Chapter #5: The Control Room

Sorry I haven't written in a while. Depression…

Thanks to my loyal reviewers; LanceisHot, Nightcrawler28, and bkrob227. As always, much appreciated.

The X-Jet

"So, like, where are we going?" asked Kitty.

"We are going to California," answered Logan, who was flying the jet.

"Yes! Finallee a partay!" yelled Kurt, doing the Cha Cha.

"No, we are on a mission," said Scott.

"And, we are not going to fool around," explained Jean.

"Aww, men," Kurt groaned.

"So, wah ah we goin to Californiah?" asked Rogue.

"There is a girl there who needs us," explained Scott.

"Some mutant hunters are trying to un-mutate her," continued Jean.

"And some human kid friends of hers are trying to save her. It could get messy," growled Logan.

"Like, what's the girl's power?" asked Kitty.

"Same power as Rogue here," Scott answered, putting his hand on Rogue's covered shoulder, "Taking powers, memories, you know, the works."

"Ah thought it whas rare to have the same powas as eachotha," said Rogue, shaking Scott's hand off her shoulder.

"She wasn't born destined to be a mutant," Jean explained, "The same people who are trying to reverse her mutation, mutated her at birth."

"Vith ze ray?" asked Kurt.

"Yeah," answered Logan, "But the bad part is, if that ray goes off when humans are in the room, it will change them into mutants."

"Oh, so what's tha gurl's name anahwah?" asked Rogue.

"Carrie," answered Logan, "Carrie Henderson."

The Broom Closet Under The School

"So now we are what!" screamed Sue, knocking over a broom, after Carrie explained the situation to them.

"You are mutants," answered Carrie softly, shuffling her feet.

"I can't believe this," Sue said to herself, "Jodi, why in the world did you make us come? Now, look at us, we are MUTANTS!" she screamed at me. I dropped Luke's hand, became invisible, and nibbled on my thumbnail, feeling sad. "Ouch," she said angrily, "You stepped on my foot, moron!" she elbowed Lewie in the stomach.

"Oops," said Lewie.

"Shut up a second, will ya Sue?" said Luke, "Do you want the mutant hunters to find us?"

Everyone went quiet. Someone was pacing outside the door on the metal floor of the ray room. I looked around, anxious for an escape. I looked up and saw an air vent with a grate over it. I grabbed Luke's hand again and nudged Carrie. When I got her attention, I pointed to the vent. After a quick nod at me, she squeezed her way to the back of the room to reach the vent.

"Hey Luke," Carrie whispered, "Do you by any chance have a screwdriver?"

"I sure do," Luke whispered back, rummaging around in his pocket. He found the screwdriver and handed it to Carrie.

"Thanks," she mouthed. Then she proceeded to unscrew the screws from the vent cover. Once they were removed, she gently took off the vent cover and motioned for us to follow her. Carrie climbed into the vent and started to crawl. Sal followed her. Lewie, Sue, and Chuck followed close behind. I let go of Luke's hand again as he climbed into the vent after Chuck. Now, invisible again, I put the vent cover back on and screwed in the screws. Left alone in the broom closet, I waited. When I could no longer hear the group crawling through the vent, I quietly opened the door of the closet, snuck out, and closed the door behind me.

Carrie and the rest of our group crawled along until they found another vent cover. Carrie unscrewed it, climbed out of the vent, and motioned for the rest of the group to do the same.

"It's about time you got here," I joked as the rest of them crawled out of the vent.

"How did you get here before us?" asked Carrie, looking around wondering where I was.

"That is the beauty of being invisible," I explained, taking Luke's hand once again, "I just walked out of the broom closet, up the stairs and into here, the control room," I motioned with my free hand.

"Very clever," grumbled Chuck as he brushed the vent dust off of his pants.

"Everybody get down!" cautioned Sal, "they are looking up into the window of the control room."

Once we were all down, I assigned us all tasks. "Carrie and Sal," I said, "Please try to find and read the manual about how to work this thing," I pointed to the complicated ray control board. They nodded and started looking. "Luke, please go examine that thing," I said pointing to the computer. He nodded and went to try and make sense of it. "Lewie, Sue, and Chuck, please try to find a map of this place," I pointed to a stack of papers that Carrie and Sal were also going through.

"And what are you gonna do?" Sue snapped at me.

"I'll keep watch," I said, "I am the only one who can stand by the window without being seen.

Once everyone was situated with his or her assorted tasks, I went to stand by the window to keep watch. I looked around the room. The window was large and rectangular, and could keep an eye over the entire ray room. A man and a woman were down there. The woman sat on the table and the man paced across the room. Under the window was the complicated ray control board. To the right of the window was the computer that Luke was busily messing with. On the left of the window was the vent that they all came through. The back of the room was filled with assorted papers, which the rest of the group was looking through. Carrie and Sal seemed to be talking softly to each other and Chuck was cussing as Sue told him what to do. Lewie was sitting on the floor looking confused.

I went over to see how Luke was doing with the computer.

"Jodi, where did Carrie leave the screwdriver?" he asked me.

"It's near the vent," I motioned. He put his fingers to his head and thought hard. The screwdriver lifted and floated over to him. He put out a hand and caught the screwdriver as he lost concentration over making it hover.

"Sweet," he said, putting it in his pocket. "So anyway, Jodi, why did you choose me?"

"What?" I asked confused.

"Why did you hold my hand? Was that necessary?" he asked.

"Oh that," I said, biting my thumb nail again, "Well, Sue has this thing with germs, Sal would have burnt me, Chuck would have frozen me, Carrie doesn't like being touched, and Lewie is just disgusting."

"Oh," he said, "But was that really necessary?"

I didn't answer and looked out the window once again.

In the mean time, Carrie and Sal were getting along fabulously. Just kidding. They were looking through the papers and every time Carrie finished with a pile Sal re-looked through it.

"Why are you doing that?" asked Carrie, throwing down the pile she was working on, "Don't you trust me?"

Sal gave her a look. Carrie sighed and picked up the pile of papers again. "They should be here by now," she said to herself.

"Who?" asked Sal.

"The x-men. They should be here by now," Carrie replied.

"There is no such thing as the x-men," said Sal, "They aren't real. The x-men are just a cartoon."

Carrie took of her glove and slapped Sal's face. "You might be a lazy a$$, self-centered, x-men hating jerk, but your opinion doesn't count because they are real," she said angrily, putting her glove back on.

"Nothing happened," said Sal, rubbing his cheek.

"Well, duh nothing happened," said Carrie angrily, "The ray made me normal when it made you into mutants."

"They're here!" I shouted, getting everyone's attention, "The x-men are here! They are in the ray room."

Who is behind this? Will anything ever be the same again? Find out in the next chapter.