Disclaimer: Marvel's. Eh. Not mine.


The Professor called them all into a meeting shortly thereafter. Scott was scrunched on the couch with Bobby, who was whining that he was missing his favorite television show. Beast was crouched on a chair facing the professor's desk, but he had turned it to encompass the whole room. Warren lounged against the wall, a grin on his face as he whispered to Jean. She flushed and smiled, punching him playfully in the arm. She had a lab coat on and looked as if she hadn't changed clothes in two days.

Scott heard the hover chair in the hallway, and sat up, poking Bobby to get him to shut up. He did so with a sigh and crossed his arms over his chest. Warren opened the door for the Professor, who smiled at him, and took his time negotiating his chair behind his large desk. When he was settled, there was absolute silence in the room, and he sat with his hands steepled beneath his chin. He looked ill at ease, which completely shocked Scott. His eyes were deeply creased, his bald pate was shiny with sweat, and his smile looked more like a grimace.

His voice seemed overly loud in the small room, "As I'm sure you have heard already," he leveled his eyes at Warren and Hank. Hank looked guilty, but Warren just continued smirking, "we're getting a new student. Some of you may be familiar with her. Her situation is…extenuating, and fragile, to say the best. Her powers are out of control and are considered extremely dangerous. That said, I want none of you to judge her, or to make her feel like an outsider, considering that we are merely outsiders ourselves. She's at a very tender age with a significant problem. I have welcomed her here with open arms, and insist that you do the same." His blue eyes pierced them all as he looked around the room.

"Just spill it, Professor," Bobby said. "Scott can't control his powers and we don't ostracize him. One eye," Bobby said, playfully.

"This is serious, Robert."

"Uh oh, you know it is when he uses my full name," Scott couldn't help but grin, but the Professor's face remained impassive. Bobby straightened up, "Sorry, Professor."

"It's alright," he sighed, shuffling papers. "I understand you are anxious." His brow creased in contemplation as he slowly put the papers back in order. "It is Rogue. From the Brotherhood."

Hank choked on his water bottle, spitting it all over Scott and Bobby. Jean's jaw literally dropped, and she banged it closed with a loud click of her teeth.

"The soul sucker?" Bobby asked.

"No, Robert. Her powers are such that she 'borrows' parts of the psyche and the ability of mutant powers from her victims, rendering them unconscious, with just the mere touch of her skin." The Professor said, placidly.

"How awful," Jean said, sorrowfully, "not to be able to touch."

"Indeed it is. Now, she has come to us for help. And we shall treat her with respect and dignity, understood?" He lost the easy tone of his voice, and enforced his meaning with images of endless danger room practices. Scott heard Bobby swallow next to him.

"Yes sir," Scott said.

"Good." He cocked his head to the side, and smiled again, "I do believe she is here."


"Holy sh," Bobby looked at Hank quickly, "ingles."

"Nice," Scott laughed.

"Well, Bobbo, my sentiments exactly." Hank replied, with a quirky smile, cuffing the younger boy on his head.

The watched the girl get out of the limo. Her face was a frown, and she wore all black. Even gloves. Her face was made pale by layers of makeup, but her eyes and lips were rimmed with black. She looked at them, shook her head, and tried to get back into the car. Someone stopped her, forcing her out very much against her will.

"It ain't fair!" she screeched, and her voice could be heard echoing loudly. Warren came to the door, peering around them. He smothered a chuckle.

There was a heated whisper in reply, and then more screeching at the limo, before a few more bags where thrown, rather harshly, out at her. She barely avoided being hit by one and the limo peeled off. She stood in the middle of the driveway, back towards the X-men, in a pile of bags, looking all the world as if her dog had just died at her feet after saving her life.

Then she turned, and the image of dejected, heartbroken, innocent girl was replaced with sullen and angry.

"Well, are ya'll gonna be gentlemen an' get mah bags, or am ah just gonna have to carry them all?" She snarled.

"I think I'm in love," Bobby murmured, before running down the stairs to assist her.


"So Rogue, will you be graduating this year as well?" Jean asked, pleasantly, attempting a smile with macaroni halfway to her mouth, to break the tension. It was the first time the Professor had ever required a dinner, one he had catered by a very expensive restaurant. It was the worst experience of Scott's life. It just so happened he got wedged between Jean, a lefty who kept battling elbows with him, and Rogue, who kept stabbing her steak like she wanted to kill it, and eyeing him as if she were imagining it was really him.

"Only if Ashley continues doing my homework," she said, equally as pleasantly, in a falsely honeyed voice. She chewed her steak viciously and smiled rather meanly at the other redhead.

Jean choked and reached for a glass of water. Just at that moment, Scott was taking a bite of his salad, knocked Jean's arm, and she spilled her water all over his lap. Then she turned bright red, grabbed a napkin, and began blotting the crotch of his khakis (they were required to dress nice too, although Rogue wore black jeans, black shirt, black gloves, black scrunchie, for god's sake). This turned Scott a bright shade of red to match Jean, and then Jean realized what she was doing, made a choking, snort sound, and sat up.

Bobby was grinning like a fool. Hank was looking at his food and not looking anywhere else. Warren looked dumbfounded. The Professor was rubbing his temples and sighing. Rogue continued to saw at her food as if nothing odd were happening.

"Um. I'm gonna go," Scott said.

"Yes, Scott," the Professor said.

He fled the room, Bobby's grin, Rogue's scowl, and Jean's small, capable doctor's hands as if the hounds of hell were biting at his heels.


As Scott sat in his room, finishing up his art homework (how the teacher expected him to color anything was beyond him, but Hank usually helped with that), he heard a knock on his door. He put down the sketch and went to answer it.

Jean was standing there, eyes closed, mouthing something to herself. Her hair was pulled back but frizzed around her ears, her nose was marked red from her glasses, and her t-shirt was old, faded, and covered in paint splotches.

"Yeah?" Scott asked.

She jumped, banging her elbow on the door, and smiled at him nervously.

"We got off to a really bad start, can I come in?" she asked.

He quirked and eyebrow and stepped back. She walked in, and he noticed dully that she was probably his equal in height. She stood in the middle of his room, clasping and unclasping her hands, looking around.

It was devoid of personality, she thought. All the furniture was the same as in her room, just arranged so that the desk was shoved underneath the window and you had to shimmy around the bookshelf to get to the closet. Clothes were strewn about, haphazardly, but the only other thing around was balled up pieces of paper. Even the rug was standard issue Xavier, only blue instead of red.

"Um, sorry, I was just doing some homework," he said, hurrying around her and grabbing the paper on the bed. He was flushed, and he hid it behind his back, moving awkwardly to the desk without turning around, and stubbing his toe on something. He yelped and cursed, then smiled and opened a drawer and shoved the paper in. He didn't have a shirt on again, she noticed belatedly.

"May I see?" she asked, curiosity piqued. Why did they act like fools around each other.

"Um." Then he opened the drawer rather viciously and held it out to her.

She took the heavy drawing paper and almost dropped it. She couldn't believe what he had drawn. She hadn't thought his blunt hands, or uniform plainness, or lack of humor would allow him to create something so beautiful. It was she, complete with angel wings, bent over a microscope. The title was Modern Day Angel. She was wearing a lab coat, her glasses, but she had this look on her face, this small, secret smile, that made her seem incredibly...sexy. Did he really see her like that?

"Oh Scott," she said, and sat down heavily on his bed. "When did you…?"

"Um…when you were working one day I sat outside and sketched you. I hope you don't mind, the idea just came to me, we were talking about religion, and I thought it would be a nice play on angels, and you know I,"

"It's beautiful," she said, cutting off his ranting. He stopped, and his face was hard and straight.

"Do you want to be an artist?" she asked.

He laughed. "A pilot."

"Mile high club, eh?" she couldn't believe she said that. He couldn't believe she said that. They stared at each other with equally astonished expressions.

"Um, I just meant that heights must give you pleasure. I mean-oh my god." She clamped her mouth shut, shook her head and asked with her eyes still closed, "Can you please put on a shirt? I can't think with you like that," she waved at him, squeezing her eyes even tighter.

She heard rustling around and peeked at him, just as the shirt went over his head. She got a good view of his chest. And the way the muscles bunched and stretched as he moved. And the small line of hair that went from his belly button and disappeared into his pants…

"There, better?"

"Thank you," she said. "I know I should be clinically detached, but you do have such a nice chest." Where the hell was her damn turn-off button?

"So do you. I mean! Jesus Christ!" Scott blushed furiously and turned around to look out his window.

"Um, I'll let you get back to drawing." She said hurriedly, standing up quickly.

"Yeah, I'm sure you have hands on things to do." Scott clamped his mouth shut at the image that produced, of Jean at the dinner table, and her napkins, and that crinkle in her forehead as she worked so intently.

"Yeah. Um, goodnight!" she said, and scurried out of there. When she was gone Scott let out a breath. In the hall, Jean leaned her forehead against the wall and banged loudly.