Lenny stood in front of the mirror in his new corner office and carefully adjusted his crown where it sat on top of his head. It looked awesome, he'd covered it in a layer of shiny gold duct tape that he'd found at Target. It was spanking awesome now. And totally protected from damage now that it was covered in the layer of duct tape. He'd find a real crown someday, but this would do for now.

He looked amazing. He pointed at his reflection. "You are gorgeous, man, and way better than Craig, you are the man."

"Lenny, the first set of trucks has left the building." Brittney stuck her head into his office as she spoke.

With a grin, he went to sit behind his new desk. He settled down into the plush chair behind it and looked at Brittney with a large smile. "Great, that's just great. How many trucks went out?"

"Six. All fully loaded. So, now what do we do?" She stepped into the office and shut the door.

"Perfect, now all we have to do is wait for mutants to begin dropping like flies!" He rubbed his hands together in anticipation.

"Dropping? I thought they just lost their powers?" she asked in confusion.

He sent her an exasperated look. "They do, you idiot, it's an expression. As soon as they start losing their powers we swoop in and offer to restore them in exchange for their support of our cause."

"Oh, right, gotcha." She pulled herself up to sit on the edge of his desk and fluffed her hair.

He scowled at her. He didn't want her messing up his new desk. "Well, anyway, when that starts happening then we will increase our army quickly. As soon as our army is large enough, then we can go after the X-Men. Until then we stay here."

She kicked her feet a little and smiled as she admired her perfectly painted toes in her new Prada flip-flops. "At least this place is nicer than that stupid warehouse."

Lenny looked around the office and gave a nod in agreement. The office building was much better than the abandoned warehouse, he'd found the brand-new office building after they had left the PEZ warehouse. The place had just been completed and he'd used the abilities of one of his mutants to secure the building for their use. He grinned happily, that particular mutant could influence the minds of humans easily. She'd convinced the building manager that he had rented the entire building to Lenny and his crew and that they had already paid an entire year's worth of rent. When the year was up he'd decide what to do with the building. Hopefully, his plans would be completed by then and he wouldn't need it anymore.

Oh yeah, this was so much better. When they hit Xavier's stupid school, those fools wouldn't know what hit 'em. Lenny leaned back in his chair and smirked.

***

Ziva lay on her back on one of the couches in the living room. Skylar was on the floor, lying on her stomach, watching TV. Craig sat at the end of the couch, Ziva's feet in his lap.

"Do you think Lenny has started distributing his stupid Compound 13 laced PEZ yet?" Ziva asked them.

"Probably, the idiot wouldn't sit around keeping it stashed somewhere," Craig replied morosely.

Skylar rolled over and looked at them. "Do you think we'll be able to find him again?"

They both shrugged at her.

Mellissa came strolling into the room. Followed by her little entourage. Stevie blasting her theme song on his iPad. "Hello all, what's a shakin' bacon?"

Ziva groaned and looked over at her. "What do you three want?" She frowned and pushed herself up onto her elbows. "Whoa, are those the Panthers from your room, Stevie?"

He sent her a scowl as he shut down the iPad. "They aren't panthers, they're housecats and don't stare at them because they don't like it!"

"Housecats? They're like what the size of a small Labrador, those aren't housecats!" Craig told him. "They weigh what, thirty or forty pounds?"

"Come on, what did I just tell you! They're sensitive about their size!"

Angela did a tiny twirl and came to a stop in front of the couch. "He found them before he came here. At a lab somewhere, he won't tell anyone where. He set a bunch of animals free but Mack and Jack followed him here. They won't leave his side. They're very protective of him."

Stevie sent her a glower and then turned back to Ziva and Craig. "Yeah, the scientists were experimenting on the animals. Sort of reverse mutanizing them. Trying to make mutants out of the animals, instead of the humans becoming mutants."

"Well that explains why they're larger than average," Ziva said, still staring at the cats. "They look like oversized Maine Coons."

Stevie reached down and gave them both a pat. "Yep, they are, but as Craig has pointed out, they weigh much more. I don't know exactly what the scientists were doing to the animals, but they're smarter than your average housecat, stronger, faster, and well, bigger."

Skylar wrinkled her nose at him. "I'll try and remember that when they try and murder me again."

"Well, you did break into my room. Like Angel said, they're protective." He shrugged.

"Wait, is that one wearing a kilt?" Ziva asked him.

"Oh yeah, that's Mackenzie and the one with the hat is Captain Jack," Angela said with a grin. "As in Captain Jack Sparrow."

Ziva gaped at the cats. "Are you serious?"

"Don't insult them unless you want to make them angry," Stevie told her.

Skylar grimaced. "I don't think you want to make them angry, Ziva."

Mellissa sighed. "Right fine, so you've met Mack and Jack, whoo hoo, but anyway what is there to do today 'cause like we're bored."

Craig shrugged at her. "I don't know, go play with your cooooouch."

"We did that already!" she whined.

"Read a book," Skylar suggested.

"We've read all of ours already like a dozen times! Do you have any good ones?"

"Nothing appropriate for you munchkins," Ziva told her.

"Why don't you go see what Storm is up to or Logan?" Skylar told them.

"Hmmm, well I know Logan is playing with his new PlayStation and if we bug him he'll Ginsu us, so that isn't a good plan of action. So, we'll go annoy ... I mean ask Storm for something to do!"

Mellissa skipped from the room and down the hallway, Stevie and Angela followed her.

Angela hummed and looked at Mellissa. "Do you think Storm will have anything for us to do?"

Mellissa shrugged as she passed through the door into Storm's office. "I don't know. Guess we'll find out."

Storm looked up from her desk covered with paperwork at them as they came into her office. "What can I do for the three of you?"

Mellissa stopped before her desk, rocked back and forth on her feet, her hands clasped behind her back, smiling at Storm. "We're bored! Do you have anything we can do? Any good books to read?"

Storm rose from behind her desk and made her way over to the bookshelves that lined the walls of her office, which was formerly Professor Xavier's office. "Well, there are plenty of books in here that you guys can read. Here, how about this one?"

Mellissa looked at the title of the book. "Beowulf." She frowned. "Is this like a werewolf book? Like Twilight? We're not supposed to read stuff like that. I mean I did, wait did I say that out loud? I totally did not read Twilight!"

Storm snatched it back. "No, it isn't like Twilight, fine, okay let's try something else." She grabbed another book and held it out to Mellissa. "Right, how about this one then."

"Grimm's Fairy Tales." Mellissa looked up at her.

"Seriously, why are they grim? What's wrong with them? Did they have a bad day at work, like you do all the time?" Angela asked Storm. "Also, they can't spell, grim has one m. Even I know that."

"Maybe we shouldn't read them if they're grim," Stevie put in.

Storm grabbed the book and shoved it back onto the shelf. "Sure, fine whatever. Here." She held another book out to them and Stevie took it.

"Hmmm, Great Expectation. What are they expecting and why do they think it's gonna be so great? Ohhh, is it gonna be a good movie or some big trip somewhere, are they getting a big package in the mail from Amazon?"

"Give it to me! Here, this one!"

"Uncle Tom's Cabin," Mellissa read slowly.

"Who is Uncle Tom and why do we wanna read about his boring old cabin?" Angela asked, reading over Stevie's shoulder.

In frustration, Storm grabbed the book and held out yet another one at them. Angela rolled her eyes. "This one makes no sense at all. The title contradicts itself! War and Peace? How can there be both war and peace at the same time?"

Storm made some sort of noise under her breath as she turned and smashed the book back onto the shelf. "Fine, right, how about this one then?"

"A Tale of Two Cities," Stevie read the title slowly.

"Oh wow, which two cities is it? Las Vegas? New York? Why are we talking about them, were they invaded by aliens or blown up by terrorists, did the Gods rain down their wrath on them? What happened? Zombie apocalypse?" Mellissa looked at Storm waiting for an answer.

Storm stared at her in frustration for a moment before she took the book back as calmly as she could, put it back on the shelf, and handed them another one.

Angela wrinkled her nose at it. "Little House on the Prairie."

"Why is it little, did they run outta wood?" Mellissa asked her.

"And why is it on a prairie?" Angela asked. "Didn't they like the city?"

"Is it like built by a prairie dog?" Stevie asked her.

Storm tried very hard not to growl at them as she replaced the book on the shelf and held out another one to them. "Here."

"Little Women. Oh, see now the other one makes sense!" Mellissa said.

"Meaning?" Storm asked her.

"The little house was for the little women! See? They needed a tiny house! You didn't tell us it was a series!"

"Or did they need it for the prairie dogs?" Stevie asked Mellissa.

"Ohhh, good point, maybe," Mellissa said. "Hmmm, maybe they all lived in the house together, but then it wouldn't have been little. These books really don't make any sense, Storm."

Storm slapped a hand to her forehead in frustration. "Right, moving on ..." She turned away and searched the shelves until she found another selection.

Angela took the new book. "A Room With a View. What kind of a view? Is it a good view or a crappy view? Can we see the happenings of the zombie apocalypse?"

Storm pointed to the jar on her desk. "Dollar Angela, for the curse word." Angela's shoulders slumped, she went and tossed four quarters into the jar with a grumble, she didn't consider the word "crappy" a curse, but Storm did.

Storm took the book and handed them another one.

"The Scarlet Letter."

Stevie looked at Mellissa who held the book. "Why is it scarlet, is it like special or did someone paint it?"

Angela groaned. "This is boring! Your books are stinky, Storm! Don't you have any good ones? You know, like Hunger Games or Ranger's Apprentice? Darker shade of Magic? Stuff like that! Exciting stuff!"

"No, these are classic books! You should read them."

"What makes them classic, besides the layer of dust?" Mellissa asked her.

"Never mind, just get out of my office. Go annoy someone else." She waved a hand toward the door.

"Fine, we'll go." Mellissa turned and led the others out of Storm's office.

"Well, that was a waste of time. I'm still bored," Angela complained as they walked off down the hallway and back toward the living room. The others were still inside, with the addition of A'Cadia who was on one side on the floor, with Mack curled against her chest purring loudly.

"No books I see," Ziva said as the three dropped to the carpet with groans.

"No, Storm has stupid old, boring books that make no sense!" Stevie complained as Jack crawled up and sprawled across his chest when he dropped down near A'Cadia. His pirate hat flopped off and landed on the floor. Stevie grinned and scratched between his ears, Jack closed his eyes happily, the hat forgotten.

"Right, of course, makes perfect sense because the purpose of books is to not make sense." Craig rolled his eyes and looked at her with a shrug.

Skylar was using a tablet to surf the Internet she frowned at something and then sat up. "Hey, guys check this out. They finished this new high-rise, high-tech office building downtown, and it's already been rented. It was completed yesterday. Yet, the entire building was rented almost immediately. The building is twenty stories of office space, how could the entire place be rented so quickly?" She looked around the room at them.

Ziva snorted. "Maybe while they were building it someone took an interest in it and decided to rent it straight off. All they had to do was wait for it to be done."

Craig took the tablet from her with a frown. "That was still pretty fast and Skylar is right, that's a lot of space for one company."

"Yeah, super fast and a little coincidental don't you think, considering that Lenny split from the PEZ factory and we lost him. He was probably looking for a new place to crash," Skylar added.

Craig frowned. "Yeah I'm sure he was, but how did he manage to pay the rent?"

"I don't think it matters. We need to stake that place out and see who's coming and going from there and make certain who rented the building," Ziva said with a grin. "And if it is Lenny then we deal with it."

Skylar nodded. "And we do it without Storm or Logan finding out, they won't let us do this, you know that, right? They want us off Lenny's case, especially knowing about the Compound 13 being in action now."

There were nods all around. And agreements to keep it quiet as they made plans to go check out the office building the next day.