Thanks to Suki for my first review. It means a lot to me that you reviewed. So this chapter is for you. I hope it's long enough for you.

All Change

Mattie had run and run. Using her new found skills, she could cover large distances with ease.

Now it was late, the streets were dark, and the only place that she could go was home. The garage door had 'Mutie Scum' written on it in bright red spray paint. News travelled fast. She slipped in the back door and padded silently through the kitchen. Maybe Dad was already in bed.

"Mattie. Get in here."

So much for that idea. She slunk into the living room and stood in front of his chair. The room was dark, the only light being the street lights that shone through the window. He'd clearly been sitting here for a while. Empty beer bottles were strewn on the floor and she could smell the alcohol on him.

"What have you done?" He asked

"Nothing." Was her first response, then: "I won the race."

"Hu." He grunted.

Mattie tried again. "You'd have been proud of me, Dad."

"Proud!" He spat the words. "Proud that my daughter is a filthy mutant!"

She stepped back, as though distance could make his words hurt less. "Daddy I..." She stopped. She was a mutant. That much was clear to her, she couldn't stop being one.

"You know half the football team are in the hospital because of you."

She looked up. "You heard?"

"Yeah I heard. When the Coach rang me up to tell me what my daughter had done."

"It was self defence! They were trying to kill me!"

He wasn't listening. "I know those boys, so do you. How could you do that to them Mattie?"

"I didn't..."

"I don't want to hear it." He cut her off. "Enough of your lies!" He glared at her. "Things are going to change around here, young lady."

"Dad..."

His tirade carried on over her words. "All these years I've love you and nursed you. This is how you repay me? I loved you Mattie."

"I love you Daddy." Mattie replied in a small voice. "Don't you still love me?"

He didn't answer her. "When I think of what we've been though together. For you to keep something like this from me."

"I didn't keep it from you. I only just found out. I didn't know." She ran forward and took hold of his arm, crouching on the floor and looking up at him. "I didn't know and I'm scared and I'm confused. I need you Daddy."

He shook his arm out of her grasp. "What would your mother say?" He looked down at her with beer deadened eyes. "What would she think?" A sudden thought flashed though his eyes. "Did you kill her?"

Mattie drew back with shock.

"That's why she's not here anymore! Because of you and your filthy mutant blood!" He stood up suddenly, towering over her and his voiced raised in anger. "You disgusting piece of shit! Your own mother would rather face her death than be here with you!"

Mattie fell back, then scrabbled to her feet. "No Daddy! Please! No!"

Her father was past reason. "Get out! Get out of my house you murderer!" He took hold of her arm and dragger her towards the door.

"No! Please no!"

He was immune to all her cries and tossed her out onto the street like garbage. Mattie got unsteadily to her feet. Curtains were twitching despite the late hour. Trying to summon up some sort of dignity, Mattie eyed her father. "I still love you Dad."

"Get out!" He roared.

"Fine." She gave him one last look before running down the street. She had no idea how fast she was going but it was fast enough to whip her tears away.

It was cold. It was dark, it was late and it was cold. The sports top and gym shorts had seemed like a good idea before. They were cool and wouldn't make her too hot during her race. Her race that now seemed like years ago. At the start of the day she had been preparing to race. Dad had made her an extra special breakfast, and he'd gone over techniques with her. Don't run too fast at the beginning. Build your speed for later. Keep an eye on the other girls. Try not to be distracted by the boys. She had grinned at the last comment. She and Dad had done a lot of work in order for her to go into this race. No one else knew about all the extra training that they had put in together. She was going to stun the Coach. Well she had done that at least!

She'd kissed Mom's photo for luck as she left. She'd wanted to wear her necklace, the one that had belonged to Mom. The one that she always wore. But she knew that it wasn't the best of ideas if she was running. Dad had put it in his pocket and promised to look after it for her. So she'd kissed the photo and whispered a silent prayer to Mom to be watching. Dad had given her a really tight, squeezey hug to apologise for that fact that he had to work and couldn't be there to watch her.

Mattie shivered, as much with cold as the memory of how different this morning had been. How could her life have changed so much in such a short space of time? What was she meant to do now? Hide away? Fight crime? Commit crimes? Start fights? She'd never paid that much attention to talk of mutants on the news. Why would she? She didn't know any and had no notion that she would ever meet one. The thought that she might be one herself had never even crossed her mind. She was a freak. Someone different to everybody else. Something inside her had changed and there was no way to change it back. How she wished she could. But she did know enough to know that there was no cure for being a mutant. There couldn't be. If there was then all the mutants would have changed back to human. No one could possibly want to be this way. She moved slowly along the dark road, kicking at anything that crossed her path. She was doomed to this forever. She knew it, and yet she couldn't accept it. Like knowing that you've cut your hair, but still getting a shock every time you look in the mirror. She'd changed, but she couldn't get it into her head that she had changed.

There was the sound of inrushing air and the figure from before dropped in front of you.

"Finally. We found you." He sighed with a broad German accent. "We have been looking for you everywhere." His fringe flopped in front of his face as he studied her. "Are you alright?"

Mattie stood her ground. She had had enough of running from one situation to another. Everything she had done today had seemed to be at a run. She was not going to let some person who could appear out of thin air startle her.

"I'm fine." She told him. A not entirely accurate statement, but not a total lie either.

"A nice balance." Another voice interjected.

Mattie spun to find the red head from the ally way regarding her thoughtfully.

Mattie ignored that fact that she had no idea what she was talking about and moved onto the more pressing matters.

"You two are mutants? Right?"

"Ja." The boy replied grinning at her. Mattie gave them both the once over. So far there where no scales or huge orange spots. These two looked normal, if you forgave to boy for the fact that all of his clothes seemed to be a size to big for him. Baggy was a fashion but this was taking it to extremes! The red head, by comparison was dressed impeccably.

"Thank you." The girl offered Mattie her hand. "I'm Jean."

"Hi." Mattie shock her hand, there wasn't really anything else she could do.

"I'm Kurt." The boy told her. "You should really come with us now." He stepped forward and took hold of her arm.

"Oh no." Mattie pulled free. "I have had way too many people try to manhandle me today. I've had enough of it."

"But you need to come with us." He told her urgently. He took possession of her arm again and pulled.

"Hey!" Mattie swung at him. Before today she couldn't think of when she had last hit someone. Now that was all she seemed to do.

Kurt was more agile than Jeff and he ducked her swing. "Mine Gott! Is that how you thank all your rescuers?"

"Sorry." Mattie remembered the ally way. "I... Thank you. I don't know what I would have done if you hadn't come along."

Kurt stepped into a low bow, grinning from ear to ear. "No problem. Saving people is just how I like to run my day."

Mattie was forced to laugh. It sounded good; she'd almost forgotten that she could laugh.

"Come on." Jean said. "Kurt's right. We really do have to get going."

Did she want to go with these people? Mattie looked from Jean to Kurt and back again. They were mutants! On the other hand so was she. And they had saved her life.

"Where?" Mattie asked as she fell into step with the older girl.

"We have a house here." Jean told her.

"The Professor called in a favour." Kurt supplied.

"Who?"

"Professor Charles Xavier." Jean filled in. "He runs a school that Kurt and I are part of. He'll want to meet you." Jean flashed her a warm smile. "I think you'll like him."

"We're here." Kurt sing songed, opening the door to an apartment. Inside mainly consisted of a kitchen with a lounge area tacked on the end and two bedrooms.

"Mattie, you'll be with me." Jean said leading the way into the larger of the two rooms. "Do you snore?"

Mattie shrugged. "I don't think so." She jumped onto the bed. It was nice to be in a place where she could finally stop for a moment.

Jean pulled a t-shirt from her bag on her bed. "Here. Put this on. I'm going to cook up something. I'll call you when it's ready. Okay?"

Mattie nodded. "Okay." Changing into the shirt she snuggled into the bed. The day's events whirled around in her brain until she closed her eyes tight to shut them out. She was fast asleep when Jean came back in a few moments later to check on her.

Mattie came awake with a jolt. She struggled to control her breathing. Her heart was hammering in her chest. She couldn't remember what she had been dreaming about. Just the feeling that went with it. The feeling of total, uncontrollable fear. Slowly she stopped shaking and her breathing slowed to normal. She sat up in bed. Sleep was out of the question, she did not want to go back into that dream. She slid out from the covers and padded across the room. In the doorway she paused briefly to check on Jean, she was still asleep, breathing deeply.

"I'm glad someone can sleep." She mumbled heading into the kitchen, she'd missed lunch and dinner and she was starved.

The kitchen was already being raided. A furry creature, naked except for a pair of boxer shorts, was rummaging around in the fridge muttering under his breath. He held a spoon in his tail, which he was twirling as he muttered.

"Hey!"

The figure whirled as he heard her exclamation, the spoon dropping to the floor. White fangs glinted brilliantly against the dark indigo of his fur.

Mattie stared at him in horror. But before she had time to cry out the figure was calling out to her.

"No no. It's okay, it's me." He stabbed frantically at his watch. "Don't be scared." There was a flicker and the figure in front of her shimmered and changed into the shape of Kurt.

"It's me see."

Where there had been a furry monster there was now Kurt. Except that instead of a furry monster wearing just boxer shorts there was now Kurt wearing just boxer shorts.

"Erm..." She could feel herself starting to blush.

"Are you alright?"

"Kurt?"

"Ja?"

Mattie swallowed, not sure how to mention his lack of clothing. "Erm..." Okay so she was just wearing the t-shirt Jean had given her and her gym shorts. But that was more than Kurt had on.

Something in the way that she was behaving must have gotten though to him, as he glanced down, cursed and grabbed his sweatshirt off the back of the chair.

"Sorry."

Mattie felt her blush deepen. She cast around desperately for something to talk about. Somehow she felt that pointing out to Kurt that he was all blue and furry was a little redundant.

"I'm sorry if I scared you." Kurt said, he looked miserable at the thought.

"No, it was just a shock, that's all."

He nodded. "I know I look shocking."

Mattie thought this was going a bit far. Okay so he was different, but he still had the same number of arms, legs and eyes. And, okay so there was a tail. But as scary creatures went, he wasn't half as scary as Carl Thompson had been with that knife.

"You don't have to have that thing turned on." She said after a while. "I mean if you want to be blue then, that's okay."

"It doesn't bother you?" Kurt asked, lifting his eyes to meet hers.

Mattie shook her head.

Kurt pressed a button on his watch and his shimmered back to blue. "It's an image inducer." He explained. "The Professor gave it to me."

Mattie nodded again. It made sense, the Professor was clearly smart. "So is there anything to eat? I'm starving!"

Kurt nodded. "Me to." He shrugged. "Come have a look, take anything you fancy."

Mattie helped herself to the leftovers of dinner, and then pulled out a tub of Ben and Jerry's fish food ice cream. She joined Kurt on the sofa.

"So this school of the Professors? What's it like?"

"The Institute?" Kurt leaned back and looked thoughtful. "It's crazy. It's a home for mutants. Where we learn to train and how to use our powers. We all live together, like family. So, like families, we drive each other mad." He grinned. "In a good way."

"So, if I came with you. I'd learn how to control this super speed thing?"

Kurt nodded. "The Professor is a very good teacher, and then there is Logan, Ororo and Mr McCoy. They teach us too."

Mattie sat for a while, digging at the ice cream. "I can't wait to get away from school. It is not going to be pretty there."

"We still go to school." Kurt told her. "Some of the people there know that we are mutants. Some people there are other mutants who don't live with us. Some are nice humans, some are not so nice." He gave a shrug. "I guess high school is pretty much the same wherever you go."

"I bet at your school they don't try to murder you in ally ways." Mattie muttered. She tried to sound casual, but she could feel the pin pricks of tears in her eyes.

"They were just bullies who didn't know what they were doing."

"That doesn't make it okay!" She snapped angrily. "Sorry. I didn't mean to snap at you."

Kurt nodded sympathetically. "I don't mind. We all blow off steam now and then."

"It's just not fair! I never asked for this. Most of them had never even spoken to me until today. And the first time they do, it's because they want to tell me that them murdering me is the best thing that can happen to me."

Kurt said nothing, letting her get it out of her system.

"And then... And then..." The tears that had been threatening spilled over. "And then my dad..."

Kurt moved over to her side and put his arm around her. Mattie buried her head in his shoulder. Hot tears running down her cheek and dripping onto his sweatshirt.

"He said... He said... Oh God!" Her small frame was rock with tears as she drew breath after heaving breath. Kurt held her until she had cried herself out. He whished that there had been someone to do this for him. But then he had had to toughen up on his own.

Finally Mattie got herself under control. She pulled back from Kurt and gave his a crooked smile. "Sorry."

Kurt shrugged. "Do you want to talk about it?"

Mattie hiccupped and scrubbed at her red rimmed eyes. "I guess."

Kurt waited, patting her hand encouragingly.

"My dad was really angry." Mattie told him, he voice she noticed was only shaking slightly. "He'd been drinking, and... Well he said a lot of things. But he said that I had..." She drew in a breath and forced herself to say it. "He said that I murdered Mom."

Kurt stiffened. Then he motioned for her to go on.

"Mom died when I was born. Some complication with the birth. I don't know. Dad always tells me about her. What she would say about whatever is going on in my life. So I feel like I know her. I was a baby. I couldn't have hurt her. Could I? Oh God what if it's true? Could I have hurt her? Was it me? Did I do it?"

"No." Kurt reassured her. "It wasn't you."

"But what if it was? What if I did it by being... this... a mutant? What if I killed her?!" Mattie's voice had risen to wail.

"Shhhhhh." Kurt soothed her. "It's alright. It's okay."

Mattie sagged against the sofa, exhausted from letting out all her emotions and fears.

"Ready to sleep now?" Kurt asked.

Mattie nodded, she felt like she could hardly stand. She got up and made her way to her room. She got into bed and closed her eyes. Instantly the fear was back. The unnamed nightmare lurked at the edge of her consciousness, waiting, just waiting for her to fall asleep and back into its clutches. She got back out of bed and made her way out into the kitchen again. She paused in the doorway of Kurt's room.

"Kurt?"

"Ja?"

"I'm afraid to go to sleep." She knew that she sounded like a small child. As a child she had been convinced that there was a really scary monster living under her bed. He would wait until her dad had left he room before he would move. Then she would hear him creeping around. She'd listen and listen until she could stand it no more and had screamed for Dad. Only the monster always hid just before her dad got there. The nightmare was stalking her like the monster. She needed someone to make it go away. And in the absence of Dad, Kurt would do.

"Hang on." Kurt came out of his room pulled open the curtains in the kitchen to let in the pink light of dawn.

Mattie sat on the sofa and Kurt sat down next to her. She shivered and he pulled her into a hug. "Why can't you sleep?"

"I had a nightmare. That's why I woke up. I don't want to go back there. It's waiting for me."

If Kurt found this comment silly he made no sign of it. Instead he sighed deeply stretched out of the sofa and placed her head on his chest. Mattie reminded him of a little kitten. Small and frightened.

"I could tell you a story if you like?"

"Yes please."

He stroked her hair and started to tell her about when he had arrived at the Institute and the adventures that he and the other X-Men had gotten into. Mattie sighed contentedly; he heard her breathing become more regular as she slowly fell asleep. He wasn't sure if she was fully asleep or just dozing so he kept talking. He dropped off to sleep in the middle of the time that he had met Forge.

When Jean awoke she noticed that Mattie wasn't in bed. A quick psychic scan of the apartment told her that Mattie hadn't left during the night. Maybe she was having breakfast. Jean got up, pulled on a dressing gown and made her way into the kitchen. She stopped short at the sight of Kurt and Mattie asleep together, curled up on the sofa. She raised an eyebrow, what would Amanda say? As quietly as she could she made herself a coffee and then went to phone the Professor.

It was a few hours later before Kurt started to stir.

Morning

Kurt looked up sharply. Jean was sitting on one of the tall bar stools leaning on the kitchen counter.

Morning. He replied slightly sheepishly.

Jean arched an eyebrow. She was looking impeccable as always, while he was lying on a sofa with a girl they had just met yesterday.

I...

Jean stared at him for a moment longer before he felt her laughing in his head. She couldn't keep the smile off her face.

Ladies man!

He grinned and shrugged. She needed to talk to someone.

Jean smiled again. She knew what a good listener Kurt was. We need to wake her up. The Professor would like us back. He's anxious to meet our new member.

Kurt gently shook Mattie. "Time to wake up."

Mattie grumbled something inaudible. "Five more minuets."

"Mattie." Kurt repeated, continuing to shake her.

She sighed. "Okay, alright, 'm up 'm up." She opened her eyes slowly, and then opened them wide as she took in where she was.

"Oh God! I'm sorry."

"Don't worry." Kurt told her stretching.

Mattie scrabbled up off the sofa and bit her lip in acute embarrassment.

"Coffee?" Jean asked.

"Please." Kurt pulled himself off the sofa and took the cup Jean handed him. He downed the contents, wincing as the hot liquid scorched his throat. "I'm going to hit the shower." And he disappeared with a puff of smoke.

Jean glanced at Mattie. "Coffee?"

Mattie didn't like coffee, but right now she would take anything she was offered. She nodded gratefully, sipping at the bitter coffee. She added three large spoonfuls of sugar.

"When you're ready to go we'll swing by your house and pick up some of your things. You father wants to see you before you leave."

A hunted look came into Mattie's eyes. "He won't want to see me." A sudden thought occurred to her. "Does he know where I am?"

Jean nodded. "The Professor called him this morning. He needed to make sure that your father would agree to you coming to live at the Institute."

"What did he say?" Mattie looked like she didn't really want to hear the answer to her question.

"Well, apart from accusing the Professor of being a kidnapper, he was fairly calm. Once the Professor explained that you were safe and that he would see you today. He's been up half the night looking for you apparently."

"Really?" Mattie's whole face lit up. "He wants to see me? He doesn't hate me?"

Jean shook her head with a smile. "I think that he was just caught by surprise."

"He's not the only one." Mattie said with a rueful grin. She polished off her coffee and grabbed one of the bagels. She had suddenly got her appetite back.

Mattie's father was standing waiting for them in the driveway when Jean pulled up. Mattie couldn't get out the car fast enough; she threw herself at her dad who infolded her in a huge hug.

"God! Mattie I was so worried about you kido!"

"Sorry Daddy." Mattie whispered hugging him tighter.

"No." He held her away from him so that he could see her face. "No I'm sorry. I should never have said all those awful things to you. They're not true, none of them. Your mother would be so mad at me."

Tears filled Mattie's eyes, but she blinked them back. "It's okay Dad."

"I'm so very sorry Mattie." He hugged her again, giving her a squeeze before letting her go. "So I guess we better get your things together."

Mattie slipped her hand in his as Jean and Kurt got out the car.

"Mr Drew." Jean extended a hand.

"So you'll be looking after my little girl?"

Jean nodded. "You spoke to Professor Xavier this morning."

Mr Drew nodded. "Yes I did. He seems like a decent bloke."

Kurt grinned. Mattie couldn't help trying to see though his image inducer. Now she knew what was there, she kept looking for it. Any hint of blue. There wasn't any.

"Do you mind me going, Daddy?"

Her dad turned to smile at her. "Not if it's what you want. And it's not to far away. I can always visit you."

Mattie nodded. "I think that it would be good for me to learn how to control what I can do." She gave his hand a squeeze then slipped into the house to pack her things.