Help! Part 2

Valued Introduction

"Here, you can wear these." Rouge held up a pair of plain blue jeans and a back t-shirt. "If we're the same size then they should fit." She stated.

"Thanks Rouge." Ardelle said as she accepted them. "Uh, where can I change?" She asked.

"Oh," Rouge smiled lightly. "There's a bathroom right in there." She pointed, her accent coming in pretty thickly. Ardelle looked to where the brunet had pointed and walked to the small room, closing the door. Rouge came to stand by it and leaned against the frame of the door, her harms crossed over her chest.

"So, what's your mutant power Rouge?" Ardelle's voice came through the door.

"Well… It's a little complicated. If I touch someone I can absorb their life energy – and their memories." She said, a hand coming up to brush one of the white strands of hair that had escaped and slid before her face. "That's why I have to wear these gloves, is because is has to happen through skin contact."

"I see." Ardelle said. A sudden thump came from the bathroom. "Ow!" Her voice escaped. "I'm okay!" She said as soon as she could.

Rouge laughed. "What did you do?" She asked.

"I uh—I kinda tripped while pulling on the jeans and stubbed my toe." She said.

Rouge smiled, but it quickly faded away. "Hey, Ardelle, where did Logan find you?" She asked.

"I –" She paused to clear her throat. "I was … uh…" She opened the door. "This is going to take a while to explain." She said, looking Rouge in the eyes.

"Why?" She asked.

"Well… it's a little complicated, as you say." Ardelle said, referring back to Rouge's word choice. When Rouge didn't respond Ardelle sighed and stepped from the bathroom, dressed in her borrowed clothes. "I escaped from a prison, used for holding mutants. It was once used for keeping juvenile kids who had been caught in possession of drugs, but they changed it. They – don't as me who they are, I'm not quite sure—but they build another prison. The new prison is a secret though, everyone still believes that dealers and users still go to Sampson, where they did before. But now…" Ardelle shook her head.

"So," She continued on, "I escaped with some friends. We got separated though, I don't know if they made it out. I hope they did. But I kept going, like we all agreed that we would if we were split up. And I came to the road that Logan was driving on. He nearly ran me over actually." Ardelle gave a light chuckle at that. "Anyway, I told him all about the prison changes, because he still knew it as a place for drug addicts. And he said he'd help me. He brought me here." She said.

Rouge nodded. "…Do you like Logan?" She asked.

A sly smile fell across Ardelle's face. "You mean, like him?" Ardelle asked, and when Rouge nodded she smiled. "Nope. I figured you did, considering the look on your face when you saw me." She said.

Rouge shook her head. "I don't like him like that. It's just, he helped me the same way he helped you... only not quite." She said. "So I just wanna look after him a little, you know? And anyway, who knows what kind of treacherous fiend you were hiding within yourself!"

She and Ardelle laughed a little at that, but something in Ardelle flipped as the words replayed themselves in her mind. 'Treacherous fiend.' When had she heard those before? As she laughed she tried to remember, but couldn't, and had a feeling she didn't want to.

"Well, let's get you to Professor Gray, shall we?" Rouge introduced. Ardelle nodded and they made their way out the room and down the hall.

* * *

"Professor Gray?" Rouge knocked on the large oak door. The sound of the bashing of Rouge's knuckles on the wood echoed around the hall they were in.

"Yes Rouge?" A voice came through.

"Professor X wants you to meet a new student." Rouge said as the 'click' of the door opening sounded and light streamed through the crack between the door and the frame that was quickly getting larger.

A woman with red hair wearing black slacks and a blue v-neck t-shirt emerged through the bright light of her room. "Hello there." She said easily, as she looked at Ardelle. "I'm Jean Gray." She said, extending a hand, which was accepted by the blinking blond. "Won't you come in?" She invited, stepping out of the way.

"Thank you." Ardelle said as she entered followed quickly by Rouge.

"So, you've been accepted into our school for the Gifted." Mrs. Gray stated. (A/N: Yes, it should be MRS, because in the movie she says, I quote, "… I married a good guy." So there!) "I suppose you'll need a schedule. What courses would you like to take for this semester?" She asked.

"Uh, well… what's offered?" Ardelle asked.

Mrs. Gray smiled politely. She walked over to a gray file cabinet and opened a drawer. She sifted through it for a few moments before finally pulling out a manila folder and tossing it onto the desk. Ardelle watched as a piece of paper and a pencil came floating towards her and rested themselves on the folder. "Fill out anything that looks like you'd want to take. You must have a Science, History or Geography of some sort, a Math course, and Literature. Anything else is optional." She explained as she closed the drawer and walked over. "Gym is only needed for students under junior year." She said as she pulled up a chair and took a seat.

"Okay." Ardelle grasped the pencil and opened the book, flipping through the courses. She wrote down the classes that were mandatory first:

Trigonometry Senior Literature Honors Physics European History AP

"There." She said. Jean picked up the paper and looked at it. "These are difficult classes." She said. Ardelle nodded.

"When I went to school with non-mutant students I was in Honors literature and I was going to take European History either junior or senior year. And I like physics, so I thought it would be appropriate. I'm also better at things like Geometry then Algebra, so, I thought Trig would be better." She explained a little unsure.

"All right. Well, you know your strengths better then I do." Jean said as she slipped the paper back in front of Ardelle. "You can look through and see if there are any other classes you'd like to take, or that can be it, and you just focus on those four major ones."

Ardelle nodded. She flipped through the rest of the packet, carefully reading the short description of each class was, and only wrote down two more.

Acting Studio Mechanics

"I'm done." Ardelle said. Jean picked up the paper again and read over it.

"Good." She said while nodding. She smiled when her eyes fell upon Ardelle's last pick. "My husband teaches Mechanics." She said. Ardelle gave a small smile. "All right. I'll type this up for you and give it to you at dinner, which will be at 6:30. I'm sure Rouge wouldn't mind escorting you?" Mrs. Gray looked to Rouge who was sitting cross-legged on Jean Gray's bed, elbows resting on her knees, her hands drooping down, and her jacket had slipped down a little from her shoulders.

"No problem." She said, as though she was excited. "Are you done Elle?" She asked. Ardelle blinked, a little surprised at the nickname that had just popped out of Rouge's mouth.

"Yeah, I'm finished." She said, standing, lifting the chair a little telepathically so that when her knees pushed it back it didn't scrape across the floor.

"Great! Let's roll." She said, jumping from the bed and walking over to Ardelle, she grabbed her hand and pulled her out the door.

"Thanks Mrs. Gray!" Ardelle managed to get out before she was jerked from the room.

* * *

"You can meet everyone now." Rouge said as they stopped in front of a door. "They're all pretty nice, and they'll accept you quickly. They did me anyway." She said, her knuckles once again rapping upon an oak door.

"Who is it?" A voice came from the other side.

"Sponge." She said. Ardelle looked to Rouge with a questioning gleam in her eye that made Rouge giggle. "It's because of my mutant power, you know? I can soak up people's energy?" She explained.

'Oh.' Ardelle's mouth formed, causing another light laugh to escape from Rouge, but it was covered up as shuffling occurred and the recognizable sliding sound of a chain lock being removed came through the door.

"Come on in." A voice said as the door opened, and a face emerged. He was pretty pail, small gray bags were under his eyes and his dirty blond hair was slicked back away from his face. The door opened more and Rouge slipped under his arm, followed quickly by Ardelle.

"Hey gang, this is Ardelle." Rouge introduced as soon as the blond boy had closed the door and slid the lock into place.

"Hi." A brunet said, waving. Her hair was tied in a ponytail and she wore blue bell-bottoms with a pink v-neck and a lighter pink underneath it. "I'm Kitty." She introduced herself.

"Sarah." Another girl introduced herself. Her red hair was a lock of red frizzles, a black leather choker was around her neck, and she was decked in a deep, long sleeved purple shirt, covered with a black fish-net-like vest and black pants, decorated randomly with safety pins.

"You all ready know Bobby." Rouge said as she walked over to him and sat next to him. He gave her a half smile and nodded his head towards Ardelle.

"Take a seat." The blond said behind Ardelle, who was still standing. She flinched a little, as she had forgotten he was there. When he saw her shoulders jerk he gave her a sly smile. "Pyro." He introduced himself, taking a step around her and replacing himself among the colorful assortment of pillows that littered the carpeted floor.

"Nice to meet all of you." She said as she took Pyro's advice and sat down on a blue pillow, leaning against the wall. The room wasn't very big, it was large enough to fit them all, but they wouldn't be able to run around and be crazy in it if they wanted.

"So, what's your power?" Sarah asked, her fingers tracing themselves along her choker.

"We're not really sure, but we think that I can adapt to physic attacks and things like that." Ardelle tried to explain. Sarah's eyebrows lifted themselves at that.

"Cool." She said. "I can harness rays of light and turn them into anything I want."

"My powers let my change my structure, so I can go through anything I want. I wall, this pillow... you." Kitty said. Ardelle smiled at Kitty's tone.

"What about you?" Ardelle asked Pyro.

He clicked the lighter in his hand and turned it on. "I can manipulate fire." He said in a creepy tone. The fire slicked from his lighter to his hand where he formed into a ball. He looked at Ardelle (whose eyes were watching the fire with amazement) and closed his fist, extinguishing the flame. He clicked shut his zippo.

"Cool." She said. They all grinned.

* * *

A/N: I know, it was little short and nothing really happened, but it will in the next chapter! I swear it will! Just hang in there, it will get more interesting… I hope… Review if you please! I do like reviews! And when time goes on I will not be following Jean and Ororo to get Nightcrawler, I'm going to stick with the kids. Okay? Okay! Quel lome!

~Sephron