Brenna had always felt more comfortable with the bustle of a city around her. She'd spent several years on the streets of Chicago and developed the sixth sense required to survive, the one that told her when danger was imminent. It helped to know that she could defend herself if need be but by no means did she allow her guard to drop.

She'd stopped in at a small bistro for a quick dinner, and while she'd sat at the bar enjoying her food she'd overheard a conversation behind her. The two male participants were discussing in hushed tones the fact that there had been a slew of disappearances all over the city. She would have ignored the rest of what they said if one of them hadn't mentioned how those disappearing were mutants. The other man hushed him but she'd already heard enough to make her lose her appetite.

She listened a little longer to see if they'd mention any specific places the disappearances had happened; one spot was nearby, just a few streets over. Maybe it was stupid to go there alone, but she was curious and unafraid.

The area the man had described was fairly deserted save for a few huddled groups. Brenna used her limited telepathy to scan the minds around her, picking up on anxiety and apprehension, and several of the minds she touched were also mutant. She drifted close to one group, close enough to catch snippets of conversation, most of it about the disappearances; one girl was crying over the loss of her friends.

Brenna projected a sense of calm, and a sense that she was nonthreatening, so that she could ask questions. Based on her own history she knew groups like this were loathe to talk to outsiders, but she knew enough to present herself as a friend, or at least an ally. The girl who'd lost her friend was almost eager to tell her what had happened, how the boy had been taken almost right out from under her nose just a street over. Little by little she found that they saw it as kidnapping, because why would mutants who'd already run away from home just disappear? It didn't make any sense.

She thanked the girl for her time and went to the second location. Almost instantly she felt another presence, several in fact, and as she turned to find the source, a hand grabbed her arm and bent it behind her back at a painful angle. One wrong move and it would break.

Without much thought she lashed out, a blade of pure blue energy appearing in her free hand. She bucked her head back into her assailant's face and when they let her go, startled, she lashed out. The energy blade didn't cut but had the same effect as a tazer, stunning anything it touched. She turned again and got a telekinetic shield up a moment before several darts pierced her skin.

They were dressed all in black down to masks over their faces.

"This one's not gonna come easily," she heard one of them, a man, say. The one who'd grabbed her reached for her arm with the arm she hadn't rendered useless, and when she ducked away they lashed out again, this time with a fist, and it took her in the jaw. It rocked her head back and made stars explode in her vision. She redirected her TK again into her fists to take the assailant out.

Hands grabbed her from behind, strong enough that she had trouble breaking free. Her opponent punched her in the stomach, doubling her over, and another hit took her in the face again, splitting her lip against her teeth. She spat blood as she braced herself against the hands that held her and kicked out, taking the one who was beating her in the chest.

The one holding her took one hand away and she used the slight slack to jerk one hand free, enough to turn and use the blade again. It slammed into the man's chest, not where she'd been aiming but he towered over her in height and she'd take what she could get. Once free she knocked him and his partner back with a blast of TK and then she took off running. She ran until her lungs wanted to give out and then she kept running, all the way back to her car.

She drove back to the Institute in a daze to the point she didn't remember the journey, and she sought out Logan as soon as she got inside.