Marvel owns the X-men, no profit is to be made from this work.

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"She's worse than my dog was."

"Well, you were the one that mentioned a trip to the doctor." Kitty hissed in a whisper, "I didn't know you had a dog."

She didn't know much about John actually, despite how chatty he could be, he hadn't opened up about himself very much. It was conversations such as they were having that the little truths came out in offhand remarks, such as likening a certain little cutie to a dog hiding from a trip to the vet.

"Border Collie mix, never knew what with." Smiling at the memory of the family pet, John peeked in a linen closet on a whim.

"You really think she'd hide in there?" Kitty asked, but truth be told they too much ground to cover and the Professor wasn't giving them any hints.

"Hey, she's tiny. She could probably be hiding in a lot of places."

The Professor obviously knew just where she was, but it was all part of letting them settle in and feel welcome. The only problem being that so was a full check up and Doctor Grey wanted Jubilee to see a trusted pediatric given her circumstances.

"Well we've checked the attic, the gym, the library and even the garage. And we know from playing this game with Terri, that the Prof would give us the heads up if she had fallen asleep wherever she's hiding."

Terri took hide and seek serious to the point she'd dozed off during a couple of games and didn't hear them calling for her. So that meant Jubilee was awake wherever she was. Hoping Bobby and Jones were having better luck than them, a peek out the window saw Pete giving Terri a piggyback ride out in the snow, checking for any signs that Jubilee might have fled the cozy warmth of the school.

"Did I just hear a..." John asked quietly before falling silent, exaggeratedly mouthing the rest, "...can of coke?"

Nodding in reply, Kitty listened for anything else but was met with silence. Motioning for John to keep walking and talking to himself, she waited behind. Just on the very edge of her senses did she hear the familiar crack of a can of pop getting opened the rest of the way. The hallway offered few places for anyone to hide with windows lining one edge that overlooked the estate.

Listening at the wall and doing her best to ignore John having a one-sided conversation with himself, the crinkle and crackle of a bag of chips was unmistakable. Pointing at the very wall she had her ear pressed to, Kitty saw that John was just as confused as she was. Proving he could be sneaky when he worked at it, he joined her there and listened with her.

"No way!" John mouthed out in his disbelief.

The school was old enough for it, but now their little game of cat and mouse had turned into something just a bit more interesting than a game of hide and seek with a girl hiding from a trip to the doctor. Offering John her hand, Kitty counted down from five but picked three to ghost through the wall...right into the secret passage Jubilee had been hiding in.

A half empty bag of chips and nearly full can of coke sat where she had been, but Jubilee hadn't gotten far, sparing them one last glance before darting around a corner.

"Oh she better have found out about this before anyone else, otherwise you guys have been holding out on me!" John shouted, immediately chasing after the wayward girl.

"Well I got some questions for the Professor concerning his rules about not ghosting through the walls, because I'm wondering if he was fibbing about the risk of electrical fires!" Kitty snapped back, just a little irked that she hadn't known about it either.

Darkness enveloped them quickly enough, as unlike the girl they had been chasing after, they hadn't brought with them a flashlight. The flick of a zippo brought with it a dim light, her eyes adjusting to the gloom as John cautiously lead the way through the secret passage as if they were in some murder mystery.

"Somewhere Doc Grey and the Prof are having tea and crumpets while laughing at us." John growled.

"Probably while Mister Summers tries to tell them enough is enough." Kitty agreed.

Dazzling light flooded the passage with the mechanical groan and scrape suiting of the booby trap from an ancient temple fit for Hollywood. Blinking past the stars that blinded her, Kitty saw a silhouette standing at the threshold of some hidden entrance.

"That's more or less how it went. Don't worry, Jean intercepted her once she got on the dumbwaiter." Scott said in greeting.

"When were you going to tell us about this?" John immediately asked, hardly caring about just where Jubilee had gotten off to in the light of finding out about the school's secret passages.

But by the firm set of Scott's jaw and how his shoulders stiffened at the question, Kitty thought she knew the answer to that. The passages weren't anything leftover from the yesteryears of the Xavier Estate, the mechanical behind the door looked too new.

"You hoped you wouldn't have to, didn't you?" Kitty asked, earning herself a troubled admission of guilt from her teacher.

"There's no point in keeping it a secret from you any longer, but that's a drill that can wait until next week." Scott confessed, offering her his hand to lead her from the dusty passage.

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"Jones, could you just pick something already?" John wearily groaned as the station flipped again.

"But there's nothing on." As if to prove his point, Jones blinked again to change the channel.

It was a waiting room like any other, replete with uncomfortable seats and old magazines that ranged from People to National Geographic. Looking up from an interesting article in Nat Geo, Kitty ignored the argument over what was playing and stole a peek at Bobby where he was busy playing checkers with Terri.

"King me." Terri demanded.

"I'm gonna have to teach you Chess, I mean you'll probably still school me but at least I won't feel as bad about it."

Hiding a smirk behind her magazine, Kitty added chess along with ice skating as things she had in common with Bobby, or so she hoped. The occasional cup of tea in the evening with the Professor had her brushing up on own game.

"I don't like needles!"

Ever since the lady doctor had vanished with Jubilee and Jean, such defiant outbursts had carried from the office, but this was more fearful than stubborn and Kitty felt a pang of sadness for her little cutie as a incoherent scream rang. But while screaming kids belonged in a doctor's office, the rapid fire snap and bang of firecrackers didn't. Bobby and Scott beat her and John alike in getting to their feet to rush down the hall.

"Jean!?" Scott called at the door as the stink of smoke wafted throughout the practice.

"We're alright Scott, we're all just a little bit scared is all." Jean answered, her voice turning quieter as she sought to sooth Jubilee, "It's okay, you didn't mean to."

The article, however interesting it had been, could no longer hold her attention. What had her interest was seeing the side of John she liked, excusing himself without a word to head down that hall where Scott and Bobby lingered. He didn't need to ask Scott for permission, knocking at the door in a rare bit of courtesy for him.

The door opened to a suspicious crack from which Jubilee peeked out of, her lips set in a stubborn line despite her damp cheeks. John vanished with the slamming of the door, the minutes that followed quiet enough that Jones found himself interested in an infomercial if just to make up for the idle chatter that had so very quickly died.

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New York was behind them and with it the trip to the doctor's office, the shopping trip between then and now told by the bags that filled the back of the Suburban. Finding themselves at the Roadhouse, it was a bar and grill that had been a mainstay of Westchester County for ages if the stories she been told of it were anything to go by. Kitty picked away at her burger and tried her best to appear aloof, even if her curiosity was killing her because of the game they were playing.

"Most embarrassing moment?" Turning over the question, Bobby sipped at his soda and considered it for a moment, "My parents thought I was wetting the bed."

Unable to hold back a snort of laughter, Kitty couldn't believe Bobby had the gumption to tell them something like that. As if to prove his point, a fine layer of frost spread over his hand that quickly melted a few seconds later. It painted a picture that told of a boy waking up at night, not knowing what was going on and trying to hide it with midnight trips to the laundry hamper and linen closet.

"I broke my bed." Pete added as his own admission.

"You've done that here." John looked to Kitty and Terri who both likely remembered a couple of nights where something had gone bump between the twilight hours.

"It was a bunk bed, my older brother had the bottom bunk."

"Ouch dude. I mean seriously, ow."

Wincing out of sympathy for Pete's older brother, it wasn't so much that he was heavy when he shifted...as much as he was hard. Just the same he was still pretty heavy and she could only imagine the rude awakening the Rasputin household must have had that night. Finding herself called out for her own moment, she already had too many to pick from that she didn't want to relieve.

"My parents thought I was sleep walking, a couple of times I woke up down in the basement."

That left Jones, John, and the girl they were trying to make feel better about her accident back at the doctor's office, Jubilee. And just like Jubilee, she wouldn't go asking Jones about any embarrassing moments, not after the hard luck he'd already suffered.

"I thought my mom bought some trick candles for my birthday, huff and puff all I could, they wouldn't blow out." John revealed, noisily squeaking his straw against his soda lid as he did.

Giving him a kick to get his attention as he stared at his soda, Kitty let her smile be her thanks for opening up like he had. The John she knew was back with a cocky wink, but beneath it she saw the John she liked, the one that did what she couldn't, be a friend to a girl who needed one.

"I blew up the Plasma, just...paf and it was gone. The only reason they were mad was because there was no way to explain it for the extended warranty."

"Paf?" Terri asked all too innocently.

Like Bobby before her, Jubilee held up her hand in a shy display of what made her different. Static sparks snaked up her finger unto the tip, bursting with the now familiar crackling pop of firecrackers.

"Paf."

Having more questions than answers that nagged at her, Kitty filed them away for the day she hoped she could ask them. Finding a smile in comparing Jubilee to John, just maybe she'd have to wait for a few more off hand remarks to get to know the guarded girl.

"I'll change the channel for you." Jones offered, mustering up a sheepish smile for the girl that sat across from him.

Knowing a crush when she saw one, Kitty looked to her own. Bobby was completely oblivious to her admiration and just maybe that was for the best, but a napkin doodle said her affections weren't unnoticed. Folding it up like a lady's favour, Pete tucked it away from prying eyes.

Thinking she had her own tale to tell of a night spent at the Roadhouse, Kitty let herself imagine the children of Xavier's that had come before her, before all of them. Hiding in plain sight doing all the things like any other teen their age, trying to figure it all out even if they pretended they already had all the answers.

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