Well, at least she'd mastered the art of asking perplexing questions. "Therein lies a problem," said Charles. "Your mother... didn't exactly give me much of a chance to inform her of the opportunity you've been given."
"Why th' hell we need her fo'?" said Todd. "Sara's sixteen, yo. She can run off an' go somewhere new any chance she likes. All legal-like." A brief vision of a white picket fence keeping a small horde of lizard-frog children safe flitted through his mind.
...and echoed in Sara's. "You know... that might just work. I can call Ray. He and the staff have always been - helpful." And why not? "You and Jean can run interference and explain the van away whilst we move all my junk. It's perfect. Would you like to come along, dear?"
Todd preactically glowed under the influence of the invitation. "He'p you outta th' lion's den? Fo' sure, yo."
"And while we're occupied," said Charles, a firm lesson forming in his head, "Logan and Hank can prepare your room."

Sara had thrown a hoodie on, and fiddled with a pair of work gloves. "On or off?" she wondered aloud.
"On, yo," advised Todd. "Stops anyone seein' what they shouldn't oughta. Don' want no nosy neighbours spreadin' sh-- stories."
"This can't be right," Jean was murmuring. "We're heading into Snobby Slopes."
Sara snorted at the nickname. "Yes. I guess we are." She grinned like the cat that had found a canary in the cream.
Todd peeked out a window and whistled. "Yo, these places are huge."
"Most of it's empty space," dismissed Sara. "The how and why of flaunting one's heating bill. Amongst other things."
"You been in some o' these?"
"Dear... as you would say - this mah hood, yo."
"Yo, that's just scary."
Sara giggled. At least until she spotted a small convention of matching pink SUVs clustered in a curved driveway. "Oh no..." she moaned. "Mom's called a pow-wow..."
"Pardon?" said Jean.
"Whenever she's in crisis mode, Mom calls in all her relatives for unnecessary counselling. And since it's now after school... there's a high risk of cousins."
Todd felt his stomach sink. "Somethin' tells me they ain't like you."
"No," said Sara. "They're not. Have you seen Village of the Damned and The Stepford Wives?"
"Oh." Todd shuddered. "Ick."
"Could you park at the side? That way, Todd and I can nip 'round to the back without a fuss, and you won't get boxed in by Soccer Moms."
"Interesting," said the Professor. "Not many people in this area have had ramps installed."
"And not many people spot ours," said Sara. "Good luck with the gorgons, and try not to let them pinhole you about fashion versus style." She opened up the back doors and bailed out.
Todd followed, keeping up with her eager steps at a light jog. "Yo, I knew yo' were loaded, but... day-umn, yo."
"Didn't you know? The Adriens are Old Money from Boston. Dad only built here 'cause Mom wanted to be close to her family." She waved at a distant figure on a ride-on lawnmower, who startled, and then waved back. "That was Henry Basilton. He and Mom have had a low-grade war about the gardens since day one... sometimes, I think he only stays on to stop her from taking over."
"He does excellent work," said Todd.
Sara braked at a door and rapped on it. tap tap tatap tap
"Two bits," murmured Todd.
Sara grinned.
"Sara! Hola!" The slightly rounded Mexican-American opened her arms wide.
"Consuela!" Sara did the same. They embraced. "Todd, this is Consuela StMartinez. Consuela, Todd Tolenksy... my boyfriend."
Todd's heart exploded in happy fireworks. He didn't even know what he was babbling until he realised he'd slid into Spanish.
"(You've found a good one, to be so polite in here.)"
"(I'm as surprised as you are,)" said Sara, also speaking Spanish. "(Todd, you didn't tell me you were bilingual.)"
"Never came up," he blushed. "Gotta be good at somethin', yo."
"(Ah, we make him shy.)" Consuela embraced him and kissed his forehead. "You will be good for her. I approve."
And somehow, this was a better blessing than anything from her biological mother. Todd floated along as they wound through a maze of back passages and corridors.
"Hetty started packing your books the minute Ray told us," said Consuela. "We'll be sad to see you go, miss Adrien."
"I'm not exactly sorry to go... I mean, away from Mom. I'll miss all of you."
Consuela looked around for errant spies. "Ray mentioned something else," she whispered. "A big change for you?"
"Yeah," Sara eased her hood back a little. "I'm a mutant... and I'm growing scales. Well... sort-of scales."
Consuela hissed in sympathy. "Ouch... Mi pequeña muchacha pobre(1)... You need all the rest you can get. Which means we get you out of here."
"Bless you, Consuela."
Hetty turned out to be none other than the British exchange student, a senior who looked startled to be sharing the same room with Todd Tolensky.
Sara pulled her hood as far forward as it could go and thanked the girl profusely for her help.
"Go downstairs," said Consuela, catching the vibe. "They'll be wanting the finger-food and drinks, soon."
"Yes'm," Hetty bolted.
Sara stepped over a few boxes to greet what looked like a ginger tribble in a plastic tube. "Hel-lo Chuckie," she cooed. "Did 'oo miss mommy?" The apparent tribble unfurled into a hamster and scurried through the tubing to a little hatch. "Aw, yes 'oo did..." She fed him an apple chip and smiled at Todd. "This is Chuckie the Wonder Hamster. Sort of a science project leftover, if you will." She told the story, how her previous year's class had had a female hamster, who then gave birth to a small crowd of baby hamsters, and subsequently abandoned them. How the entire class banded together - for a change - to save the tiny lives, naming them after characters from Rugrats in the process of nurturing them. And how she discovered that the otherwise intelligent creature was agorophobic.
Todd had never seen a healthier rodent. Chuckie practically gleamed. And Sara had invested a great deal of money into making him comfortable, as he could see from the wide assortment of rodent tubing, toys, and the hand-crafted cardboard 'kennel' in his fishtank home.
"But enough jibber-jabber. We need to get moving before Mom twigs."

(1) My poor little girl.

Meanwhile, Jean and Professor Xavier were discovering that Sara rarely joked when talking in shorthand.
The assembled group of women were caught in the middle of a makeover party. Some were curling their hair while others were straightening it. Most wore some kind of facial pack. All glared at the interlopers as if, at any instant, their eyes would start glowing red.
"Terribly sorry to intrude," soothed Xavier. "But we weren't able to conduct a proper conversation on the telephone. I thought, perhaps, if I bought a student representative of my school, it might allay some of your--" bitching "--concerns."
"Hi Mrs Adrien," Jean was uncertain which of these gargoyles was which, so she pitched to the assembly. "I'm Jean Grey, one of the Seniors at Professor Xavier's School for Gifted Youngsters, and--"
"Jean Grey," sang a brunette in a pink power suit. "I read so much about you in the local news." She stood and took her hand. "You must make your parents so proud."
Actually, I scare the living crap out of them, Jean thought behind her polite rictus. But that's not a point I'm going to bring up in here. Instead of verbalising a lie, however, she just laughed. Party Laugh number five, which meant, "I'm laughing politely because I haven't got anything nice to say." She rallied admirably, though, and continued from where she left off. "And we'd like to have your Sara join us. Along with her skill with the harp, we've discovered she has a very high IQ--"
"Unless that stands for idiot quotient," iced Mrs Adrien, "I find that very hard to believe."
Hetty Smith, replete with a maid's outfit, toured the room with petit fours. "Excuse me, m'm," she said, pretending Jean wasn't there. "M'seur Marchants is very upset. Apparently, someone has ordered pizzas, m'm."
"Just take them down to the game room and tell M'seur that boys will be boys(1), and I will compensate him adequately for any distress he's experienced."
"Yes'm." Hetty bobbed and withdrew from the room.
If Jean knew Hetty, the news about Jean Grey visiting Sara's house would be all over the school before the hour was out. Well, Jean had even better ammunition if she did blab, and that was how Hetty found out. "Mrs Adrien, it's very easy for a genius to be misidentified as a trouble-maker. I, myself, had a similar problem," Although my problem wasn't helped by hearing what other people thought... "When I was much younger, of course. Professor Xavier now has trained staff who can spot a -er- troubled youth and recommend testing." Is it me, or am I talking really fast?
It's excusable, 'said' the Professor. I had trouble getting a word in edgewise, too.
Mrs Adrien, however, was somewhat rocked by the news that Jean had had 'trouble' in her early life. "You... were misidentified?"
Jean laughed. Party Laugh number three, "It's funny now, but it sure as hell wasn't funny then." "Oh yes," she said. "I was very withdrawn and moody, a situation not helped by the death of a close friend. I was bored with schoolwork and because of my depression, I began to ignore it. My grades slipped startlingly."
"Fortunately," Xavier smoothly entered into the conversation, "I was performing a study on intelligent youths and why their grades were sometimes - erratic. I was able to help Jean overcome her difficulties and put her on the best path for her learning."
I suddenly feel like I'm on a platter with parsely in my ears, 'said' Jean. "Here's one we prepared earlier..." Thanks a bunch, Prof. "Everybody's been very pleased," she said with Party Laugh number eight, "Little miss humble."
"Tell me, Professor," said Mrs Adrien. "Could you work a similar miracle with my daughter?" Interesting, how she used that word as an epithet.
More tiny morsels were passed about by an older maid, thus distracting the room from three people carrying boxes down an adjacent hallway. Sara, Todd, and Ray, in that order.
"I have no doubt that Sara will shine," he said, "once given a fair chance."
"And -ah- how foolproof are your testing methods?" asked a co-gorgon.
"One hundred percent," chirped Jean. "The IQ test is just one of many that we use in order to ascertain if a student is gifted." And one of them is called the X-gene. If you don't have it, you don't get in. "We're very exclusive."
Another gorgon spoke. "Still, one can't help but hear things about some of your - alumnus... That Wagner boy, for instance. Always acting up." She pronounced it incorrectly as 'WAG-ner'.
Therefore, Xavier stressed the correct pronunciation when he spoke. "Kurt Wagner is battling a relatively high number of concurrent stresses. He's coping with a new culture, a new language, a new routine and a lot of new faces, all at the same time." He tented his fingers. "I challenge any of you to move to a different country and continue in a similar vein without - some kind of trouble. And yet Mr Wagner is adapting marvellously well."
There were general murmurings along the lines of, "What do you expect - he's foreign," amongst the gorgons.
"How much does this exclusive school of yours cost?" said Mrs Adrien. "And more importantly, can I sign some contract that guarantees her stay will last for two and a half more years?"
"Is it a boarding school?" said a fellow gorgon.
"We prefer our students to live on the premises, so yes, it is a boarding school. As for the cost... whatever you feel comfortable with donating is fine." He smiled benevolently and 'pushed' a thought into Mrs Adrien's mind. Give the man some money, went the meme. He's taking that girl off your hands.
"I suppose it couldn't hurt to cut a cheque," she mused. "Just to defray a few costs."
"Anything you donate is fully tax-deductable," Jean added. God, how could someone so rich be so tight-fisted?
One of the mysteries of life, alas.

(1) The official policy on any male wrongdoing in Sara's mother's side of the family.

"And the books are done," crowed Sara. "Now for my clothes, computer, tchotchkes, hamham, and sundry other bits and pieces. And Eileen."
"Yo' takin' everythin', ain't'cha?"
"Well, I'm not moving my makeup-slash-film lab. That'd take three trucks and I'm sure the Professor wouldn't approve."
"Yo' amazin'," he said appreciatively. "C'mon, let's book." He turned, only to find his way blocked by what could only be described as a bubbly blonde.
"Sara Louise, I knew it was you," squeaked the girl. She held her arms stiff, but bounced about in such a way as to make Todd search her shoulders for signs of a wind-up key. "My mom said your mom's been feeling poorly."
Sara's shoulders drooped. "Hello, Cricket," she said. "What are you doing outside after dark(1)?"
"Oh, I came by to see why you were sneaking around and all," she chirped. "Are those going to Goodwill?"
"They're certainly going to someone's good will," said Sara. "Please, Cricket, I don't have time to dally." She began walking, taking Todd's arm in a firm grip and hustling him along.
Cricket bounced in their wake. "But I have to tell you my good news! I'm going to be working with the Junior-year cheerleaders! Isn't that fantastic?"
"Yeah," deadpanned Sara. "Astounding."
"And I owe it all to my mom buying me those special silicone bra-stuffers! It's always okay if you just need a little help!" Her platinum curls bounced when she did as she followed them inside. "Everyone uses them, these days!"
"Cricket..." Sara sighed. "Can you please quiet down? My mom shouldn't be disturbed when--"
"Your mother," said a creature that could only be Mrs Adrien herself. "Is already disturbed. Why are you creeping around through the servants' entrance? Who is this young man? And what sort of perverted ideas are you selling to poor young Cricket?"
Todd saw Sara's face fall. He could read that expression all too well. Oh crap...

(1) I can just hear Sara thinking, There goes the theory about hidden solar cells.

There is no feeling as bad as encountering someone or something that one has been attempting to avoid.
Sara imagined that, if the helmsman on the Titanic knew the ship's fate as the iceberg gently bumped along her side, he would have felt the sick, sinking trepidation that Sara felt now.
No matter what happened, there was going to be a disaster.
One hand reached out, unbidden and spasmodic, for Todd's. He squeezed back.
"Well?" said Mom. "Aren't you going to be feeding me lies about how you weren't doing anything or saying anything? Or are you just going to stand there like a landed fish and prove how much your so-called IQ is pure cock-and-bull? I don't know how much or how badly you cheated, young lady, but you can bet I will find out!"
"I was just shifting some things out," murmured Sara. "I didn't want to be a bother."
"You were a bother on the day you were born, little miss! From the moment you started in my womb you were a bother! I don't even know why I tried to have you! And STOP THAT TWITCHING THIS INSTANT! Do you want other people to see you like this?"
Cricket had fled. Todd remained as her lifeline.
"N-nnnnn..." damn stammer. Damn twitching. And bother Xavier for telling her not to box them up. "Nnnnnn..."
"Jean Grey never had trouble like this! Jean Grey is a good daughter! Even when she was in dire straights, she stood out from the crowd and landed herself a scholarship! Jean Grey has always been a good girl! She never caused half as much trouble as you. Why can't you do something with yourself? Why can't you accomplish anything? Why are you holding that street punk's hand?"

Jean Grey did, despite what Mrs Adrien thought, have vices. One of them was being almost fatally curious. Therefore, she'd excused herself to powder her nose, and followed Mrs Adrien to see where she was going.
And now she got an earful.
It was always said that evesdroppers never heard any good about themselves, and it was partially true, here and now. Hearing her name thrown like a weapon, accompanied by the whimpers and moans of Sara, was an ugly, ugly thing.
I never knew I was an instrument of torture... She stepped into the room, clearing her throat and pretending she'd been deaf. "Excuse me?"
In a literal flash, Mrs Adrien was cloyingly sweet and kind-natured again. "Something I can help you with, dear?"
"I'm afraid I'm a little lost," she lied. "Can you show me where the ladies' room is?" she added Party Laugh number one, "Aren't I a little silly?"
"Of course, sweetie." Mrs Adrien took her arm. "This way."
Jean smiled winningly in the grip of an urban monster. This must be why they like pretty virgins in their sacrifices... to distract them while the heroes can rally their forces.

Ray hustled them into the kitchen, appologised to someone called M'seur Marchants, and made a quick hot chocolate for the both of them.
"Sorry you had to see that," Sara whimpered. She shook violently as she sipped her drink.
"Yo, I wouldn't be no good boyfriend if I left yo' t' face a Dragon alone." Todd found he had more than a few trembles himself. "Y'know, some o' the ole ones from legends spat poison?"
Sara laughed. "Apt. Oh, so apt." Her breath shuddered in and sighed out. "I am so glad I'm leaving her."
"Yeah. Change is holiday." Todd hugged her. "It be cool, yo. You get better wit'out no poison Dragons aroun'."
"Oh God," Sara whimpered. "I just realised I owe Jean Grey a favour... What do you do for the girl who already has everything going for her."
"A week free of Toad slimin's?" he grinned. "I can make up a li'l certificate..."
Sara giggled. "You're sweet, dear, but this is my debt to pay. I'll find something, anon."
"And meanwhile," said Ray, "we have to get on."
"And on, anon, anon," joked Sara. "I'll pack, you boys ferry. If anyone asks, Todd's a friend from school."
"Hey, yo. We share Biology class, a'ight?" he grinned.
The joke worked. "Oh yes. That would work. You my bad boy." She kissed his cheek. "Come, love. Away, away..."

AN: Today's colour is "Kurt's fur" blue.