Another reader prompt, this time from hp80, who has a very specific request involving the students of the Academy and a swimming pool. Probably only going to be a two or three parter, with added Dadneto and a partially disrobed Peter for your enjoyment. Petra (and the guest reviewer who gave me a similar prompt) I'll do it, but give me some time to think. In the meantime keep your suggestions coming :-)

Charles clapped his hands together loudly to call the attention of the entire common room. Not that there was too much noise in there at the moment, most of the students either slumped in their chairs or having retired to their rooms to try and sleep off the heat. He cleared his throat, and said

"In light of the heatwave – and the fact that we currently don't have any way to change it – your classes for the rest of the week have been cancelled" there was a very lacklustre cheer from someone, "When Storm returns on Monday you can expect to be back to it, so enjoy your break. Use it wisely. And please, we don't want anybody else getting heatstroke so do be sensible. That's all"

He wheeled away, pulled at the collar of his t-shirt, already drenched in sweat despite having dressed down. It would have to be the one week of the year when Storm had asked for some leave that they were hit with a heatwave, wouldn't it? The entire student body was discontented and fractious, nobody able to concentrate, and Hank already had two of the younger students down in the infirmary. Unfortunately for everybody, one of those students was Bobby Drake, who had been in such high demand to cool everybody off since the hot weather began yesterday that he'd worn himself out and collapsed, leaving nobody with any fresh ice on hand. It was impossible to teach them in this weather – and more impossible still to ask them to train, even if the Danger Room was air conditioned, they'd still collapse the moment they stepped out of it in their uniforms.

Practically laying on a sofa next to Scott with her shirt tied above her midriff and the tiniest pair of shorts she could find, Jean fanned herself for a while, then got too hot to move that much. Scott moaned at her

"Don't stop" he grumbled, "The breeze was nice"

"My arm's tired, and so is my head. Hey, Peter?" Sat opposite her and equally slumped, Peter grunted at her and didn't open his eyes. "Can't you whip up a little tornado or something and cool us off?"

"You're kidding, right?" he replied, wiped a hand over his sweating face with distaste, "I couldn't whip up a bowl of Cool Whip right now. You think I'm moving then think again"

"How come you're suffering?" Jean complained, made a feeble attempt at fanning again, "You're always moaning about being cold, shouldn't this weather suit you?"

"Heat's no good for him either," Angela muttered, not moving from her position laying with her feet dangling off the sofa and her head on Peter's middle, "crazy metabolism and all that. He'll overheat too fast"

"Plus I'll probably faint, it's too hot to eat much," he added, "So unless you wanna put me in the sick bay with Bobby and Marie, no tornados today"

"We could go swim" Jubilee suggested wearily. "If we can be bothered to walk down to the pool that is"

A thought seemed to strike her then, and she raised her head from where it had been lolling, looking up at Kurt perched on a chandelier with a naughty little smile. He was half dozing on the gently rocking fixture, and she took careful aim before shooting a shower of sparks at him that made him jump enough to come crashing to the floor with a bump. He swore colourfully in German, rubbed his head and sat up.

"What was that for?!" he cried, "I didn't drool, did I?"

"I bet you can't teleport us all to the pool at once" Jubilation grinned. She knew he could, but Kurt responded to challenges much better than he did to requests. In so many ways, she thought, he was exactly like a normal teenage boy. Kurt drew himself up indignantly

"I CAN!" he said, petulant, "All you would have to do is hang on to me!"

"Dogpile!" she said brightly, flinging herself onto the blue boy, the others followed, grabbing onto fur and tail and ignoring his protests. Only Peter didn't move, peering at them as if he found them very amusing.

"Aren't you coming, Maximoff?" Scott asked, Peter stretched and stood

"I'll walk. See you guys down there" he yawned, rolled his shoulders back. They cracked satisfyingly, "I'll freeze up if I don't move soon"

With that the heap of Mutants was gone. Peter heard a faint splash and several yells of surprise. By the time he had strolled down to the poolside most of his classmates were pulling themselves fully clothed out of the pool, spitting out water.

"TO the pool, Kurt" Scott was saying, "TO, not IN-TO. Your English still needs some work"

"Sorry," Kurt shrugged, gave him a toothy smile, looked anything but sorry "But you're cooler now, ja?"

"C'mon guys, we're only in shorts and shirts. We can swim like this"

Jubilee pulled her hair out of its pigtails and laid her fancy bands by the side of the pool carefully, slipped off her tennis shoes, and held her nose to cannonball straight back into the deep end. The rest followed, leaving soggy shoes and shirts to dry in the baking sun, splashing happily and enjoying not feeling like baked potatoes for a while. Noticing only when they were cooler and more refreshed that Peter hadn't joined them, and had in fact settled himself on a sun lounger with his shirt off and his headphones in, stretched out comfortably with his hands behind his head.

"My god, could you *be* any skinnier?" Scott remarked. Peter took out one earbud headphone and didn't move to reply

"A, yes I could, but it's not pretty. B. You're just jealous you couldn't eat junk seven days a week and look like this, and most importantly C. I'm not skinny, just small"

He stretched back as if to prove a point, flexed the lean, flat and very visible muscles in his abdomen, and settled down with both headphones back in, considering the argument won. Angela jumped on Scott and ducked his head underwater, careful to hold his shades on as she did. She perhaps more than any of them knew how Peter hated being teased about his size, and was keen to shut the boy up before he really hurt his feelings. Scott came up spluttering, turning to the girl with a worried look

"Are you sure you're okay in here Spark? I mean – electricity and water…"

She held up her wrists to show him the two thick bracelets she always wore and grinned

"Totally. These are guaranteed water-resistant and rust-free, and accidental electrocution-free" she playfully splashed a little water at her boyfriend, leaned on the side of the pool, "Aren't you going to come in for a bit?"

"Nah, I just got this album, you guys have fun – I'm good right here"

Shrugging and accepting it, she pushed away from the side, happy alongside the others for a good couple of hours until they had felt refreshed enough to go in for dinner.

They next day had been the same, only this time Peter had refused to join them claiming he didn't have any goggles and hated getting water in his eyes. Rolling said eyes at Jubilee when she had pointed out that he had numerous pairs of goggles

"They're *running* goggles" he told her, "They're not waterproof"

Next time it was that he didn't want to mess up his hair, then it was that he'd just had a big lunch, then that he was just too damn tired and would they please leave him the hell alone and let him relax in peace? Walking back to the Academy on Saturday afternoon, Jean had fallen into step beside him – he was far too hot for any decent speed – and quietly said

"Peter, can you swim?"

He gave her an incredulous, calculated sneer.

"Of course I can! Just because I choose not to do something doesn't mean I can't! I mean, you can levitate, but you don't fly about all the time do you?"

"I can also read minds," she said with a faint smile. Peter's sneer vanished, caught in an undeniable lie. He folded his arms petulantly.

"You know what? I've kinda had it with all the telepaths around here. Next time I see Dad I'm gonna ask him for –" he stopped short, seeing Erik coming the other way. He *must* have heard him, he'd raised his voice. Damn him and his mouth.

"Ask me for….?" Erik asked, meeting them with a ghost of a smile playing around his lips.

"A helmet" Peter snapped, "I want a Magneto-Junior helmet to stop all these freakin' telepaths jumping into my head whenever they feel like it. What if I was thinking about something you didn't wanna see, huh Jean?"

He gave her a meaningful look. She blushed deep red and looked away quickly

"I can't believe you just thought that" she stammered, "Scott and I do not... I mean, we haven't….. *really* Peter? Whipped cream?!"

"And chocolate sauce." He added, smirked at her, "Now stay out of my damn head from now on or I'll throw something *really* dirty out there"

Jean looked at him hard for a moment, then laughed, punched him lightly in the shoulder and left him standing with Erik. He regarded his son, barefoot and wearing only a pair of grey denim cut-offs that showed the full extent of his legs beautifully, wondered why he didn't tan when by all accounts he'd spent most of the past four days laying out in the sun.

"What was that all about?" he asked, walked with Peter as they headed back to the school. The boy shrugged. Erik was learning that there was a whole Peter Language of Shrugs, and this one was the 'don't want to talk about it but I'll probably talk about it because I'm kind of upset and won't be able to help it' shrug. Erik rested a hand on his shoulder, squeezed lightly. Started a count of ten. Before he had got to four, Peter blurted out

"They keep trying to get me to swim with them!"

"And what's so bad about that?" Erik asked, and immediately knew by the way the boy's shoulders tensed that he'd put his foot in it.

"Nothing! Everything! Just….." Peter sighed, drew his arms in more tightly around himself, "I can't swim, okay? Wanda's the swimmer in the family, I can't do it – I sink"

"You…"

"Sink. Like a stone, dude. Wanda's swim coach said she was good because she's all" he traced a feminine shape in the air in front of him, "apparently curves are good for swimming. I'm just not curvy enough I guess"

Erik looked at him, tried not to stare too hard. It was easy to make people feel like a bug on a pin with his habitual penetrating stare. The boy certainly was anything but curvy, there wasn't a spare ounce on him, and back when he would have been trying to learn to swim Erik knew from photographs that he'd been even slighter. Not much good for keeping afloat, really. But it couldn't be impossible. Erik squeezed his shoulder again, kept his silence, and started to form a plan in his mind.

A/N : Peter in nothing but cut-offs. Just going to leave you with that thought...