The world can be an unfair and dangerous place. At least that's what her father told her when she was young, in an attempt to shield her from a world that he believed was out to get her. Her and her kind.

To Ramona, her father was a legend. And although he died when she was young, she still remembered all of the important lessons he left her with. Ramona remembered how he would tell her about his many travels all over the world, and the different kinds of mutants that he met during his travels. Mutants who would control fire, mutants who could read minds, mutants who could walk through walls…each one more fascinating than the other, and the stories never got old or boring. She even remembered being a baby, snuggled up in her father's arms as he levitated and dangled his keys in front of her, as she tinkered with them in amazement.

Being a mutant was something to be proud of, he said, and unlike a lot of the unfortunate mutants out in the world, she grew up with parents who instilled pride in her abilities.

"But father," she mumbled, "what if people treat me differently for being a mutant? I just want to fit in with everyone else. I want to be normal."

"If you're always trying to be normal, you will never know how amazing you can be."

Ramona's mother died not to long after her father, and she remembered even less about her. Except she knew that she was beautiful, and that she loved her and her father very much. She was sent to live with her uncle for the rest of her childhood, in Boston, MA. Boston was somewhat good to mutants; its socialistic, democratic and overall liberal attitude provided a much needed safe-haven for her during her adolescent years, when she worried the most over her perceived image to non-mutants. It's not that she actually looked that different; she had seen and heard of mutants who had all sorts of physical mutations, from blue skin, to horns on the head, and even angel wings that grew on the back. But she had purple eyes; vivid, bright fuchsia color that immediately outed her identity as a mutant and thus, an outcast to many in society. Ramona decided to show them proudly, however, throwing the blue contacts in her uncle's face when he suggested that she wear them to disguise herself.

Ramona was 14 years old when she freaked out at her uncle and froze him and everything around her in a fit of panic. She stared, confused, at his suddenly dead-pan eyes and frozen expression, his finger frozen in the air and his mouth halfway open as if he was about to reprimand her. She looked at the wall, the clock was frozen in time, the second hand stopped directly at the 2 and unmoving. Ramona looked outside, the cars were halted, the birds stopped in midair, and the silence deafening.

She could control time.

She focused; it took a couple of minutes, but all of a sudden everything was back to normal. Birds were flying, cars were honking, and her uncle was yelling at her as if nothing strange had even happened. He mentioned having a headache afterwards, but other than that nothing was out of the ordinary and he didn't even notice what had happened. Her powers grew and expanded over the years. She would have visions in her dreams of the future, and they always came to fruition. Not only could she stop time, she could see into the future. Never too far into the future and never too grand, but Ramona could foresee things such as questions that were going to be on her tests, or who she was going to meet or what present she was going to get for her birthday. People from a special school for Mutants in Seattle, Washington, called Xavier's School for Gifted Youngsters, visited her shortly afterwards, somehow becoming aware of her abilities and concerned that she wouldn't be able to handle her abilities on her own. They offered guidance and a chance for her to grow and expand her powers.

She told them to get lost. Ramona had zero interest in traveling across the United States, leaving behind her uncle and all of the friends that she met.

They talked about her as if she was dangerous, her powers of controlling time a danger to everyone around her.

"Ramona, you could be missing out on an amazing opportunity," her uncle attempted to persuade her, "plus you don't really know or understand your own powers. They could help you control them."

She wasn't dangerous. Her father warned her about people like this, other mutants who might be jealous or fearful of her powers and attempt to control her. Ramona wasn't about to let anyone control her or her powers. She was the master of her own destiny.

After high school, Ramona went on to study psychology at New York University. New York was the city of opportunities, and supposedly a good place for mutants to flourish, unlike the small, suburban and rural areas of the country. Two weeks into her freshman year, she found herself immediately drawn to the mutant rights group that was slowly gaining popularity on campus. It started out as a couple of mutants getting together to discuss civil rights and mutant issues within the world, but it expanded to so much more.

And this is where the story begins.

Ramona was in her junior year at NYU and was president of the group, which became lovingly known as the Brotherhood of Mutants. It expanded after the recent shooting of an innocent mutant in Brooklyn, which blew up all over social media as a civil rights crime.

"John, Jason and Lani, you three are going to take the Freshman and Sophomore class to Manhattan, at Washington Square Park. Get there around 1PM, no later than that however because the police have asked us to have the area cleared by 4PM, and we should be out there for at least a couple of hours if we want to be interviewed by CNN. There should be at least 40 freshman and sophomores joining, so make sure that they each have a sign or banner to bring. They should have all made them at the last meeting, so double check that they're appropriate and don't have any slurs or swears on them please?"

"But those are the fun ones," John snickered, and Ramona glared.

"I don't need any negative post about us," Ramona replied sternly, "I need this to go as smooth as possibly. The last march we organized blew up in my face, and I had to hear about it from the Dean for at least five weeks until the press died down. You have your speech prepared, yes?"

"Yeah, it's all set," John muttered, looking at his fingernails, "I finished it last night, should go over with a BLAST."

Ramona rolled her eyes, "I regret not being able to look it over beforehand. Don't screw it up…" she looked over at her vice president, who was writing everything down for her, "Dominic, you and I will take the remaining juniors and seniors over to Times Square and set up the protest there. There will be a lot of tourists and people around, so I made sure to call the NY Police ahead of time and told them that we'd be there."

"Right-o, president-o," Dominic swiveled in his chair, throwing his sunglasses over his bright orange eyes and running his hands through his electric blue hair, "Don't stress it, McFly. It'll be fine. You got this shit on lockdown."

Ramona ran a hand through her dark hair and sighed, "I suppose you're right. All right everybody, you know what you got to do. Let's get this protest started!"

Ramona and Dominic got the 30 students together in the auditorium, a hodgepodge of mutants of all different sorts of abilities and forms. "Brothers and Sisters, there better not being any pepper spray, tasers, or any other weapons hidden on your person when we go to the protest!" Ramona shouted, staring down all of the students who arrived, "This is a PEACEFUL protest. No attacking civilians, no attacking police officers. If you are taunted, you stand tall. If you are harassed, you stand tall. I don't want to see any of my mutants end up in handcuffs or pepper-sprayed because they decided to retaliate against an annoying civilian. Got it?!" "Got it!"

That's it. That's all I got for now lol

When inspiration hits again, maybe I'll write more. Don't hold your breath though.

-T