Pierce thought he had taken the three by surprise. Imagine his own surprise to find that two kids and an injured slug would not be taken as easily as he had thought.

"You're not takin' us that easy, Robo-Prelate!" Reaper's voice filled with defiance, as he goes in to fight the robot hand to hand, but is beaten by another.

"RRROOOOOWWWWWWRRRRRR!" Wildchild has been waiting long enough, and he is anxious to return to his master, Shinobi. He tears through Pierce, leaving nothing but his head. Meltdown takes care of that last bit, with a small plasmid she releases into his mouth. The head explodes with the plasmid, as Reaper and Wildchild pick up go after Stonewall and Hardrive.

Tarot falls, her head falling beside her, as Shatterstar moves on to the rest of the Hellions.

Guido goes punch for punch with Beef, but, as Beef grows weaker with each blow, Guido gets stronger and bigger with every blow he takes. "This is so much fun, you know that?"

Unnoticed, Rictor gets up, and hides behind a crate as he charges as much energy as he can, hoping to take out as many Hellions as he can, without taking out his own team. He notices that two other people, a man throwing blades at the Hellions, and a woman with six arms fighting with swords, have joined the fight. He figures they're on their side, as Shatterstar seems to know them. He ignores the fact that Omega Red has vanished. 'This should be enough to take out at least half of those S.O.B.s,' he thinks. He comes out from the shadows, blasts out, and then screams, "Down, Posse!"

His blast tears through the Hellions, as none of them use their powers in defence. None are left standing.

"Yeah! Good job, bro!" Warpath gets up, and runs towards Ric.

"Don't celebrate too soon, bro," Guido says. "Tessa just contacted me, says that we should jet on over to Pacific Heights. Shinobi has a plan. Says we should just 'play along'."

"Let's move then. 'Star, who are these two?"

"This is Longshot and Spiral, they are...old friends of mine."

"Well, welcome to the X-Posse, you two."

{We have to hurry, Rusty. If Shinobi can't keep up his ruse, he's screwed.}

"Now where could you be running to?"

"Selene!" Tessa looks around and senses that she has reinforcements.

{Tabitha, if you would...}

"Die, bitch!" Tabitha jumps from the building, letting go of everything she's got. Wildchild and Reaper soon join her, as they had taken care of Hardrive and Stonewall. Selene is taken by surprise and one of Tabitha's plasmids actually connects, staggering her. That is all that the group needed, as that threw her for a spin, giving Reaper and Wildchild just enough leeway to take her out.

"Fastball special, 'Child!" Reaper shouts loud and proud, as he throws Wildchild at Selene, the feral mutant then proceeding to slash her guts. She throws him away from her, trying to not scream from the pain. Reaper has no way of getting to her, but Rusty makes up the difference. He lashes out with as much fire as he can, frying Selene to the bone, despite her telekinetic shields.

"That's one bitch we don't have to deal with later, eh, Tessa?"

"Good job, let's move." The group moves, with Rusty and Reaper carrying Milan.

In Pacific Heights, Leland is dumbfounded with Shinobi's answer. He had expected Shinobi to at least boast about Leland working for Onslaught, he was nowhere near ready for compliance. "You surprise me, Shinobi."

"I know. But I figure if we throw in with you and yours, we've got a better chance at survival than if we oppose you."

"Smart man, smarter than your father ever was. Let's call back our forces, no more bloodshed."

"Let's."

In the shadows of a nearby building, a figure draped in shadow watches the scene. He's looking for an opening to take out Shinobi, hoping that the death of their leader will force X-Posse to surrender. But instead of an opening, he sees Shinobi and Leland shaking hands, as if they were old friends. He also sees that X-Posse is coming in from two different directions, and that there's only the three other Hounds there. All the Reavers must have been eliminated, just like the Hellions. This was too much. X-Posse was too large in number, and it seems that Leland was befriending them. He never did like Leland; he only joined the Hounds to get some kills in. Leland was playing nice, though, and Omega Red does not play nice.

"Die!" He screams as he drops from the building, going after Shinobi and Leland, hoping to take out both of them.

"Omega Red! Leland! Is this your doing?" Shinobi screams in anger at Leland, but he notices that Leland is just as surprised as he is.

"It certainly is not." Leland utilises his power of gravity manipulation to hold Omega Red in place. "Arkady, what madness is this?"

"You are a traitor to the Hound cause!" the Russian spits as he writhes in Leland's grasp.

"Am I? I have just brought in a whole other group of mutants to 'the Hound cause'." Leland points out, proudly standing in front of Shinobi.

"They're X-Men!"

With that, Warpath, who had come behind Omega Red, had had enough. "Like I told you last time, it's X-Posse!" He tackles Omega Red, knocking him into the ground.

"Warpath, stand down!" Shinobi orders, standing side by side with Leland, and Warpath hesitates, but he remembers Tessa's message. 'Just play along'. He backs off, hoping to God that Shinobi knows what he's doing.

Leland walks over to Omega Red, still holding him with his powers. "Will you yield, Red? Or do I have to send you into the cold of space, trapping you forever?"

"You cannot stop me, Leland." One of Omega Red's tendrils creeps up on Leland and grabs him by surprise, causing him to release his hold on Omega Red.

Shinobi sees an opportunity to get rid of Leland, but he remembers why he said yes to Leland's proposal, and decides to help him.

"Reaper! Free Leland. Leland, when you're down, launch that bastard to the sun!"

Reaper, 'playing along', jumps and cuts the tendril holding Leland, and Leland, pissed off, just looks at Omega Red, and half an instant later, he is in space, frozen instantaneously, gone forever.

"Thank you, Shinobi, I am in your debt." Leland gets up, removing the tendril from his leg.

"Let's call it even."

"Um...Shinobi, what's going on?" Tessa approaches him, unsure of the deal that had been made.

"We're joining the Hounds, babe. It'll be fun, trust me." {Later.}

"Okay. I...I understand. What're your orders, Shinobi?" {Explanations later, team.} She sends out a message telepathically to the rest of X-Posse.

"I'm glad to see that your team follows you wherever, Shinobi." Leland smiles at Shinobi, placing his firm grasp on Shinobi's shoulder.

"They joined me and Tessa when we left Bishop's brood, because it was boring there. The rest came along for the adventure. I saw you guys might need more people, and we're just looking for kicks, so I figured we'd join you."

"Well, then we'll wait for any others of my team to show, and we'll move out."

"Selene's dead. Pierce was here, he killed her, and she crushed him telekinetically with her dying breath." Tessa makes up false truths that could have happened.

"We saw Skullbuster take out the Hellions, Beef included," Ric says.

Meltdown follows suit, and makes her own tales. "Your boys put up a fight against the rest of the Reavers. But we got tossed aside by their fighting. We could only watch them kill each other. One o' ours, she tried her best against the last Reaver, Cyber, but she got taken. We barely finished him off. We went to the shore, and your boy Harpoon tried to kill us, and would have, but 'Child showed up and slashed him. He barely survived."

"Well, it seems I have traded one crew for another. Shall we move?" Leland, believing every word turns his back to them and walks towards Bayshore.

"Let's go...um...Leland? Where are we going?" Shinobi was curious, because he had plans himself, and if the Hounds' plans didn't match, maybe they would have to kill Leland and the Hounds, and take their chances.

"Oh, I thought I mentioned it. We're going to Onslaught Island. Onslaught's planning for a mass invasion by X-Men and we want to be there. Kill a few X-Men in the process." He looks back for any doubts among his new crew, but finds them anxious for action, seemingly against any target. He was pleased.

{Keep it up you two. It's working.} Shinobi tells Milan and Tessa, who are using their powers to remove any lingering doubts in Leland and the Hounds' minds.

{We need them still.}

In X-Posse #04: Just what is Shinobi playing at!?! Are X-Posse joining the ranks of the Prelates? What need have they for Harry Leland? Just what will the rest of X-Posse think of Shinobi's plans??? I don't know, but I know where you can find out! Right here, in thirty!