Disclaimer: You know the drill. 'Mutant X' and all of it's characters = Not Mine. Lexi and Izzy Fox-Mulwray = Mine.

Author's Note: I am so sorry that I've been so long between updates. Work and other stories got in the way.

Chapter 5.

Kensington Junior School, ten o'clock in the morning, the next day.

"Simon, will you tell Lexi to pass the purple crayon?"

"Lexi, Izzy wants you to . . ."

"I heard her." Lexi passed the requested crayon to her twin, rolling her eyes, a scowl on her pretty face. Her sister was being such a little kid!

"Simon, tell Lexi that I said thank you."

"This is stupid." Simon muttered. "Why don't you guys just talk to each other."

Izzy glared at her hapless neighbour. "Anna, tell Simon . . ."

"But Lexi's the one you're mad at." Anna pointed out heedlessly.

Izzy crossed her arms over her chest, glaring at the other three occupants of the table.

She had thought that school, a big kids only zone, would have given her a few hours of freedom from Ryan, but Miss Roberts had already let Lexi give a speech extolling the virtues of their new cousin at Show and Tell and wasn't even stopping her making a card to celebrate Ryan reaching the advanced age of four days.

She felt like crying.

All she ever wanted was to have her twin, her best friend and staunchest ally back but Lexi seemed to have allied herself with her sister's rival.

Sanctuary.

"I just don't get it, Adam." Shalimar's tone was troubled. "Why are Lexi and Izzy still fighting? They've never fought for this long before. Actually," She frowned thoughtfully. "I don't think they've ever fought before."

Adam patted his surrogate daughter's shoulder consolingly. "I wouldn't worry too much about it." He comforted. "Children always have their ups and downs."

"What I don't get is why Izzy is so against Ryan." Brennan said. "I'd have thought that she'd be the one cooing over him and that Lexi wouldn't give him the time of day. Izzy's the only one who's ever shown any interest in fussing over her dolls. I think Lexi scalped one of hers."

"I think it could be a feral thing." Adam mused.

"That doesn't make sense." Brennan objected as Shalimar bristled at this insult to her kind. "Aren't ferals supposed to be really protective of their families, especially the kids?"

"Like Lexi." Shalimar supplied.

"Yes, but ferals can also be territorial, very unwelcoming of newcomers." Adam pointed out. "And that's probably what's happening with Izzy. I'd say we had a fifty-fifty chance of either reaction with both of the girls. Although Izzy might be feeling a bit jealous. She is the youngest, after all."

"By less than six minutes." Brennan pointed out skeptically.

"But the youngest nevertheless."

"It makes sense that she's feeling jealous." Shalimar considered his words. "The girls have always been really close, kind of dependent on each other. Now Lexi has a new interest and Izzy's feeling left out."

"So what do we do about it?" Brennan always preferred to have a course of action to follow. "How do we sort it out for them?"

"We don't." Shalimar spoke up. "We give them a chance to work through this by themselves."

"What if they can't?"

Shalimar smiled wryly. "Then we butt in."

Kensington Junior School, a coupe of hours later.

"Children." Miss Roberts clapped her hands to get her little students' attention. "Sit quietly now, class. I have an exciting, important announcement to make."

Although the noise in the room died down in obedience to her commands, most of the children slumped in their seats, awaiting their teacher's announcement with an understandable lack of amusement, given that Miss Robert's last 'exciting, important announcement' had involved a new set of readers.

"As you know, there's only six weeks left until Parent's Show." She told them, forgetting that, at five, six weeks might as well be six years. "The sixth grade is going to give a musical recital. The fourth and fifth grades will form a choir . . ." She paused, saw that she had lost the little interest they had had in her announcement and cut to the chase. "We will be teaming up with the first grade to perform a play." She beamed at her class, confidently awaiting the question of what play. "We will be enacting 'Noah's Ark'." She announced, realizing that nobody was going to ask. "Does anyone know what happens in 'Noah's Ark'?" She prompted.

Anna raised her hand. "The animals go in two by two?"

Miss Roberts beamed at her. "Precisely. Now, first thing we have to do is to decide who wants to be which animal."

A thundering chorus of demands rang through the room and students leapt to their feet, waving their hands about wildly, shouting out their choices.

"Quiet down now, boys and girls." Miss Robert raised her hand for silence, trying to decide on a fair way to proceed. "We'll go in alphabetical order."

Izzy knew exactly what she wanted to be.

She sat in suspense as David Bertram became a bat, Anna, who was lucky enough to be a 'C', chose the role of giraffe, and the two students who came under the letter 'E' made their choices.

She knew her twin well enough to know which animal would take her fancy.

/It doesn't matter. / She thought smugly. / 'I' comes before 'L'. I get to pick first. /

"Now the Fox-Mulwrays." Miss Roberts smiled. "What will it be, Alexis – Lexi." She corrected herself hastily.

"A tiger." Lexi announced eagerly.

"Vey nice, dear." Miss Roberts looked across at Izzy, who slumped despondently in her seat. "And what about you, Izzy? A twin tiger?"

Lexi offered her sister a tentative smile, more than ready to bury the hatchet. "Come on, Izzy, it'll be fun."

Izzy glared at her. "No." She stuck out her lower lip. "Tigers are silly. I want to be . . ." She racked her brains trying to come up with an animal she liked. "A bear. A big scary one."

'Are you sure?" Miss Roberts didn't like giving up the idea of two adorable identical tiger cubs leading the procession into the ark.

"Yes." Izzy said firmly. "I don't want to be anything that she is."

Lexi bit her lip, hurt that her overture of peace had been brushed aside.

"Whatever you prefer." Miss Roberts said, defeated, walking on to the next child, who anxiously awaited her.

Izzy watched her go, feeling more than a little unsatisfied with her victory.

/I'm supposed to feel good when I win. / She thought pensively. /So why do I feel nasty? /

TBC.