Disclaimer: No, this isn't mine. See part 1 for more detail

Notes: Yep, I'm new, sorry about the lack of notes on the previous one but I'm still getting used to this. I've gotten rid of indenting at the beginning of paragraphs, yeah, I know it's not strictly correct, but the indents look weird in this format.

A quick note on rating, which I should have mentioned in chap 1, just so there's no misunderstanding, this story does contain a little swearing, but it's all in-context and most of it is fairly mild. Just so you know.

Any way, I'm hoping you like this and will be eager to give in reviews, the more I get the faster I'll post the next chapter, so if you read, please, please, please review.

Part 2

_...dreaming I'm a butterfly?

It was morning, and the lazy sunlight leeched through the window of Margaret's bedroom window. She yawned and stretched, allowing herself to forget, for a moment, where she was.

When she finally did remember, she checked her clock, it was 10:30 in the morning, obscenely late for her, but everyone was allowed a lie in every now and then weren't they?

She tried to remember what was happening that day. Dr Xavier had wanted her to report to Dr McCoy for a physical check up, and then she would move on to some physiological analysis.

She sighed and pulled on her clothes, brushed her long red hair, and marched downstairs for breakfast.

After she finished her meal of bacon and eggs, she followed the first part of her time-table, meeting with Dr McCoy.

The man in question turned out to be a large, dark headed guy, with a lively attitude and friendly demeanour. When she entered he was looking over one of the 'X' kids, Benjamin, AKA Kurt.

It seemed like quite an odd experiment was going on, Dr McCoy seemed to be tapping the air around an area just by Benjamin/Kurt with a hammer. And, though his hammer seemed to be meeting nothing, the dark headed boy was wincing with pain.

'Fascinating,' murmured the Doctor, 'totally visualized even to the pain level. Quite extraordinary. Ah Miss Richardson,' he exclaimed, suddenly noticing her, 'please wait a moment, I'm almost finished here.'

He put the hammer down and scribbled down some notes on a clip board.

'Right, Benjamin, I'm basically finished up with you now, you can go. I'll be with you soon, Miss Richardson, I just want to type up some notes.'

He wandered away, clip board in hand, into a small office.

Margaret jumped onto the edge of the hard bed whilst Benjamin/Kurt put his shirt back on. She hadn't meant to say anything to the strange boy until a mixture of nerves and curiosity prompted her to ask, 'Just what was Dr McCoy doing to you, before?'

'He was tapping my tail,' replied Benjamin/Kurt nervously, 'to see if I felt pain.'

'Tail?' gasped Margaret, hardly believing what she was hearing.

'Ja, my perso- I mean I have a tail, but no one can see it. I was just showing Dr McCoy that I felt pain when he taps it. I thought it might be proof but it seems like he's just writing it off, like every other piece of evidence we've given him.'

Margaret couldn't quite believe what she was hearing; the guy was claiming to have a tail! It was ridiculous, it was absurd, and yet… it wasn't.

Still, the boy was obviously mixed up, and Margaret felt pity rise up in her throat once again, how damaged would a soul have to be to make up such a strange persona?

Benjamin/Kurt must have caught her look, because he looked at her with a glint of resentment in his eyes.

'It's OK,' he said, 'I know I'm right, Scott says that we'll figure a way out of this soon, then everything will be OK. I just hope he finds a way out of it soon, I don't know how much of this I can…' His voice faded into silence.

Margaret found herself putting an arm round him, something about the boy demanded comfort. She noticed that his hands were in an odd position; their fingers seemed to be stuck in the Vulcan salute.

He noticed her looking and said 'it's because I've only got two fingers. None of the others say they see four, but I only see two. I don't understand it, either.'

'It's OK,' said Margaret, trying to sound soothing, 'it'll be fine.'

'Ja, it will be now you're here, Jean, you've always been the calm one, you can make anyone feel better.'

His words disturbed Margaret a little, and she moved her arm from around his shoulders.

'Look,' he said, understanding her movement, 'I know you think this is all a little weird, now. But soon you'll remember who you are, just like all of us did. Just… just meet up with us for a bit, have a chat. Then you'll see.'

There was such hope in the boy's voice that she felt a sudden rush of guilt, and pity. How could she say no to a tone like that? Besides, if she learnt something she could pass it onto Dr Xavier, which might help him analyse the problem better. Anyway, she was curious, he seemed to certain that he knew her, so sure… she almost felt as if she knew him, because of it.

'Alright,' she said at last, 'when do you want to meet? At dinner?'

'Nein, best we do it in secret, without being constantly watched. I'll come for you tonight, in your room, and then I'll take you to the others.'

'But how?'

Kurt/Benjamin's face split from its previously dour expression into a mischievous grin, 'you don't need to teleport to find my way from place to place without being seen. Not if you know it well enough, at least. I'll see you tonight, bye Jean!'

With this he jumped down off the hard bed and practically skipped off, away back into the mansion. Margaret could not help but wonder what she had got herself into. 

McCoy's physical tests were merely to confirm her general health, and so rather boring. Dr Xavier's tests went in a similar fashion, too. He had checked a few things with her, asked her a few questions on how she had been settling in, and that was all.

So now she lay in bed, the day having gone quickly and smoothly. Her eyes were just drooping when a husky German accent spoke from the darkness.

'Gutten aubun mien freund.'*

Jean choked back a scream as the friendly face of Kurt/Benjamin appeared above her.

'Told you I could get around from place to place without being seen,' he laughed, 'come on, the others are waiting.'

She watched as he, clad only in PJ's, opened one of the air ducts and climbed in. Slipping on a dressing gown, and feeling more than a little apprehensive, Margaret followed.

After much crawling and sprawling through the twisting ducts which Kurt/Benjamin seemed to know like the back of his hand they finally reached their destination.

It seemed they had taken refuge in one of the many sub-basements of the institute, and they sat crouched there, with only some battery torches for light.

'Jean!' cried Kitty/Jenny, and gave the astonished Margaret a hug.

'Glad you could make it,' said Scott/Thomas, 'take a seat, this must seem strange, it'll take a while to beat the programming, but soon you'll start to remember, trust us.'

'OK,' said Margaret, fiddling with the edge of her nightgown nervously, 'well, start talking.'

'Right, well, I'll start from the beginning. My name is Scott Summers, when I was very young both my parents were killed in a plane crash, and only I and my brother survived-'

'So I grew up in with the Wagners, and I worked in a Der Jahrmarkt, the circus, doing acrobatics and trampoline, it vas wunderbar, I loved the attention of the crowd.'

'Funny, I mean, I'd of thought you're appearance would have given you plenty of attention,'

'Ja, Jean, but there is attention and attention, it's like the difference between flying and falling. But any way, the day my powers developed-'

'Ah was just kissing him, and it's… it's indescribably, like ah was just… taking part of him, sucking him into me. Ah don't remember the details, but ah couldn't stop, ah was just so terrified, and when I did he was… he was in a coma.'

'That's dreadful,' gasped Margaret/Jean, 'how did you're parents react, did you join the X-men then?'

'Ha, no way honey, ah was way too scared. No, ah went looking for help in all the wrong places. See-'

'After that business with Lance I, like, was totally ready to give you guys a try. I mean, you and Scott, like, totally freaked me out at first, but, you know, the Professor's got some really good ideas, and he calmed me down. And it offered me a place to develop our powers, right?'

Jean/Margaret nodded, 'but it's tough, right?'

'Too right! Training in the morning, training in the evening, training, training, training! But it makes us tough, I guess, and boy, with all the things we face, we need to be tough. Remember when-'

'I mean, reading Shakespeare to a huge, blue monster! I'd never thought I'd seem myself doing that! One of the scariest moments in my life, but it got us Dr McCoy, the REAL McCoy, that is. Not the phoney that keeps running round here. Any way, another scary time was when you won that award and then lost control of your powers, remember?'

'Oh yes,' laughed Jean, 'I was totally out of it, all those voices in my head, I think I trashed half the mansion!'

'I! You said I, Jean, do you remember now? Is that you?'

'Why… yes, yes I do remember! I'm Jean Grey! I'm Jean Grey!'

Jean leaped forward, hugging Evan, and he hugged back, whilst around them Kurt, Rouge, Kitty and Scott whooped and crowed in joy. The X-Men were reunited once again.

'Have you got any idea what's happening here, Jean?' asked Scott.

They had calmed down now, and were once again sitting in a circle, with Jean at the head, the subject of attention. She cradled her head in one hand, a thoughtful expression on her face.

'No, before you started reminding me, I honestly thought I was Margaret Richardson, it was as if… as if all my memories had been covered up by a sheet on new memories, and you had to remind me of the old ones so I could remember them, and ignore the new ones, if that makes sense.'

'Ja,' nodded Kurt, 'it was similar for all of us, though not as complete. You, as Margaret Richardson, seem to have a full set, from childhood, I only remembered the false life of Benjamin Darkholme for a few months before I came here. Dr Xavier claimed I had amnesia from a nervous break down.'

The last sentence was spoken in tones of anger and bitterness.

'We were hoping,' continued Scott, 'that you would know something, that your telepathic powers would be working.'

'I… I don't know if they are,' Jean replied, 'I have had some telepathic experiences, I think, hence the excuse about hearing voices, but I don't know about my telekinesis. I've not really tried to use either ability since I came here, wherever here is.'

'Well,' prompted Rouge, 'now's as good a time to try as ever.'

Jean nodded, and concentrated on one of the battery torches lighting the room. She strained and strained, eventually it moved upwards, levitating a few inches off the ground. Then, exhausted, she allowed it to drop, back onto the hard concrete floor.

'That's not good,' she said, 'I only moved it upwards a few inches, and that happened with a lot of concentration, I should have been able to make it fly across the room.'

Kitty looked concerned, 'that's odd, our powers work, or appear to work, just fine. Or at least they do to ourselves and each other, but like Kurt said before, everyone else denies their existence, and even their effects don't properly work.'

'It's like… someone's been rearranging the universe around us each time we use our powers,' said Rogue, 'Scott blasts a hole in a wall or something, but no one sees it, and a few seconds later the wall's as good as new. It's weird.'

'What about your telepathy, Jean, have you tied that?' asked Evan.

Jean closed her eyes and concentrated, yes, she could hear them. Hear their confusion, their fear, their worry.

She said as much, and the others looked relieved.

'Perhaps you should try that against one of the others,' suggested Scott, 'one of the reasons why you've been better programmed might be that you represented more of a threat. If you scan them then we may work out what exactly they want.'

'Who cares what they want?' cried out Kurt, 'they're probably trying to experiment on us or something! We need to escape. Tell her about the plan, Scott.'

'The details of it aren't important, but we need you help. Tomorrow afternoon there will only be two adults supervising us for lunch, nurse Dalkholme, and the security guard, Logan.'

'Logan's a security guard here?'

'Yeah, fitting huh? Any way, that's when we're going to try to escape, we can take out Dalkhome easily, and steal her keys, but Logan's going to be a problem. So, tomorrow act like you still think you're Margaret Richardson, and at lunch, at 12:45, try to drag Logan away from the dinner room, think up some excuse. We can use that time to at least get some of us out, try to figure what the outside worlds doing, if there is one. Then we'll come back and rescue the others later. You don't have an appointment with Dr Xavier tomorrow, do you?'

'Yes, but it's in the evening.'

'Good, I don't know if any of the adults have their powers, but I don't want to risk Xavier reading out thoughts and finding out our plan.'

'What about the Brotherhood,' asked Jean, 'they're here too, can't they help?'

Kitty shook her head, 'it seems like they're, like, totally brainwashed, we can't get through to them at all.'

'Maybe they don't have the telepathic defences we have,' suggested Evan, 'you know, the Professor helped us out a lot with those. Or maybe they're not really the Brotherhood, maybe they're… I don't know, people that have taken their forms or something. Either way, they won't be any help.'

'So, you know our plan,' said Scott, 'will you help?'

Jean nodded, how could she not?

'Right, remember, don't let on to anyone that you remember who you are, we don't want to arouse any suspicion. We'd better break up now, I'll see you guys tomorrow. Kurt, will you show Jean back to her room?'

The fuzzy elf nodded, and led Jean back through the ducts to her own bedroom. It was funny, before, when she thought she was Margaret Richardson, she had seen Kurt as a normal human. Now, however, she saw his true appearance, his fuzzy, pointy eared, blue, self. Yet… when if she looked in another way, sometimes, she saw him as human, it was impossible to describe it properly.

She didn't let herself worry about it though, as she lay back down in her soft bed, she thought only of getting a good night's sleep before the trial of tomorrow began.

The day went smoothly, Jean stayed away from the other X-men, and away from Dr Xavier. She spent much of her time with Lucky and the other Psudo-Brotherhood members. She tried to be interested in what they said, and what they did, but in truth the time crawled by, her stomach constantly tying itself in knots.

She did, however, learn something interesting. Her telepathy only seemed to work on the other X-men, everyone else was a blank slate to her, she couldn't feel them at all. This was more than a little alarming, and only served to increase her anxiety.

When lunch time had crept upon her, Jean was more concerned with thinking up ways to distract Wolverine, than with eating anything. Then, she had an idea!

After making an excuse to the others she went to her room, spending a few minutes there until it was nearly 12:40. She was on her way back to the Canteen, hurrying as fast as she could, when she heard the sound of childish laugher ringing through the corridors.

Looking both ways, she caught a glance of a bare leg, and the hem of a white dress, their owner running round the corner. She jogged after them, trying to catch a better look, but by the time she had rounded the corner, the girl was gone, as if she had never existed. Shaking her head, Jean tried to forget about it, probably just one of the 'new' residents, none of whom she had met properly yet. But the youngest of those was twelve, and even from the very little she had seen of the girl, Jean could tell she could only be about 10 or 11, tops.  

Trying to put the incident behind her, she then ran back to the canteen, feigning worry and fear.

'Mr Logan,' she called, hurrying to the security guard, 'please, I need your help, something has been stolen from my room!'

'What do you mean?' asked the burly man.

'I had my Walkman in my room this morning, and I went back there a few minutes ago, to get a jumper because I was feeling cold. I noticed that my walkman was gone from where it usually was, on the shelf, and I had a quick look, but I can't find it! And I'm sure I left it on the shelf! Please can you come and look?'

Logan nodded quickly, and, much to Jean's relief, followed her out of the canteen, and down the corridor. They had not gotten far, however, before there was a cashing sound, and screaming from back in the canteen. Logan, snarling, ran back towards the source of the ruckus. Jean cursed, if only they had gotten a little further, he might not have heard. She turned tail and ran back to the canteen also, so she could at least see what was going on, and perhaps help a little.

All pandemonium had broken out, Scott, Evan and Rogue were battling the other residents, the false Brotherhood of Mutants, whilst Kurt was rolling about on the floor, kicking and punching Mystique, or Nurse Darkholme as she liked to be called here. Just as Jean entered, Kitty broke free of the scuffle, running towards the back wall of the canteen.

She tried to phase through it, and partly succeeded, but the wall seemed to spit her back out, and she fell, slumping to the floor.

Or did she simply run into the wall? Phasing's impossible, right?

Wolverine, meanwhile, had quickly separated Kurt and Mystique, holding the struggling teen tightly, whilst calling up reinforcements.

His request was quickly answered, and a four other guards, plus Dr McCoy. They broke up the fight between the X-men and the Brotherhood, and Dr McCoy went to inspect Kitty and Nurse Darkholme.

Jean watched, mutely, as the X-men were led away, all fairly passive, they knew they had lost. Only Kurt struggled against his guard, kicking and punching Logan whenever he could.

Nurse Darkholme, who had regained her wits somewhat, was screaming at him.

'Ben, please, stop, don't' struggle, it's OK, Ben, please, don't fight, it'll be fine.'

'Nein,' the teen screamed back, 'I'm not Benjamin, I am Kurt Wagner! Stop messing with my head, you bitch! I am Kurt Wagner, I am Kurt Wagner, I am-'

At this point Dr McCoy slipped a syringe into Kurt's arm, and he ceased struggling, hanging limp in Logan's arms.

Jean felt tears sting her eyes, and she ran out of the canteen again, hurrying back into her bedroom, trying to forget the sound of Kurt's desperate screams.

A few hours later, when darkness had claimed the sky outside, Jean dragged her heavy legs to Dr Xavier's office.

He sat in a large leather chair, his fingers steeped, his eyes hard, staring into hers as if they wanted to dissect every secret she possessed.

'May I sit down, sir?' she asked timidly.

He nodded, and she took a seat in the chair opposite him, unsure of what was to happen next.

'Miss Richardson,' he began, 'I was going to start your treatment today, but something else has come to my attention. Today Mr Logan reported that your Walkman had been stolen, and that you had asked him to leave the canteen, just before the… incident, occurred, so that he could inspect you room. Is that true?'

Jean nodded.

'Miss Richardson, when you came here your parents gave me a full inventory of all your possessions, you do not, in fact, own a Walkman.'

Jean was silent, she tried to keep both her mind and face unreadable.

'It has also come to my attention,' continued Xavier, 'that you have been seen talking to the Special Cases, also known as the X-men. Is this also true?

Jean said nothing.

'Margaret,' Dr Xavier was earnest now, leaning forward in his chair, closing the distance between them, 'this is important. Those children can be dangerous, both to themselves and to others. You should not spend too much time with them, I know they are fascinating, I know they may seem sincere and friendly but-'

'My name's not Margaret,'

Jean did not know why she said this, it merely came out, burst out of her frustration, fear, and anger. Xavier's reaction was immediate, a flash of confusion crossed his face briefly, followed by a look of true fear.

'What do you mean?' he asked.

'I am Jean Grey. I'm not sure who you are, I'm not sure what's going on, but at least I know who I am. All the X-men know their identities now, and you can't take that away from us, no matter how hard you try.'

Xavier leaned forward still further, 'please, listen to yourself, Margaret,' he hissed, 'listen, I know that you… you feel that you're this Jean Grey, but you're not. You are Margaret Richardson, and you have been… been brainwashed by those other children, made to think that you're someone else. It's what happened to all of them, they were persuaded by Thomas, and now they totally believe that they're someone else. But it's not too late for you, Margaret, you can still come back, please, don't believe them, I know it's tempting to go into their fantasy world but it's not real! It's a complex lie, a phoney!'

'You're the only phoney here,' spat Jean, 'I don't know what you're trying to accomplish, but you won't do it.'

'I only want you to get better,' cried the Doctor, 'please, listen to yourself, Margaret, listen to who you think you are? A superhero? A super-powered teenager in spandex? Works great in comic books, but this is real life! Think about it, telepathy, teleportation, phasing, optic-blasts, blue-furred demons! It's ridiculous, it could never exist!'

Jean's face remained unreadable.

'Please!' begged Xavier, 'I've lost four students to this already, don't make me lose you! Just talk to me, Margaret, I can help you!'

'But I am Jean Grey,' Jean replied stonily, 'not Margaret Richardson, and until you're ready to explain things to me, to explain why you're doing this to us, then I have nothing to say.'

With this she got up out of the chair and walked out, closing the door behind her.

Once outside she leaned against the wall, sweat dripping from her face, trying to calm down. Keeping up an iron visage had been hard, and now her stomach was doing tumbles. Her stomach danced even more when she heard Dr Xavier's voice, faint from behind the wall.

'Mr Richardson? Yes, it's Dr Xavier. I'm afraid I have some bad news regarding your daughter.'

*Translated this should be 'good evening my friend,' but I think that I've got the spelling and grammar wrong. A nice person on Internutter's site (which is a must visit in you have even a passing interest in Kurt) gave me the actual translation, but as that's down at the moment you're going to have to put up with bad German. Sorry!