A/N: First I'd like to say that I have a patchwork idea on any X-men Universe. So to make things easier on me and you the reader I'm just going to take the two versions I have the easiest access to and combine them to make a comprehensive world for all of this to enact in. I am using the 'Movie' rules and laws of society and the school lay out but putting the 'X-men: Evolution' cartoon version of the 'Main' Characters in there. I do this because the cartoon has characters that I can easily assimilate and understand but the Movie has a more interesting setting.
As far as anti-Mutant groups go I will probably just pull out any known ones (since I don't know them off hand) and create one that will fill the need should I find one is required. The 'Main' Characters (Nightcrawler, Wolverine, Rogue etc...) will not be showcased in this series except in one later or as a mention of some kind, but it's just easier to use set characters in that one compared to creating new ones to fit the bill.
Okay, with that out of the way, on to the rest of it...
The Lost and Unseen: Sins of the Mother
Gladys Horner was washing dishes that day.
She placed a cleaned and rinsed glass on a towel she had laid out on the counter when a bizarre 'Zatch-pop' found it's way through the air. She nearly dropped the wet glass onto the towel, but it seemed to wobble back upright on it's own as she raced into the living room.
Her son Joseph was curled on the floor just in front of the Television. The appliance itself was smoking slightly, a lighting flash of dark black across what parts of the screen hadn't cracked.
She knelt by her son who was holding his hand whimpering quietly. She was able to pry his other arm away to get a good look. He wasn't burned or marked in any way, but his clothes had been melted in spots.
"Joey?" She asked turning the unharmed hand over. "What happened?"
He looked at her frightfully. He was barely ten years old and was forced to acknowledge something shouldn't have to consider for a few more years. Something that made him a different part of society. "I was just going to turn it on." He said, voice cracking. "It just blew up, all I did was turn it on. I'm sorry, I didn't mean to."
She stroked his head, a tissue box seemed to be closer than normal and she pulled a few to dry his tears. "Joey, you have to be careful. We have to replace the TV before your father gets home."
Her son, her poor son. Small, skinny, scraggly hair, and a Mutant, all of this made him something most people would turn away from. And it was all her fault.
"Come on, get up. I know you can't really control what's happening to you." She straightened his clothes and hair as he stood. "But you have to be more careful. If your father ever finds out."
"Let him find out." Joey said sounding angrier than he'd intended.
Her eyes fell to the floor. "No, he can't baby."
"Momma, we can go somewhere else. Be around people like us. Mrs. Wetts next door, she knows of this place."
She was so ashamed. It was because of her and her faulty genes that he had any power at all, if only... "No honey, don't talk like that. You're too young to talk like that."
She turned her head to face the front door when the sound of a car pulling up reached her. "Oh shit. I mean shoot. Oh I don't know what I mean." She stood up looking worriedly at Joey. "You're father's home." She strode to the TV and tipped it over. The crash wasn't deafening but the screen split along the web work of breaks as it hit the floor. "I'll tell him I broke it on accident, you get to your room."
Joey dashed up the stairs to his room pausing at the top just out of sight. The door had opened.
Daddy was home.
"Gladys what the hell happened to the TV?"
"Mike, please, it was an accident, I was dusting and I guess I reached too far and."
"Shut up." Michael Horner slapped his wife.
She didn't spring back from the assault and remained motionless. "It was an accident."
"Do you want another one?" He asked threateningly.
Before she could answer a voice called from above. "Don't you do that again!"
Mike looked up the staircase to his son. "Joey, the hell are you doing?"
"Telling you to back off." For a ten year old he was doing a good job of presenting himself boldly. "Don't you ever touch my mother again!"
"Oh, so the little bastard wants to play does he? Well come on big man, lets see what you got." He advanced up the stairs.
Joey put a hand on the wall where he stood, the electric pattern burned into the wallpaper and plaster beneath it. He couldn't help but smile at the look on his fathers face. The man that had been a bane on his mothers' life.
"You little Mutant. I should beat you within an inch of your life." Mike said dangerously.
"Try it."
"Mike please! Joey stop, go to your room."
Michael turned on his wife. "It was you, you did this. You infected little wretch. I knew I should have left you in that dead-end town where I found you."
"Mike, please don't say that." She was starting to cry.
"I said leave her alone!" The boys' power could not travel through the air but the staircase became an impressive display of electricity and melted plastic as the shock reached up burning through the older mans shoes regardless of the rubber the soles consisted of.
Mike went rolling and landed rather hard at the base of the staircase.
Joey, breathing hard and more than a little dazed at what he'd just done, bolted down the stairs. He grabbed his mothers' hand. "C'mon, we have to go while he's out we." He pulled on the doorknob and stopped in his tracks.
There, hand raised to knock, was Mrs. Wetts. She was a strange old woman from next door with white hair she'd possessed since she was born. A pair of bright purple eyes normally kept behind dark sunglasses gazed down at the boy. "I see you've taken matters into your own hands anyway my little Strike."
Joey clung to his mother. "He did it again."
Mrs. Wetts nodded. "I know, I could feel it from my kitchen. The car will be here soon." Those strange eyes lifted to Gladys. "My dear, I'm so sorry, I should have taken care of this long ago. But it was your life not mine."
"What are you doing here?" Gladys asked suddenly.
Mrs. Wetts smiled. "I doubt your son has had the chance to tell you. There is a place, I was hoping to sneak you out. It's for people like you."
"A Woman's shelter?" She asked increasing her hold on Joey.
The older woman shook her head. "Don't think I haven't seen you. The glass of milk that never spills, the napkin that never hits the ground, the errant utensil that's just out of your reach suddenly sliding into your hand." Her smile widened. "It's a place for Mutants my dear."
A non-descript gray car pulled up in front of the house. A woman with sharp features and cat-eyes got out, claws held in a way that made them less noticeable.
A man got out from the drivers side. He looked normal enough. "Well if it isn't old Violet-Eyes." He called smiling cordially as he approached. "How's things?"
Mrs. Wetts gave him a long look.
His eyes seemed to lose their focus, then snapped back into place. "That bad huh?" He looked to Gladys. "My name is Richie, most call me Equal." He held out a hand to shake.
She took it carefully.
Richie's attention turned to the boy. "So you're Strike huh?"
"Strike?" Gladys asked.
"That's my name mom. I can send electricity into anything I touch. Anything." Joey said while looking up at her.
A moan behind them alerted Richie and his less-than-talkative partner to Mike in the background.
Mrs. Wetts pulled Gladys farther out of the house. Joey followed closely. "Quickly dear, before that brute wakes."
"But." She thought about trying to get away, but didn't.
"Gladys?" Mike got to his feet slowly leaning out the front door. His wife was about to get into a strange car with a strange man and the kooky old woman from next door. And what the hell was that Mutant doing standing by them all. The cat-like-woman glared at him from her place between him and his departing family.
"Gladys you get back here! Gladys!"
His wife stopped getting into the car and faced him. "Mike, please, don't do this."
He looked at her. Really looked at her. That bitch Mutant wife of his had infected his son and was now going to abandon him. Stupid... "Gladys don't make me come over there."
She was actually about to head back to him when Mrs. Wetts stopped her. "Don't dear, he's not worth it."
Mike ducked back into the house and returned a moment later, an empty beer bottle in hand. "Stupid witch!" The bottle went flying.
The cat-mutant reached a hand out to catch the object but it never got to her.
Richie stared at this woman he'd been sent to collect from a bad situation. Her eyes were a color of gray he couldn't recall them being before. He glanced back at the house and saw a brown glass bottle sitting quietly in the air. Telekinesis was not exactly a radical power but she was obviously very strong. She'd caught the bottle quickly; it couldn't be more than five feet from the man who'd thrown it.
"Mike, leave us alone."
"You come back here. Now damn it!"
Gladys let a few tears well up as she let the bottle splinter into long pieces. "Mike, please."
Richie looked at Mrs. Wetts. "What the hell? Did she just do what I think she did?"
The old woman nodded. "Seems she's stronger than I thought. Calm her before she actually does kill the man."
Richie had a reason behind his code-name 'Equal'. He wore no gloves so his hand easily made contact with the skin of Gladys's arm.
Immediately the shards of glass clinked to the ground. An overwhelming sense of calm came over her. She felt, well, equal. As if something she needed had been added to her letting her be balanced out.
Mike shook away the momentary fear. It had looked as if Gladys was actually going to kill him. He started to leave the door when his wife was shut up in the car.
The cat-mutant came into full view and held out her hand. "If you come any closer I will be forced to break bones you never knew existed pal." She said in a strangely deep voice. "This woman is going somewhere safe, I don't suggest you follow or try to find her. If you do you will be arrested and taken to a court of law."
Mike stood still, glaring at the *thing* that was now telling him what to do. "Fine, take them, you can keep both those freaks." He turned around and went back into the house slamming the door behind him.
Mrs Wetts peered into the car window and waved good-bye to the boy she'd gotten to know over the last few months since his powers had shown themselves. His mother was still lost in the swoon of Equals' gift.
Once the car was out of sight she put on her sunglasses and simply went home.
* * *
"Gladys tell me how you feel."
She looked up at the strange man. He was very nice and had a wonderful voice. Though he was completely bald and confined to a wheel chair he seemed perfectly normal.
"Lost." She said quietly.
He nodded. "Richard and Fiona tell me you expressed a Mutant power of your own when they picked you up. Even my associate Deana Wetts says she's seen you use it. Would you like to tell me about it?"
She looked down. "I, I can't."
"Are you afraid?"
She nodded.
"Of what Gladys?"
She shook her head slightly. "I can't let anyone find out. Mike, he made me promise to never use them when we got married. Then when Joey was born, I just got so frustrated. I started using them a little at a time to get things done." She looked up. "Not in front of him of course."
The Professor nodded. "Tell my Gladys. Did Michael hit you often?"
She froze. A slight buzz entered the back of her mind. She didn't quite know it but the Professor was giving her a slight nudge of confidence. Sometimes required to get a few patients to face a fear or reality.
"Y-yes."
"And you never retaliated?"
She shook her head more defiantly. "I could have hurt him. I mean, I can lift a car if I keep my mind at it."
He quirked an eyebrow. Few Mutants from their generation had a Telekinetic power of her sort at that magnitude.
"Interesting. Do you have any other powers at all?"
"No."
Xavier leaned forward on his desk. "Gladys, I'd like you to consider staying here at the Institute. There are very few Mutants of your age that show themselves. I'm sure you could help many of the children here with powers similar to you. You and Jean could benefit from each other come to think of it."
Her hands twisted in her lap. "I don't know. I'm so scared. What if Mike finds."
"He won't." The professor said interrupting her. "He's already had a restraining order placed against him and he's on our Watch List. Many of our students are being protected from similar situations."
"But. I'm just a house wife." Another buzz entered her mind and she felt a little calmer.
"We do have job openings in the Institute if you'd like to take one up. You could even consider classes on one of our many scholarships. This is a place to allow Mutants the chance to be productive members of society and the use of their powers at the same time." He kept up the buzz letting her get the full impact of the opportunity he was giving her. "You have a gift. Many in," He paused. "Our generation did not get a chance to use what they have. I was very lucky. I sincerely wish you had been as fortunate. You have a very strong ability that even with dis-use has become very impressive."
She looked down at the floor as he removed his influence. This was her decision, not his.
"Let us help you Gladys."
She took a moment to glance out the window. She could plainly see many of the students already enrolled. Joey would defiantly fit in here. She'd already seen him comparing powers with a couple of other children who used electricity.
But would she?
"You say, there are others with powers like mine?" She asked looking back to the Professor.
He nodded. Even without trying he could hear her debating with herself on the matter. Mental powers often had a physic offshoot to them, she seemed to have a very mild ability to project her thoughts. She could use some training in 'lowering her voice' so to speak.
"I, I don't know. But maybe, at least for a little while. For Joey."
He nodded. "As long as you like. I'll have Jean show you around. She has Telekinetic powers as well." He pressed a small button on the intercom.
A girl, possibly in her Senior year of high school came in, red hair loose down her back. She looked very, normal.
"Jean, this is Gladys Horner. She'll be staying with us." The Professor said. "Gladys, this is Jean Grey. Jean, if you'll show her to the room we set up for her and her son."
"Of course Professor." Jean said holding her hand out to Gladys.
The older woman shook it carefully as she was escorted from the room.
"So." Jean said. "You're Strike's mother?" She was very impressed with this woman. So few Mutants at his age or even Gladys's age had the courage to even come to him. Fewer still to be open about their ability to themselves.
"Yes. Though I guess he'll always be Joey to me." She paused a moment. "Do you have a name like that too?"
Jean gave a small laugh. "No, I'm just Jean. It's a little harder getting a 'Name' when you're abilities are all mental ones. Anything you come up with makes you sound like a bad 70's super hero or something."
Gladys smiled. "I suppose."
Jean motioned Gladys further down the hall. "The room for you two is down here.
Gladys glanced in the direction she was about to go. Jean just stood there waiting with a smile for her to follow. It looked so nice, no threats if she slipped up on her power, no smacks if she didn't make dinner just right.
Maybe she would stay here.
As far as anti-Mutant groups go I will probably just pull out any known ones (since I don't know them off hand) and create one that will fill the need should I find one is required. The 'Main' Characters (Nightcrawler, Wolverine, Rogue etc...) will not be showcased in this series except in one later or as a mention of some kind, but it's just easier to use set characters in that one compared to creating new ones to fit the bill.
Okay, with that out of the way, on to the rest of it...
The Lost and Unseen: Sins of the Mother
Gladys Horner was washing dishes that day.
She placed a cleaned and rinsed glass on a towel she had laid out on the counter when a bizarre 'Zatch-pop' found it's way through the air. She nearly dropped the wet glass onto the towel, but it seemed to wobble back upright on it's own as she raced into the living room.
Her son Joseph was curled on the floor just in front of the Television. The appliance itself was smoking slightly, a lighting flash of dark black across what parts of the screen hadn't cracked.
She knelt by her son who was holding his hand whimpering quietly. She was able to pry his other arm away to get a good look. He wasn't burned or marked in any way, but his clothes had been melted in spots.
"Joey?" She asked turning the unharmed hand over. "What happened?"
He looked at her frightfully. He was barely ten years old and was forced to acknowledge something shouldn't have to consider for a few more years. Something that made him a different part of society. "I was just going to turn it on." He said, voice cracking. "It just blew up, all I did was turn it on. I'm sorry, I didn't mean to."
She stroked his head, a tissue box seemed to be closer than normal and she pulled a few to dry his tears. "Joey, you have to be careful. We have to replace the TV before your father gets home."
Her son, her poor son. Small, skinny, scraggly hair, and a Mutant, all of this made him something most people would turn away from. And it was all her fault.
"Come on, get up. I know you can't really control what's happening to you." She straightened his clothes and hair as he stood. "But you have to be more careful. If your father ever finds out."
"Let him find out." Joey said sounding angrier than he'd intended.
Her eyes fell to the floor. "No, he can't baby."
"Momma, we can go somewhere else. Be around people like us. Mrs. Wetts next door, she knows of this place."
She was so ashamed. It was because of her and her faulty genes that he had any power at all, if only... "No honey, don't talk like that. You're too young to talk like that."
She turned her head to face the front door when the sound of a car pulling up reached her. "Oh shit. I mean shoot. Oh I don't know what I mean." She stood up looking worriedly at Joey. "You're father's home." She strode to the TV and tipped it over. The crash wasn't deafening but the screen split along the web work of breaks as it hit the floor. "I'll tell him I broke it on accident, you get to your room."
Joey dashed up the stairs to his room pausing at the top just out of sight. The door had opened.
Daddy was home.
"Gladys what the hell happened to the TV?"
"Mike, please, it was an accident, I was dusting and I guess I reached too far and."
"Shut up." Michael Horner slapped his wife.
She didn't spring back from the assault and remained motionless. "It was an accident."
"Do you want another one?" He asked threateningly.
Before she could answer a voice called from above. "Don't you do that again!"
Mike looked up the staircase to his son. "Joey, the hell are you doing?"
"Telling you to back off." For a ten year old he was doing a good job of presenting himself boldly. "Don't you ever touch my mother again!"
"Oh, so the little bastard wants to play does he? Well come on big man, lets see what you got." He advanced up the stairs.
Joey put a hand on the wall where he stood, the electric pattern burned into the wallpaper and plaster beneath it. He couldn't help but smile at the look on his fathers face. The man that had been a bane on his mothers' life.
"You little Mutant. I should beat you within an inch of your life." Mike said dangerously.
"Try it."
"Mike please! Joey stop, go to your room."
Michael turned on his wife. "It was you, you did this. You infected little wretch. I knew I should have left you in that dead-end town where I found you."
"Mike, please don't say that." She was starting to cry.
"I said leave her alone!" The boys' power could not travel through the air but the staircase became an impressive display of electricity and melted plastic as the shock reached up burning through the older mans shoes regardless of the rubber the soles consisted of.
Mike went rolling and landed rather hard at the base of the staircase.
Joey, breathing hard and more than a little dazed at what he'd just done, bolted down the stairs. He grabbed his mothers' hand. "C'mon, we have to go while he's out we." He pulled on the doorknob and stopped in his tracks.
There, hand raised to knock, was Mrs. Wetts. She was a strange old woman from next door with white hair she'd possessed since she was born. A pair of bright purple eyes normally kept behind dark sunglasses gazed down at the boy. "I see you've taken matters into your own hands anyway my little Strike."
Joey clung to his mother. "He did it again."
Mrs. Wetts nodded. "I know, I could feel it from my kitchen. The car will be here soon." Those strange eyes lifted to Gladys. "My dear, I'm so sorry, I should have taken care of this long ago. But it was your life not mine."
"What are you doing here?" Gladys asked suddenly.
Mrs. Wetts smiled. "I doubt your son has had the chance to tell you. There is a place, I was hoping to sneak you out. It's for people like you."
"A Woman's shelter?" She asked increasing her hold on Joey.
The older woman shook her head. "Don't think I haven't seen you. The glass of milk that never spills, the napkin that never hits the ground, the errant utensil that's just out of your reach suddenly sliding into your hand." Her smile widened. "It's a place for Mutants my dear."
A non-descript gray car pulled up in front of the house. A woman with sharp features and cat-eyes got out, claws held in a way that made them less noticeable.
A man got out from the drivers side. He looked normal enough. "Well if it isn't old Violet-Eyes." He called smiling cordially as he approached. "How's things?"
Mrs. Wetts gave him a long look.
His eyes seemed to lose their focus, then snapped back into place. "That bad huh?" He looked to Gladys. "My name is Richie, most call me Equal." He held out a hand to shake.
She took it carefully.
Richie's attention turned to the boy. "So you're Strike huh?"
"Strike?" Gladys asked.
"That's my name mom. I can send electricity into anything I touch. Anything." Joey said while looking up at her.
A moan behind them alerted Richie and his less-than-talkative partner to Mike in the background.
Mrs. Wetts pulled Gladys farther out of the house. Joey followed closely. "Quickly dear, before that brute wakes."
"But." She thought about trying to get away, but didn't.
"Gladys?" Mike got to his feet slowly leaning out the front door. His wife was about to get into a strange car with a strange man and the kooky old woman from next door. And what the hell was that Mutant doing standing by them all. The cat-like-woman glared at him from her place between him and his departing family.
"Gladys you get back here! Gladys!"
His wife stopped getting into the car and faced him. "Mike, please, don't do this."
He looked at her. Really looked at her. That bitch Mutant wife of his had infected his son and was now going to abandon him. Stupid... "Gladys don't make me come over there."
She was actually about to head back to him when Mrs. Wetts stopped her. "Don't dear, he's not worth it."
Mike ducked back into the house and returned a moment later, an empty beer bottle in hand. "Stupid witch!" The bottle went flying.
The cat-mutant reached a hand out to catch the object but it never got to her.
Richie stared at this woman he'd been sent to collect from a bad situation. Her eyes were a color of gray he couldn't recall them being before. He glanced back at the house and saw a brown glass bottle sitting quietly in the air. Telekinesis was not exactly a radical power but she was obviously very strong. She'd caught the bottle quickly; it couldn't be more than five feet from the man who'd thrown it.
"Mike, leave us alone."
"You come back here. Now damn it!"
Gladys let a few tears well up as she let the bottle splinter into long pieces. "Mike, please."
Richie looked at Mrs. Wetts. "What the hell? Did she just do what I think she did?"
The old woman nodded. "Seems she's stronger than I thought. Calm her before she actually does kill the man."
Richie had a reason behind his code-name 'Equal'. He wore no gloves so his hand easily made contact with the skin of Gladys's arm.
Immediately the shards of glass clinked to the ground. An overwhelming sense of calm came over her. She felt, well, equal. As if something she needed had been added to her letting her be balanced out.
Mike shook away the momentary fear. It had looked as if Gladys was actually going to kill him. He started to leave the door when his wife was shut up in the car.
The cat-mutant came into full view and held out her hand. "If you come any closer I will be forced to break bones you never knew existed pal." She said in a strangely deep voice. "This woman is going somewhere safe, I don't suggest you follow or try to find her. If you do you will be arrested and taken to a court of law."
Mike stood still, glaring at the *thing* that was now telling him what to do. "Fine, take them, you can keep both those freaks." He turned around and went back into the house slamming the door behind him.
Mrs Wetts peered into the car window and waved good-bye to the boy she'd gotten to know over the last few months since his powers had shown themselves. His mother was still lost in the swoon of Equals' gift.
Once the car was out of sight she put on her sunglasses and simply went home.
* * *
"Gladys tell me how you feel."
She looked up at the strange man. He was very nice and had a wonderful voice. Though he was completely bald and confined to a wheel chair he seemed perfectly normal.
"Lost." She said quietly.
He nodded. "Richard and Fiona tell me you expressed a Mutant power of your own when they picked you up. Even my associate Deana Wetts says she's seen you use it. Would you like to tell me about it?"
She looked down. "I, I can't."
"Are you afraid?"
She nodded.
"Of what Gladys?"
She shook her head slightly. "I can't let anyone find out. Mike, he made me promise to never use them when we got married. Then when Joey was born, I just got so frustrated. I started using them a little at a time to get things done." She looked up. "Not in front of him of course."
The Professor nodded. "Tell my Gladys. Did Michael hit you often?"
She froze. A slight buzz entered the back of her mind. She didn't quite know it but the Professor was giving her a slight nudge of confidence. Sometimes required to get a few patients to face a fear or reality.
"Y-yes."
"And you never retaliated?"
She shook her head more defiantly. "I could have hurt him. I mean, I can lift a car if I keep my mind at it."
He quirked an eyebrow. Few Mutants from their generation had a Telekinetic power of her sort at that magnitude.
"Interesting. Do you have any other powers at all?"
"No."
Xavier leaned forward on his desk. "Gladys, I'd like you to consider staying here at the Institute. There are very few Mutants of your age that show themselves. I'm sure you could help many of the children here with powers similar to you. You and Jean could benefit from each other come to think of it."
Her hands twisted in her lap. "I don't know. I'm so scared. What if Mike finds."
"He won't." The professor said interrupting her. "He's already had a restraining order placed against him and he's on our Watch List. Many of our students are being protected from similar situations."
"But. I'm just a house wife." Another buzz entered her mind and she felt a little calmer.
"We do have job openings in the Institute if you'd like to take one up. You could even consider classes on one of our many scholarships. This is a place to allow Mutants the chance to be productive members of society and the use of their powers at the same time." He kept up the buzz letting her get the full impact of the opportunity he was giving her. "You have a gift. Many in," He paused. "Our generation did not get a chance to use what they have. I was very lucky. I sincerely wish you had been as fortunate. You have a very strong ability that even with dis-use has become very impressive."
She looked down at the floor as he removed his influence. This was her decision, not his.
"Let us help you Gladys."
She took a moment to glance out the window. She could plainly see many of the students already enrolled. Joey would defiantly fit in here. She'd already seen him comparing powers with a couple of other children who used electricity.
But would she?
"You say, there are others with powers like mine?" She asked looking back to the Professor.
He nodded. Even without trying he could hear her debating with herself on the matter. Mental powers often had a physic offshoot to them, she seemed to have a very mild ability to project her thoughts. She could use some training in 'lowering her voice' so to speak.
"I, I don't know. But maybe, at least for a little while. For Joey."
He nodded. "As long as you like. I'll have Jean show you around. She has Telekinetic powers as well." He pressed a small button on the intercom.
A girl, possibly in her Senior year of high school came in, red hair loose down her back. She looked very, normal.
"Jean, this is Gladys Horner. She'll be staying with us." The Professor said. "Gladys, this is Jean Grey. Jean, if you'll show her to the room we set up for her and her son."
"Of course Professor." Jean said holding her hand out to Gladys.
The older woman shook it carefully as she was escorted from the room.
"So." Jean said. "You're Strike's mother?" She was very impressed with this woman. So few Mutants at his age or even Gladys's age had the courage to even come to him. Fewer still to be open about their ability to themselves.
"Yes. Though I guess he'll always be Joey to me." She paused a moment. "Do you have a name like that too?"
Jean gave a small laugh. "No, I'm just Jean. It's a little harder getting a 'Name' when you're abilities are all mental ones. Anything you come up with makes you sound like a bad 70's super hero or something."
Gladys smiled. "I suppose."
Jean motioned Gladys further down the hall. "The room for you two is down here.
Gladys glanced in the direction she was about to go. Jean just stood there waiting with a smile for her to follow. It looked so nice, no threats if she slipped up on her power, no smacks if she didn't make dinner just right.
Maybe she would stay here.