Thalia Murphy was happy to have her final exams out of the way and to have passed her grade 11, one more year and she would be finished high school. Her family was taking her and her brother Richard out to New York city to celebrate since he had just wrapped up his first year of university. Thalia and her family lived in duchess county so it was only about an hour away. In many ways Thalia had lived a blessed life, she had a kind and caring family, her brother Richard bordered on over protective, but he was still one of the nicest guys you could ever meet. He lived to help people, he was studying to become a doctor, it made sense that he would make a career out of it. Thalia's parents Anna and John were wonderful as well and after all these years they were still very much in love and much to Thalia and Richards embarrassment made no attempt to hide the fact. Not that Thalia would ever say the words out loud but she though it was sweet in a totally gross and embarrassing way. Many of Thalia's friends parents had gone through divorce, and it put a terrible strain on their whole family she was thankful that she never had to go through anything like that, though her parents could stand to tone down the PDA's. They had a close knit family life, they even had game night every Saturday, Richard would come home from University for the weekend to do laundry and visit and they would spend the night hanging out and playing board games sometimes it would be Risk, or Charades, or pictionary, they bounced around a lot to keep things interesting. Thalia and Richard would always make cracks about how lame it was but it was a tradition they both enjoyed not that they would ever admit it. As they traveled down the road Thalia's thought began to drift to the future, with only one year of high school left if was time to start thinking of the future, she could study medicine like her brother but she disliked the idea of having to cut people open. The law was a subject she always found a little dry so Lawyer was out because she was sure she would never bee able to pass the bar. Her mind continued to race through the endless possibilities when all the sudden her mothers frantic voice

"John look out!"

Thalia looked up just in time to see a semi had jackknifed and was rolling right towards them. John tried to swerve out of the way but there wasn't enough room to avoid the large truck. Within seconds the two vehicles collided with tremendous force, sparks flew and something exploded. Thalia screamed as some sort of energy shot forth from her within her shielding her from certain death. Fire surrounded her and the smell of burning flesh invaded her nostrils, she looked around in horror as she saw the charred and crushed remains of what used to be her family, and the smouldering pile that used to be the family car. Thalia stood up and got out of the wreckage and looked over her body which did not have a scratch on it. She felt dazed, she was in such shock that the gravity of the moment had yet to dawn on her, Unsure of what to do she just started walking. she didn't make it very far when the shock and adrenaline began to wear off and everything came crashing down. She fell to the ground and tried to scream but only wound up choking on her own sobs. Her lungs felt tight as she struggled to breathe and pain ripped through her body. Through she could not see it her body had begun to undergo a transformation, her skin turned hot pink and her long blond hair turned royal blue, and set of deep purple fairy wings ripped out of her back causing her so much pain she almost passed out. Then the physical pain subsided leaving her alone with her mental anguish. As she sat there on the ground sobbing a large jet appeared overhead a rope dropped down and next thing she knew Thalia was surrounded by strangers, a African American woman dressed in black with hair as white as new fallen snow approached her.

"Are you alright child."

"Not even close." Thalia choked out, then took a good look at those surrounding her, she recognized them from the news as the X-men, 'what would the X-men want with me' she wondered "are you hear because of the accident?"

"What accident?" Cyclops asked her.

Thalia gestured to the road behind her "A little ways up the road. car accident, my parents, my brother, oh god their... their all dead." she said between sobs.

"Actually we are here for you, we wanted to see if you were interested in going to "Xavier's school for the gifted." Jean Grey said gently.

Thalia looked up at the confused, "But I'm not a mutant."

"Someone get this kid a mirror." Logan said.

Jean offered Thalia a hand to help her up. "What is he..." as she reached for Jean's hand she noticed her Magenta coloured skin , she recoiled so hard she fell over backwards and placed both hands in front of her inspecting them with disbelief in her eyes.

"Yeah that, wait till you see the rest of it." Wolverine said with a chuckle.

"Logan, this poor girl has been through a lot this night, and I am sure that isn't helping." Storm chastised him.

"I know this can't be easy, but will you come with us and hear what we have to offer." Jean asked.

Thalia shrugged, "Where else am I gonna go looking like this?" Thalia said glumly, as she rose to her feet. 'Tonight was supposed to be a night of celebration.' she thought as she began to wonder if her life would ever have something worth celebrating again. she boarded the X-jet with a heavy heart and turned to Wolverine.

"So you guys got a mirror on this thing, I want to see the rest."

"Bathroom." he answered and pointed in the right direction.

"Are you sure your ready to see it... I'm sorry i don't even know your name." Jean asked

"It's Thalia, and no I'm not sure I'm ready though now I'm certain I have to see it." She said and trudged off to the small bathroom, she open the door and flicked on the light, What she saw surprised her, she looked like a freaking rainbow, the bright pink skin and blue hair was bad enough but wings too, such a deep violet they were almost black. As she was staring at her new freakish looking self, beginning to think things could not possibly be any worse she found herself wondering if this dark cloud had a silver lining. 'Can I fly?' she asked herself, she closed her eyes and concentrated really hard, with no idea how to move a body part she had only just obtained. with focus they did start to move and she found herself starting to gain a little altitude. A surge of excitement rushed through her as she realized she could in fact fly or at least hover, in her excitement she lost her concentration and fell to the floor with a rather loud thump seconds later there was a knock on the door.

"Hey kid you okay in there?" Logan asked.

Thalia rose to her feet and opened the door, "I'm fine."

"What happened?" Jean asked.

"Well I looked in the mirror and saw I look like a total freak, which may take some time to get used to, and then when i saw the wings i thought how will i ever be able to find clothes again, then the thought occurred to me that maybe I could fly, which would be awesome so I tried and just when I started to hover I lost concentration and I fell, but any landing you can walk away from is a good one right?." Thalia answered trying to force a smile.

"You don't look like a freak." Jean said gently

"Oh come on i look like pinker bell." Thalia responded then noticing some confused looks she thought it best to elaborate. "You know like Tinkerbelle only pink."

"Your still beautiful, I'm sure once you adjust to your new look you will see that too." Jean responded kindly.

"Um.. thanks." Thalia said grateful for her kindness but had no real idea how to respond, everything was happening so fast her brain didn't quite know how to process it all yet, and she was so overcome with loss that she didn't really care what happened next.

A short while later the X-jet landed underneath the basket ball court, Thalia sat quietly her mind racing with questions, why her, this was by now small account the worst day of her life, some might count themselves lucky to be alive, but Thalia would have gladly died back there if it meant her family could live. She felt so alone, with no idea what she was going to tell her friends, or if she would even have any friends left when they saw her like this. Her school had a couple of students that attended briefly after they had mutated within a month of their mutation they usually wound up being home schooled or shipped off to a private school like the Xavier academy, some of the students had been so cruel not just to mutants, but to their family, and their friends. High school could be bad enough with out most of your classmates hating or fearing you. Maybe her friends would be better off if she just let everyone believe she died in the accident with her family, Lord knows she wished she had.

Thalia followed the X-men through the hanger and into the mansion and before long she found herself in front of the schools founder Charles Xavier, after a brief introduction he explained to her that he had a dream of mutants and humans living together in peace, and that he had created the school for exactly that purpose, and also so mutants would have a place where they could learn to harness the full potential of there powers and learn to control it. To be among there own kind and not have to live in fear of the enemies of the outside world. This got Thalia thinking her she thought her biggest problem might be some bigoted bullies at her school, then she began to think to every news report she'd ever seen on the X-men the did have powerful enemies, Purifiers, the brotherhood, Sentinals, Thalia began to feel as though her head might explode.

"So how would you feel about joining our school?" Xavier asked, Thalia stared blankly back at him for a moment, he had kind eyes, and so far everyone had been very nice, but with the day she had she wasn't sure it was a good idea for her to be making any life altering descisions. Though one thing was very clear either way her life was going to be very altered. Looking like this she was sure she wasn't going to survive out there, and she had no idea what her new power was capable of only that she had to have one or she never would have survived the accident. What if this new power had offensive capabilities? What if she hurt someone?

"I think this is the best place for me right now Mr. Xavier."

He smiled kindly at Thalia, "I think so too, I want to make sure that your okay, so we are going to send you to get checked out by our resident doctor, and then i will have one of the other students show you to your room, and tomorrow we will collect your things, and give you the grand tour if that's alright with you."

Thalia nodded.

"If you'll follow me I will show you the way to Dr. McCoy's lab." Jean said and headed for the door Thalia walked closely behind. "I'm sorry for all you have been through today, and I just want you to know that I'm here if you ever need to talk."

Jean's kindness made her think of her mother, and tears began streaming down Thalia's face, she furiously wiped them away and took a few deep breaths trying to regain some form of composure. "Thank you." They finally reached the lab, and Thalia couldn't help but be impressed it looked almost like something right off of Star Trek, high tech equipment everywhere.

"Hello there, you must be the new student." Hank greeted her warmly, and stretched his hand out to shake hers, all the sudden she felt as small as an ant Thalia was only 5'4" and had a very petite build next to beast she felt tiny, though she felt a little comforted to not be the only one in the room with out a physical mutation. She reached out and placed her hand in his and shook it, he was surprisingly gentle.

"That's me, I'm Thalia, and It's a pleasure to meet you Dr. McCoy."

"There is no need to be so formal, please call me Hank, or if you prefer Beast."

Thalia was not sure she would feel comfortable calling him by a moniquer he had obviously received do to his physical appearance, since her new look was so outlandish.

"Alright it's a pleasure to meet you Hank."

"The pleasure is all mine Thalia, now with your permission I would just like to run a few tests on you, are you in any pain?" he asked with a warm and friendly smile.

"Not anymore, I was in tremendous pain earlier but it faded quickly."

"That's probably nothing to worry about sometimes physical mutations can be quite painful when they manifest, take a few deep breaths for me." he responded as he listened for her heartbeat. He ran a few more tests and took a blood sample.

"Well Thalia it would appear that you are a perfectly healthy 16 year old girl."

"Thank you Hank."

"Now if you ever need anything, all you have to do is ask, Ah just in time Thalia this is Kathryn Pride."

"You can just call me kitty everyone else does, oh my god I love your wings they are like so totally pretty."

"Thank you, I'm Thalia, It's nice to meet you Kitty." She said awkwardly, a little surprised that she wasn't being treated like a total freak in spite of the way she looked.

"Come on wait till you see your room your will like totally freak." Kitty said exuberantly pulling on Thalia's arm. "Don't worry you will love it here everyone is like so cool, I was a little freaked out when I first started coming here but once you get used to it its like the best place in the world, oh and wait till you see the danger room its kinda scary at first but its wicked cool. Everyone is like so excited to meet you, tomorrow once you get settled."

Kitty talked so much so fast as she was guiding Thalia to her room that Thalia began to wonder if Kitty's mutant power was not needing to breathe. When they got to Thalia's new room she once again felt dwarfed it was a rather large room with a king size 4 post bed a few dressers and a full length mirror.

"It's so big, and beautiful, Thank you Kitty."

"Don't mention it, all see you tomorrow for the tour and ill introduce you around, most of the students have gone home for the summer but there is still a few people kicking around who live here full time." With that Kitty disappeared leaving Thalia alone in her new bedroom, It had been a long and trying day and she knew there would be many difficult days ahead so she decided to just get ready for bed she dug around in her closet for something to wear to bed. Finding a oversized t-shirt she tried to pull that over her head but it awkwardly got caught in her winds, which did not seem to fold in, so she kept digging eventually she found a night gown that was far too big but it had a low back and a zipper and tossed that on thinking it was probably the best she was going to find, then she turned off the lights and crawled into bed