By half past two Warren had come to the conclusion that he wasn't going to sleep tonight, so set off in the direction of the kitchen. It had been two days since Alcatraz and he was still shaken by it.
It seemed as though somebody had had the same idea as him, as sat at the table, was a young woman with long purple hair and blue eyes.
"Hi. Couldn't sleep?" she enquired.
"How ever did you guess?" he asked with heavy sarcasm.
Well I am a telepath Warren. "Do you want a drink?" She held up an unopened bottle of beer.
"A lady would give me her name first", as he said this he sat in the seat opposite her. "Also, you do have me at a disadvantage seeing as you know mine"
"Betsy Braddock", she offered up the bottle again, Warren took it and drank deeply from it. "So go on then, what's keeping you up?"
"Well, my father hates me for being a mutant, even though I saved his life on Alcatraz. The whole of this school probably hates me for being the son of the man who invented the cure and for the fact that I tried to take it. Let's face it, when they find that out and I really don't know where I fit anymore." All of these confessions came rushing out of his mouth before he could stop them. He had never confided in anyone like this before, or at all for that matter, and he didn't know why he was sharing them now, with this girl that he barely knew. After taking a moment to compose himself, he thought he should return the favour and enquired, "How about you?"
"Well let's see... I've just got back from England so I'm massively jetlagged and a kid on the plane threw up on me. Then, I get back to the school to find that in the month that I'd been away, helping my brother prevent England from imploding, that two of my friends are dead and that I now have to plan four lessons for the next morning. I win", she said with a sardonic smile.
After that, they sat in silence for a few minutes until it began to get incredibly uncomfortable. Betsy was the first to break the silence. Frantically she scrambled for the first and only thing that she knew they had in common, "So when did you get your powers?" Admittedly, it wasn't the best opener but she really knew very little about him. They only other thing she knew was that he was rich and very few good conversations started with, "Whose family do you think is richer?", or, "How many ponies did you own growing up?"
"You first", Warren was not going to give up that information just yet, he would have to either really like this girl or be a lot drunker to tell that story.
"Fine! I was sixteen when my older brother and I were kidnapped by a group of super-villains. While we were being held captive, I realised that I could hear what they were thinking. A while after that I worked out that I was telekinetic and that I could do this", as she said that she produced a katana of magenta psy-energy in her hand. "I also found out that my other brother was a superhero, but that's a story for a different day. So go on then, what's your story?"
Warren wondered if he could get away with not telling her his story or if he could lie. He could, but what would be the point. Sure, this would make him look like a complete coward but hey what the hell? Here goes nothing...
"I was about nine or ten." Wow, he must really like this girl! "And I started to notice that wings were starting to grow from my shoulders. As you know my father is very anti-mutant. I didn't want to let him down." Well there's no stopping now, "So I cut off my wings." He let out a nervous laugh... "What's worse is that, my dad walked in and worked it out, also evidently, they grew back. So it was a bit of a waste of time over all."
Throughout all of this, Betsy had remained silent, gazing steadily into his eyes. Much to Warren's surprise, she did not think any the worse of him. If anything she thought better of him. She reached out and took his hand in hers, smiling at him encouragingly.
"You should feel privileged; you're the first person I've ever told that." Warren broke their eye contact and slipped his hand out of Betsy's.
"Yeah, well there are some things that you can only share with a British girl that you only just met, preferably over a beer", and with that, she got up and left the kitchen, smiling back at him one last time before she left.
A/N: So that's my fist chapter! I'm thinking about making this about a three-shot and the next chapter should be up about next month (or sooner or later – who knows?). I have a lot of work on at the moment but I will finish this at some point. Also thank you to Hatter the Alice for the inspiration she provides!