Tai looked around frantically, looking for something, anything, that would either hide his appearance or help fix his holo-inducer. He quickly glanced down at it and saw how hopeless a task fixing it would be. The indcuers screen was shattered and it was emitting faint whirs and clicks, it was obvious to Taipan that it was wrecked far beyond repair. Just then he saw the door handle start to turn and the door start to slowly open.
"Tai? Are you O.K in there?" it was Anna. Tai reacted quickly, hurling himself at the door, pushing it shut
"I'm fine Anna, I'll be out in a few minutesss" he said, slipping back into his normal speaking patterns, which he always did when he was nervous. He remained at the door, holding it shut, until he heard Anna walk away down the hall, back to her room. Tai breathed a sigh of relief before looking in the mirror again, he sat down on the edge of the bath and put his head in his hands, for once he'd actually been happy, Xaviers was the only place where he hadn't been hated or despised for what he was and now that he'd finally made a friend who wasn't a mutant, she was going to find out about him and it'd all be ruined.
Outside Kitty and Kurt were arguing over what to do
"He's getting through those watches faster than you go through willing passengers" Kurt said to Kitty, who punched him in the arm
"Get serious Kurt, what're we gonna do, we didn't bring a spare inducer and he can't stay in there all night" she snapped, her gaze flickering from the bathroom window, to Kurt, to his inducer, to her backpack, back to the inducer, then to the window again, Kurt realised what she was thinking
"Oh no, you're not giving him my inducer, the Professor said he'd start charging me for those if I broke another one" he said. Unfortunately his pleas fell on deaf ears as Kitty quickly snatched the indcuer off his wrist, phased her upper body through the bathroom wall to grab Tais broken one, phased back out and set to swapping the image matrixes around between the two inducers, then phased through the bathroom wall again and left the new inducer where she'd grabbed the broken one.
Tai finally got up and slithered over to the sink, deciding there wasn't any other option than to tell Anna the truth, wishing he could have had a few more weeks of pretending to be human as his eyes fell on the new inducer. If he had any knees, Tai would've dropped to them in thanks for the inducer, but since he didn't he quickly put it on and left the bathroom.
In his room Graydon was throwing a football up in the air, smiling, he'd hear his sisters screams any minute now when she saw Tais true appearence, then that freak would be out of their lives forever. He stood up and left his room, wanting a front row seat when the mutants secret was discovered.
"You O.K now?" Anna asked him as soon as he arrived back in her room
"Yeah, I've just got a upset stomach, it feels like its full of snakes" Tai replied, smiling silently to himself at the irony in what he'd just said. Just then the bedroom door opened and Mrs Creed stuck her head in.
"You two O.K in there?" she asked them
"We're fine mom" Anna replied
"Yes Mrs Creed, never better" Tai replied, looking over Mrs Creeds shoulder was Graydon, who had an expression on his face that was a combination of shock and rage. Tai smiled back in response, watching as Graydons place turned red, then bright hot white with rage as he turned and stalked back to his room.
The next few hours passed relatively uneventfully for Kitty and Kurt, who were getting bored in their tree.
"Why'd Creed put that mouse in the room?" Kitty asked Kurt, who shrugged
"Beats me, maybe he was hoping Tais predatory instincts would take over and he'd try and eat it or something" he replied
"Well it did kind of backfire when he just picked it up and gave it back" Kitty said, grinning
"Yeah, especially when his mom yelled at him for bringing the mouse in the house in the first place" Kurt replied, trying his best not to fall out of tree form laughing. It started tor ain and Kitty quickly put her raincoat on, Kurt didn't bother and the rain soaked his blue fur. Kitty then realised he hadn't activated his inducer since they'd been in school earlier.
"Hey Kurt, how come you haven't used your inducer all day?" she asked him
"Oh, I turned it off after we left school" he replied
"Why? Normally you leave it on all the time" she asked
"It saves the battery, its kind of low on power right now, I forgot to recharge it yesterday…" he trailed off as they both realised what that would mean, they scrambled for the bathroom window but they were too late. They were so busy that neither of the mutants noticed a familiar figure hop through the rain towards the house.
Just at that moment Tai was turning around to face Anna, having just noticed the rain start to come down. Then the inducer flickered and died, the final power reserves exhausted. He caught a glimpse of his reflection in the window and quickly spun back around, pulling the hoodie he was wearing up to try and hide his face, which didn't really help, much.
"Tai, is something wrong?" Anna asked behind him. Tai sighed and realised that now, he'd finally have to tell her the truth. He opened his mouth to speak when he felt something small fly through the open window and land on the windowsill in front of him. He looked down and saw it was an extra power cell for the inducer. He quickly grabbed and swapped it with the dead one in the inducer, amazed at how he'd been saved twice in one day but too happy to care.
"Nothing's wrong Anna, I was just looking a the rain, it's raining as bad as it use dot back in the Phillipines" he said, walking back over to help her with the last few questions.
Outside Kitty and Kurt noticed someone leap form the tree near Annas bedroom and hop away across the lawn, they both sprang into action with Kurt teleporting out of the tree and Kitty phasing down through the branches. Kurt re-appeared right next to the mysterious person and grabbed them by their shirt collar.
"Hey let go ya blue elf" the person replied in protest. Kurt hauled them to their feet and realised who it was
"What're you doing here Toad?" he snapped, the Brotherhood member pulled his collar free of Kurts grip before replying
"I overheard you and Summers talking back at the Institute" he replied
"You're spying on us!" Kitty hissed, keeping her voice down, not wanting anyone to notice three mutants arguing on their front lawn
"Hey orders are orders, but I know what it's like to be judged by your appearance y'know? So I decided to come give you guys a hand, and give the snake boy a chance" he replied, remembering what had happened when he'd tried to steal Kurts inducer during his date.
"Wow, looks you've got a heart after all" Kitty said
"Yeah well this was a one time thing so don't expect me to go easy on you X-losers if we meet again" Toad said, turning and hopping away into the darkness.
A little further down the street Wanda watched Toad leave, she smiled to herself, it seemed there was hope for the repulsive mutant yet.
Kitty and Kurt quickly retreated back tot heir tree as they heard the front door open, Tai waved goodbye to Anna and left the house, heading to where Scott was waiting to take him back to the Institute. Before he drove away he glanced up at Kitty and Kurt in their tree and nodded, they waved back, showing their plan had been a success.
Back at the Institute Tai returned to his room and fell down onto his bed. Just seconds after Kurt had teleported back into the room.
"So how'd it go?" he asked
"It went great, no problemssss" Tai replied, to which Kurt fell from where he'd been hanging up on the lampshade.
In the next chapter – When Doug Ramsey discovers he's a mutant can Rahne and Kitty work together to save him from the plans of Graydon Creed?
To be continued, please review