Apparently, no one wants to know. *Sigh* Oh well. You're all going to find out ANYWAY!! So booyah!
MetaChi, it appears you are my only faithful reader, and if you have no, life…it doesn't matter to me!! For once, I don't have a really long A/N-response-to-a-review thingy to write in response to…your review. And seeing as NO ONE ELSE IS REVIEWING!!! *Cough* I suppose it's time to say-
-On with the fic!
Oh wait! Let it be known that from here on in, Kurt no longer says "Was," the German word for 'what,' but 'vhat.' The only reason I did that before was b/c a friend of mine informed me that no respectable English-speaking German person would say 'vhat' b/c it sounds too much like their word for 'fat.' As is obvious, I have decided to ignore him. In your face, Bernard Michael O'Brien III!
Okay, on with the fic for real this time…
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"Your family, Janella?" She nodded.
"My stepmothers in New Jersey," she clarified. Kurt shifted uncomfortably and half got to his feet.
"Uh…zhould I…?" he started. She grabbed his wrist, almost urgently.
"No! Stay…I want you to hear this too," she said earnestly. She bit her lip and reached for her laptop, flipping the thing open and booting it up. "I…don't live with your typical family," she started haltingly.
"Vell, none of us here do, really," Kurt said encouragingly. Janella cocked an eyebrow at him.
"I know that," Janella replied. "But at least all of your families are earthen." As she waited a moment for the import of that statement to sink in, she pulled up a program on her computer, practiced fingers flying over the keys and tapping in a password almost before the dialogue box popped up.
"Wait a moment," Professor X said. "Are you implying that your step-parents are…are…?" Janella nodded sharply.
"Extraterrestrials, yep," she said. "Ain't that a bombshell?" She clicked the mouse buttons rapidly a few times and he computer began to whir rapidly. A pair of images, 3-D holograms, rose in front of the screen. One showed a tall thin creature with skin of a bright green. What parts of the limbs that could be seen were stick-thin, spindly. It had wide, slightly luminous red eyes, and a pair of boxily curled black antennae. It was dressed in a definitely in-human manner, with what looked like some sort of armor covering its upper body. Only two fingers could be seen.
The other, if the holograms were to scale, was shorter than the first. It looked almost the same. It had green skin and red eyes, but antennae with a kink on the end instead of the curls. Unlike the other figure, though, this one was dressed in human clothes, albeit vastly oversized ones. She turned the computer around so the others could see it.
"Are…those your stepmothers?" Ororo asked. Janella shook her head with a laugh.
"No!" She pointed to the one not in human clothes. "She's one of them. ZaiFae Luthuviel; she's an Irken, they both are. The other is her son, Reno."
"The one who spooked you when we first met?" Ororo asked. She nodded.
"The one and only." Kurt opened his mouth, but she cut him off. "He was wearing his own hologram projector."
"Oh."
She took a deep breath. The two holograms flickered and disappeared, to be replaced with another one, this time of a solitary being. It was taller appearing than the other two, and had a quite human body. Its skin was a bright magenta color, and it had a pair of wings that looked exactly like Janella's folded to its back. Its arms were crossed over its ample chest. The most unusual thing about it was its head. It had a pointed snout, and a long, bony, curving crest jutting from the back of its head. It wore form-fitting, relatively human clothes…though the platform boots looked like something out of the seventies rather than the current times.
"Lightwing Moonstars," she said. "My other stepmother. One word of advice-don't get on her bad side. She's more powerful than you can imagine!"
"Really?" Professor X questioned. "How so?" Janella opened her mouth to respond, but was cut off-by a shout in her head.
~Janella Baduini, spill one thing about me and you'll regret it if you even set foot on our property again!~
Janella winced away, and the Professor pressed his hands to his temples.
~Not so loud, please,~ he requested.
~Calm down, Lightwing,~ Janella snapped, thought voice cold. ~I won't say anything else.~
~Yeah, you better not.~ With that injunction, the voice was gone. Janella rolled her eyes and sighed harshly.
"I can't believe she was monitoring my mind! Doesn't she trust me?" she asked, sounding extremely hurt.
"She was…monitoring your mind? At that distance?" Professor X asked incredulously.
"Yeah. Can you believe that?" She crossed her arms and flopped back against the pillow.
"She has quite an amazing reach," he commented. She nodded.
"I told you she was powerful. We're lucky she doesn't ever get the urge to conquer a sentient planet, or we'd be in major trouble." They lapsed into silence for a few moments, and Ororo was the first to break it.
"How did you come to be living with…with them?" she asked tentatively. Janella dropped her eyes.
"According to Lightwing, they found me in a garbage can one day, and she…well, she adopted me."
"You mean you lived vith zat full time?" Kurt asked. Apparently he too had heard Lightwing's outburst.
"She's usually not that bad," Janella said, glancing apologetically at Professor X. She shifted uncomfortably under the gazes of the three. "Now you see why I didn't want to tell anybody. Sure, this school is very accepting, and we're all mutants here, so we all know what it's like to be left out. Among us, no one is really, truly excluded. But, well…even the most open-minded of people have trouble with the fact that not only are there extraterrestrials on the planet, but one of their number lived with them for most of her life."
The Professor nodded. "I can see your point," he said. "That is something that's…very hard to accept."
"You're telling me," she said with an eye roll. "So, keeping in mind how hard it is for people to accept this little tidbit, do you think you guys could maybe not spread it all over the Institute?"
"Oh of course, Janella," the Professor said. "I can see why you wouldn't want it spread, so don't worry. Your secret is safe."
"Cross my heart," Kurt added. Janella smiled at them.
"That's a relief," Janella said with a laugh. She inclined her upper body at them, and winced as her wing twitched.
"You must stop doing zat," Kurt said with a laugh. She shrugged.
"Sorry if I'm causing you any discomfort, blue boy," she said sarcastically.
"Well, dinnertime is approaching, so we must be going," the Professor said politely. Janella nodded.
"I'll send Evan down with your meal, Janella," Ororo said, rising and opening the door for Professor X. Janella waved jauntily as the three of them exited. When the door swung shut, the air over in the far corner of the room began to shimmer and wave. Then, like a curtain being dropped, Reno appeared, leaning jauntily, in all his Irken glory.
"That was close," he said with a laugh. She nodded.
"No joke. I think they took it pretty well though."
"Jeez, talk about giving me a heart attack," he said, eyeing her. "I though you were going to point me out! And then Lightwing…" He trails off, rolling his eyes, and though he actually have pupils to indicate the movement, she had lived with him long enough to be able to tell.
"Nah," she said, shaking her head. "They may accept they concept, but they're definitely not ready for the real thing, so scat! You heard Ororo; her nephew will be down soon. And don't get caught!"
"Calm down, sis," he said. "You know I won't. Well, nice seeing you weren't dying. Mom will be reassured."
"Yeah, tell her I said hi," she said, before making a shooing gesture. "Now git!" She waved as he cracked open the door and slid out, disappearing as he went.
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"Ain't that a bombshell?" I just love that line. Seriously, it's one of the best lines in the fic…or at least the chapter. So, now you know who Janella's elusive and mysterious stepmothers are. Oh, and for the record, they're not aliens with lesbianistic tendencies. They live together for practical purposes only. How the heck d'you think ZaiFae got a son?? Sheesh. Actually, if you watched the show Invader ZIM, you'd know that Irkens are born from tubes…but ZaiFae's a very, VERY special case. *Nods*
So. Review. Please? I beg you!! I really need to know someone other than MetaChi is reading this. Even if you hated it, review. Tell me why! Just let me know you read it! Please? Come on!
Disclaimer: Now, not only do I not own X-Men: Evolution, I don't own Invader ZIM, or Irkens, either! Dammit. Mythos is me, however, and therefore mine, and Lightwing, who started as my creation along with the rest of her species, had evolved into her own person and personality, so I guess I really don't own her anymore either. Double dammit. Oh well!