and gently put my hands on her shoulders, "Look, I understand how it must feel to be singled out and left alone, to be exploited by the ones you trust." I began to think of my old boyfriend who tried to sell me to some dude on the black market, "But trust me, I will look after you, especially now - just stick with me, eh?"

After a few seconds of processing what I had just said Pilar smiled and her glowing patterns began to glow brighter. She nodded and walked to get into the passenger side of the car.
I had pre-packed my backpack with the money I would later bet, a jumper, a mask and a pair of fingerless gloves.

"Where are we going?" Pilar asked, looking around again, then she started to go through the draws.

"We go to the city, you can change us into a few good looking guys and we find some people to direct us to the nearest poker joint." I answered watching what she was doing, "What are you looking for?"

Before she could answer, she pulled out a picture of the owner of the car - it must have been some mutant from the academy. I just nodded to see I understood.

We came to the barriers and the man on the gate just nodded and smiled at me, it appeared Pilar's power was extremely effective. We drove through the gate and onto the open road, I looked at the signs and began to follow them into the City.

After a long hour of driving and focusing on the road, we came up to the first few dark alley.

"Ignore my earlier plan, this will be easier than I thought, just look for some form of blue or red lighting." I smiled and looked over to Pilar, "Do you want a jumper at all? I don't mean to offend you but these people might not be as accepting."

She let out a small laugh, "I think I've got it covered." she morphed into a girl I had seen at the academy, of course, how could I forget about her power?

"You ready?" I asked before opening the door, I got a subtle nod.

The street was in a cloak of darkness, with some bright blue and red staining the darkness, voices weren't heard from this distance. Due to this I guessed the clubs were underground. I saw a spray painted word in the illuminating blue light. It read "Freaks" - I looked back to see if Pilar was ok, it seemed the same thing had caught her attention.

"Come on, that's the one we're going to. I've got a good feeling about that one." I smiled and led her down the grey alley, as we were slowly illuminated by the blue light voices were emerging from the metal bar door.

We were completely bleached by the blue light, a large man was standing behind the bars. He eyed us and crossed his arms, he closely examined us and smirked.

"Freaks only. I think you two are looking for the strip auditions." he laughed, another man was sitting next to him - I heard his lower pitched laugh.

"Pilar," I whispered, "Stop using your power."

"What?" she whispered back, we were unheard due to the laughter of the two men.

"Look at them - they're mutants like us. I say you stop your power and I'll rip these bars off?" I suggested.

"Let's do it." Pilar agreed after much thinking.

Pilar let down her power and showed her green glow, that discoloured the blue aura around us, the men stopped laughing and stared. I ripped the bars off and began to walk towards them. The bars were clattering behind them as they travelled down the stairs into darkness.

"Ok, you're in, go down and ask for the room with Gambit. He's the only one with a few free spaces left tonight." He smirked again, "He'll give you a run for your money...Sweety."

I gave him a glare and replied with, "I'm anything but sweet."

With this I walked passed him and into the darkness, luckily Pilar's glow was enough to see the steps and the floor, I couldn't see anything but the green glow.

"Hello?" I walked towards a small slit of light.

"Yes." A voice replied, with slight humour, "Here to play poker?"

"I am indeed. Are you Gambit?" I slowly moved forward, I looked back to see if Pilar was still with me.

"Join me," The light hit me full in the face - making my retinas ache - "Come in and join me."

My eyes finally re-adjusted and I saw Gambit in full, along with a red mutant on his side, he was rather devilish looking and another women who had long blonde hair. Each one had a few notes in front of them.

"How much you got kid?" Gambit smiled and leaned closer to me, "If you've got 50 bucks I'll count you in."

"Of course I've got 50 bucks." I snapped back giving him my own smirk, I pulled my back pack from my back and took out 50.

"Let's begin..." Gambit dealt the cards without touching them and his eyes illuminated pink.

It was at this point I began to take in the scenery, the table was blue rather than the standard green. The walls were full of graffiti and the floor was just plain concrete. It seemed that this room was the lowest - or so it seemed until I saw the safe and the door that led to a sort of lounge.

"Maybe later you could join me in there hey kid." Gambit winked towards me and I noticed my cards were now infront of me.

After six games and winning all of the red man's money - much to his distaste and anger, as he disappeared into a cloud of red smoke - I was beginning to feel lucky, especially as the blonde women was folding and failing in the game.

Suddenly the Blonde women stood up, "I have had enough of this! I never win and it's not changing tonight. I'll leave you with these two freaks! At least I'm no mutant."

As she left Gambit smiled and all the cards collected themselves into a deck, "Well, she wasn't a happy bunny, would you like to join me in the study?"

He swiftly stood up and moved into his study.

"Pilar? Do you want to?" I asked, looking at her hopefully.

"Okay, couldn't hurt right?" Pilar replied letting out air, as if she had been holding her breath all the time she was in the joint.

We both made our way into the room. It was a magnificent sight, the red and gold streaming from every direction and the chairs looked like they were fit for kings - or queens.

"Now you two have yet to introduce yourselves. Care to do so?" Gambit spoke, breaking me from the daze his room had put me in.