The bell sounded out with the usual clatter of chairs and rustling of bags. “Bye Mrs. Grey!” “Byeeee!” “Goodbye Mrs. Grey.” It warmed her heart to have even a handful of her students offer farewells. She liked it even better when they weren’t so rambunctious or forgetful, but what could you do? “Who forgot their shoe?!” she called down the hall, a pair of feet running back to grab it, roughly putting it on before taking off without a word of thanks or apology.

Sitting down, there was one student left, having taken advantage of Jean’s means of lending an ear. Antonio sat in his tank top, head bowed. Jean took her seat and turned her chair, leaning slightly forward with her forearms on her legs and hands loosely clasped. In the silence she glanced at the drawer she kept her phone in, heart pulsing as fears and anxieties reared up, but she kept her cool and resisted the urge to check it.

“You said that if we tell you something bad we wanted to do we wouldn’t get in trouble?” Antonio finally spoke, his words weak.

A light sense of dread crept in. “I said that, and no one’s gotten in trouble for talking to me.”

Antonio was still uneasy, but after he was quiet for a minute or so he went to his backpack. He returned with a kitchen knife about eight inches long. Jean kept neutral. Easier done than said when she’d been lightly aware of it all day. “Is that from your kitchen?”

Fear spread on Antonio’s face. “Are you gonna tell my mom and dad?”

“If they don’t know you have it then you just need to put it back and there won’t be a problem. But that’s only if they don’t know.” Antonio normally tried to be tough in class, dismissing assignments and not putting any effort in. The scared boy in front of her was almost unrecognizable in a way. Reaching into her desk, she pulled out half a pack of Nutter Butters, her intended sugar break for the rest of her post-school work. He let out a low whine, taking them with shaking hands before devouring them as fast as he could. Halfway through the last one, he stopped to break down. It took all of Jean’s effort to hold back her own tears.

He spoke through his sobs. “M-May c-c-called me sk-skinny d-during PE yesterday a-and I was mad s-so I b-brought the knife t-t-to stab her.”

Taking a breath to steady herself, Jean reached out and put her hand on his knee. She wasn’t sure if it was for his sake or hers. “A-and I’m o-only sk-skinny because my p-parents don’t feed me!”

That was the cry of help Jean had been looking for. She’d known. How could she not? She didn’t give him a snack on a whim. But to randomly give him food usually would have been an odd look, and Jean didn’t want to be on the receiving end of suspicions she couldn’t easily dispel or invite unwanted claims of favoritism or 'getting to close'. Mind reading was something even she felt was off putting, more so than her mutanthood. But now, in this case, it was no longer a concern.

Jean’s stomach was mixed with relief at the weight starting to lift and anxiety at what was coming next, a scenario she’d spent more than a few bus rides grappling with. When Antonio started to calm just a little bit, Jean said, her voice wet, “We’re going to get you help. I’m going to get Mr. Grant and Mr. Satou, okay?” The former the most veteran teacher of the school, the latter the Vice-Principal. Even if Jean knew what to do, deferring to her seniors as a the most junior was the smart play. You can’t do everything yourself, Scott had told her some time ago when they were still figuring out their domestic situation. She’d been trying to take it to heart. You’re not in trouble.”

A quick call on the school lines had the two older men at her door in minutes. Jean stood back as they took over the situation. Sadly it wasn’t the first time either of them had dealt with abuse cases. Wouldn’t be the last for any of them either. Thanks offered to Jean, they took control of the situation and moved Antonio to a different office. Hopefully they had something a little more substantial to offer food wise. Jean was left at her desk, leaning back and taking a moment in the empty class to just...unpack everything a little. Some time later, there was a knock on the door with a soft voice following. “You okay in there?” Mrs. Herb was always the strictest and firmest with Jean, which was why this soft tone rendered her nearly unrecognizable.

Wiping at her eye and finding a bit of errant moisture, Jean insisted, “Yeah, I’m okay. Gimme five more minutes.” There were some footsteps as she took her up on that. Not sure if she’d return, Jean blew her nose before daring to check her phone, her source of anxiety for the past school day. She’d been seen this morning when she lifted the truck, and she’d spent the whole day waiting for her life to crash down around her. It was a risk she’d been prepared for, but at this point she thought it might be better for the other shoe to just drop, no matter what else came down with it.

To Jean’s surprise, Mrs. Herb did return, taking the seat Antonio had been using. “I just came here to check on you. You did the right thing, and Antonio’s going to get the help he needs. But are you all right? You look like you got a lot on your mind.”

Jean gave her an odd look, confused by the stressing of an unexpected word. She reflexively did that which she had so often never wanted to do as she peeked into the woman’s mind. She saw herself, standing on the side of the highway road talking to a police officer in passing, from the perspective of someone in a driver’s seat with a bag of school papers on the passenger side. A once overturned truck passed by next. Flashing back to reality, Jean’s jaw flapped open as she realized what she’d seen in Mrs. Herb’s memory.

Jean tried to play it cool. “O-oh! Oh. Uh. Mm.” She did not play it cool.

Mrs. Herb pursed her lips. “You weren’t even wearing a mask. Did you think no one was going to notice?” She hissed, as though someone might be just outside the door or window.

“I-I know, I just didn’t- I didn’t think it was going to play out like this!”

Herb took a palm and planted on the side of her face, shaking her head. “Hun, you are out of your mind.”

Jean massaged her temple, the scolding helping her snap back. “I’m doing this for a good reason! I just...don’t know what’s going to happen from here on out. I’m prepared, but...”

“Prepared to get fired? If the school district thinks you’re a liability then it won’t be pretty.”

“Then I might be able to sue for discrimination against mutants!” Herb dropped her hand, mouth gaping into a neat ‘o’ as she stared, dumbstruck. Jean looked to the side nervously. “M-maybe?”

“And if there’s trouble downtown, are you just going to fly out of class? What kind of example will that set?”

“I know I can’t do everything, but that doesn’t mean it’s fine for me to do nothing.”

“But it doesn’t have to be, you know, this!”

“You sound like my husband...”

“Well, I’m glad someone in that household has sense!” Jean have her the side eye. “Look, I know you’re not stupid. Honestly you’re too smart for your own good. I’m not going to say you’re doing the right thing, but I’m not going to say it’s wrong either. Just…” Herb grabbed a sticky note and jotted down her phone number. “Think before you go forward with this. I won’t like it, but I’ll cover your class if you need to. As long as it’s important!”

Jean took the note, studying it for a moment, before asking, “...You don’t think I’ll really get fired, do you?”

“I’ll see you tomorrow, Mrs. Grey-Summers.” Herb excused herself, leaving Jean to her lonesome. Her heart leapt when her phone suddenly started buzzing with notifications. Pulling it out of the drawer, she saw a message from Scott with a link to twitter, a number of people posting about the green and gold clad superhero spotted in the morning and asking about who she was. She felt excited and sick all at once. “There it is...”

X - M E N
X - M E N

^{_{____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________}}

Angelica and Elize have been squabbling, Elize is 19 and generally a bit of a hard-headed edgy teenager, she called Angelica a ‘normie’ and Elize was obviously opposed to how Angelica got to ‘hide’ her mutant powers for so long, all the way into adulthood. How Angelica got to have a completely normal life, Amy-Sue Allen, ‘bombshell’, had told her. Angelica found the codenames so silly. Why did they even have these codenames? They had been told it was a relic from the cold war, and how Xavier had been instrumental in preventing the Cuba Crisis escalating into full blown nuclear war, and finally putting an end to hostilities between east and west. These ‘Nom de Guerre” were a remnant of a time of war.
Settling into the mansion, besides Elize being annoying, Amy-Sue and the others proved to be very easy friends. She found herself laughing over coffee with the eccentric Hank McCoy, she found Maximilian charming, like a big brother. And Alex Summers? Oh. Yeah. She liked him. She even caught a glimpse of the elusive Pete Wisdom and Remy LeBeau, a dynamic duo that skulked around.
The faculty and the older students generally spent a lot of time together, the younger students, far outnumbering the faculty, lead to each student who was old and mature enough took a part in raising and helping their younger peers. Those with longer tenure at the school clearly took more initiative. Elize was one of those who insisted on doing very little. Something that already, after just a week, was already jarring for Angelica.

Nine of them had dinner and then were supposed to watch a movie. Amy-Sue, clad in her black tracksuit, was making perfectly made popcorn using the heating from her powers. Her crystalline skin made it hard to discern any moods from her face. Angelica found it hard to read her emotions at first from the metallic shade of grey. However, after a bottle of wine the night before and them getting rather deep into discussing Angelica’s rather quick interest in Mister Summers, as well as Amy-Sue’s own entanglement with a particular military man, she felt rather close to the professor. Amy-Sue arrived with the popcorn to the large sofa, telling Elize to scooch in.The people assembled were Angelica, Hank, Amy, Alex (Who Angelica was making eyes at), Elize, Roberto and Michael McCain, who’s four arms were all working on different projects. Tonight was movie night. The Phantom, from 1968 was on the agenda. Beast’s favorite. Students and alumni alike, each hanging out, like a family.

“Where’s Max?” Miss Jones asks and Alex smirks from across the sofa, Beast in between the two.
“Oh, he’s off training by himself in the danger room. The guy rarely rests. He’s spending his rest time monitoring security for the grounds. He’s like a papa bear. And he gets extra watchful when mom and other dad aren’t here.” Alex joked about Xavier, Storm and Magneto being their parents, it was clear to Angelica that this was a running joke.
Angelica had heard of the Professor’s and Storm’s absence this week, since Angelica met them both for the first time. Appearance at the UN, apparently.

Elize, gets a notification on her phone and tosses the stream on the TV, on top of the phantom. She doesn’t say much, her expression isn’t holding the kind of nonchalance they usually have come to expect from the negasonic teenager. Once the livestream begins, everyone’s mood nosedives. Beast, when the mention of ‘one trillion dollars per week’ is mention makes an off-handed comment about the datapoint being misconstrued, but he’s stunned into silence before he can go into a doctorate speech about data-analysis. The words of the billionaire who will change their lives, the gluttony of all of their greatest fears coming alive. Angelica is shocked to hear Tony Stark utter, and take pride in it.

The TV blares:
"The future is a moving, marching machine, the War Machine. Project War Machine puts the power back in the hands of the people you trust, imagine one of these,"

Unveiling the robotic exosuits, the very notion that war is coming to mutantkind pulls them down, covering them like a wet blanket.
A new day dawn for mutantkind. Angelica can’t help but think that maybe, a nom de guerre might not be such a bad thing to have, after all.

Elize is the first to speak up. For the first time, Angelica doesn't notice that dry sarcasm in her voice.
"Does Max know?"

Once the lifestream pans away from the robotic suits, power is cut in the house.
And not just the house, but an entire 100 mile radius from the Xavier's mansion. Power returns in a minute and a half, the lights come back on.

Hank assures the teenaged girl;
"I think he knows, and I think Storm and The Professor are doing all they can to stop this."