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A/N: I want to thank everyone who reviewed! Thank you so much! And here's chapter 4

Chapter 4: Oliver's " 'Bout ten"

"Oooooliver, oh Oooooliver…"a singing voice called from what it seemed to be far to the young, auburn haired boy. He smiled, the voice tickled his ear. He shifted in his covers.

The sleeping boy didn't noticed a sigh of exasperation.

"OLIVER CROMWIME!"

Oliver jumped from his bed, prepared to battle the troll that had called to him. His fists were balled and fiery ready to punch the living air out of anything that moved in that small moment. His head turned violently from one side to another searching for something that he didn't even know what it was.

There was a gigantic grin crouching down near his head-rest side of the bed. Found it. He punched the stupid grin, unaware that the grin was attached to the resident catlike boy, Maximus "Max" Pine.

"Bloody hell! It's me you git!" Max held his jaw. Apparently the young boy had an extremely powerful punch.

"oh, that makes it loads better, being you…" he glared at the older boy, throwing the covers to one side and his feet to the other, out of bed. "Shouldn't 've woken me up like that." He mumbled. He was still with his school clothes, except for the tie that was neatly folded on a working desk that stood between his bed and the window. The same desk Max was now leaning on nursing his jaw. "Stop being a wuss, I didn't hit that hard."

"Bloody hell you didn't! Hate to see what skull you could crack if you did hit hard." He replied sarcastic, glaring at the ten-year-older.

"ha ha…" he glared back, getting up and straightening his clothes.

Max was getting up and now was moving his jaw, making sure he could still make all jaw movements.

"Where are the others?" Oliver asked.

"In other rooms. Besides me and you, Sean is sharing a room with us, he's already down for breakfast. I stayed to wake you up since you don't know your way around." He replied, but visibly not happy about receiving a punch.

"Let's go to breakfast then!" Oliver smiled. And walked out of the door and turned right.

"It's the other way, you git!" Max followed him.

Oliver and Max just stood there, facing the kitchen. Their mouths wide open at the rush of students. They have never seen that many mutants under one kitchen.

Max's eyes run through the crowd trying to find someone he knew and found, sitting at the table, Lavigna who was talking to Mr. Logan and Amelie that was concentrating in transporting the bacon through the shadows. He smiled.

Dragging Oliver, Max went up to Lavigna. "Good morning, Ms. Lavigna." Max said. Oliver was now staring at a fuzzy blue boy who was hanging from the ceiling lap having a tug war with a shadow, fighting over the bacon.

Laving turned in her seat, she smiled, "Good mourning, boys. Slept well?"

Max nodded. "yeah. Um, where do we go to get food?"

She gave a small laugh, "This is pretty much like the school. Self service."

He raised an eye-brow "More like survival of the fittest…" he muttered looking around. Logan chuckled.

Eventually, Max was able to eat one third of his breakfast, another third was eaten by Oliver, who couldn't get any food since he was smaller than most kids there, and the last third was sent to a young boy named Jamie's face. Apparently he was yelling "I'm older than you!" to Oliver, over and over until Oliver got fed up and threw a large amount of burnt omelet his way.

Lavigna was outraged by Oliver's actions, and probably even more outraged at Max for laughing, tapping Oliver's shoulder and saying "Nice shot!" After hitting Max upside the head, she announced that Oliver had already finished his breakfast and that he would, willingly, do the dishes.

Oliver groaned and headed to the sink washing the plates that were already piling up. When Oliver finally had finished cleaning the kitchen, the two students in charge of lunch already came in and got started on cooking. Since he didn't know where his room was, Oliver decided to head outside and take a look at the place.

He passed the gigantic doors and proceeded to go down the stairs. Looking around he found that almost everyone was there. He saw an one-armed John trying to catch his other arm that was being thrown from Aileen to Amelie. Laura was under a tree sitting by a Goth with white bangs, both were reading. Sean was bouncing up and down holding on to an Asian girl. Oliver smiled, Sean used to do that with him. It was so much fun. Rose was farther, next to some roses talking to a white haired, dark skinned woman. Max was sitting at the top of the tree Laura and the other girl sat under, glaring at a girl that was laughing at a boy who had just bommed (as in BOM) into a tree (That would be Sam, and the girl is Rahne…just guess why he is glaring… ).

Oliver reached the base of the stairs and looked around for someone to hang out with. But around all these people, he felt incredibly small, and a bit dislocated.

"Oliver, right?" a voice said to his right. The boy turned his head from where the voice came from and found a man sitting by the wall. He was wearing jeans and a black muscle tank top and sun glasses. His hair was auburn-brownish, not exactly long, but long enough for the front hair to cover his eyes (1).

Oliver walked over to him. "Yeah, what's yours?" he looked with suspicion.

"Remy LeBeau." The man smirked, "mind me asking why de suspicion?"

The boy softened, and sat by him. "Sorry, natural reaction." He replied.

Remy nodded and grabbed a pack of cigarettes, took it out and placed it on his lips, he placed the pack back on his pockets and searched for a lighter. Oliver watched.

Not finding the lighter, Remy leaned his head back, clearly mad at himself for forgetting a lighter. He took the unlit cigarette out of his mouth. "Y're not here for 12 hours and y' already got y'rself into trouble, not even Remy was that fast."

Oliver took the cigarette out of the man hand and placed it on his lips, he snapped his finger and at the tip of his index was a small flame. He smirked at the gapping adult. Lighting the cigarette, Oliver took a sip, and took the cigarette out of his mouth so he could let the smoke go, but Remy yanked the cigarette out of his hand. Oliver blew the smoke at Remy's face.

"Y' shouldn't smoke. How old are y'?" Remy asked taking a sip of the cigarette.

"'Bout ten." He replied. Remy stared and the boy.

"'Bout?" Remy questioned, "What d'you mean, "'bout"?"

"Don't know when my birthday is. Don't know when I was born. Don't know my age. Lavigna says that I'm about ten…so, I'm about ten." Came the reply.

"Y' were a street kid, weren't y'?"

"What does it matter?"

"Is y'r name really Oliver Cromewime?"

"No. I don't know. One needs a name to be in an orphanage, you know. That's the name I was given."

"Oh." Remy took another sip of the cigarette. "When did y' get y'r powers?"

Oliver thought for a while, trying hard to remember. "Dunno. Since I can remember, I guess. But that doesn't count much…I had an amnesia about a year ago."

Remy raised a brow, "How come?"

Oliver furrowed his brown, trying to remember. "Something 'bout a traumatic experience. I've no idea what it was, and I don't plan on finding out either." He bowed his head for a moment, then lifting it up again, "That's about the time I met Lavigna and she brought me to the school." He said with a smile, looking at the adult. "No other orphanage would take me in, apparently I had a record for being arsonist." He grinned.

Remy chuckled. He could feel that they would get along very well.

(1) think Sawyer from lost, or the gambit from X-men: the Animated Series. I hate his hair in Evo.