If the mind was a physical place, then Ryder’s was a minefield.

Ordinarily, her mind was a steel vault- Nothing could penetrate it. But now, she opened the doors and silently [i]dared[/i] someone to try and take a peek. For the past few weeks, the girl had been doing her damndest to keep her coma believable. She knew, hours after being brought here, that she was in a simulation that these strangers called the Danger Room. A proving ground of some sort where people threw themselves at holograms and machines. The place had security, cameras and electronic protections here and there. She could tell they were dancing around her, since there were dark spots between the strings in her weh of influence, places they made sure didn’t have anything she could weaponize. But negative space still had a shape.

Ryder pretended to be asleep, doing her best to keep herself totally still while going into a borderline meditative state over the last few weeks. She practically became the digital system of the building, while her body went so still that there were no readouts on the medical equipment suggedtigg by she was “active.” It was a wonder that Xavier could detect anything at all, with her being so focused on scanning her surroundings. But Ryder knew an intruder on her territory just as well as they would know one on there’s. So she allowed the vault doors to crack open, just wide enough for an echo to escape. It kept the old man’s interest, to an extent that kept him coming back. She didn’t try to read him, knowing it would rouse suspicion. No,instead, she let the minefield do its job.

Keeping one eye on her existence and another on the web of information that every computer, radio and phone in the building created, Ryder allowed this intruder to snoop around. The other one wasn’t willing to go very far, and she didn’t bother as a result. To Xavier, the “curtains” would show nothing. A still house with the presence of life, but not the actions. Perhaps someone was upstairs, or hiding just to the side of the windows, knowing someone was watching for them in case they closed the blinds. 

Ryder recognized a few of the faces he dragged across the world. No one she ever met in person, but secretly had plenty of information on due to her constant vigilance against Umbra’s cruelty. None of them meant a damn thing to her. They were treated better than her, despite being lab rats, so why should she? Half of them weren’t even considerably threats to her, and none of them knew she existed. Ryder preferred that over the alternative.

Even when they poked at her wounds, she managed to resist the nigh-indomitable instinct to snap someone in half. She [i]hated[/i] being picked at in such a way, even when it was for a good reason. Her cover was almost blown twice, and the blue one was almost proven right when Jean tried to remove some bits of molten plastic from her skin. At that point, she had to telekinetically hold herself in place just to avoid decapitating the woman. Ryder didn’t find herself feeling surprised when Jean tread more careful than the old man. If anything, Xavier was just being outright by thinking an impenetrable fortress would just [i]allow[/i] him inside, with no circumstances attatched. 

Stupid enough, in fact, that he stepped on a landmine.

The proverbial door wasn’t answered, because for someone to answer it implied the door was closed. She left it open, and the knock opened it wider. No one appeared home, but then he was pulled inwards. A hook found itself embedded in his mind, and dragged him into the room beyond that door, which snapped shut with such a fury behind it that there was no question as to how awake Ryder truly was.

And then the metaphorical psychic room became a [i]literal[/i] room. Something possibly familiar to Xavier, who was accustomed to entering someone’s mind. Only it wasn’t as inviting as his thought process might’ve led him to believe. The walls and floor were a depressing, dark blue, made of some kind of wood. There were windows, but they led to an absolute nothing. Everything felt heavy in this room, heavy in the sense that there was little separating it from physical reality. The walls felt real to the touch, and they felt ice cold.

Xavier was not invited, he was detained.

He was alone in a place where he did not belong. A place that hated his existence, where the very air seemed to bristle against his form. 

[i][b][color=00ffff]YOU ARE A FUCKING IDIOT, OLD MAN[/color][/b][/i]

The voice was like a bad dream, echoing off of every atom in Xavier’s body. It was inside his head, outside, and everywhere else in a way that only made sense in the mind, as though a god had come down from the sky and screamed.

One minute she was nowhere, and she was present the next.

Ryder manifested before him, dressed no differently than the way she was found three weeks ago. And she looked disgusted by Charles’ presence.

[color=00ffff]”You poked a bear for weeks. And now it’s got you. Explain yourself right fucking now, before I shatter you.”[/color]

How could this child, who hated the world and everything in it so much, be the daughter of Charles Xavier?