Roxas was damning the secrecy of his training now. He was thirsty.

The fridge installed in the Danger Room—that what the X-Men called their subterranean training facility, apparently—was always restocked between sessions. Shadow had pointed out that if they took anything from there, they would arouse suspicion.

"And besides that,"he had said, "There aren't any meal breaks in real combat."

Roxas lifted the weights in each hand one after the other, over and over. He did one exercise continuously until Shadow stated the name of the next one, then he did that one over and over, until the process repeated. They were light—five kilograms, each—as the focus of the exercise was endurance rather than strength, but they felt heavy as anything else he might have been holding instead.

"Shoulder fly." Shadow said.

Roxas did as instructed, holding his arms straight and repeatedly lifting them from his sides to be outstretched parallel to his shoulders—the dumbbell lateral raise, or 'shoulder fly'. He glanced in Shadow's direction, seeing him idly reading through some plain looking books he had taken from up in the control room.

Roxas groaned and grunted with each lift. His lungs heaved, Roxas employing the full power of his chest as Shadow had instructed. 'Breathing technique', he'd called it.

Shadow said the name of another exercise, and Roxas obeyed. He wanted to ask when they'd start with the actual fighting, but knew he'd get some sort of cryptic reply that would likely piss him off.

His mind went on a tangent at the thought of the word 'reply'. Earlier that night, after getting back to the school, Lance had said something to the Professor about what had happened, and less than a minute later, Xavier had the other teachers in his office along with Lance. They didn't come out again for an hour, maybe more.

When they did, they asked to see those who were in the lobby during the incident. Once seated inside (Xavier had Scott bring in some more chairs), he told them what the problem was.

"Hey...ehn...Shadow?" Roxas asked between ragged breaths.

Shadow glanced up at him. "Squats." He said, telling Roxas the next exercise. "What is it?"

Roxas started the exercise. "What do you know about 'Mastermind?'"

Shadow took a look at the small clock he'd taken from the control room. He closed the book and put it with the others. "Mastermind; born Jason Wyngarde. He's a hallucikenetic, similar in nature to a telepath."

Roxas furrowed his brow. "What's the difference?"

"Telepaths can read and control minds, and change anything from a memory, to a habit, to even the entire personality." Shadow stood a held up a hand, signalling Roxas to stop. "A typical hallucikenetic can only make you see something that isn't there, though Mastermind, being a more potent example of the psionic sub-class, can alter memories."

"Alter memories?" Roxas asked.

Shadow didn't answer. He picked up the books and walked toward the elevator. "Enough for tonight. But I expect to see you doing something in the gym later today."

Roxas looked at his watch. Three minutes past midnight. "I need to keep this secret. I can't work out during the day."

"You assume that an exercise routine will be looked at as suspicious. People only see someone concerned with their personal appearance or health. The only person to see otherwise would be X-23, Wolverine, and Xavier, who would dismiss it as an attempt to qualify for becoming an X-Man."

Roxas allowed himself a sigh of annoyance. He appreciated Shadow thinking things through, but did he have to explain in such a know-it-all way? "If you say so". Roxas stepped into the lift as Shadow held its automatic door for him. "Anything else?"

"Cut down your midday naps. No more than thirty five minutes."

Roxas looked at Shadow, confusion on his face. Seeing this, Shadow explained. "You have to train your body to do without the usual comforts you previously had. No water during our training sessions, push your body constantly, and limited sleep. Your body will adjust." The elevator reached the control room, and Shadow stepped out. As the door closed, he said. "Don't be seen."

Roxas knew. He put a hand to his forearm, feeling the hot flesh; the last time he had done something physically strenuous, he had ached afterward. He hoped this would be less so, despite the likelihood of it being the opposite. The doors opened again, letting Roxas into the halls of the first sublevel. He made his way silently, but quickly. If caught, which he wasn't and had yet to be, he could pass it off as a midnight snack run.

He made it back to his room, and wasted no time in getting to sleep. His dreams were the usual; reliving moments he never had. He didn't pay them much heed, as there was nothing he could do about them. Besides, he'd decided not to worry too much about them, hadn't he?

He woke to a banging on his door. He rolled over, his intial reaction being to ignore the waking world in favour of some more shut-eye. But then a telepathic nudge from Shadow later, and he was up.

'Up. Now. You have things to do.'

Roxas got himself ready for the day ahead in a sleepy daze. Add to this his body was aching—to hell with Shadow's order to hit the gym today—and he was moving at a snail's pace.

And to make the day just perfect, he got detention for the first time for sleeping in class.

"Okay, screw food;" He muttered to himself as he left the room for lunch, "I'm getting some sleep." He found a secluded place in the sublevels—not that he could go upstairs because of the renovations and repairs—and nodded off.

Upon waking, he found himself staring up at Kitty.

"You wanna talk about it?"

"About what?" Roxas asked, still a little sleepy.

"You wanting to know about the Morlocks." Kitty explained. "You've kinda brought up some bad feeling around here."

"No one's said anything." Roxas said, getting to his feet. "Is it just Rogue who has a problem, or what?"

"It's all of us." Kitty said. She shifted her feet, crossing her arms. "It's a while back. A long while. Storm had a nephew here; he was one of the students once."

"Did he make the morlocks?" Roxas asked, guessing where the story was going.

"No, he...well, there was an incident with an energy drink; turns out it held a violent reaction to mutants."

"Like what?"

"Made our powers go nuts."

Roxas furrowed his brow. "Doesn't that happen sometimes anyway?"

"Heh. No. Not like that. Anyway, Spike—that's his name—he drank some, and his mutation went into overdrive."

"What was his mutation?"

"He could grow bones from anywhere on his body. Plating, stabbing and throwing weapons, the lot." She looked down the hall they were standing at the end of. "As far as I know, what went wrong was the bone plating wouldn't retract."

"So...he thought he couldn't fit in anymore?" Roxas guessed.

Kitty shrugged and sighed. "He didn't stick around to say what was going through his head. We searched for him for a while, but we never found him again."

Roxas thought he got the idea; Rogue and the others must have felt abandoned by their freind. "Um, what was his name?"

"Huh?"

"Your friend; what was his name?"

"Evan. He liked skateboarding. He was pretty good at it." Kitty took a breath and stood straight. "Now you know why we don't like to bring them up."

Roxas nodded. "Got it. I won't talk about them again."

"Well, I didn't say that, but you might not want to around Storm."

"Or Rogue?" Roxas asked, the memory of soreness across his face flashing up.

"Her either." Kitty confirmed. "She's a bit bitter about it."

A bit? "Okay. Should I wait a while before apologising, then?"

Kitty shrugged again. "Up to you. She's not that good at staying angry. I mean, she is angry, just not that angry."

Roxas was completely lost, but decided to let it go.

Kitty took a glance at her watch. "Oh...um."

Roxas leaned forward to take a look. "What?"

"I forgot: Scott sent me to look for you, cause you were late for class."

"...How late?"

Kitty tried a weak smile and a cheer. "School's done for the day! Hooray?"

X23 was in the school gym doing her regular routine of exercise alongside a few others, noting Roxas abscence from the scene. She thought he would have taken to exercise, given the fact he had a weapon at his disposal.

Did being turned down from being trained as an X-Man put him off?

"Hey, X23?"

X23 looked at Kurt, who was doing a dumbbell excercise with each arm and his tail. "Yeah?"

"Have you seen Roxas this afternoon?"

X23 shook her head. "No. Do you want me to tell him to talk to you when I do?"

"Yeah, that'd be great." Kurt said.

There was an awkward silence—on X23's part at least—and X23 spoke up. "Are you going to tell him off?"

Kurt stopped his workout. "Don't know. I'm pretty ticked at him, bringing up old wounds like that."

"He didn't know." X23 stated in Roxas' defence.

"I know that." Kurt snapped. Another awkward moment followed his outburst, and he said, "Sorry, I...I don't know how to explain it to him. Hell, I don't know how to explain it to you; Logan had to do that."

"Rogue didn't slap me in the face for asking." X23 pointed out. "And you didn't get all emo, either."

Kurt tried to resist a smile. "We're being too hard on him, aren't we?"

"A bit." X23 agreed. "I know it's none of my business, but maybe you should take this opportunity to let this go. You know, just sort things out with him when you see him next?"

"You mean 'when'." Kurt corrected. "I don't know, but...I'll think about it."

X23 gave a nod. They had another twenty minutes, give or take, before they had to put everything away and close the room up, so she got to finishing her work out.

After packing everything away and looking the door, X23 went off to search for Roxas.

Where is he?

She went to the lower levels, there being the only place to logically look for him—the only workable areas up top were the gym, the garage, and the laundry. She checked the boys rooms first.

Getting there, she knocked on his door and called his name.

"He isn't there." Came the voice of one of the other boys. "Kitty got sent after him."

Noting this, X23 left, giving an over the shoulder 'thanks' as she left.

The girls rooms next. To her surprise, she found kitty there. Knocking on the open door, she greeted, "Hey. Did you find him?"

Kitty looked up from her magazine. "Yeah. He's in the Professor's backup office."

No point going to him, then. The professor preferred the students not to interrupt him when he was handing out penalties for tardiness or other missteps in student life. "Is he getting more detention?" X23 asked out of curiosity.

"He wishes." Kitty said. "He's in there with Rogue. The Professor's sorting out what happened between them last night."

X23 felt a little relief at this. "Good. I was just talking to Kurt about doing the same. Do you think Rogue will listen?"

Kitty shrugged. "We'll see." She said.

"Rogue, why did you hit Roxas?" Xavier asked this in a typical psychiatrist tone.

"Because he went behind my back and..." Rogue trailed off, unwilling or unprepared to state the her issue.

Xavier turned to Roxas. "What did you do?"

"I looked up who the Morlocks were." Roxas said.

Xavier nodded. "Is that what upset you?" He asked Rogue.

Rogue didn't answer.

"Rogue, everyone is entitled to their own feelings regarding Evan's choice to leave. But it isn't fair to misdirect it at anyone who does not know about that choice, and who theref ore inquires out of curiosity. No matter how tactlessly."

Rogue still didn't reply. Roxas decided to take the initiative, and said, "Sorry."

"Whatever." Rogue whispered harshly.

"Rogue." Xavier said to get her attention. "You have no reason to be angry at him. It was an honest mistake."

When Rogue didn't reply again, Xavier sighed. "We'll leave it at that then. You may both go."

Roxas let Rogue go first, and Rogue herself did so with attitude. Ignoring this, Roxas said "Thanks Professor."

"You're welcome." He said. "Before you go; Scott will speak to you about your absence from class today. And tell Shadow he can come in now."

Roxas nodded. He opened the door, and Shadow was on the other side.

"I heard." He said. Communicating nothing else, he stepped past Roxas and closed the door behind him.

Roxas blew a breath out. He was in for more detention, no doubt about it. This secret training thing was going to be much harder than he thought.

He made his way to his room, looking to loosen up his muscles for the exercises ahead with some of those warm ups he learned. Soon enough, there was a knock on his door. Roxas guessed it was probably X23, coming over to check on him. "Come in." He called.

The door opened. It was Kurt. "Hey, man." He said.

Roxas sighed inwardly. Great. Now this. "Hi." He greeted back. "I talked with the Professor and Rogue about last night..."

Kurt pointed upward. "Yeah, I wanted to talk about that." He pointed upward. "I've got some ice-creams upstairs in the garage. You want to talk this over a pair of those?"

Roxas abruptly thought about the sunset. "Yeah, sure." He said.

Kurt held out his hand, inviting a handshake. Roxas accepted and took hold. There was a sudden blackout, as though he had blinked, and they were standing in the garage.

"Whoa..." Roxas said. He'd seen Kurt teleport before, but had never gone with him. "That was weird."

"You get used to it." Kurt said, opening the small fridge beside them—the one Scott kept his drinks, snacks, and other such things for when he was working on his cars and other vehicles. "But then, I do that every day, so maybe you'll take a while. Here."

Roxas took the ice-cream and opened it. Raspberry flavour. Hit took a bite and took a spot on the wall, leaning casually. "Sorry about bringing up your friend." He said.

Kurt took a similar position on the other side of the fridge. "The professor told you?"

Roxas shook his head. "Kitty."

Kurt nodded. "Yeah. Evan was a cool dude. When he left, Storm was heartbroken. We didn't understand how he could do that." He took a bite of his ice-cream. "So, yeah. That's why we don't like to bring up the Morlocks. We're pretty angry at him for abandoning us like that."

Roxas mind flashed an image of a white room, and that same friend that was leaning against the building. "I...think I can relate."

Kurt looked at him. "You can?"

"I think." Roxas repeated. "I mean, I don't remember everything. But I can remember some feelings."

"Amnesia." Kurt recalled. "Right."

They were both silent for a minute, biting away at their ice-creams. "Why is Rogue so angry about it?" Roxas asked, breaking the silence.

Kurt sighed. "She'd been screwed like that before. And she's got other issues too. Long story short, she's not big of forgiving betrayals of trust."

Roxas nodded. "Will she be angry with me for bringing it up much longer?"

Kurt shrugged and smiled. "Give it a week. She'll come around."

Roxas smiled as well. "I'll take your word for it."

Kurt opened the fridge again, grabbing some soft drink this time and handing one to Roxas. "Anyway, sorry about being so hard on you about it."

Roxas held out his hand for a hand for a handshake. "No problem."

Kurt took his hand, accepting the gesture. "So, the Keyblade;" He said, "Do you know haw to use it?"

Roxas shook his head. "No. The Professor doesn't want me to use it, anyway; I blasted a hole in the gym."

Kurt laughed. "You'd be surprised how many times that happened before everyone stated learning to control their powers downstairs." He took a sip of his drink. "Is the Professor going to put you through that."

"No." I've already got that handled. "So long as I don't use the Keyblade, I can't do much of anything."

"Huh. So it has a catch, then?"

Roxas nodded.

"Hm." Kurt was silent for a moment. "So, forgetting the powers and all that, what about using it normally?"

Roxas looked at Kurt. "What do you mean?"

"Well, when you fought Shadow and X23 you were pretty good, but do you know anything beside how to swing it and do a few binds?"

Roxas shrugged. "No idea." He admitted. "Amnesia and all that."

Kurt smiled. "You know...I've been getting into fencing. There's a martial arts club in town that does European and Oriental sword techniques. You could give that a try."

"You do swordplay?" Roxas asked.

Kurt beamed with optimism. "Yeah, the guys there say I'm pretty good." Fiddling with his watch, he allowed his tail to show. "I'm working on a way to use this, too."

Roxas raised an eyebrow. "Three swords?" He inquired.

Kurt nodded enthusiastically. "You in?"

"Sure." This'll come in handy. "When is it?"

"Fridays and Saturdays. Thirty-two dollars a month."

Roxas nodded. "Okay. I look forward to it." Looking at his watch, he added, "We better get back inside. Dinner should be soon."

"Grab on." Kurt said, extending his hand.

A millisecond of black later and they were standing in the lower levels just outside the room they were using as the dining room.

"Okay, let's get in there." Kurt said, opening the door.

The smell of hot food made Roxas' stomach rumble furiously. Joining the line, he spotted X23, who waved for him to join her.

Eventually getting his food—the line was going a bit slow, much to his stomachs chagrin—he took a seat opposite his friend.

"I thought you might've been attacked by those Heartless again." X23 said by way of greeting.

Roxas took the blunt statement as an X23-brand joke. "No such luck; would've gotten me out of more detention."

"How'd it go?" She asked.

"Well, no one slapped me this time." Roxas said.

X23 smiled. "So you sorted things out with Rogue and Kitty?"

Roxas sighed. "Kitty yes, Rogue no." He took a bite of his dinner and briefly lost himself to the satisfying taste. "Sorted it out with Kurt as well." He said through his chewing.

"Swallow first." X23 said with a bit annoyance. "Did you talk it out just before you came in?"

"In the garage. Used the fridge that was in there."

X23 took a sip of the coffee she had next to her plate. "Don't make a habit of that. Scott and Kurt are on thin ice about whose is whose in there."

"Does Scott own the ice cream or the soda?" Roxas asked.

"Which one did you have?"

Roxas smiked sheepishly.

"Crap..." X23 muttered. "Anyway...so the Professor couldn't get through to Rogue, then?"

"No. She's still pretty mad." Roxas looked around the room briefly, but didn't spot her anywhere. "Kurt said she might calm down in about a week."

"That's optimistic." X23 remarked. "But she has been through a few betrayals of trust."

Roxas nodded. "Anyway, how was your day?"

X23 flexed a fist. "I was in the Danger Room all day today. Keeping in practice."

A thought crossed Roxas' mind. "Does Shadow spend any time in there?" He stopped short of saying, 'During the day'.

"A lot, actually. Whenever S.H.I.E.L.D hasn't come in, he's been in there for hours. He'll spar with some of us if we ask."

"What's he like?"

"As a combatant?" X23 asked for clarification.

Roxas nodded.

"He's pretty inaccurate with those energy blasts. At first, I thought that was really weird, as did everyone else. But recently, we found a late night recording of him trying to break a pane of glass by screaming at it. When we questioned him about it, he stated that he was told that those hand blasts were the first power that G.U.N tried to add onto his healing factor."

"How late are we talking?" Roxas asked casually, fearing he may have been discovered.

"Very early; two o'clock through to four."

Roxas held back a sigh of relief, though he snuck out a breath he had been holding. "So, he's got some powers he doesn't know about?"

"He knows about them. He just didn't know they worked till recently." X23 siffed the air briefly. "Hmm...deserts gonna be great."

Roxas looked around. "Where is it?"

"Still in the kitchen." Taking another whiff, X23 said, "Might be a few minutes."

Roxas glanced at his watch. He should be getting ready for his session with Shadow. He gulped down the rest of his food, and stood from the table. "I gotta get to bed. Can't risk more detention."

X23 nodded. "Sweet dreams."

Roxas nodded back and left the room. He felt a little twinge of guilt, lying to his friend, but only a little. He needed to be ready.

But at least he wouldn't need to lie about training with Kurt.

Got this chapter done, finally. Setting up some extra content with Kurt's sword skills, mostly to give Roxas someone to spar with besides Shadow.