Authors Note: Thank you to the reviewers. I kinda lied when I said this would be on hiatus, but it's 1.03am and I'm a lil bit inebriated XD

Independent Fire: The anonymous feature has now been enabled. Thank you, I didn't know I could do that. :D

Mrs. Allerdyce: HAHA I wish! I have one novel I'm currently working on which is a completely original idea, but the chances of me ever getting published are slim. This is all for fun. All my first-year exams are within two weeks of each other, so I shall try to get this finished after then.

The Xavier Institute, New York.

The next day.

Marc's alarm went off at seven, and he swiped at it sleepily before he realised it wasn't in its usual place. Sighing, he located it and gave it a telepathic thump to turn it off. He was just about to roll over and go back to sleep when he realised that he wasn't at the embassy. He bolted upright in bed. Taking in the surroundings, he recalled the events of the previous day, and chuckled to himself.

Throwing off the duvet, he made his way to the ensuite bathroom and took a quick shower. As he brushed his hair, he thought of what John would say when he found Marc already at the Institute. Grinning to himself, he quickly pulled on a pair of three-quarter length cargo shorts and a long sleeved hockey top and made his casual way to the kitchen. The aroma of frying bacon and fresh toast made his mouth water.

Entering the kitchen, he saw the two women and Professor Xavier preparing breakfast and discussing the imminent arrival of John. He stood uncertainly in the doorway, not wanting to interrupt.

No fear of that, Marc, said the professor. With two telepaths, we couldn't miss you. His mental tone was warm. Marc stepped forward.

"Is there anything I can do to help?" he asked.

"Could you lay the table for breakfast?" asked Jean.

"Sure thing, Miss Grey," he said. "How many people are there who have breakfast?"

"Well, there's twenty-three students who attend here, and the four of us, plus Scott," she replied. "Twenty-eight places."

"No problem," he said, and began levitating placemats, crockery and cutlery from their cupboards and drawers and laying them according to what he had been taught by his parents. When Jean turned back a minute later to check and see how he was doing, she found the table laid impeccably. She whistled.

"That was fast," she complimented him. He smiled. "Juice and milk are in the fridges, and the jugs are in the cupboard to your left. After that, it's just the cereal, and I think-" she paused, her head cocked to one side "-Yeah, the rest of the school's awake."

Then Marc felt it, the distant rumble getting nearer and nearer to the kitchen. The door banged open, and a steady stream of teenagers flowed through the door towards the table. Marc had to flatten himself against the wall as the stampede passed him. There appeared to be far too many people for the table, and there seemed to be about five or six clones of the same kid. Reaching out mentally, he found their thoughts were all identical.

"Uh, Miss Grey, there's definitely more than twenty-three here," he said cautiously.

She didn't even turn round. "Jamie, pull yourselves together. If you want five portions, you can cook them yourself. "

The five clones all merged into one small body, and Marc estimated the kid to be eleven or twelve. There were suddenly three seats left over. Marc smiled to himself. Helping Jean to lift the platters of bacon, eggs and toast to the table, he slid into his place next to the boy called Jamie, and began helping himself. The flow of conversation soon settled into an easy babble.

"You're the new kid, aren't you?" asked Jamie, reaching for the toast. It was slightly out of his reach, and Marc 'lifted' the plate nearer him. "Thanks," said Jamie, taking two slices. "I'm Jamie, or Multiple."

Marc returned the plate to the table after snagging two slices for himself. He replied as he started buttering them. "Yeah, I arrived last night. I have a friend who'll be arriving later on today. Does everyone here have an alternative nickname?"

"I think so. We have training exercises, and they're easier to remember, especially if there are more than one person with the same name on the same team. I saw you talking to Iceman and Colossus last night, so you know them. The girl over there at the end is called Kitty Pryde, and she can phase through solid objects. She's also called Shadowcat. The girl next to her is called Jubilee, which is short for Jubilation Lee. She can shoot fireworks from her hands." He went on to identify everyone around the table, including their powers, and Marc filed it all away. His memory was incredibly good, close to photographic. He had no problem memorising names and faces.

Jamie suddenly turned to him. "What's your name?" he asked.

Marc looked confused. "Marc Duchaine," he replied.

"Not your real name, your mutant name," said Jamie, looking at his expectantly.At the continues blank look Jamie sighed. "And everyone says older people are smarter. You need something that sums up your abilities and is easy to pronounce."

Marc was at a total loss. What could he call himself that didn't sound too pretentious?

I have a suggestion, thought Jean. What about Shift?

But that's only half my powers, he responded.

It doesn't have to sum up everything about you, just your major power. And while I have no doubt that you're better at telepathy than shapeshifting, it'll have to be the visible part.

I'm not too sure about Shift, though. Wasn't that the name of the evil ape in The Chronicles of Narnia?

Jean mentally applauded. Ah, someone who's actually read them! I never thought I'd see the day!

Marc smiled to himself, and said to Jamie, "You'll need to give me a couple of days to find something really fitting, then I'll let you know."

In the meantime, I want you to go to Washingotn to pick up John Allerdyce. Please ask Ororo to set up the pilot program on the Blackbird for you, said the Professor. I'm sure you can pick it up with no problems.

"The Professor wants to know if you can set up the pilot program on the Blackbird," he said, unsure whether this was some kind of code. He began lifting dishes to the kitchen, where Ororo started putting them in the dishwasher as the students finished their breakfast. They finished putting the dishes away when Jean walked into the kitchen, looking expectantly at the pair of them.

"So, Jean and I are taking you to Washington, are we?" she asked. She walked out of the kitchen, Marc following her.

"I assume so," he said. She led the way to a new corridor that Marc hadn't seen before. Stopping at a blank section of wall, she touched a switch. Marc didn't see anything-

-and then an entire section of the dark wood panelling slid to the side, to reveal a brightly-lit elevator.

Stepping inside, Marc whistled. They had gone from the elegant opulence of the mansion to the sleek utilitarian elevator. Marc guessed correctly that the elevator would take them to the Blackbird. The section of panelling slid back into place, and the elevator started moving. Marc's stomach told him it was downwards.

The elevator smoothly stopped, and without a sound, the door slid back. From what Marc could see, it was a well-lit locker room with suits and jackets made of leather, reinforced with Kevlar. "What is this place?" he asked, looking around eagerly.

"This is the staging area for X-Men missions. In these lockers are our uniforms, and any accessories that we might need. Cyclops, for instance, has a few spare visors that he replaces his glasses with. They can also adjust the intensity of his optic blasts. But that's neither here nor there." She reached into a nearby locker and pulled out a black hooded sweatshirt with the same stylized X's he'd seen yesterday afternoon. Pulling it on and zipping it up, he turned to Storm. She tilted her head to one side. "It'll do for the moment," she said, then turned on her heel and walked to the door at the other end of the locker room. Pulling it open, she advanced into the cavernous black space, and said, "Lights on."

With barely so much as a flicker, six high-intensity halogen floodlights turned on, and Marc gasped. Resting on the smooth poured concrete floor was a jet. Not just any jet, but an extensively modified Lockheed SR-71 Blackbird high-speed reconnaissance jet. Two ramjet engines sat at the rear, hidden behind the graceful lines of the prominent dorsal stabilisers, and the more restrained ventral stabilisers. It rested on three legs, and from the lack of wheels Marc guessed that it was VTOL capable – Vertical Take-Off/Landing. A long stairway ran up to the jet's cockpit under the belly, facing forward, and lights embedded in the steps ignited just a second behind the main hangar floodlights. Marc stared in awe at the jet, as Jean came through the door behind him and nearly ran into him. She grinned at his expression. "Beautiful, isn't she?"

Marc was speechless. And the Professor wants me to learn how to fly her?

Oh, yes. It's not that easy, but it won't take you too long to get the basic hang of the controls. She shifted back to verbal speech. "The Professor's going to keep all the kids occupied while we leave, Storm," she said. Moving smoothly past Marc, they entered the jet. Marc followed them.

Inside the cockpit, Jean was strapping herself into the pilot's seat, while Storm secured herself to the navigator's chair. These seats had also been modified, making them extremely comfortable. Storm pointed at a chair near a screen and Marc obediently sat down, securing the four-point harness. Resting his arms on the sides, he gave the cabin a long, slow look.

There were eight main chairs in the cockpit, with jump seats for another ten next to the hatchway. The pilot, navigator and three other people on each side all had a considerable amount of leg and elbow room, and each one swivelled, like an office chair. Jean pulled a headset down from an overhead rack and put it on. Storm and Marc followed suit.

There was a slight crackle of electronics, then Jean's voice came over the earphones. "You OK there?"

"Never better," said Marc, his excitement building.

"Good. Hangar doors opening," said Jean. Marc peered out through the viewport. Nothing had changed. Then it hit him. "Vertical take-off and landing," he said.

"Very good," said Storm approvingly. She punched in a long series of keys. "If you look at that screen, you can see a view of the pilot's screen. Familiarise yourself with this, and then we'll go from there." She turned back to her own screen. "Vertical thrusters reporting one hundred percent output."

"Here we go," said Jean, pulling back on a lever. The Jet rose smoothly into the air, the thrusters roaring to lift it off the ground. Rising up through the hangar, sunlight suddenly streamed into the viewports, and Marc caught sight of the mansion. Mentally orienting himself, he realised where the hangar was, and barked a laugh. "The basketball court?"

"Exactly," said Jean with a smug smile. "The Professor's suddenly remembered something that requires everyone to be in the mansion in his office, which is soundproof, and faces the other side of the grounds. We're perfectly safe."

Two hundred miles above New York, an orbiting Lacrosse satellite was just passing over New York City on a course that would take it further up the East Coast and over the North Pole. Its onboard trackers registered the sudden appearance of a warplane, and the cameras began taking photos.

One of these photos was pulled from the National Reconnaissance Office computers by a hacker, legally operating out of a supposedly defunct military base in Alaska.

It was the Department of Defence base tasked with understanding mutants. It had a log name, classified to all but a few people in Washington. It also went under the name of Alkali Lake.

The man took the photo to the base commander, a short, burly firebrand of a man named Colonel William Stryker. He examined the photo at length.

"I know that place," he muttered to himself. "Xavier's."