Chapter 5

Rogue and I walked into our room and the first thing I saw was my bed. It looked soft and fluffy and was perfectly made.

"Hey," I said looking at Rogue, "my beds a mess."

She rolled her eyes at me. "I told Xavier that your bed was broken and that you had been sleeping on the floor and he said that he would get you a new one as soon as possible."

"Cool, he can fix the bed, so can he fix the snoring you do?"

She looked at me. "I snore?"

"Like a dying cow."

She laughed and went into the bathroom. I sat down on my new bed and started bopping up and down.

Rogue called from the bathroom, "Did you actually mean that you have nothing to live for? Are you gonna kill yourself or something?"

I got up from my bed, "If I killed myself how would I hear your retched snoring each night?"

"So that's a no?" She asked.

I sighed, "I'm not going anywhere."

"Good, because I'd miss you; only a little though."

I laughed. "I'm going for a snack."

"Promise me that you won't eat any ice cream?" She came out of the bathroom and watched as I opened the door.

I turned around and smiled, "What ever."

I shut the door and started walking down the hall.

"Hey."

I turned around and caught something but did not bother looking at it. I looked at John down the hall. I remembered that I was to make his life crap around me.

"It's the one Bobby bought for me, I copied it for you."

He turned and started walking away, I opened my mouth to say something but he beat me to it. "Oh, yeah," he turned and walked backwards. "Stop eating so much ice cream, even I don't eat that much."

He gave me a little wave and turned the corner. I looked at my hands. It was a copy of the CD that Bobby bought for him. I told my self to forget about being mean to him.

When I got to the kitchen there was only one person sitting by the counter. I remembered him, while switching form classes Rouge and Bobby said hi to him. Damn, the one time I need to remember a name is the one time I can't, oh well. I walked over to the fridge. He almost jumped out of his skin when I opened the door, he jumped up and claws shot out of his hands. I thought this would be a good time for some drama so I let go of the door and ran away. I heard him call after me a couple of times but I pretended not to hear him. I liked running, but not from a fight. If I am in a fight I make sure I finish it.

I started walking down the hall eventually because I could not hear him following me. I got inside and sat on my bed.

I looked at Rogue across from me. "I'm hungry."

She gave me a face, "You just got back from eating." She saw the CD John gave me in my hands, "What's that?"

"Nothing" I said getting up.

"Well it's obviously something, let me see it." She held out her hand.

I looked at her.

"Please?"

I held out my hand to her.

"The one with the CD in it." She said rolling her eyes.

"How do you know it's a CD?" I asked her.

She stared at me for a second, "Because you're holding a CD case."

I pretended to think out loud by accident. "Damn! She's smarter than I thought."

Rogue smiled.

"What?" I asked cautiously.

Suddenly the CD was ripped out of my hands, I turned around, Bobby had snuck up behind me.

"Give me back my CD."

"Make me." He said smiling playfully.

I concentrated on Bobby's finger tips and just as they caught fire slightly, John walked in with some salad. Bobby dropped the CD on the floor and started yelling.

"Oh cool! Dinner and a show!" John sat down on the floor grinning.

I quickly picked up the CD and ran out. I did not close the door but it slammed anyway, Bobby must be following me. I sharply turned the corner and sat down. I checked the case over for damage; good nothing.

John turned the corner. "You know I can't follow you very well if you're running down the hall and I have salad in my hand."

"I didn't know you'd be following me."

He kicked me lightly as a gesture to move over.

He held up two different bottles of dressing, "Italian or Balsamic?"

I realized he was talking to me. "Oh, well, I like Italian better."

He sat down the other dressing and poured some Italian dressing on top of the salad and pushed it over to me carefully.

"You brought the salad for me?" I asked looking at it. I have to say it did look awfully good.

"Bobby wanted me to make sure you had something other than ice cream."

I brought the salad closer and took a bite. Rogue and Bobby turned the corner.

"Why would you do that? You could have hurt him!" Rogue looked disgusted.

"I made it so I wouldn't." I put down my fork; I had a feeling this was going to take a while.

Bobby was next to speak. "Rogue for the last time, I wasn't screaming in pain or anything like that, I was laughing."

She looked at him then me. "If you knew you wouldn't hurt him then why did you run away so fast, you had nothing to worry about?"

"Yeah, I didn't have to worry about him, I had to worry about you, you looked like a hairy buffalo ready to trample me."

She took her glove off and walked towards me. John and Bobby grabbed her; I never knew they could move so fast.

She relaxed, "I'm sorry, come on Bobby, John are you coming?"

He looked at Rogue, "No, I'll stay here and make sure she eats all this salad."

"Suit your self."

Rogue and Bobby left down the hall.

I looked at John. "Does taking off her glove have something to do with her mutation?"

"She has the ability to borrow mutant's powers and basically kill people just by touching them, that's why she's always wearing the gloves."

I nodded.

We heard Bobby's voice echo down the hallway, "Rogue what's wrong?"

John and I got up and jogged down the hall. I stopped, Rouge was running at me. She pushed me down and grabbed my face, I could hear Bobby and John yelling and trying to pry her off me. My whole body felt numb and I could not breathe, I felt weaker by the second. Damn you girl it was just a joke.

"She lives, we thought we were gonna have to put ice cream under your nose or something retarded like that."

I heard Bobby laugh.

I am in the hospital. "Damn I hate hospitals."

"Well would you have liked it better if we had left you there in the hall with Rogue to die?" Bobby asked me.

John sighed, "It would have been a lot easier on the arms."

I turned my head and looked at him. "I'm not that heavy."

Both answered at the same time, Bobby said no, John said yes.

I looked back at John, "Woos."

"I am not a woos."

"Are too."

"Are not, Bobby was the one making the dying noises." He got up and started making faces and groaning.

I laughed a little, groaned then said, "I'm too tired to laugh, get out I'm going to sleep."

I closed my eyes. I really did feel tired, I was hungry too.

"John, you ate my salad." I kept my eyes closed.

He stopped and turned around. "How did you know that?"

I smiled still keeping my eyes closed. "Because, you just told me."

"You sneaky bitch."

I head Bobby laugh.

"Go away I'm asleep, oh and if you come back bring me some salad, but keep it away from John."

A couple of hours later when they let me out, I was still very tired. They told me to stay out of class for the rest of the day, and as you can imagine, I was perfectly fine with that.

I went straight to my room and fell asleep without getting undressed.

"Libby we're putting in a movie want to watch it?"

I opened my eyes; Bobby was looking down at me.

"What movie is it?"

"The Hill's Have Eyes."

"Ok."

I got up and we walked down to the living room. We all sat in the dim semi-darkness of the living room in front of the plasma screen television. All of the sudden I liked this school a lot more. John was on his hands and knees putting the movie in the DVD player.

He got up and saw me. "Have a good snooze?"

I half smiled. "Well, it wasn't on the floor so that made it a little better."

I looked around; there were three people I did not know.

A girl looked up, "Is this girl you told us about Bobby?"

"Yep, Libby, this is Jubilee, Pietro and Kitty."

I shook hands with everyone, well, kind of; I went to shake Kitty's hand and went right through it. I gave her a little smile instead.

I sat down on a couch on the far side of the room. Bobby sat down beside Kitty. Jubilee came in the room with popcorn; I did not even realize she left.

She handed each person their own bowl of ice cream and popcorn. "I didn't know who wanted what so I just gave each of you a little bit of both."

Jubilee handed me my bowl.

"That's fine with me." I said.

John sat down beside me and scooped my ice cream out of my bowl and into his.

"That was my ice cream." I said watching the space where it had once been.

"No more ice cream for a week." He said walking back to the DVD player.

The movie turned on and John stood up, "I'll get the lights."

Jubilee came out of the kitchen again with her own bowl and sat on the other side of Bobby. Pietro sat down beside me and looked up at me.

I looked over at everyone else, "Isn't he a little young to be watching this movie?"

Bobby looked at me, "We argued about that for about twenty minutes before I came and got you—"

"They decided that I was mature enough to watch." Pietro said giving me a toothy smile, I kind of lifted my top lip and moved to the other side of the couch a little, he moved closer and kept watching me with a smile.

The previews ended and the actor's names started coming up.

"We don't need to watch this do we?" Jubilee said, "Where's John? We'll get him to be the FF person."

At that moment John walked in from the kitchen with a mouth full of popcorn. We stared at him.

He swallowed, "What?"

He picked up the converter and sat on the floor be low my feet. We all waited while he fast forwarded past the names. When he played he set the remote on the floor beside him and leaned back on my legs.

"You're not too heavy." I said.

I could tell he was smiling, "Wait 'til you feel my full weight."

I closed my eyes and turned my head so I was facing Pietro, I opened my eyes; he gave me another toothy smile. "The movies over there." I pointed to the plasma TV.

Jubilee moved over on the couch, "Pietro stop bugging Libby, come sit over here with me, Bobby and Kitty."

He leaned back on the sofa and crossed his arms, "But I wanna sit here."

John sat up and turned to him, "Go sit with them." He said standing up with his bowl.

"No, and what are you gonna do about it, set my hair on fire?"

15

"No," I said, "I will." So I did.

He immediately got up, I put out the fire. He looked at me, his smile was gone, and instead he had a competitive look on his face. It was my turn to give him a toothy smile. He walked over and sat in between Jubilee and Bobby and John sat beside me. Now was my chance to get my ice cream back. Damn he had already eaten it all. I put my spoon down.

He looked at me, "I knew you'd try for it."

"Just watch the movie." I said playfully.

When the movie was over it was about ten pm. Everyone went to bed. John Bobby and I all walked slowly in the direction of our rooms.

"Libby, when you get in your room, don't kill Rogue." Bobby said

"Yeah, only hurt her a little."

Bobby glared at John. "I'm just kidding, but personally I'd want revenge if it were me."

Bobby glanced at him. "Yeah well she's not you, you wouldn't do anything like that would you?"

I did not answer.

John looked at Bobby, "Ooo, she's not as nice as we thought she was. What do you do to people when they tick you off?"

I shrugged.

"What do you do to them?"

"Well, I kicked a teacher in the shins, and I almost gave the principal a nosebleed. That was the day before I left for here."

Bobby and John looked at each other.

Bobby was first to break the silence. "Well, to tell you the truth, I can kinda see you doing it, if you got angry enough."

John nodded.

"I was satisfied, I thought it was a job well done." I said proudly.

Bobby's face went all funny; I do not think he thought I would do anything like that un-purpose.

"How many times did you do stuff like that?" Bobby asked me.

"Well," I thought for a moment. "Actually I did it a couple of times a week I think."

I stopped in front of my room. "Well, see you later."

I walked inside and saw Rogue sitting on her bed. We watched each other for a moment before she said "I'm sorry."

I turned around to look at her, "Give me one good reason why I shouldn't try to kill you."

We stared at each other for another moment; my hands clenched into fists and caught fire. I threw the fire towards her; she lifted her hands in front of her face and screamed as her skin peeled. She screamed in pain

again and I thanked Xavier for putting me on the first floor as I jumped out the window. Since it was almost ten fifteen pm it was dark by now so I wouldn't be seen in my dark clothes. I had never really been outside so I had no idea where I was going. Eventually I ended up in a courtyard with a big fountain. Suddenly I found my thoughts on Magneto. I did not know how they got there but they did. I was thinking about his power and what he used it for. I thought it would be interesting to be around him. I knew he had another mutant with him called Mystique; she can take the form of any thing or one and mimic their voice perfectly. They were both using their mutations all the time; I wanted to be able to use my powers freely as well. I constantly wondered what it would be like to be around him, and what it would be like to be a part of one of his plans. I sat down in a corner where no one could see me if they came looking for me. Maybe they won't come looking for me, they know it is chilly outside and I do not have a jacket or food. Maybe they will wait for me to come back. Or maybe no one will ever think of me for hours after they are all back in bed. Maybe I won't give them the satisfaction of me coming back; maybe I will go find Magneto.

"Libby?"

Damn, who is it? John passed the corner without noticing me; well at least I knew it was a good hiding spot. I stood up and walked behind him for a while before going beside him. We stopped walking and we turned to face each other.

"So, you burned her hands huh?"

"Well, I was going for her face, but she moved just in time."

I walked over and sat on the fountain. John walked over and sat beside me. All my thoughts were still on Magneto.

"Can I ask what you're thinking about?"

I looked at him and debated on whether to tell him or not.

"If I tell you will you promise not to tell anyone else?"

He nodded his head.

"Before I came here the first mutants I had ever heard of was Magneto and Mystique. Ever since I've been thinking about them constantly, about their powers, what they do with them, the things they try to do with them. Before you came out here I was wondering what it would be like to work with them. He has a group of mutants that's always growing. I want to use my power without getting in trouble with anyone."

He looked at me.

I spoke again before he could. "If you didn't come, I would probably be on my way to finding him right now."

He looked as though he was thinking hard. "He is very interesting." He said without looking at me.

"John, you and Bobby are really the only friends I have here, if I left you guys would be the only ones that I would be leaving and no one would miss me. I'm considering the possibility of leaving."

He still did not look at me. "I've been thinking about him too, so if you do go, tell me first, we'll go together."