Chapter 9: The Hearing
Ororo wheeled Xavier into the courtroom. It was fairly empty. The judge sat behind the bench, the court reporter was in the usual place, and over to the left, Dr. Hebron and Andi's parents were sitting. Ororo looked disappointed; she was hoping to see Andi.
"So what is the order of business today?" the judge peered over his glasses at Xavier.
The bailiff stepped over to the judge. "Mr. Xavier is here to petition your Honor for the removal of Mr. David Hebron as the legal guardian of the minor child, Alexandra Lorraine Sanderson."
The judge hmmm'd as he shuffled through the papers. "I see here that the child's parents, Robert Bruce Sanderson and Chelsea Marie Sanderson, signed over their child into his care. There is no mention of Mr. Xavier here." He peered over his glasses at Xavier. "Please explain why you are here, Mr. Xavier."
"I run a boarding school for gifted youngsters," Xavier said. "Alexandra was recently enrolled in classes, and she was in fact dropped off at my school a week ago by her parents, who were planning on taking a long overseas trip and did not wish to take their daughter with them. Though it was highly unusual, I agreed to allow the child to remain at school through the greater part of the summer holidays so that her parents could be free to pursue their other activities unhindered. Mrs. Sanderson gave me Alexandra's schedule and insisted that I be sure that she followed it to the letter each day. I have here a copy--" Xavier handed it to Ororo, who handed it to the bailiff, who passed it to the judge. He read it, his eyebrows dancing up and down several times in surprise, and then said to Robert, "You can't honestly expect a child to follow such a strict schedule during the summer vacation, do you?"
"Yes we do," Robert frowned. "Her doctor, David Hebron, insists that a strict, unvarying routine would be better for her mental health than an unstructured one such as other children may have. You see, Your Honor--"
Judge Ridenour held up a hand. "There will be time enough later for you to explain your side," he said firmly. "For now, Mr. Xavier, please continue."
Xavier compressed his lips and carefully didn't look at Robert as he continued. "Alexandra was informed that it would be impossible to follow the imposed schedule, as our staff during the holidays is not paid to wake her up. She seemed quite apprehensive about the change, and when pressed she admitted that her parents had threatened her with confinement in Dr. Hebron's asylum should she fail to live up to their impossible expectations. She was doing her best to follow her parents' schedule when we were awakened one night by her screams. She had a violent nightmare, and in an effort to calm her I asked her to tell me what she had dreamed about.
"She told us it was not just a dream, it was a memory. She then proceeded to inform us that Dr. Hebron, of whom she was terribly afraid, had incarcerated her in the mentally unstable wing of the asylum he was working at. Alexandra is an empath with a high degree of sensitivity; being trapped in rooms where the other individuals cannot control their emotions is the closest form of mental torture I have ever encountered. And as she had just recently come into possession of her gifts she had not yet learned to control what she was feeling; she did not know how to 'shield' her mind from the onslaught of others' emotions. Her parents consigned her to Dr. Hebron's care for a year, and in that time did not bother to visit her, or check up on her welfare or current condition. She was simply given to Dr. Hebron and forgotten.
"Dr. Hebron had a specific purpose for suggesting her parents entrust her to his care. He is doing some form of research on mentally ill, unstable, and autistic patients. As these individuals are incapable of reacting to stimuli, Dr. Hebron wanted Alexandra to tell him what the patient was feeling. This required a degree of specialized control that Alexandra did not possess. To force her to develop that control, Dr. Hebron locked her in an isolation chamber for days on end, without food or water or facilities to care for herself. She finally learned how to cope with the intense emotional onslaught; no small feat, considering she had never been trained or shown how to develop any kind of control. She did it by sheer will borne out of desperation and necessity. Dr. Hebron told her that if she could learn to shield then she could help him with his patients and she would be permitted to go home.
"That was not the case. Upon finding Alexandra had managed to form rudimentary shields, Dr. Hebron then locked her in rooms with dangerously unstable individuals to force her to concentrate on one specific person's emotions. When he became impatient with the slowness of her progress he commenced using electroshock therapy on her, channeling electricity at much higher levels than is normally used through electrodes on her skin to 'encourage' her to develop the control he wanted her to have. As a result of these sessions with him, Alexandra has permanent burn marks and scars on her body where the electrodes were placed.
"She was eventually sent home by a new doctor at the facility when Dr. Hebron was transferred to a different asylum in Boston. His license has been revoked by the American Medical Association and by the American Mental Health Association, for unconscionable practices upon the inmates in Boston and he has been banned from practicing in his chosen field, psychotherapy, permanently. However, my recent research indicates that he has been hired to consult in a private hospital funded by a liberal-minded gentleman out in Colorado. I am concerned that Dr. Hebron might attempt to take Alexandra to Colorado, halt her schooling, and commit the same atrocities on her that he did before."
The judge heard Xavier out, and then said, "I'd like to hear from Alexandra's parents. Mr. and Mrs. Sanderson, if what has happened to the child is indeed true, then you have a great deal to answer for."
Chelsea began. "Alexandra was always such a difficult child. She was quiet, moody, depressed, and not at all like the other children at her school. She didn't really seem too much different from them, though, until she turned ten. Then she suddenly started to act up, cause all sorts of trouble at school, and pick fights. My husband and I even canceled our European tour one year because the school called right before we left and told us she was expelled.
"This went on for five years. She was all right when she came home, but she began to act up in school as soon as we dropped her off. Then one night we were on our way back from visiting another prospective school when a tractor trailer flipped over on top of our car. It was a terrible accident. I had a great gash in my arm that was bleeding badly, and I heard one of the ambulance workers saying something about gangrene and possibly having my arm amputated. It scared me. The emergency personnel got my husband out of the car, and something of his was broken, and he was in great pain. I wanted to stay and wait until I knew Alexandra was all right, but my husband and I needed medical attention right away, and the rescue workers finally convinced me that Alexandra was fine, she had just suffered a scratch on the head. So I relented and allowed them to take us to the hospital.
"Even with our injuries, the hospital insisted on discharging us early. In a transparent attempt to get more money from us, the hospital kept my daughter in there for a week until she had caused so much trouble they were only too glad to release her. They tried to make me promise that I would engage a trained nurse for her, but I saw through the trick, and I refused.
"Alexandra malingered in bed after she got home. I finally had enough of her nonsense and told the house staff to not bring her meals upstairs anymore. The girl got out of bed, down the hall and onto the stairs fine, and as I watched her, she turned to me and said, 'Look Mother' and she threw herself down the rest of the steps. She did it deliberately; I was determined that she wouldn't get away with tricking me like that, and instead of taking her to a hospital where she could embarrass us more, I engaged a private doctor for her.
"Thus thwarted, she cooked up a brilliant scheme. She pretended to fall mentally ill so that we would get another doctor for her. She told us she was a mutant and that her power was empathy, and that she couldn't control it. She threatened to kill me if we didn't get another doctor. At first we didn't believe her; but when Dr. Hebron came to see her he told us she was indeed one of the mutie freaks, and he assured us he would train her. While we were out on our European tour, and staying out on the west coast, he called us every day and apprised us of her condition and progress. He was told not to hurt her, and to ease our fears on that point we were even mailed videotapes so that we could see her happy, playing with other children, learning her lessons. She seemed like a different child when she came back; Dr. Hebron told us if we wished to have her good behavior continued, we would continue following the schedule he had begin for her at the institution. Our housekeep was duly noted of the fact, and we continued to see to it that she kept the schedule. She has had no disturbances since then, and we had no reason to believe that a longer stay with the good doctor would not produce lasting results."
"We have also just discovered that she is not our daughter." Robert picked up the tale. "I am ashamed to have to confess this, but eighteen years ago I gave in to a moment of weakness and slept with a woman who was not my wife. She came to me some months later holding a child named Alexandra and told me it was mine. She threatened to expose my infidelity to the press if I did not agree to raise the child as my own. So I did. But recently we went to have a DNA test done, and it came back negative.
"You can imagine what a shock it was to us to find that Alexandra was not our daughter. Most other parents would have dumped such a problematic child off into the local orphanage and wash their hands of her, but considering her fragile emotional state, I could not do that to the little girl who I watched grow up. Yet at the same time we could not be expected to keep her around; she was a disruptive influence on our household and our lives. Dr. Hebron gave us a solution; he suggested that we transfer guardianship of Alexandra to him; he would continue with her therapy while she was so close to him as to make her conversion complete. And all I can say is that neither my wife nor I ever saw any marks of abuse or scars on her body."
"Apparently because you were never around to see it, if there was any," the judge said amiably. When Robert seemed about to protest, he raised a hand. "I've seen enough neglectful parents in my courtroom to write a book about them, so don't say a word. I have considered the petitions, and I must say I'm surprised at the thoroughness with which each has been prepared. There is, however, one large piece of the puzzle missing. Two, actually. Mr. Hebron, before I hear your side of the story, I must ask you; where is the child in question? Where is Alexandra?"
"I did not feel that she was up to the stress of today's hearing, your Honor," the man said smoothly. "It has, after all, only been two days since she found out that she has no parents, and that her biological mother dumped her off on a stranger's door step. Given her mental fragility and her tendency to relapse into destructive behavior, I decided to keep the child at home."
"I admire your consideration, Mr. Hebron but I am going to have to insist that you produce Alexandra for the court's benefit. As the child is only a few months away from being of age to make her own decisions I would like to hear from her what she would like to do. In the meantime," he frowned, looking down at the papers in front of him, "I find, Mr. Hebron, that what Mr. Xavier says is true. Your license has indeed been revoked; therefore I find it difficult to believe you would continue to practice on her when your continuance is so obviously contraindicated. Therefore, you are ordered to deliver up Alexandra to the Laight Street Children's Shelter until the matter has been settled, one way or another. We will reconvene again at this time tomorrow to settle the question of where she should live until she is of legal age to take charge of herself."
"Your Honor, as you will see from reading the papers, Alexandra has been declared mentally incompetent. Therefore, regardless of her age, she needs to be in the care of an adult."
"Declared incompetent by whom, Mr. Hebron? You? You will excuse me if I laugh, right? It is far too convenient for you, the one who ids to profit by her continued presence in your house to be declared mentally incompetent by you. Mr. Xavier," Judge Ridenour turned to Xavier. "As one of the world's foremost experts on mutants, and psychological manifestations in particular, do you agree that Alexandra Sanderson is incompetent?"
"Absolutely not, Your Honor," Xavier insisted. "Alexandra is as sane as you or I. Her only fault lies in being unable to properly control her empathic gift; a problem which I temporarily remedied by putting a shield around her mind that cannot be taken down by anyone but me. It is, however, only a temporary measure, and I would appreciate it, your Honor, if you would consider allowing her to come to my school rather than consigning her to the emotional pool that a children's shelter is…"
The judge shook his head as he stood. "I'm afraid not, Mr. Xavier. The purpose in removing her from Mr. Hebron's house is to keep him from doing what they call in criminal court, 'contaminating the witness.' The same applies to you as well. She is to have no contact with anyone connected with this case until we reconvene at this time tomorrow. Mr. Hebron, you will see to it that Alexandra is delivered to the shelter in three hours' time, at five o'clock." He turned and left the courtroom, walking briskly.
The Sandersons and Hebron left shortly after, leaving Charles and Ororo sitting in the courtroom. "I hoped that the Judge will decide that Andi belonged with us," Ororo said.
Xavier patted her hand. "The important thing is that Andi is away from Dr. Hebron," he said. 'We will see her tomorrow soon enough. Let's go home."