Authors Note: Thanks to everyone who replied and was so nice and such. This is my first time writing on here (which is a warning, not an excuse haha). I think having Kitty as the center character of the first chapter, kind of gave a "fresh" feeling to it all, know what I mean? But…enough with the chit-chat…and the one-way roads and one-character POVs. From now on, I'll be multi-tasking with the story! :D sooo lets begin, shall we?

Chapter 2

Hell's Kitchen, Manhattan

Black Sun Orphanage

"Whooooaa I never meant to brag! But I got him where I want him now! Whooooaa it was never my intention to brag, to steal it all away from you now!" Layla bopped her head to the beat of her favorite song on her favorite c.d, folding a black tank top before stuffing it into her suitcase.

"Can we please turn to Rihanna!" Shelby whined at her friend who enjoyed the continuous mess of vocals, screams, and snare drums that encircled the room.

"Nope. My turn to pick the c.d. Sucks for you" Layla responded before dancing over to her near-empty portion of the closet in one of the many rooms of the orphanage. She found her two belts entrapped in one another on a hanger and untangled her black belt with metal studs from her hot pink belt with a skull that had a heart for one of its eyes and shoved them both next to the black tank top.

Shelby groaned, flipping onto her back and kicking the headboard in a playful temper tantrum. "You suck! And so does the crappy music you listen to" she complained, taking her year-old Seventeen magazine and placing it atop her head.

"Mhhmm" Layla simply answered, "You know you'll miss me and my crappy music once I blow this popsicle stand!"

"Maybe…But I don't miss you now."

Layla dove across her bed for the remote on the pillow and shut the stereo off. She turned around and rolled her eyes at Shelby before taking out her c.d. with an indignant "Hmph!" and placing it into her c.d. case.

"So where are you heading off to anyways?"

"Boarding school" Layla said monotonously, putting her c.d. case into her small Jansport backpack her mom had purchased for her first year of 2nd grade all those years ago. She folded her headphones with a nearly broken wire and her silver c.d. player next to it.

"You told me that already…what kind of boarding school? Where's it at? Is it in London? Upper East Side? Please don't tell me, you're ditching us for some uppity-uppity snobs…"

"That's probably only on Gossip Girl, Shel" Layla replied, taking her pair of baggy black Bermuda shorts and black leggings with lime green stripes ("Or maybe they're lime green with black stripes" Layla thought) and putting them in the corner of her bag, next to the belts.

"So you're going to the Upper East Side?!"

"No, I'm just mocking how the garbage you watch so easily affects you"

"You're a Degrassi kinda person, aren't you?"

Layla smirked at Shelby's accusation, taking 12 pairs of socks and messily bundling them into a netted compartment at the roof of her bag.

"It's in…Louisiana" she lied. "Westchester" she thought to herself.

"Aren't they still recovering from Katrina?"

"No," Layla said after a pause, considering Shelby's question, "I think they're okay now"

"That's good."

"Yeah."

"Did you just get a scholarship or something?"

"You could say that" Layla murmured. "If being a freak that's known as the bottom of society worldwide is your idea of a scholarship, then yeah."

"But it wouldn't be the truth, would it?" Shelby accused. She had long ago taken the magazine from her face and was now sitting at the edge of her bed in a criss-cross-applesauce position.

"Look, Shelby…I don't want to talk about it right now. Okay? It's just…a school."

"…Okay"

Layla sighed. She hated lying to people she cared about. Lying was fine with strangers, she had decided years earlier, because strangers could get you into trouble. But lying to people who you cared about and who cared about you…that was wrong. It was…wrong. She couldn't really think of any other word to describe it. It was just that undeniably strong feeling in the pit of your stomach that churned and churned until it sickened you to the core. In her book, that feeling was called "wrong".

"So when am I going to see you again?" Shelby treaded onto new territory carefully. This wasn't really talking about Layla's new school, right?

"Isoon, you know? I'll see you soon, Shelby. We're besties, okay? No one could ever destroy that…but I'll give you the address once I get there. And you can mail me. And you can tell me all about your new family 'cause I know you'll get adopted soon."

"I guess" Shelby's voice mildly quavered.

…she's gonna cry.

Layla turned around to see tears slithering down Shelby's cheek, fingers tapping against her face, looking absent-mindedly at Layla's suitcase.

Layla walked over to her and enfolded her in the biggest hug she could give. Shelby didn't respond till a minute later, sobbing into her best friend's shoulder and mumbling gurgled words only Layla could understand. Because that's how best friends were. They understood each other.

"For the most part" Layla decided.

Because that's all Shelby could understand. She couldn't understand the overgrown hatred building inside for political figures in the world, most of them lecturing about the dangers and horrors of mutants, never knowing they were really talking about her. Never knowing they were talking about a 14 year-old, orphaned girl. And, as long as Layla breathed, she'd make sure Shelby didn't know either.

"No one in my old life will know."

Vermont Mountains
Middle of Nowhere

Sooraya was starting to grow impatient with her "driver". They had been riding around for hours in an unfamiliar place where the trees were beginning to look more and more familiar. She quietly decided they had been here at least twice before. She was going practically insane and running out of options. Surely they had caught on to the fact that she had caught on.

"So…why don't we stop to get something to eat, eh?"

Sooraya looked up to see a treacherous, headstrong man that she was unlucky enough to be forced to catch a ride with. She knew what he was trying to do. And, judging by the smile on his ugly, scrawny partner-in-crime that was slumped in the passenger seat, he knew too.

This was the first time she had ever feared these men before, the first time she had ever fully regretted taking a ride from a stranger. But there wasn't anywhere she could run now. They were out in the mountains of Vermont. No one was around. She could run, yes, but for how long? The pines and oaks were dizzy maze of bewilderment. There were plenty of places to hide, no places to run off to. She didn't want to play hide and seek with these random people who were slowly attempting to trap her. What would become of her? She had heard of what happened when girls played in the forests and didn't come back, when people hitchhiked with other people. But she had foolishly decided to ignore that. And now she was beginning to think, that, in two weeks, her body and identity would show up on CNN. It was times like these she regretted straying away from her homeland in Afghanistan, days like these when she wished she would have begged the slave traders to take her with her mother, if only to be with someone she knew. It was times like these she could….

"But I won't…" she thought "Not unless…I have to. And I won't have to. Ever. I can't even control it."

"I was talking to you, girl" the man said impersonally with a hint of anger in his tone. Sooraya frowned and played with the edge of her niqab, looking down at her left knee that was nicely folded across her right, both hidden by her abaya. This was the 4th time in the last 1 and ½ hours he had asked that question.

"No. I ate before I came, Sir" she replied politely, looking out the window, not daring to meet his eyes.

"Nonsense! You must be hungry" answered the man in the passenger seat.

"No, I am fine" Sooraya said again.

"I think we should. We wouldn't want you to starve."

But Sooraya wasn't stupid. There wasn't a food store or even a gas station in sight. Where could she, or even them for that matter, eat at? Out of the grimy trunk of his truck?

"That's not going to happen" she reassured herself shakily. Somehow the thought of eating their food was scarier than slowly starving in the heat of their unconditioned car…or out in the forest…

"Stop thinking about it, Sooraya. It won't happen. They are nice men. They offered to help you. Pushy though they may be, they will not harm you. They won't harm you. They won't harm you. They wouldn't dare harm you. They wouldn't ha"

Sooraya's stomach did a backflip as the driver's previously still foot pressed down on the opposite pedal; the truck began to halt to a stop. She knew they could sense her nervousness. It was practically what had fueled them for these past hours.

She kept her mouth closed once the car stopped. And it was like that for just a few seconds too. Complete silence, time freezing. Nothing but the emerald grass that poked out from the ground beneath them. Nothing but the cloudy dirt that wrapped itself around the car from the engine pushing the dusty road up into the air, particle by particle, speck by speck. Nothing but the teasing whispers of the wind outside, the very wind that seemed to be watching them and looking onto them with pity in its eyes. Nothing but the snap of a red, rickety Toyota truck getting three of its doors wrenched open in unison…nothing put the padded steps of a fearful teenage girl who had adjusted her niqab and begun to run away in the direction of the setting sun that peeked behind the trees.

Westchester, New York
Xavier's Institute for the Gifted

Kitty stood out in the hallway, waiting for a reply to the knock she had just given on the hollow door of Warren Worthington III. Ororo had asked her to check up on him a few minutes ago, as he had been acting strange earlier that day. Kitty couldn't exactly put her finger on it, but she knew exactly what Ororo was talking about. She had a way of subconsciously observing things others passed as normal. Apparently, Ororo did too. "Warren!" she called, "You in there?! Warren?!"

No reply. Kitty sighed and was about to turn on her heels when the door opened with a loud SWOOSH!!

Warren stood, nearly as tall as the door hinge, a t-shirt and baggy sweatpants hanging limply from his muscular form.

"Oh…hey" he said calmly, "I was out flying. Sorry. How long have you been out here?"

"A few minutes."

"Oh."

And just like that the conversation that was supposed to have a purpose turned into something incredibly awkward.

"Are you okay?" she asked, looking down at her green flip-flops. Perfect toenails peeked out behind the frays at the end of her jeans.

"Yeah," he said, just as casually as before, but Kitty noticed his muscles has tensed a little bit, his pale pink lips going into an emotionless line.

Kitty knew that face anywhere. Bobby had even given it to her a few times.

It was that "Girls are crazy…" look. And it was the most defensive look she had ever been shot.

"Oh no" Kitty thought, "I am not gonna be the one looking stupid here."

"Storm wanted to know," she said, breaking the uncomfortable silence.

"Oh" was his short reply. Kitty hated when people replied in short answers. All of this "Oh" business irritated the snot out of her. The brunette tried to restrain from rolling her chocolate brown eyes.

"Okay" she replied, attempting to give him a taste of his own medicine. She shrugged her shoulders carelessly before walking away with a look of pure annoyance on her face.

"Boys are crazy…" she thought.

Authors Note: Okee-dokee…that's my chapter. Hope ya like! Please review because it would mean a lot. Thanks a bunch!