AN: Happy Monday everyone! I'm working on a Girl Scout Patch Ceremony (better known in my Troop as a Green and White) for the end of the week. I'm still not sure how and why they put me in charge of the whole thing but my sister and I are working on it. I hope everyone's having luck with all of their end-of-the-school-year activities and are ready for a good summer vacation. Summer is always fun! Anywho, your reviews are always appreciated. They make my day/week. I'm really glad all of you are hanging around for the ride!
LadyJadePerendhil: I'm so very glad you like the story and I appreciate your song suggestion. There's a semi-spin off sequel in my head someplace for this story (I think). I'm happy to see you liked how Arwen acted in the chapter. I figured she probably wouldn't be all that proud of her actions when considering them at the moment.
Elainor: Ah...in the words of Seraph (one of my all time favorite characters from The Matrix Reloaded/Revolutions) "You do not truly know someone until you fight them." You shall see if father and daughter get around to sparring each other. As for mother and daughter, their relationship will improve albeit slowly.
hobbitgirl11: I hope your first Pointe lesson went well! I bet you didn't fall at all! I remember, my first year on Pointe, we didn't really dance in them either. We just did barre and some floor exercises with them. As for my dances, for one tap we're doing some music from movies with Gregory Hines in them and, in the other we're doing Celia Cruz's music (Spanish music). One ballet we're doing to two Beethoven pieces, one being his 5th Symphony and I can't remember the name of but we're doing Pointe to it. I'm doing the song "Scarborough Fair" for my private and jazz is some music from the 1990s. We got everything worked out in class last week for our performance on Sunday.
kalika55: Wait no longer! Here's the next chapter!
sunni07: Oh! I'm sorry you were confuzzled! That's never a good thing. I'm glad the chapter cleared things up for you. I never realized the chapter titles could be confusing. Thanks for pointing that out. Here's another new chapter, straight from my computer.
LalaithoftheBruinen: I can't say who the lore master is but I can assure you Elrond is still in Middle Earth. After all, he's got to find out about his daughter and granddaughter! I also have to get him in the story because he's one of my favorite characters.
Disclaimer: I own nothing except for a handful of made up characters. Tolkien thought up the concept and, as such, it belongs to him. I'm just playing in his world. I'm broke and in college. All I own are Pointe Shoes.
Niphredil was beginning to wonder if the span of a day in Middle Earth differed any from the span of a day in the world she had once lived in. She'd cleaned up after her morning ride with her mother, changing out of scruffy riding clothing into something far cleaner and made her way into one of the higher points in the citadel.
According to her mother, she was to wait there until someone came to get her. Her assumption had been that this sort of banishment had something to do with the strange party that had just entered the city.
The party's importance must have been great, she assumed, for both her parents, along with a mixed honor guard consisting of guards wearing a strange looking tree on their chests as well as a few knights wearing odd looking orange, blue, and black colors, had gone down to meet it on the first level. With them others. People she assumed were of high rank or somehow important to the city.
Quietly, like a church mouse, another figure entered the room.
"You get sent up here, too?" Niphredil questioned without turning her head.
Dressed in a tunic and breeches, looking as much like a female version of her brother as possible, Emma slid to the floor of the small room.
"My brother said I was to stay up here with you until someone comes to retrieve me," she stated, some disappointment in her voice.
Since finding out there were to be visitors- important ones at that- Emma's curiosity had been piqued. She had assumed she was going to be able to go down with her brother to greet them but that was not to come to pass. Like Niphredil, she was going to have to wait until a later time to discover the nature of the visitors.
"Where is your brother anyway?" Niphredil asked, curiously.
It was rare to see the two elves separated for very long. Niphredil had assumed that he was her keeper in this large city, despite the presence of her human "parents."
"He went down to greet the visitors with my parents. They said my mother was of high enough rank and of enough importance to go down and meet them," Emma replied, glumly.
"Think of this way, maybe this surprise will be in our favor. That is why we are not allowed to meet these visitor people," Niphredil stated, trying to make the elven child feel better.
The disappointed tone in her voice had shown Niphredil just what was going through Emma's mind. She was hurt by the fact she had been left behind in the citadel. It made her feel that she was not important enough to take part in whatever events were going on down there.
In actuality, Niphredil felt much the same way. She was not all that keen on being kept in the dark by her parents. It made her feel unwanted. Of course, if there was a good reason for her temporary banishment, she would understand but no reason had been given yet.
Emma gave the half-elven female a wan smile. That was a possibility she hadn't considered.
"That could be it," she commented, voice changing for the better, "My brother never really said why I was not allowed to go down with him and my parents."
"That's the spirit," Niphredil said with a laugh, she, herself, feeling better at that idea.
It was better than one of the ideas she had been toying with. The idea that this mysterious visitor was some sort of enemy to the city and her parents wanted her away for her own good. Of course, that idea was preferable to the fact she could have been kept away because her parents were afraid to have her seen within the walls of the city.
The latter idea seemed inane, given what she had learned from them. Both had made it clear that they wanted her both in the city and in their lives.
The two females lapsed into silence, both watching the party wind their way up the many levels of the seven-leveled city. With the gates not being in a straight line from level to level, the party had to twist here and there to try to get to the city's pinnacle.
"So, did you have many friends in the other world?" Niphredil asked, curiously.
To her, Emma seemed like the friendly sort. The type of person willing to go out on a limb and make friends with the new kid in the class or the new Girl Scout in the troop. The one who, most likely, had many friends in her circle.
Much to Niphredil's surprise, Emma shook her head.
"Do not get me wrong, I tried to make friends but it never seemed to work. I was not enough like the others to make friends. I use to take dance lessons in the other world. The people I danced with did not want to be friends with me because I looked and acted differently. Never, actually, bothered me though," Emma answered with an absented minded shrug, "How about you?"
Niphredil thought for a moment, trying to figure out the answer to that question. It would be hard to explain her closest friend to Emma but, given the fact the young elven child had come from the other world, it might be able to explain it to her without too much fuss.
"I didn't have a lot of friends either, so don't feel bad. Like you people figure I was just too weird to be friends with. I did have one really good friend, though. Probably the only person I truly miss from the other world," Niphredil, finally, answered.
"What was she like?" Emma questioned, sounding quite interested.
Her interest was borne out of true curiosity. Anyone who would befriend someone who was, generally, accounted as being too strange, too odd to bother with, must have been a very different sort of person.
"Her name was Hope. She was a wee bit of a kid with mousy brown hair. It looked like you could crack her in half if you tried hard enough. She was one tough kid, though, given what she was and stuff," Niphredil answered, being vaguer on purpose.
"What was she?" Emma asked.
She'd been sworn to secrecy about what Hope, and Hope's friends and family, actually were. Of course, it had been quite the accident when she found out herself...
FLASHBACK
It was freezing cold out; frosts crusting in the ground at their feet and, as far as many of the Junior Girl Scouts of Troop 6417 were concerned, on their faces and hands as well. Only crazy people should have been out in the biting cold. Well, crazy people and Junior Girl Scouts who were working on the "Sky Search" merit badge.
Most of the scouts were joking around, talking and giggling while the guest speaker pointed out constellations to them, in an effort to free their minds from the bitter cold.
Niphredil was not among them. The cold wasn't bothering her as it was bothering her step-sister Jane a few feet away. She was listing to the speaker with rapt attention, somehow feeling a kinship to the stars in the sky. Every one of his words were being absorbed, ready to be repeated at a latter meeting.
Standing a few inches from Niphredil, wrapped up in a heavy coat and hat, was Hope. The little girl, Jane's age but in no way her friend, coughed roughly into her gloved hand. Despite all the clothing she was wearing, Hope was still visibly shivering. The cough wasn't helping the situation by any means.
"Go inside, Hope," Niphredil whispered, splitting her attention between the speaker and her friend, "I'm sure Miss Sandy will understand why you skipped the speaker."
"No way!" Hope quietly, exclaimed, "I'm fine!"
"No...no you're not. For Pete's sake, Hope, you're sick as a dog to begin with. I'm sure this isn't helping you any," Niphredil countered.
Actually, according to Niphredil's best estimation, Hope was always sick. It was rare to see the small Junior Girl Scout not coughing or sneezing.
"Allergies," she had, once, said, "and a propensity for getting respiratory infections."
That was the reason for her always sneezing or coughing.
"Don't worry about me. I'm fine," Hope retorted, with a small cough.
Niphredil just silently shook her head. Hope was thickheaded sometimes and felt she knew what was best for herself. Nine times out of ten she was right. That one-tenth of the time was the part Niphredil was concerned about at the moment.
As the speaker continued to talk, a large cloud passed, obscuring the sky and making it difficult to discern the tiny pinpricks of light they had been staring at.
"Don't worry, gang," he called in a jovial voice, trying to get the waning attention of the troop, "I'm sure it'll pass."
For several moments, feeling like an eternity in the freezing cold, the Scouts stood waiting for the large cloud to pass.
"I guess we're going to have to finish this another time. I'm sorry girls," Miss Sandy called over the growing din.
"Are we going to have snack?" questioned a large, burly girl by the name of Olivia.
The troop moved toward the entrance to their meeting place. All except Hope. The small Scout appeared to be deep in concentration, something out of place in the fight to get back into the warm building.
"Wait, Miss Sandy, I think we can continue," the speaker called.
The troop, audibly, groaned and turned back towards the speaker.
The cloud, by no means, had moved but, somehow, the tiny pinpricks of light had returned, organizing themselves over the clouds.
"Isn't that amazing? I'm cold I want to go in," stated Alyssa, a rather bratty girl with a chip on her shoulder the size of a small country.
"No, I do believe we can finish this discussion now," Sandy, the Junior Girl Scout Leader, stated firmly.
The lecture started up again, constellations being pointed out to the girls.
It was then Niphredil noticed a strange glow, the color of blue starlight, off to her side. Ever so slightly, she turned and saw something that caused her eyes to go wide as saucers.
Hope stood bathed in a light blue glow, her eyes shut tight. The small Junior Girl Scout rubbed her hands together and opened them. In between her palms, were tiny spheres of blue light. The same spheres that were in the sky above them.
"What in the world?" Niphredil mused, suddenly realizing just what her friend was.
Several Girl Scout meetings passed, before Niphredil could work up the courage to question her friend about the display during the lecture.
It was the end of a meeting, closing having just been said and sung. Jane had gone off to chat with one of her friends, leaving Niphredil alone. Walking around the large meeting hall, she, literally, bumped into a rather dejected looking Hope.
"What's wrong, Hope?" Niphredil questioned, concerned.
"Nothing. My mom's just going to be a little late, that's all," she answered, ruefully.
"Can I ask you a question? I mean, I don't want to pry or anything but..." Niphredil requested, tailing off.
Hesitantly, Hope nodded her head. It almost seemed that the small Junior Scout knew where this conversation was going.
"It was you, wasn't it? The one who made those stars over the clouds," Niphredil broached, carefully.
For a moment, panic crossed Hope's face. It was obvious that she had been found out. Niphredil's question had been answered in an instant.
"Please, don't tell anyone. I don't want to cause trouble. I just want to be like the other kids," she pleaded, "My mother wouldn't be pleased at all if they found out. It's enough that I had to do that even though I know better than that."
"Hope," Niphredil stated, trying not to sound shocked, "I'm not going to say a word to anyone. I was the only one who saw you. I just wanted to know. What are you, anyway? I mean, other than a fellow Girl Scout and my only buddy in this entire place."
The smaller Girl Scout squirmed, uncomfortable in the given situation. She knew she wasn't supposed to say anything about who and what she was and what she wasn't. Niphredil was her friend, though, a fellow outcast in the troop. She'd understand...right?
"I'm a mutant. I live at the Xavier School for Gifted Youngsters," she admitted, "My mother, a mutant, teaches at the school. She and my dad, a mutant, take care of my brother- a mutant too -and I."
Niphredil tried not to looked shocked but wasn't entirely successful. To find out one of your best friends was a mutant, something that was universally feared, could catch anyone off guard.
"How long have you known you were a mutant?" Niphredil questioned, feeling exceedingly dumb.
"All my life. I was born with some of my powers already active. See, I'm not exactly an atypical mutant either. Both my parents are mutants; genetics stated there was a one in four chance of a genetically pure mutant child. I'm that one in four chance...one hundred percent pure mutant," Hope answered, a small hint of pride in her voice.
"That's wicked, Hope, really it is. What are your powers? I mean, what you were doing out there that night?" the older female asked, actually interested.
Hope knew she had already said too much, revealed too much about herself and her family. Her friend, though, did not seem bothered by the fact she had just found out someone she had known was a mutant...one of the highest order.
"At home, they call me 'Starsheen.' Well, my that's the moniker my Godfather gave me but that's neither here nor there. I can control ambient starlight and use it to do all sorts of things. That's what I was doing the other night, making stars out of starlight. I have a few other powers but that's my main one," Hope answered, quietly.
"You have to promise," the young mutant Girl Scout broached, "not to breathe a word of this to anyone. Not your foster parents or anyone like that. If they were to find out..."
"You've got my word, Hope. I promise I'm not going to say anything. Scout's Honor. If I did, they'd force you out of the troop and I wouldn't have anyone to take to anymore," Niphredil promised, holding up her middle three fingers on her right hand.
END FLASHBACK
"What was she?" Emma asked, again.
"She was just different, that's all. I promised her I wouldn't say," Niphredil replied, keeping her word to a friend she was pretty sure she wasn't going to see ever again.
Emma nodded her head, accepting her answer.
"She must have been some kind of different," Emma commented, "to make friends with someone no one wanted to be friends with."
"That she was," Niphredil mused, "that she was."
LadyJadePerendhil: I'm so very glad you like the story and I appreciate your song suggestion. There's a semi-spin off sequel in my head someplace for this story (I think). I'm happy to see you liked how Arwen acted in the chapter. I figured she probably wouldn't be all that proud of her actions when considering them at the moment.
Elainor: Ah...in the words of Seraph (one of my all time favorite characters from The Matrix Reloaded/Revolutions) "You do not truly know someone until you fight them." You shall see if father and daughter get around to sparring each other. As for mother and daughter, their relationship will improve albeit slowly.
hobbitgirl11: I hope your first Pointe lesson went well! I bet you didn't fall at all! I remember, my first year on Pointe, we didn't really dance in them either. We just did barre and some floor exercises with them. As for my dances, for one tap we're doing some music from movies with Gregory Hines in them and, in the other we're doing Celia Cruz's music (Spanish music). One ballet we're doing to two Beethoven pieces, one being his 5th Symphony and I can't remember the name of but we're doing Pointe to it. I'm doing the song "Scarborough Fair" for my private and jazz is some music from the 1990s. We got everything worked out in class last week for our performance on Sunday.
kalika55: Wait no longer! Here's the next chapter!
sunni07: Oh! I'm sorry you were confuzzled! That's never a good thing. I'm glad the chapter cleared things up for you. I never realized the chapter titles could be confusing. Thanks for pointing that out. Here's another new chapter, straight from my computer.
LalaithoftheBruinen: I can't say who the lore master is but I can assure you Elrond is still in Middle Earth. After all, he's got to find out about his daughter and granddaughter! I also have to get him in the story because he's one of my favorite characters.
Disclaimer: I own nothing except for a handful of made up characters. Tolkien thought up the concept and, as such, it belongs to him. I'm just playing in his world. I'm broke and in college. All I own are Pointe Shoes.
Niphredil was beginning to wonder if the span of a day in Middle Earth differed any from the span of a day in the world she had once lived in. She'd cleaned up after her morning ride with her mother, changing out of scruffy riding clothing into something far cleaner and made her way into one of the higher points in the citadel.
According to her mother, she was to wait there until someone came to get her. Her assumption had been that this sort of banishment had something to do with the strange party that had just entered the city.
The party's importance must have been great, she assumed, for both her parents, along with a mixed honor guard consisting of guards wearing a strange looking tree on their chests as well as a few knights wearing odd looking orange, blue, and black colors, had gone down to meet it on the first level. With them others. People she assumed were of high rank or somehow important to the city.
Quietly, like a church mouse, another figure entered the room.
"You get sent up here, too?" Niphredil questioned without turning her head.
Dressed in a tunic and breeches, looking as much like a female version of her brother as possible, Emma slid to the floor of the small room.
"My brother said I was to stay up here with you until someone comes to retrieve me," she stated, some disappointment in her voice.
Since finding out there were to be visitors- important ones at that- Emma's curiosity had been piqued. She had assumed she was going to be able to go down with her brother to greet them but that was not to come to pass. Like Niphredil, she was going to have to wait until a later time to discover the nature of the visitors.
"Where is your brother anyway?" Niphredil asked, curiously.
It was rare to see the two elves separated for very long. Niphredil had assumed that he was her keeper in this large city, despite the presence of her human "parents."
"He went down to greet the visitors with my parents. They said my mother was of high enough rank and of enough importance to go down and meet them," Emma replied, glumly.
"Think of this way, maybe this surprise will be in our favor. That is why we are not allowed to meet these visitor people," Niphredil stated, trying to make the elven child feel better.
The disappointed tone in her voice had shown Niphredil just what was going through Emma's mind. She was hurt by the fact she had been left behind in the citadel. It made her feel that she was not important enough to take part in whatever events were going on down there.
In actuality, Niphredil felt much the same way. She was not all that keen on being kept in the dark by her parents. It made her feel unwanted. Of course, if there was a good reason for her temporary banishment, she would understand but no reason had been given yet.
Emma gave the half-elven female a wan smile. That was a possibility she hadn't considered.
"That could be it," she commented, voice changing for the better, "My brother never really said why I was not allowed to go down with him and my parents."
"That's the spirit," Niphredil said with a laugh, she, herself, feeling better at that idea.
It was better than one of the ideas she had been toying with. The idea that this mysterious visitor was some sort of enemy to the city and her parents wanted her away for her own good. Of course, that idea was preferable to the fact she could have been kept away because her parents were afraid to have her seen within the walls of the city.
The latter idea seemed inane, given what she had learned from them. Both had made it clear that they wanted her both in the city and in their lives.
The two females lapsed into silence, both watching the party wind their way up the many levels of the seven-leveled city. With the gates not being in a straight line from level to level, the party had to twist here and there to try to get to the city's pinnacle.
"So, did you have many friends in the other world?" Niphredil asked, curiously.
To her, Emma seemed like the friendly sort. The type of person willing to go out on a limb and make friends with the new kid in the class or the new Girl Scout in the troop. The one who, most likely, had many friends in her circle.
Much to Niphredil's surprise, Emma shook her head.
"Do not get me wrong, I tried to make friends but it never seemed to work. I was not enough like the others to make friends. I use to take dance lessons in the other world. The people I danced with did not want to be friends with me because I looked and acted differently. Never, actually, bothered me though," Emma answered with an absented minded shrug, "How about you?"
Niphredil thought for a moment, trying to figure out the answer to that question. It would be hard to explain her closest friend to Emma but, given the fact the young elven child had come from the other world, it might be able to explain it to her without too much fuss.
"I didn't have a lot of friends either, so don't feel bad. Like you people figure I was just too weird to be friends with. I did have one really good friend, though. Probably the only person I truly miss from the other world," Niphredil, finally, answered.
"What was she like?" Emma questioned, sounding quite interested.
Her interest was borne out of true curiosity. Anyone who would befriend someone who was, generally, accounted as being too strange, too odd to bother with, must have been a very different sort of person.
"Her name was Hope. She was a wee bit of a kid with mousy brown hair. It looked like you could crack her in half if you tried hard enough. She was one tough kid, though, given what she was and stuff," Niphredil answered, being vaguer on purpose.
"What was she?" Emma asked.
She'd been sworn to secrecy about what Hope, and Hope's friends and family, actually were. Of course, it had been quite the accident when she found out herself...
FLASHBACK
It was freezing cold out; frosts crusting in the ground at their feet and, as far as many of the Junior Girl Scouts of Troop 6417 were concerned, on their faces and hands as well. Only crazy people should have been out in the biting cold. Well, crazy people and Junior Girl Scouts who were working on the "Sky Search" merit badge.
Most of the scouts were joking around, talking and giggling while the guest speaker pointed out constellations to them, in an effort to free their minds from the bitter cold.
Niphredil was not among them. The cold wasn't bothering her as it was bothering her step-sister Jane a few feet away. She was listing to the speaker with rapt attention, somehow feeling a kinship to the stars in the sky. Every one of his words were being absorbed, ready to be repeated at a latter meeting.
Standing a few inches from Niphredil, wrapped up in a heavy coat and hat, was Hope. The little girl, Jane's age but in no way her friend, coughed roughly into her gloved hand. Despite all the clothing she was wearing, Hope was still visibly shivering. The cough wasn't helping the situation by any means.
"Go inside, Hope," Niphredil whispered, splitting her attention between the speaker and her friend, "I'm sure Miss Sandy will understand why you skipped the speaker."
"No way!" Hope quietly, exclaimed, "I'm fine!"
"No...no you're not. For Pete's sake, Hope, you're sick as a dog to begin with. I'm sure this isn't helping you any," Niphredil countered.
Actually, according to Niphredil's best estimation, Hope was always sick. It was rare to see the small Junior Girl Scout not coughing or sneezing.
"Allergies," she had, once, said, "and a propensity for getting respiratory infections."
That was the reason for her always sneezing or coughing.
"Don't worry about me. I'm fine," Hope retorted, with a small cough.
Niphredil just silently shook her head. Hope was thickheaded sometimes and felt she knew what was best for herself. Nine times out of ten she was right. That one-tenth of the time was the part Niphredil was concerned about at the moment.
As the speaker continued to talk, a large cloud passed, obscuring the sky and making it difficult to discern the tiny pinpricks of light they had been staring at.
"Don't worry, gang," he called in a jovial voice, trying to get the waning attention of the troop, "I'm sure it'll pass."
For several moments, feeling like an eternity in the freezing cold, the Scouts stood waiting for the large cloud to pass.
"I guess we're going to have to finish this another time. I'm sorry girls," Miss Sandy called over the growing din.
"Are we going to have snack?" questioned a large, burly girl by the name of Olivia.
The troop moved toward the entrance to their meeting place. All except Hope. The small Scout appeared to be deep in concentration, something out of place in the fight to get back into the warm building.
"Wait, Miss Sandy, I think we can continue," the speaker called.
The troop, audibly, groaned and turned back towards the speaker.
The cloud, by no means, had moved but, somehow, the tiny pinpricks of light had returned, organizing themselves over the clouds.
"Isn't that amazing? I'm cold I want to go in," stated Alyssa, a rather bratty girl with a chip on her shoulder the size of a small country.
"No, I do believe we can finish this discussion now," Sandy, the Junior Girl Scout Leader, stated firmly.
The lecture started up again, constellations being pointed out to the girls.
It was then Niphredil noticed a strange glow, the color of blue starlight, off to her side. Ever so slightly, she turned and saw something that caused her eyes to go wide as saucers.
Hope stood bathed in a light blue glow, her eyes shut tight. The small Junior Girl Scout rubbed her hands together and opened them. In between her palms, were tiny spheres of blue light. The same spheres that were in the sky above them.
"What in the world?" Niphredil mused, suddenly realizing just what her friend was.
Several Girl Scout meetings passed, before Niphredil could work up the courage to question her friend about the display during the lecture.
It was the end of a meeting, closing having just been said and sung. Jane had gone off to chat with one of her friends, leaving Niphredil alone. Walking around the large meeting hall, she, literally, bumped into a rather dejected looking Hope.
"What's wrong, Hope?" Niphredil questioned, concerned.
"Nothing. My mom's just going to be a little late, that's all," she answered, ruefully.
"Can I ask you a question? I mean, I don't want to pry or anything but..." Niphredil requested, tailing off.
Hesitantly, Hope nodded her head. It almost seemed that the small Junior Scout knew where this conversation was going.
"It was you, wasn't it? The one who made those stars over the clouds," Niphredil broached, carefully.
For a moment, panic crossed Hope's face. It was obvious that she had been found out. Niphredil's question had been answered in an instant.
"Please, don't tell anyone. I don't want to cause trouble. I just want to be like the other kids," she pleaded, "My mother wouldn't be pleased at all if they found out. It's enough that I had to do that even though I know better than that."
"Hope," Niphredil stated, trying not to sound shocked, "I'm not going to say a word to anyone. I was the only one who saw you. I just wanted to know. What are you, anyway? I mean, other than a fellow Girl Scout and my only buddy in this entire place."
The smaller Girl Scout squirmed, uncomfortable in the given situation. She knew she wasn't supposed to say anything about who and what she was and what she wasn't. Niphredil was her friend, though, a fellow outcast in the troop. She'd understand...right?
"I'm a mutant. I live at the Xavier School for Gifted Youngsters," she admitted, "My mother, a mutant, teaches at the school. She and my dad, a mutant, take care of my brother- a mutant too -and I."
Niphredil tried not to looked shocked but wasn't entirely successful. To find out one of your best friends was a mutant, something that was universally feared, could catch anyone off guard.
"How long have you known you were a mutant?" Niphredil questioned, feeling exceedingly dumb.
"All my life. I was born with some of my powers already active. See, I'm not exactly an atypical mutant either. Both my parents are mutants; genetics stated there was a one in four chance of a genetically pure mutant child. I'm that one in four chance...one hundred percent pure mutant," Hope answered, a small hint of pride in her voice.
"That's wicked, Hope, really it is. What are your powers? I mean, what you were doing out there that night?" the older female asked, actually interested.
Hope knew she had already said too much, revealed too much about herself and her family. Her friend, though, did not seem bothered by the fact she had just found out someone she had known was a mutant...one of the highest order.
"At home, they call me 'Starsheen.' Well, my that's the moniker my Godfather gave me but that's neither here nor there. I can control ambient starlight and use it to do all sorts of things. That's what I was doing the other night, making stars out of starlight. I have a few other powers but that's my main one," Hope answered, quietly.
"You have to promise," the young mutant Girl Scout broached, "not to breathe a word of this to anyone. Not your foster parents or anyone like that. If they were to find out..."
"You've got my word, Hope. I promise I'm not going to say anything. Scout's Honor. If I did, they'd force you out of the troop and I wouldn't have anyone to take to anymore," Niphredil promised, holding up her middle three fingers on her right hand.
END FLASHBACK
"What was she?" Emma asked, again.
"She was just different, that's all. I promised her I wouldn't say," Niphredil replied, keeping her word to a friend she was pretty sure she wasn't going to see ever again.
Emma nodded her head, accepting her answer.
"She must have been some kind of different," Emma commented, "to make friends with someone no one wanted to be friends with."
"That she was," Niphredil mused, "that she was."