Disclaimer: X-Men are the property of Stan Lee and Marvel. If I owned them, don't you think that I would have better things to do with my time than write crap like this?
Story Notes: Story is post X1 in the Movie-'verse and will ignore X2 and X3. My world, folks. This story includes an OC of my own creation. Dani Evans is mine and if you try to steal her, I'll have to release the giant ear-eating maggots that I have in a bucket outside. I've based her personality off of my own, so expect a bit of an enigma. There will be no OC romance in this story. Dani's your average eighteen year old with real problems and a real life. There will, however, be CanonXCanon relationships that are going on in the background. Note: Story may include Jean-bashing.
Rating: Story is T for language, suggestive content, and possible brief nudity.
Normalcy is Overrated: She never asked to be different. She was pretty complacent being normal. The day that changed her whole life changed. Being a mutant definitely isn't all it's cracked up to be. OC alert!
Normalcy is Overrated
-Chapter Four-
So living in a huge Mansion had a lot of perks, I'd be the first to admit it.
I got my own room, which is always a plus, and the bathrooms were kept pretty clean. I didn't have to clean them like at home, so that was always a big bonus in my head. Food was always hot and fresh, and as long as I made it down to the kitchens before it was all gone, I could practically have my choice of delicious food. The people seemed pretty cool, even if I did tend to avoid them.
But, it still wasn't home.
Mr. Xavier had carted me off to a new room, a room that he informed me was my only choice due to the nature of my so-called mutation. Apparently, I was a danger to not only myself, but everyone around me until I could get control of it. Needless to say, I somehow got royally screwed over and I was stuck in the boys wing.
At first, I'd thought that he was joking around, maybe pulling my leg as some sort of a hazing process. But, after three days, I'd finally accepted the fact that I was always going to have to knock on the huge community bathroom door before I entered. Sure, there were stalls, but there were also urinals.
I did not want to see any of that.
There's also the fact that they wouldn't let me go back to my house with them in order to get my stuff. Mr. Xavier, or Professor Xavier as everyone else seemed to call him, was adamant and sent Scott, Jean, and Ororo back to New Jersey to get my stuff. Sure, I had most of their names down, but that didn't mean that I wanted any of them to be going through my freaking panty drawer!
Of course, there's also the fact that I start school again in just over a week. They wanted me to get a bit more acquainted with my peers and get a bit of control of my hands, er- powers before they let me loose in a classroom. So, what was I supposed to do with all of the time that was on my hands?
Apparently I was supposed to wander around the huge Mansion-esque school with absolutely no destination in mind. I'd tried simply hiding out in my room, but my one and only neighbor was less than quiet.
Trust me. The sounds coming from Mr. Logan's room will make any girl run for the hills.
So, it was with a nervous gait that I entered what the map in my hand insisted was a recreation room. A quick glance around the rather empty room proved that the map wasn't a complete waste of resources, and I found myself shuffling toward a large couch almost suspiciously. I knew that most of the others were in class, but it seemed like every time I thought I had a moment alone I ran into someone that was content to merely stare at me or ask "What can you do?"
I mean, come on! I think it's pretty rude to stare at someone to begin with, but to seriously ask them what they could do?
Sure, I could run down the list of my wide array of skills and talents and wow them with my awesome prowess, but something told me that they were referring to it. That's what I called it. It. I was apparently some mutant that could do weird things with my hands, things that caused a lot of damage and left people around me just as confused as I was.
Plus, I knew that I stuck out like a sore thumb.
Everyone was running around with book bags and talking to their friends, and most of them actually looked normal. Okay, so I might have screamed a few times, particularly on the first day when I found myself facing this chick that looked more like a snake than an actual snake, but I'd apologized the moment that I realized that Crocodile Dundee wasn't going to make a sudden appearance. I, on the other hand, was walking around in borrowed sweats with stupid X's on them and looking like some sort of lost invalid.
I mean, it was pretty hard to look normal when you have your arms folded over your chest everywhere you go. Maybe it wasn't the safest fail safe plan to get me through the day, but so far I'd only had an accident. Okay, two. But, I still thought I was doing pretty good.
Mr. Xavier and his X-Men thought otherwise.
"You're the new chick, right?" a voice from the far left caused me to literally jump a foot off of the ground. Of course, the same voice chuckled at me as I turned abruptly and found myself facing a rather unfamiliar figure. "Yeah, you are her. Danielle, right?"
He sat in a corner, alone, leaning his chair back against the wall as he played with what appeared to be a lighter of some kind. His face looked a little familiar, and I vaguely remembered meeting him when I met the others that liked to dress up in leather and get kinky by saving people.
"That would be me," I managed to reply as I clumsily folded up the map and slipped it into the pocket of the baggy gray sweats before crossing my arms, yet again, over my chest. "Thought class was still in?"
"Yeah, well, I decided that class was out and bailed." He chuckled rather loudly before smirking and closing the lighter indefinitely. Almost lazily, he rocked the chair forward and rose, walking toward me with a sort of strut that made me think of a rooster. "I'm John Allerdyce, but you can call me Pyro."
The snort wasn't something that I'd planned, but it wasn't exactly something that I could take back. Of course, I knew the moment that he narrowed his eyes that my chance at a good impression had just been chucked out the window, but the majority of me didn't much care. Still, it was in my nature to take a bad situation and make it better, so I attempted to right my mistake.
"Sorry, the whole code names thing is just pretty weird if you ask me." Shrugging as if to say that it didn't rightly matter, I wiped my hand on the side of my leg and then offered it to him. "Danielle Evans, but friends call me Dani." There, that was good, I was relying on the manners that my grandma had beaten into me.
He glanced down at my hand before taking it cautiously, shaking it only once. Before dropping it. "Hey, we're mutants. Most of us take something that represents our unique powers, obviously." Then, he clicked open the lighter and produced a large ball of flame within a second or two, seemingly holding it in his other palm. As quickly as it appeared, it disappeared. "Hence Pyro."
My eyes were wide in amazement and I slowly nodded my head. "I'd only seen a few mutants before, other than on the news, before I came here," I admitted almost in an ashamed matter. "There were a few back home, but the majority of them bailed pretty quick. Lot of chauvinistic jerks in my hometown that didn't smile too kindly on people like you- er, us."
There it was again. It was still hard to place myself in the same group as them. They were mutants. I was me.
Yet, I was a mutant, too, right?
"Right," he managed before cocking a brow in my direction and slipping his lighter into the pocket of his jeans. "I heard that you're going to be training with us, the Junior X-Men." Maybe it was the horrified look on my face that gave my confusion away, because he quickly continued. "The X-Men are the teachers and stuff? Cyclops, Storm, Miss Grey, and I think Wolverine. Hell, he's not a teacher but he might as well be."
Chewing on my bottom lip, I nodded as though I could completely follow his words, when in truth I was more confused than I was before he'd mentioned the X-Men in general. "So, the Jr. X-Men are... I'm guessing students?"
"Bingo," he grinned, walking past me and toward the entryway. Almost lazily, I looked over my shoulder and let my gaze follow him. "Dani?" I flinched as I realized that he'd caught me simply staring at him.
"Yeah John?" I mumbled, turning completely as I crossed my arms over my chest.
There it was, the common bad boy smirk that made me immediately realize that I was going to have to stay as far away from him as humanly possible. As mutantly possible? Oh, whatever.
"Welcome to Mutant High."
A/N: Thanks for reading. Feel free to review.
