I push them, everyday during danger room sessions I push them until they were ready to collapse. After all the humans weren't going to be easy on them so I won't either. I can't, one mistake and my kids may never come home again. This is why I make them dodge lasers and rotating saws. My students may believe I'm sadistic and just loved torturing them but the smile on my face after every session isn't because of their pain. It's due to relief. Those kids fought mutant terrorists, the US government and even apocalypse, but they still complained about danger room sessions. They didn't have the hardened edge of soldiers who had seen war. Drake still froze underwear as a prank and kitty still gossiped about boys with Jubilee. They were still kids, there was no doubt they were years ahead of their human school mates but they weren't jaded, at least most of them weren't.
There are those who of them who are jaded though. they have the look of one who is deciding whether to make friends of eliminate a threat whenever they meet someone new. They're suspicious of everyone they meet, and they keep me up at night. Even more than I dream of having my bones fused with adamantium my nightmares revolve around those kids, who aren't kids.
Rogue, she's been used so many times she doesn't particularly trust anyone, not even Chuck. She's always waiting for the other shoe to drop. For someone to say she wasn't wanted, she had to leave. Always so suspicious about everyone she meets. Who do they work for? what do they want? Who are they after? The only one she's even come close to trusting completely was Kurt. They moment she realized Elf was her brother was probably one of the best memories she had regarding mystique.
Blue boy is another one of kids, He may be the biggest prankster in the house but he's also like a beaten puppy. Always expecting a bad reaction whenever someone sees his blue fur. Though that isn't even the most troubling part. Just last week he had a run in with the FoH. It seems Kurt's image inducer was on the Fritz again and he got caught couple blocks away from school. He didn't have time to port out of there before he was knocked unconscious. They room they kept him in had some weird power negator that kept mutants from using their abilities too. By the time the x-men got there he had a serious concussion 4 busted ribs various bruises and his left leg was busted in two places. If it hadn't been for the boy scout I would've killed every one of those bastards. He woke up two days later in the medical lab, the first thing he did was apologize to chuck for busting his watch.
When Drake told him about the mutant hating pricks blue boy said he was glad they were still alive. He didn't hate them, he pitied them. For he knew only those who were not secure in their belief of god would be lured down the Devils path. He said a lot of other stuff too, a few quotes from the bible. He had the look in his eye, of a man that was tired. Of a man that was on the verge of just giving up. That day was when I found out why his adopted family sent him here. Apparently his family was a group of circus performers and one day the crown realized that the Incredible Nightcrawler wasn't wearing a costume. They set fire to the circus tent gathered a mob. It was when they tied him to a stake and set him on fire that he first found out about his ability to teleport.
But my biggest concern is X-23. She's family; she's also the youngest excluding Jamie. Yet I doubt she even remembers all the people she's killed. Her first day of public school the French teacher asked her to saw something in French; she repeated the five most effective arteries to cut in order to kill someone. That was her first and last day as a freshman at Bayville High. Her reaction in the danger room worries me as well. When the simulator is set to a real life hologram the other students get around most of their enemies by knocking them unconscious. She spends about four seconds assessing her enemies and another ten killing the lifelike robots. I doubt it ever occurred to her that she shouldn't kill them. We've tried explaining to her that killing was wrong but she doesn't seem to understand it yet.
She does try though. She's always asking the other students why they react they way they do. Why Amara gets mad when Drake reads her Diary and why Kitty squeals over Lance. After that she decided that keeping a diary was a normal thing to do so she would too. Thankfully she felt the frequency and pitch of kitty's boy crazy chatter was painful enough to be considered torture. Her diary is Worrisome though. She talked about her time in Hydra and started writing a record of all of her missions. Don't look at me like that I never read the damn thing. Jamie found it and his damn nightmares that night woke half the school. Kid still won't go near her. Chuck actually felt the diary thing was a good idea though. Thought it would help her come to terms with leaving Hydra and X23 behind her. It did some; She says her name is Laura now.
Apparently Dr. Kinney gave it to her right before she died. Laura went to see Kinney right after we blew that base up. Apparently a hydra agent was watching her though. They slipped something called a trigger scent onto her while Kinney went to the store for food when she got back Laura went crazy and stabbed her. Apparently the good doctor was keeping a few secrets though. While Laura's DNA was a 90% match to mine there was a difference, Kinney Carried Laura nine months for hydra, and there was a ten percent match to her DNA. Out of everyone she's killed, her mother's death hit her the hardest. It seems like nothing we say can convince her she isn't a monster, an animal.
These kids, at their age they should be fighting with their dates. Not fighting terrorists. They should talk about school dances not fighting techniques. They shouldn't be so used to hate and betrayal that they come to expect it. They don't complain about the Danger room, their usually the first ones there. Every time I looks them in the eye he becomes overwhelmed with rage at the people who Hurt them. Humans, parents and government alike. Out of all my kids those are the ones he wants to coddle. The ones I wants to stay at home during missions. I wants to force them to live their childhood but he knows he can't. They would only resent him. So I push, I protects and I makes sure they're strong enough to come home.