Unlikely
Chapter Seven: Above All
Mia didn't like that kid, yet she couldn't stop thinking about him. She sat at the dining table in the kitchen of the orphanage, working on her homework. Maggie sat beside her in another chair, coloring on a plain piece of paper. They were alone in the kitchen. No one liked to be in the same room as Mia.
Though she was usually friendly, everyone in the orphanage thought she was bad luck. Every family she had been adopted by so far had ended in tragedy, and she was always returned to the orphanage within the same month she had been adopted. At the same time, so was Maggie. Maggie didn't go anywhere without her elder sister.
The sisters' appearances were nearly exact opposites.
While Mia's hair was shimmering silver in wide curls a few inches past her slender shoulders, Maggie's hair was a flourishing chestnut brown in straight tresses cut short just inches past her ears. Maggie and Mia were equally slender and short, and both had unique pale violet-colored eyes. Both sisters acted friendly, and though one was autistic and the other normal, to each other there was no one in the world they loved more than each other, as they only had each other left.
Maggie tapped her sister's arm. "Look, Mimi. It's us." She said happily.
Mia looked at the picture and smiled calmly. "I see three people."
Maggie looked over her picture and pointed to the tallest figure that had brown hair. It was a good drawing, Mia thought. "This is mama," her little sister explained and moved her finger to the shortest figure, "and this is me." Her finger moved to the figure on the end with gray hair colored in Crayola crayon. "And this is you." She said then pointed at the square building with the many windows behind the three figures. "This is our home."
Did Maggie have any worries? Mia wondered as she looked at her empathetically. Her little sister always seemed so carefree, and she was in the special education class at the middle school, so she was doing better than expected for someone with autism, so she had been told.
Mia worried for her younger sister constantly when they were apart, but at the same time she felt sorry for her. She knew Maggie loved her deeply, as Mia cared for her the same, but that only made things harder. She wanted Maggie to be adopted by a loving and caring family, one that would make her feel wanted and happy. One where she wouldn't have to worry about her little sister because she knew she would be cared for. At the same time, she didn't want to be abandoned, especially if it meant losing her little sister.
"Something wrong?" Maggie's small voice brought Mia back from her thoughts.
She looked into her sister's matching pale violet eyes and smiled calmly again. "No, I was just thinking. Want to go to the library when I'm done with homework?"
"Let's go now!" Her younger sister exclaimed happily.
Mia looked over her homework and sighed. Well, she only had her English homework left anyway. Maggie could watch a movie on one of the televisions at the library while she finished the English essay assignment.
"I guess s…" she trailed off as a knock sounded from the entryway, only a hallway away.
Quick footsteps sounded from upstairs coming down and then came the sound of the door being opened and voices.
"Er, hello. Does Mia McKellen live here?"
Mia stood and started for the hallway, which would lead her to the entryway and the front door.
"She's one of the twelve orphans here. Who are you?"
"My name is Xavier… I'm a professor and own an Institute for gifted youngsters. This is Jean Grey, one of my students and a recent instructor. Are you the caretaker?" Mia paused. Hadn't there been an Institute like that on the news? An Institute for mutants, wasn't it?
"Yes. Won't you two come in?" There were more footsteps and the sound of wheels on carpet then the same womanly voice as before called into the large house. "Mia! Come down here! There are two guests to see you."
Feeling uneasy, Mia glanced at her younger sister and then at the door that led from the kitchen to the backyard.
She could make a run for it. Take Maggie and go out the backdoor.
But no, she reasoned with herself. Maggie wouldn't survive living on the streets, not half as long as she could. And it wouldn't stop the caretaker from finding out she was a mutant. Then what was going to happen to Maggie? She didn't know how those people – that professor and his ward- did this sort of thing. If she didn't come freely, would they take her by force? And what about Maggie? She loved her sister… she couldn't leave her behind.
Mia stopped herself there. She was getting too ahead of herself, making herself panic.
She calmed quickly and with a last glance at Maggie walked down the hallway and into the living room, where Jean Grey and Professor Xavier were waiting. Jean Gray stood beside the professor, who sat smiling serenely in his wheelchair. Mia easily recognized them from the news and smiled as she nodded in greeting to them both.
"Good evening." She greeted quietly.
"Good evening." Greeted the professor. "You seem to already know who we are." He added, smiling knowingly. Mia nodded. She didn't care how he knew that. Perhaps her expression just gave it away. "Do you know why I am here?"
Mia glanced at the caretaker, whose expression plainly said she had no clue, but Mia did. She looked back to the bald man in a brown suit with brown eyes that sat in a wheelchair, and nodded solemnly, questions having to do with her younger sister chasing one after another through her thoughts though she hoped her own expression wasn't leading onto it.
The professor's expression softened. "Well, I am here to ask if you would like to come and live at the institution. It's much like a boarding school, you'll find. You will receive a room to sleep in, and we have lessons that deal with the students' special gifts. Of course you will still be attending Bayville Highschool."
Mia shifted uncomfortably in her place at the doorframe of the hallway. "I would love to, only… I have a younger sister."
"Ah, I see. And you are unwilling to leave her behind. She's welcome to come along also and live with us." Xavier cut in.
Mia smirked. "But my sister and I have no parents. That would mean the institution would become our foster home. I'm known to be a Jonah, y'know, someone who brings bad luck. Are you sure that's all right?"
The professor's smile returned. "I'm not exactly superstitious, but I'm willing to take a chance. Now if you'll excuse us so I may talk with your caretaker, to sort things out, as it were. Jean will accompany you, help you and your sister pack, and pick up the loose ends I've left unexplained."
Mia nodded and turned to go back to the kitchen, with Jean following closely behind.
Author's note: Here we go, now the story is moving along. Hope you're enjoying.
Preview of Chapter Eight: Of Worriers and WarriorsA bit absently, Mia noticed her reflection in the mirror. It had only been three days since she had come to live at the Xavier Institution for Gifted Youngsters, and Kitty had been right, she was looking pale, and thinner than her usually wiry figure. Her silver hair was looking healthier, having been recently washed, dried, and groomed, and now lay about her shoulders casually, but her pale violet eyes were still as hollow as they had ever been.
Disclaimer: I don't own copyrights to X-Men: Evolution. I only own my original characters.