It was a cold, snowy December night, and the hoboes under the bridge were doing what hoboes under bridges always do on cold, snowy December nights: gathering around a trash can fire telling stories about their pasts.
Frank ran away from home at the age of 16. He traveled all across the country, surviving by working various blue-collar jobs. Coal miner, oil driller, prison guard-Frank had done it all. Al had been a successful young stock broker. He lived in a swanky Manhattan penthouse, dated supermodels, and rubbed elbows with celebrities. Then he lost everything on a couple of bad investments. Tom was an avant-garde artist who refused to sell out. He had his principles, dammit.
The stories were, of course, a pack of lies. These men were lifelong drug addicts. They squandered every penny they ever had on alcohol, meth, cocaine and heroin, but that makes for a boring story on a cold, snowy December night. One needs a bit of entertainment to take the edge off, and as the night wore on they had no choice but to address the fourth hobo who was sitting apart from the group, too far away to feel the fire. He had electric blue eyes and silvery hair, and wore a hat made of tin foil.
"How about you, pal?" Frank called out loudly enough to hear over the traffic on the bridge. "What's your story?"
"Story?"
"Sure. You lived on the streets long?"
"Almost always. Since the war, anyway."
Oh, Frank thought, so he's a veteran. Must be PTSD.
"Any family?" Tom asked over his shoulder, his back to the old man.
"Dead," the man said flatly, adding with a wry smile, "Almost always."
"So, after the war," Al asked, wanting to change the subject, "did you have a job, a house?"
"Never for long. It's hard when the government wants to kill you."
Here we go.
"Why does the government want to kill you?"
"They're afraid of me. I can move things with my mind."
Jesus.
The man in the tin foil hat could see Tom and Al's shoulders shake as they chuckled. Frank tried to shush them, but it was too late.
"And let me guess," said Al, "the tin foil hat: it keeps people from reading your mind?"
"Of course!" the old man answered a bit defensively. Even Frank couldn't handle this; the three hoboes burst out laughing, slapping their knees and wetting their pants, and the mutant called Magneto stalked off into the night to kill all humans.