Finding a Family

By Laheara

(March 2007)

Chapter One

Discovering Powers

The bright sunlight gleamed off the shining black limo as it pulled through the ornate wrought-iron electric gates of August Lance Academy, an elite private high school on Manhattan Island in New York. The schools buildings and grounds were well-tended. The buildings had tall light green stone arches and dark grey brickwork that was covered with thick green climbing vines with yellow blossoms. The schoolyard had a thick green lawn with both black wrought-iron and light tan wood benches scattered under large, leafy trees which shaded the students who sat under them. Several colorful flowerbeds edged the driveway and more were scattered throughout the grounds. Birds chirped in the trees.

It was mid-September and the students had been back for nearly three weeks. The grounds were occupied with stylish and cheerful teenagers in school uniforms of dark blue jackets, a white shirt, blue ties for the boys and ribbons for the girls, and black pants for the boys and skirts or pants for the girls. It was 8:45am Friday and many of the students were either studying or talking about what plans they had made for the weekend. Everyone had cell phones and most were working on laptops and transferring new music to their phones or mp3 players. A bell rang in three tones: low-high-low. Everyone started to scatter, heading into their first period classes in the various buildings nearby.

The car stopped before a building with an ornate stone sign in front of it which read: Hugh Edwards Hall. The driver, a man in a black suit and hat, approximately 35 years old and clean-shaven stepped out of the driver's door and came around to the back door of the passenger side. He opened the door and stood back as Alexia Connors stepped out. A well-groomed 17 year-old girl, she had long dark brown hair with soft large curls, bright blue eyes, a smooth white, but not pale, complexion. She was average height and had an attractive figure. She wore the standard school uniform with a skirt and had her hair down but pulled back into a clip at each side. She carried a case with her laptop, phone and books in it.

Alexia, known to everyone except the principal and her mother as Alex, smiled to her father's driver as he closed the door.

"Have a good day, Miss Alex."

Alex nodded and started toward the building. "Thanks Benny, I will."

She ran inside, luckily her first class was close to the main doors so she wasn't late. The classroom was long and wide lit by a bank of large roll out windows. There was a low rumble of voices and the sign on the door read: Political Science, Mr. Ronald Adams. The students knew that Mr. Adams enjoyed giving them a test every Friday to recap the week and were getting pencils out in preparation.

It was warm so Alex took off her jacket and slipped into her seat at the front of the second row and smiled at Mr. Adams. He nodded and passed out the tests as the room quieted. About five minutes later, the door to the room opened again and a boy who was in four of Alex's other classes staggered in and sat in his seat at the back near the windows.

Jason Drow had wild and stylishly messy dirty blonde hair, bright green eyes and a lightly tanned complexion. He was slightly shorter than average and wore a baggy uniform in an attempt to hide his thin, but attractive physique. But the large clothing just served to make him look smaller than he was. He seemed troubled and didn't look at Mr. Adams as he made his way to his seat. He sighed as a test paper was placed in front of him. He dug through his bag and produced a pencil, starting to write down answers as he went through the quiz. Something else was clearly on his mind.

Alex suddenly looked up as she heard a voice saying, "Why am I not dead? It hit me straight on...and I'm alive...Why didn't I die?" When no one else looked around Alex realized she was the only one that heard the voice.

The voice vanished as quickly as it had started as Mr. Adams handed a piece of paper to Jason. It was a detention slip: his uniform was unkempt and loose and he had worn a hoodie over it which was not tolerated.

Alex smiled to a few of her friends as she passed the test down the row. Being a popular girl meant she had an appearance to keep up. She was very bright with excellent grades and enjoyed all of her classes so she ran through the test very quickly.

As she was working on the last essay question, she heard a whisper. She stopped and listened in surprise – it was well known that Mr. Adams didn't tolerate cheaters. She couldn't imagine that any of her classmates were that stupid, especially since this was an easy quiz just covering the last five days of class. She shook it off and went back to her essay. Then she heard the voice again but this time she understood a couple words: "shot" and "die".

Alex looked up at Mr. Adams. He was going over the day's lesson. He didn't seem to hear anything. She heard it again and thought it was very strange that Mr Adams didn't even look up. The voice was very loud. "…hit me straight on… Why didn't I die?"

Suddenly Alex knew who the voice belonged to. It was… what was that guy's name, the baggy one… Jensen? Jamie? JASON. That was it, Jason, the guy in the back row. She looked over her shoulder and saw him leaning forward with his head on his hands apparently daydreaming.

"Miss Connors? Is something the matter?" Mr. Adams came over to her.

She jumped and looked up at him taking a second to register what he'd said. "No, sir. Nothing, I just thought I heard something outside."

Mr. Adams just pointed back at her half-finished essay and tapped his watch. She nodded and went back to work. "Sorry, sir."

Jason looked up when Mr. Adams spoke and saw Alex quickly turn away from looking at him to respond. He finished his test and stood up to hand it in. He had been digging at his hand with his sharpened pencil. It didn't even hurt; he just felt an odd pressure. He walked right past Alex and stumbled slightly, brushing against her rather hard. He steadied himself and straightened up.

Alex heard him say 'sorry', but his lips didn't move. Then his mouth opened and he spoke the word. "Sorry."

He continued to the front and laid his test on the teachers desk then went back to his desk. He looked up again and his eyes widened. He looked at his hand – it was now completely headed. He stared back up at Alex who had a large smear of blood on her white sleeve. He seriously hoped she wouldn't connect it with him and that was all he could think about. He kept looking at the blood on her sleeve.

Alex finished her quiz and took it up to Mr. Adams. When she turned, she looked at Jason again. He was poking his hand with his pencil. She reached her seat, sat down and pulled out a book she'd been reading, Activating Evolution. She heard a seat in the back move but ignored until she was jerked to the side as Jason stumbled into her. He put his hand on the seat of her chair right beside her leg to balance himself. He looked down at her and she heard "sorry". She was about to say it was ok when he said it again and walked by. She was confused that he'd say it twice and when he walked by her again she said. "No problem."

When Jason got back to his desk, Alex heard his voice again. "Oh god, oh no, don't look at the blood. Alex… oh no, please don't look at the blood."

Alex was amazed that no one else seemed to notice anything strange. He wad talking about blood and then she heard the word sleeve and smelled copper. She looked around and then looked at her sleeve. Her eyes widened as she saw a long smear of blood down her arm. She looked at Jason and saw him staring at her.

One of her friends looked up and screamed. The whole class looked around and Mr. Adams went to the girl who had screamed. She looked at Alex as she pointed to her.

Mr. Adams swallowed hard a couple times and quickly walked over to Alex. "Miss Connors, what happened? Are you all right? I need a volunteer to take Miss Connors to the nurse."

Alex ran her hand up and down her arm beneath the sleeve but didn't feel anything. "Sir, I'm fine, I don't think it's blood. I might have brushed against some red paint on the dance sign coming in here. Really, I'm ok."

Her breathing quickened and suddenly Alex's head was filled with voices, not just Jason's. She found it hard to concentrate on what was happening. Jason was hoping they didn't decide to find out who the blood belonged to and in his nervousness, he drove his mechanical pencil through his hand with a flinch. He looked down at his hand, eyes wide, hoping nobody would notice. He yanked the pencil out and held his bleeding hand as it slowly healed. When he had been shot, it had taken him several hours to heal; he'd actually spent most of yesterday in an alley in Brooklyn before he woke up. He was scared that the hole in his hand would take that long to heal as well. His blood dripped onto his pants and his white sleeve was reddened from it as well. Alex could hear his thoughts clearly above the rest of the class as he wrapped his hand casually in his sweat shirt. "Please don't look back...I'm not here...Just concentrate on Alex! Don't look at me!"

Alex had the entire class looking her over in concern. Alex winced at all the voices in her head, but was pleasantly surprised that they all seemed genuinely concerned. She was pleased that her classmates really cared about her and not just for her parents' money. She had only been at this school since the first of the semester; since her parents had moved to New York from LA.

Then she heard Jason's voice again. He seemed scared. She wondered why he wanted everyone to look at her. She looked back at him and saw him take off the hoodie he'd been wearing instead of his uniform jacket and put his hand in it. She saw the red stain on his uniform sleeve similar to her own. She stood and asked, "Mr. Adams, could I open a window?"

The teacher looked at her. "All right everyone go back to your seats, let Miss Connors breathe. Yes, Miss Connors, you may open a window."

Alex turned and walked back and over to the window beside Jason. As she reached over to grab the handle to roll out the window, she noticed the class was looking forward as Mr. Adams began speaking. She looked down at Jason; he was her lab partner in Chem class.

She leaned close to Jason and whispered. "Are you hurt? You bled on me. And your sleeve is red. You better roll it up so no one sees it. Do you want to go to the nurse?"

"I'm fine, it was...Just a fake blood capsule, it broke in my hand. I'm sorry about your shirt." He rolled up his sleeve so nobody could see the red stain and dared to use the fingers of his injured hand probe his palm to see if there was still a wound. It was still there and covered in the hoodie he had wrapped around it. Alex could hear in his thoughts that it was all real blood, but she couldn't confront him now.

As soon as the bell rang, Jason left the classroom quickly and made his way to a single unisex bathroom and locked himself in.

As she passed the bathroom, Alex could hear his distressed thoughts inside. "Heal damnit! Why is it taking so long?"

Jason tried washing his hoodie, but couldn't get the blood out. He ended up tossing it in the trash. He looked at his hand again. The wound was gone. He sighed, rinsing the blood from his skin. Leaving the bathroom, he ran right into Alex. "Oh! Sorry."

Alex stopped when she heard Jason's voice again. He said something about healing and she remembered the blood. She knew he was lying about the fake blood. She'd done enough school plays and Halloween parties to know it didn't have a copper smell like real blood. When the door of the bathroom opened she was still listening to his thoughts and didn't move in time and he barreled right into her. She heard him say sorry but wanted to talk to him.

She pushed him backwards into the bathroom again and closed and locked the door. "All right, what the hell is up with you? Why are you cutting yourself?" She reached out and grabbed his hands but they were spotless.

He was surprised by her reaction and surprised when she pushed him back into the bathroom. He wast prepared for her questions. But when she held up his hands and found nothing he just looked at her.

"I don't know what you're talking about. Why would I cut myself?" He didn't notice as his sleeve unrolled slightly, revealing the dark splotch of blood. It hadn't completely dried yet.

She grabbed the arm with the reddened sleeve and smelled it. "Right, then explain this. Fake blood doesn't smell of copper, event the high-grade movie stuff. You're hurting yourself and then healing - like getting shot. Who shot you and why? Are you in trouble? My mom is a lawyer she could help you? I could get her to do it pro bono as a favor to the school."

He pulled his arm away from her and grumbled defensively. "Fine! I can't get hurt, okay?! Not from what's happened over the last couple days at least."

He took a safety pin from his pocket and jammed it into the palm of his hand with barely a flinch, then pulled it out. It bled for a second, then the blood sucked back in and the wound healed.

"The bigger wounds heal slower. Like when I got shot the other day. I was at a mini mart that was getting robbed and I ran. One of the robbers chased me into an alley and shot me. I woke up the next day...and...wait…how did you know I got shot? Have you been following me or something? You aren't the one who shot me are you? And even if your mom is a lawyer, what would I say? This man shot me in the gut and I coughed up the bullet? Who would believe me? I'm not going to go around telling people about what I can do, people already think I'm a freak without this. I'm sure you've heard plenty of the rumors about me, right?"

He instantly thought of a few he'd heard whispered in class or in the halls. Ticking off which ones were true and which were false in his head. "I don't wear women's underwear...I was born with six toes on my left foot but had one removed. And the quarterback of the schools football team is quite attractive..." That last one wasn't a rumor, but it was true and was in his mind.

Alex watched as he drove the pin into his hand and winced along with him. Then he pulled it out and she watched as it healed in a few seconds and listened as he explained being shot.

"It's called spontaneous cell regeneration and as far as science knows humans can't do it that fast yet, just mostly bugs. Yes, larger wounds would take longer because they would require more energy so you'd be unconscious while it healed. Which is why you woke up so much later when you body had the energy to wake you up."

She took his hand in both of hers and ran a finger over the spot getting his blood on her hand. Then she looked at him like he had three heads. "Of course I didn't shoot you, I hate guns and I think they're a terrible invention. And why in the world would I follow you around? I suppose you're right about people thinking you're a bigger freak then they already do." Then she smiled and looked at him. "You really had 6 toes? I had a cat once that had weird feet. And I agree Brandon Thomas is hot but a bit demanding." Then she realized what he'd just said, "Wait! You like guys?"

He listened to her talk and let her look at the spot where he had jabbed himself. "I was scared of it at first, but now I can't stop doing it...it's weird." He pulled his hands away and leaned against the wall, rolling his bloodied sleeve back up. His eyes widened as she started responding to things he had never said out loud.

His entire face turned beet red when she commented about Brandon. "I… but... how did you... you can read minds can't you?!" He attempted to get the subject off of himself and his crush on Brandon Thomas.

Alex blushed a bit when she realized those had been thoughts. "Oh, sorry I suppose I skipped that part. Yes, I guess I can read minds and you got your power before I got mine. I didn't start hearing people's voices until I heard you today then it turned into the whole class. I don't think I got much of what Mr. Adams taught today, but neither did you - hiding that hand all class. And don't think I didn't notice that you changed the subject. I don't have a problem with your people, but it does explain a few things. With a little work you could be kinda cute and girls do notice you but you never seemed interested I guess I never looked to see if you were checking out guys. Also explains why you like to watch the football games and practices but never tried out for the team."

Her mind raced over everything and she smiled. "Well, I guess I can tell Lydia you won't be saying yes to a date with her."

Jason's face remained very red as he looked at her and she rambled on. "Lydia wanted to date me? I guess I'm flattered... but you're right, I would say no. And what do you mean with a little work I could be kind of cute? I have to work very hard to look the way I do and I don't mean I'm trying to make myself look good, I'm trying to just blend in and not be noticed by the big strong guys or the girls ... and you have been following me haven't you? Otherwise you wouldn't know I watched games and practices ..."

Alex sighed and put her hand on her hip. "In case you hadn't noticed, Brandon and Tyler and several guys on the team have been all over me since I got here. We made a deal: I wouldn't have to choose between them and they wouldn't call me at home a million times if I'd come to their games. So while I'm there, bored out of my mind, I've looked around and have seen you there too."

"At least people call you. I would kill to have people all over me like that. And okay, I'll stop thinking you're following me." He looked her over, then looked at his watch and thought, "Crap! Late for class!" Then he said, "Crap...we're late for class!"

Again Alex heard the strange echo of thought and speech as Jason spoke.

She shook her head at the echo and said out loud. "I'm going to have to get used to hearing doubled voices all the time now."

Then she noticed her next class started five minutes ago. "Oh man, we ARE late. Ok, we have a short day today, Chem class right after lunch is the last class for both of us today. We'll talk then and maybe, I dunno, grab a bite after school?"

"All right, I guess I could spare a bit of my time to hang out with someone." Then he thought, "For the first time ever."

He had never had any real friends. Like all little kids he had had friends in grade school and one or two in middle school. But once his parents hit it big in their careers, he went straight to a private school where he knew nobody and had had trouble making new friends. He walked right into the bathroom door, forgetting it was locked. He fumbled at the knob, embarrassed, and then finally unlocked the door and the two of them came out of the bathroom just in time to be seen by a passing teacher. The teacher, seeing the two come out of a bathroom, assumed the worst and plenty of questions followed.

Alex snickered as he walked into the door and thought about his comment of 'first time'. When he stepped into the hall ahead of her she saw a teacher and tried to pull him back but it was too late and they were seen. She opened a water bottle and splashed some water on her stained sleeve. She tried the excuse that he had offered to help her get the stain off her sleeve. The teacher frowned but seemed to believe her as neither where trouble students. She waved them on to class with slips so they wouldn't get in trouble for coming in late.

END Chapter One

Title: Finding a Family

Authors: Laheara and Pink

Timeline: starting on day 1 with the eclipse just like the show

Spoilers: All 18 episode so far

Summary: Set in the Heroes universe in a rich private school in Manhattan. New Heroes discover their powers and a friendship strong enough to transcend even death. This is a real time RPG a friend and I are doing at nights on AIM. Anyone interested in making a character and join let me know.

Disclaimers: Pink and I own our original characters but the idea and main characters of Heroes belong to NBC and their creators.